Winton Old Timers -- September 29

The Winton Old Timers Reunion is right around the corner. The committee will have one last meeting to finalize the many details.
It's always the last Sunday in September. Please put this on your calendar and try to attend. No reservations are taken, pay for your meal ticket at the door.
I know of one cousin who will be there from Canada and who knows who else will show up? We never know who will surprise us with their presence.
Most of the people come early; arriving at 10:00 a.m. to have more time to visit with friends and relatives they haven't seen in a long time. Others come after church services. Coffee and snacks will be available before lunch is served at 1:00 p.m.
Pictures of the Old Timers from prior years will be shown on the overhead screen. My cousin Norm will be there again to take pictures of this year's attendees.
Members from the Winton Historical Society will be at a table to take your dues for the October 1, 2013 thru Sept 30, 2014 time period. Dues are $10.00 per year which includes 6 newsletters mailed out every other month. It includes historical facts; stories from people who live in Winton or used to live here. The stories are from the past years of the Winton you used to know.
Back issues of the past year Winton Hometown News will be available for $1.00 each. Older copies will be free. Not all are still available, but for $5.00 you can have all 44 issues of the newsletter on CD in the PDF format. This is very handy because you can do a name or word search with the free Adobe Acrobat Reader which can be downloaded from the Internet if you don't already have it.
Do you need a copy of the Winton Centennial Recipe Book? Available for $15.00. Souvenior mugs with a picture of the Winton Depot are now only $4.00 each.
Rosalie and I decided to sell the rest of the "Memories of Winton 1911-1950" history books for $25.00 each. Original price was $35.00, so here's your chance to buy extra books as gifts for children, grandchildren or friends. Christmas will be here in a few short months.

Winton Cemetery at Find A Grave

There are quite a few memorials set up at Find A Grave created by different contributors. At first I thought that Find A Grave was too cumbersome and hard to find the names you're looking for. I finally learned my way around the website a little better. When looking for a particular cemetery in Merced County, here is the link to use:

Or if looking for someone buried at the Winton Cemetery I like this link. I just type in the surname and see what all comes up.

Sometimes the memorials are connected to other family members whether buried in the same cemetery or not. On my mother's side the links go from Winton to Kansas and on my dad's from Winton to Willows, CA. It's interesting to see what is out there.

If you want to create a memorial or let a contributor know of a mistake or additional information, you must first sign up with Find A Grave. If wanting to create a memorial, you must check to be sure there is not already one there for that person. They don't like duplicates and they don't want memorials set up for people who are still alive. I've seen that just so they could connect them to the in-law family.

After you are signed up and have a contributor name and number, if you see a memorial for your direct line, i.e. parents, grandparents, great-grandparents or siblings, you can request a transfer to you from the one who is managing it. Assuming you are closer related to that person than the "manager" is.
They must transfer within 30 days if you are closer related than they are.
I put up a memorial for my husband 5 years ago and then did nothing else until just recently. I have been taking pictures of the tombstones at the Winton Cemetery and posted them to flickr under the name of Winton Historical Society. If you see a relative's tombstone picture there, you are welcome to use it. If you plan to use several at Find A Grave, please ask permission first. But if you are just using them for your own personal use, then you're welcome to use them.

Also, if I have created a memorial for a relative of yours and you want me to transfer it to you, don't hesitate to ask. You can leave a message at Find A Grave or here if you are just giving information and don't want to sign up.

Atwater Group at 42nd Street Play

On Sunday August 11, a group of us carpooled to Modesto to see the play, "42nd Street" at the Modesto Performing Arts building.
We had a special interest in this play because Theresa Berry who is our song leader in church had a prominate role in the play. She has an excellent Alto voice, so I thought she would be mostly singing. But no, she had a big acting part to play. Theresa was very good. We all enjoyed it immensely. We left right after church, stopped for lunch and got to Modesto in plenty time for the 2:00 p.m. show. Carole D and I had front row seats, right behind the orchastra pit. We didn't think it was too close at all. We loved it.
I heard that Theresa is going to be in a play in Merced soon, so I think a group from the Atwater Methodist Church will again carpool to see her perform.
Thanks to Junko for the picture. From the left, front row:
Erna, Carole, Lorraine, Dolly and Theresa. Second row: Pastor Gregory, Perry, Junko, Connie, Caryl and Juanita. Way in the back facing us is Bill.
It was great fun!!
Coming up in Modesto is "Babes In Toyland" beginning on November 30, two performances on Saturday and one matinee on Sunday December first. Good show for the upcoming holidays.

Sunday, August 4, 2013

The Atwater United Methodist Church got 5 new members today. Jack and Kathryn were two of them. Some of their family came to share in their special day. After the service we all went into the "Fireside Room" and had light refreshments and coffee.
I was invited to go with Jack and Kathryn and family to lunch at Josie's in Atwater. I had a flour Tostada, it was delicious as usual. When we were through with lunch, I took a picture of the ones in our party outside on the red bench.

Nice looking family. Not all were able to be there, but still a nice group.
I enjoyed the day. Thanks for the invite.

Eating Out

Yesterday I had lunch at Sizzlers in Merced with a group of ladies from the Methodist Church. Carole D's birthday was the event that inspired the luncheon.

The restaurant gave Carole a big Strawberry Sundae for her birthday treat. She ate the whole thing! Well, o.k., she gave the big strawberry to Maggie.

Today my sisters and I had lunch at the Jantz Cafe in Atwater. We arrived around 11:00 a.m. and just in time, it was already crowded, like every Wednesday. Every Wednesday is free pie day, you get a slice of pie, free of charge with your lunch. We saw our cousin Debbie there. She ran outside after us to take our picture, so I had her take one on my camera. It was 12:30, the sun was directly overhead, so there is much contrast.

I surprised Debbie by taking her picture. She always looks so nice!!!

Winton Cemetery

This is one of the roadways at the Winton District Cemetery. It looks so peaceful. I love the large old trees that are growing there.
I've been taking pictures of the tombstones there and uploading them to flickr.
So far there are 1,339 photos online. I am slowly adding more information to the pictures when the information is available to me. Some of the information comes from the California Death Records; it lists the people who died in California between 1940 and 1997.
Usually I have a little more information on the people with a Mennonite surname. That information sometimes comes from the "Grandma" file that the California Mennonite Historical Society has created and maintains. I have their latest CD with 1,250,285 individuals linked to their families. Some ancestors are traced back to the 1500s in Holland.
I also subscribe to their "Grandma" online, where they update the information since the latest CD.
The online file currently has 1,285,498 people who can trace their ancestors back to the Mennonite churches in Russia or Prussia. They don't include the birth dates for the living people online, but the dates are included on the CD.
They started something new last year. If you have pictures at flickr you can tag them with the identification number from the Grandma file. Each person has a unique ID number. Of course they want the OLD historical pictures. Or tombstone pictures. So I have tagged a few individuals with the tombstone picture from the Winton Cemetery at flickr. I just started, so only a few are tagged.
This is an ongoing project of taking more pictures, adding additional information and tagging some of them to the Grandma online file. Fun -- but slow.

Cherry Trees

This is the Rainier cherry tree. It's doing good, nice growth, good color.

And then there is Stella. For about a month now, it's been looking sick, the leaves are drooping and losing their green color. I didn't know what to do for it. Talked to an expert orchard man and I found out there is nothing I can do. Just replant. He said cherry trees are like that. Guess we were lucky with the cherry trees we had in Merced. Besides the Rainier, I have a Bing that is also doing good. They will pollinate each other. It will be sad to have to remove the Stella tree.

I ordered two new Iris plants this year, I should be getting them soon. They were the closest to red that I found. Need to find the perfect spot for them. My Irises are going dormant, not a pretty sight right now. I'm not going to separate them this year, decided to let them become large plants so they'll have more flowers next spring.