My Family Tree is Full of Nuts

I have this letter from my Aunt Maria Fitzpatrick Bannister answering some correspondence from a Mr. Bill Brown in Pensacola, FL

January 23, 1989

Dear Mr. Brown;

In answer to your letter we must be related ins one way. My mother Geneva Lilly was born in Athens, GA. Her daddy came from Ireland. I do not know his name (Edward Lilly and he married Sarah Ann Smith)  I do know he is buried in Athens, GA . He was a brick mason. I do not know his wife’s name. They had three children my mother Geneva Lilly, a daughter Zetta and a son Emmett Lilly.

The grandfather (Edward Lilly) built the first stone building in Athens, Ga ( Lumpkin House)  he also helped lay the train track from Atlanta, GA to Birmingham, AL

I am sorry I do not know more. Thanks for writing me maybe we will meet some day.

Maria Bannister

The ( ) is the information I know. Is it now sad you do not know your grandparents information. Please today sit down and write down everything you know beginning with you to leave for future generations of family researchers.

I found this clipping. I am not sure of the source. It could be a Family Weekly from long ago.

ALL IN THE FAMILY

Everybody comes from 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, 16 great-great-great-grandparents, etc.  Every generation back we go, we have twice as many lineal ancestors.

This is very much like the Persian Chessboard problem. If there are, say, 25 years to a generation, then 64 generations is 62×25=1600 years ago, or just before the fall of the Roman Empire. So, everyone of us alive today had in the year 400 some 18.5 quintillion ancestors or so it seems to say nothing about collateral relatives.

But this is far more than the population on the Earth, then or now. It is far more than the number of human beings who ever lived. Something is wrong with our calculation. What? We have assumed all those lineal ancestry to be different people. But this is not the case. The same distant ancestry is related to us by many different routes. We are repeatedly connected with our relatives. Every marriage bring cousins together.

If we go back far enough, any two people anywhere on Earth HAVE A COMMON ANCESTOR. Whenever a new American President is elected, someone generally in England dissevers that new President is a distant relative of the Queen of England. This announcement is intended, perhaps, to soothe any residual American longing for a king of our own. Of course, when two people derive from the same small corner of the world, and their genealogies are well-recorded, the last common ancestor can be discovered. But whether is can be discovered or not, a relationship is clear: WE ALL ARE COUSINS- all members of a vast world-girdling family.

SHOULD WE HAVE A REUNION??????

Eugenia Brown Taylor , wife of Cleve Taylor, died April 21, 2003 in Anniston, AL She was born 20 March 1915.

Former Athens Man Dies in City Of Atlanta  (typed as written)

Mr. Thoms Lilly, aged Sixty-Six Years, Passed Away Yesterday and Will be Buried Here.

The following is from the Atlanta Journal of last night:

Mr. Thomas Lilly age 66, died at the residence of his niece Mrs. J.C. Dennard, 1043 East Fair Street, early Wednesday morning. He is survived by his wife; one son Emmett Lilly, of Bostwick, GA and a daughter; Mr. A.G. Fitzpatrick of Bogart, GA . He also leaves one sister Mrs. G.W. Mabry and one brother Robert Lilly of Athens, GA. The body was taken to Athens, GA his old home and the funeral and burial will be there.

The remains will reach this city this morning on the 10 o’clock train nd will be met at the station but a number of friends, carried immediately to Oconee Cemetery, where the burial will take place.

Born  17 April 1845  Athens, Clarke County, Ga

Died 20 October 1910, Atlanta GA  Buried Oconee Cemetery, Athens, GA

I am looking for Myra Watkins that lived in Sandersville, GA  in 2000.. She was a Fitzpatrick researcher.

Myra contact me at SadieMaesAttic@aol.com    Thanks  Chris Wheeler

Mr. and Mrs. Lee Roy Fitzpatrick were killed November 7, 1970 Alligator Alley, Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Piedmont, Alabama

Services for Rufus Carlton Fitzpatrick, 87, of Piedmont, AL will be 6 p.m today at Piedmont Congregational Holiness Church of Hughes Street with Hayward Clark officiating. Graveside services will be 9 a.m. Friday at Goshen Cemetery with Thompson Funeral Home of Piedmont in charge. The family will receive friends 11 a.m. until service time at the church.

Mr. Fitzpatrick died Tuesday at Piedmont Health Care Center.

Survivors include two daughters, Sandra Ford and Ginger Blythe and her husband, Rick all of Piedmont; two sons and their wives, Ronald and Sue Fitzpatrick of Albuquerque, N.M.,and Carlton and Theresa Fitzpatrick of Brunswick,Ga; a brother-in-law and his wife J.D. and Eloise White of Piedmont; 10 Grandchildren, Mike Fitzpatrick and his wife, Valorie, Karen Mattox and her husband, Ron, Tony Ford, Colleen Fitzpatrick, Rachel Faulk and her husband, Marty, Sarah Fitzpatrick, Carissa Lloyd and her husband Bob, Melanie Troxell and her husband Mike, Marion Blythe and Brandy Barber; and 10 great- grandchildren.

Pallbearers will be Tony Ford, Matt Ford, Derek McFry, Leroy Fitzpatrick, Eddie Fitzpatrick, Art Ingram, and Hank Douthit. Honorary pallbearers will be grandchildren, nieces and nephews,

Mr. Fitzpatrick, a Piedmont, Al native and lifelong resident was a member of Hughes Street Congregational Holiness Church where he served as deacon for many years, played the violin, and visited the sick and shut-ins. A World War II Army veteran, he retired from SCT Yarn with 48 years of service. he was preceded in death by his wife, Violet White Fitzpatrick; his parents Arthur and Geneva Fitzpatrick; a granddaughter, Rhonda Ford McFry ; four sisters and five brothers.

Rufus was born 7 September 1917 in Oconee, GA

Married Violet White 15 October 1938 in Anniston, AL

Died 14 December 2004 in Piedmont, AL