Treasures from the Attic (well, basement)

I feel like I've been touched by an angel.  Her name is Mary Jane and she is a cousin of mine I never even knew I had.  My first cousin, twice removed, to be exact.  I saw a post she made on the message boards on Ancestry.com for the Slowey surname.  I read her post and thought, "those are MY Sloweys!"  I then looked at the date on the post.  Wow ... 2001.  A lot of time has passed ... what are the odds she's even still looking?  I thought, "what the heck," and sent her a message anyway.

You can imagine my surprise when I received an email from her ... the very next day!  John Charles Slowey is her great grandfather.  We decided that we would share information and see if we could make any progress on our little family.  It turns out she had a box of her mother's photos and some other papers in her basement for years and just never went through them.  It was indeed a treasure trove!  Just look:

According to the inscription on the back, this is (from left to right):  Mary Christopher, Theresa Burns, and John Charles Slowey.  This photo was taken in 1928, about 3 weeks before John died.

Inscription on photo says John & Theresa Slowey with Katherine and Peter.  This photo had to have been taken sometime between 1888 and 1891.

This photo is of John Charles Slowey's brother, Patrick Edward Slowey, II.

The inscription says that this is a photo of (left to right) Ellen Slowey Murray (1867-1945), Patrick Slowey (1866-1942), Pete Slowey (1870-1950), and Kate Slowey Cunningham.  These are four of John Charles Slowey's brothers and sisters.

I've never understood why no one ever smiled for photos back in the day.  Whatever, I'm just so glad that we are able to put faces with names now!  She sent me some other photos, but I will have to post them separately (apparently, there is such a thing as too much blog!)

If anyone in Helena, Montana is reading my blog and you run into Mary Jane, give her a big ol' hug for me!