Long Time, No See

It’s been awhile since I updated this blog. I got busy with the holidays and then catching up, and then with writing. I’ve completed my second draft on the Great Depression novel and am letting it sit for a bit before I tackle it again. Not really sure where to go from here; it needs more drafts to be sure. And I am trying to prepare for the next WIP. It’s a never-ending, vicious circle.

One of the subjects in my Great Depression WIP is abusive marriages. Not to give away too much, due to desperate times, my heroine is married off young to a man much older than she is. Then the marriage becomes abusive. It happened back then, it still happens today. Unfortunately in the 1930’s – and before and long after- abused women had nowhere to turn to. Friends and family may have been well-aware of the situation, but nothing could be done really. The church offered no answers really; divorce was considered a sin by many Christians.

Indiana has an interesting history when it comes to divorce. While frowned upon by most of society – and I am sure most Hoosiers- in the 1830’s Indiana passed a bill making it easier for women to obtain a divorce and keep the children. That was monumental for the 19^th century! It was so easy to obtain a divorce in Indiana, that Heinrich Schliemann, the man who rediscovered the lost city of Troy, came here to obtain one as well. Of course while it was helpful to have such a liberal law, the majority of women did not make a beeline to the Hoosier state to free themselves of their husbands. Divorce carried a social stigma- if you were a divorced woman you were considered immoral and the blame of your failed marriage was laid at your feet. By the 1930’s divorce was too expensive that many couples opted to remain married because they could not afford to separate.

My heroine wants a divorce but various circumstances prevent her from obtaining one. Her story is partially modeled after that of a woman’s in my family. She was shackled to a violent man and was only freed through his death. While I believe in making marriage work and for better and for worse, I am grateful to live in an age where women can break away from their abusive spouses if they can. 

My Ancestor was a Polygamist…

Or maybe a Black Widower.

My Grandma always used to tell me, “When you start to shake the family tree, anything may fall out, so beware.” Ain’t that the truth!

I have started getting involved in genealogy recently and have made some new, hilarious discoveries. For several years now I’ve been able to pin-point who one of our ancestors was; a man named Michael who’s surname shall remain blank (for the reason that I don’t feel safe putting my last name out there on the internet). Anyway, Michael was born in 1758 and married a woman named Berthena in 1783 who they had a son with; their marriage was of short duration. Either they had it annulled, or they divorced or just went their separate ways. Whatever happened between the two, Berthena isn’t mentioned again but what is interesting is that Michael later names a child after her that he has with another wife (Awkward!). Once he is single, Michael proceeds to marry a lady named Jemina who later dies in childbirth. This time Michael waits two years before wedding Elizabeth; together they have six or seven children. At some point prior to 1818, Elizabeth dies or leaves Michael because in 1818 Michael marries an eighteen-year-old named Ann. And there is actually a possibility that he had married a woman in between Elizabeth and Ann, but I haven’t found a wedding date yet.

Michael was certainly a busy boy. He lived a long life, and died in 1830, at the ripe old age of seventy-two. I know in those days that the records were sketchy and marriages were often recorded in a Bible or maybe not even at all. I’m not as familiar with the divorce/annulment process of that era, but I doubt it was as easy to end a marriage as it is today. So man had an easier time leaving his wife and marrying someone else. Does that make him a Polygamist? :~P. I might be being pessimistic here, maybe Michael outlived all of his wives.

I wonder if he really was a Black Widower…

Oh well, if you can’t laugh about it, what can you do?