09-11-2012, 10:44 PM
I don't know much about my dad's Scottish side (I'm a Cochran), wish I did. But at least I know a lot about my mother's side.
I'm not clear on the exact reasons but Swedish settlers left Sweden and/or other parts of the United States because they were just a "little too wanted" by the law. They settled in East Texas where they had a bad rep (I saw a history book in a very tiny library in that county that has a very detailed history of the town and its genealogy, very enlightening!) and some just wouldn't settle down. One great (or great great) uncle of my granny was even a bank robber, and got killed (along with friends) by one posse from I think Oklahoma while running from another posse in a western state where they'd just robbed another bank (Granny said they felt they'd be safe as long as they didn't rob any banks in Texas).
Either because of their rep or because of their inclination the settlers tended to marry into each other's family more than with the rest of the town, especially at first. It seems it was the Great Depression that the Swedes were fully accepted (most to all having been born there by then and trying to be more respectable), though those were trying times. Granny told me of how many in their family were used and ripped off, or had to face bandits of their own as they tried taking earnings home. Kids were considered free labor and also ate last instead of first which is why kids learned (taught from one generation to the next) how to forage (I can as well, and I know how to make polk salad and given how toxic it is it's good I made it right when I was 13!).
Oh yes, my family (decades before I was born) helped hide Bonnie & Clyde as well. The interesting thing is the pair are considered heroes by many East Texans (especially for their habit of burning deeds or whatever at the bank that saved some people from having their lands or other property repossessed), including by my family, and Granny once took me to a Bonnie & Clyde festival where even COPS praised them (the pair were notorious cop killers as well as bank robbers). Of course the vast majority of these people were elderly and it seemed many of them at least saw them as a child (Granny wasn't even alive then but she shared what she heard from relatives who hid the pair and their car in their barn and asked for nothing but the pair left a sack of money in thanks). They were seen as Robin Hood outlaws who stood up against a corrupt government and banking system (one old man said Clyde had stood up to bullies ever since he was a little boy), kind of like OWS zealots that fought violence with violence, and after the cops killed them the cops dragged the shot up car for people to see and the locals saw it as a message about what they'd do to anyone else who thought they could step out of line rather than the cops and government going, "look, you're safe now." Talking about Bonnie and Clyde was when Granny told me, "Sometimes, justice is on the other side of the law." I was absolutely SHOCKED when I left and found elsewhere that Bonnie & Clyde were considered ruthless sociopaths by the rest of the world that never met them.
And then there's Granny. I need a break and she needs her own post, so I'll come back to this later.
I'm not clear on the exact reasons but Swedish settlers left Sweden and/or other parts of the United States because they were just a "little too wanted" by the law. They settled in East Texas where they had a bad rep (I saw a history book in a very tiny library in that county that has a very detailed history of the town and its genealogy, very enlightening!) and some just wouldn't settle down. One great (or great great) uncle of my granny was even a bank robber, and got killed (along with friends) by one posse from I think Oklahoma while running from another posse in a western state where they'd just robbed another bank (Granny said they felt they'd be safe as long as they didn't rob any banks in Texas).
Either because of their rep or because of their inclination the settlers tended to marry into each other's family more than with the rest of the town, especially at first. It seems it was the Great Depression that the Swedes were fully accepted (most to all having been born there by then and trying to be more respectable), though those were trying times. Granny told me of how many in their family were used and ripped off, or had to face bandits of their own as they tried taking earnings home. Kids were considered free labor and also ate last instead of first which is why kids learned (taught from one generation to the next) how to forage (I can as well, and I know how to make polk salad and given how toxic it is it's good I made it right when I was 13!).
Oh yes, my family (decades before I was born) helped hide Bonnie & Clyde as well. The interesting thing is the pair are considered heroes by many East Texans (especially for their habit of burning deeds or whatever at the bank that saved some people from having their lands or other property repossessed), including by my family, and Granny once took me to a Bonnie & Clyde festival where even COPS praised them (the pair were notorious cop killers as well as bank robbers). Of course the vast majority of these people were elderly and it seemed many of them at least saw them as a child (Granny wasn't even alive then but she shared what she heard from relatives who hid the pair and their car in their barn and asked for nothing but the pair left a sack of money in thanks). They were seen as Robin Hood outlaws who stood up against a corrupt government and banking system (one old man said Clyde had stood up to bullies ever since he was a little boy), kind of like OWS zealots that fought violence with violence, and after the cops killed them the cops dragged the shot up car for people to see and the locals saw it as a message about what they'd do to anyone else who thought they could step out of line rather than the cops and government going, "look, you're safe now." Talking about Bonnie and Clyde was when Granny told me, "Sometimes, justice is on the other side of the law." I was absolutely SHOCKED when I left and found elsewhere that Bonnie & Clyde were considered ruthless sociopaths by the rest of the world that never met them.
And then there's Granny. I need a break and she needs her own post, so I'll come back to this later.