COFFMAN, HAROLD RAY,
Passed away on Friday, July 27, 2007. Harold was born May 8, 1925 in Josephine, Texas. He was the son of Ray Coffman and Euleta Taylor Coffman both of Collin County. While Harold was born a country boy, the son of a cotton farmer, he lived as a county boy only a few years. In 1930 the Coffman family moved to Dallas where Harold grew up in Oak Cliff, East Dallas and the Lakewood area. He graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in January 1943. Upon graduating from high school he attended SMU for a term before enlisting in the United States Coast Guard where he served for almost three years during World War II. Most of his time in the Coast Guard was spent on convoy and anti-submarine warfare service out of New York. Upon his discharge in 1946 he returned home and reenrolled at SMU and began working for a life insurance company in Dallas. He graduated in May 1949 with a bachelors degree in accounting and finance. Harold married Jeanne Gallaher of Dallas in September 1948. Jeanne was also a graduate of Woodrow Wilson and of Hockaday Junior College. Harold and Jeanne moved to New York where Harold attended New York Graduate School of Business. After he graduated, he and Jeanne moved back to Dallas and Harold worked for Republic Bank of Dallas and later as a Municipal Bond salesman for a local brokerage firm. In March 1943 he was employed by Oak Cliff Bank & Trust Company where he helped established the first bank credit card system west of the Mississippi River. He remained with the bank until September 1987 when he retired as a Senior Vice President after thirty-five years of service. Harold was active in many civic affairs and represented the bank in numerous community service functions including his beloved Oak Cliff Optimist Club. He was very involved in both partisan and non-partisan political activities. Jeanne and Harold were both active in the Lakewood Methodist Church and Glen Oak United Methodist Church. In 1979 Jeanne and Harold moved to a new home in Cedar Hill. Jeanne died in January 1983 of ALS (Lou Gehrigs Disease). After Jeannes death Harold married Jane Harris Sellars of Dallas. They continued to live in Cedar Hill before moving to McKinney in Collin County in 1998. At the time of Harolds death, they were members of the Stonebridge United Methodist Church. He has two sons, Steve Coffman who is a Captain of the Dallas Fair Department and his oldest son, Robert who is the owner of Innovations Controlled Access Systems. Harold is survived by his wife of 24 years, Jane Coffman of McKinney; two sons and their wives, Robert and Una Coffman of McKinney and Steve and Nancy Coffman of Dallas; two stepchildren Dean (Judy) Sellers and their children and Jodi (Steve) Smith and their children; three grandchildren, Kimberly Weston, Dustin Coffman Caldwell, and Amanda Coffman; his sister Anna Lou Hager of Tyler; and numerous nephews and friends from all over North Texas. Visitation will be at Restland Funeral home on Monday, July 30, 2007 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The funeral service will be held at Restland Funeral Home on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 11:00. The internment will follow the service at Restland Cemetary. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his honor to the American Diabetes Association.
********************************************************
This is a story Harold wrote me in 2005. It was sent in a email.
***
Nancy,
It is certainly good to hear from you and I am happy that things are going well with you. How is your daughter and your grandchildren? Are they still living with you?
Jane and I are doing well these days, but we are getting older. I just had my 80th birthday on May the 8th, and I have noticed that I am more inclined to tell my age then I was last year. Saturday, May the 7th was a big day for me. My sons gave me a birthday party -- the first one I have had since I was forty years old back in 1965. Never eill forget that day. It was a Friday evening in January 1965 that for a reason I didn't know then I was kept at the bank by the President until the bank closed at six o'clock. I delayed a few minutes then headed for home. When I walked into the house I discovered that the sliding door to the living room was shut and went an opened it. To my surprise there were about twenty people in the living room and when the door opened they broke into the Happy Birthday song.
I acknowledged everyone and then asked Jeanne why were they celebrating my 40th birthday in January when my birthday was not until May. She answered that I had been acting like I was 40 so long that they decided to celebrate my birthday early.
The truth then came out, Jeanne had ordered a stereo that I had admired and the gentleman who was a friend of my parents decided to give it to me instead of me buying it and he wanted to sent it out early to get it out of his store.
After my 40th birthday party I didn't have another party until forty years later. The fact that my oldest granddaughter was also born on May the 8th in 1980 guaranteed that no one was going to pay any attention to my birthday after she was born.
I enjoyed my stereo for many years and had a rather large record collection. Since Jeanne didn't care for music I had a set of earphones with an extension cord that would allow me to listen to music in other parts of the house. The stereo was also a nice piece of furniture and it occupied a central part in our living room. I had that stereo until we moved to McKinney seven years ago. I did buy a small stereo to replace the piece of furniture. The new little stereo would also play tape and cds. Now, on my 80th birthday my gift was a iPod. That small three and a half inch by two inch gadget that will fit in my shirt pocket. I have twenty-six albums on it and I'm only using a fourth of the memory. I will be able to put over a hundred albums on the thing.
I'm concern now what I might receive on my 100th birthday. I know I'm not going to make 120 years, but I'm bent and determined to make one hundred. That still won't be the record. The record is currently held by two sister that lived in Campbell, Texas just east of Greenville. Ethel Abbott Hall died in 2002 at the age of 106 and her sister Hattie Abbott Share died the same year at 104. Never will forget my asking Ethel how she was taking it celebrating her younger sister's 100th birthday back in August 1997.
I asked one of my friends who is up-to-date on the new electronic gadgetry what I might expect to get on my 100th birthday. He said that it will probably just a earphone that plugs into your ear and you would just speak the name of the song you wanted to hear and it would start playing. I'm looking forward to not having to charge up the battery like I have to do with the iPod.
I was telling my doctor about my birthday and I asked him if he thought I would make my 120th birthday. He didn't think I would but felt like I could make my 100th if I would forget about sex. He then took my blood pressure and said that my blood pressure wouldn't kill me -- in fact he said, "I don't think I could kill you with a stick -- I couldn't do it with a heart attack or lung cancer."
1. Go to "Genealogy.com" site at: http://www.genealogy.com/index_r.html
2. At the top of the page click on "Community"
3. At the search section type in "Amos Coffman"
4. That will take you to a listing of Coffman family trees. About a fourth of the page down you will find "History & Genealogy of Coffman, Ashby, and Willson Families". If you click on this it will take you to my Home Page and you can click on the "Descendants of Jacob Coffman" This will give you just five generations of the descendants of Amos Coffman. I didn't put more on in order to protect the privacy of living people.
*************
This fits Harold so much.
Poem by Unknown:
Beatitudes of a Family Genealogist
Blessed are the great-grandmothers, who hoarded
newspaper clippings and old letters,
For they tell the story of their time.
Blessed are all grandfathers who filed every legal
document,
For this provides proof.
Blessed are grandmothers who preserved family Bibles
and diaries,
For this is our heritage.
Blessed are fathers who elect officials that answer
letters of inquiry,
For some, they are the only link to the past.
Blessed are mothers who relate family traditions and
legends to the family,
For one of her children will surely remember.
Blessed are the relatives who fill in family sheets with
extra data,
For them we owe the family history.
Blessed is any family whose members strive for the
preservation of records,
For theirs is a labour of love.
Blessed are the children who will never say, "Grandma,
you have told that old story twice today.
Author Unknown
Passed away on Friday, July 27, 2007. Harold was born May 8, 1925 in Josephine, Texas. He was the son of Ray Coffman and Euleta Taylor Coffman both of Collin County. While Harold was born a country boy, the son of a cotton farmer, he lived as a county boy only a few years. In 1930 the Coffman family moved to Dallas where Harold grew up in Oak Cliff, East Dallas and the Lakewood area. He graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in January 1943. Upon graduating from high school he attended SMU for a term before enlisting in the United States Coast Guard where he served for almost three years during World War II. Most of his time in the Coast Guard was spent on convoy and anti-submarine warfare service out of New York. Upon his discharge in 1946 he returned home and reenrolled at SMU and began working for a life insurance company in Dallas. He graduated in May 1949 with a bachelors degree in accounting and finance. Harold married Jeanne Gallaher of Dallas in September 1948. Jeanne was also a graduate of Woodrow Wilson and of Hockaday Junior College. Harold and Jeanne moved to New York where Harold attended New York Graduate School of Business. After he graduated, he and Jeanne moved back to Dallas and Harold worked for Republic Bank of Dallas and later as a Municipal Bond salesman for a local brokerage firm. In March 1943 he was employed by Oak Cliff Bank & Trust Company where he helped established the first bank credit card system west of the Mississippi River. He remained with the bank until September 1987 when he retired as a Senior Vice President after thirty-five years of service. Harold was active in many civic affairs and represented the bank in numerous community service functions including his beloved Oak Cliff Optimist Club. He was very involved in both partisan and non-partisan political activities. Jeanne and Harold were both active in the Lakewood Methodist Church and Glen Oak United Methodist Church. In 1979 Jeanne and Harold moved to a new home in Cedar Hill. Jeanne died in January 1983 of ALS (Lou Gehrigs Disease). After Jeannes death Harold married Jane Harris Sellars of Dallas. They continued to live in Cedar Hill before moving to McKinney in Collin County in 1998. At the time of Harolds death, they were members of the Stonebridge United Methodist Church. He has two sons, Steve Coffman who is a Captain of the Dallas Fair Department and his oldest son, Robert who is the owner of Innovations Controlled Access Systems. Harold is survived by his wife of 24 years, Jane Coffman of McKinney; two sons and their wives, Robert and Una Coffman of McKinney and Steve and Nancy Coffman of Dallas; two stepchildren Dean (Judy) Sellers and their children and Jodi (Steve) Smith and their children; three grandchildren, Kimberly Weston, Dustin Coffman Caldwell, and Amanda Coffman; his sister Anna Lou Hager of Tyler; and numerous nephews and friends from all over North Texas. Visitation will be at Restland Funeral home on Monday, July 30, 2007 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The funeral service will be held at Restland Funeral Home on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 11:00. The internment will follow the service at Restland Cemetary. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his honor to the American Diabetes Association.
********************************************************
This is a story Harold wrote me in 2005. It was sent in a email.
***
Nancy,
It is certainly good to hear from you and I am happy that things are going well with you. How is your daughter and your grandchildren? Are they still living with you?
Jane and I are doing well these days, but we are getting older. I just had my 80th birthday on May the 8th, and I have noticed that I am more inclined to tell my age then I was last year. Saturday, May the 7th was a big day for me. My sons gave me a birthday party -- the first one I have had since I was forty years old back in 1965. Never eill forget that day. It was a Friday evening in January 1965 that for a reason I didn't know then I was kept at the bank by the President until the bank closed at six o'clock. I delayed a few minutes then headed for home. When I walked into the house I discovered that the sliding door to the living room was shut and went an opened it. To my surprise there were about twenty people in the living room and when the door opened they broke into the Happy Birthday song.
I acknowledged everyone and then asked Jeanne why were they celebrating my 40th birthday in January when my birthday was not until May. She answered that I had been acting like I was 40 so long that they decided to celebrate my birthday early.
The truth then came out, Jeanne had ordered a stereo that I had admired and the gentleman who was a friend of my parents decided to give it to me instead of me buying it and he wanted to sent it out early to get it out of his store.
After my 40th birthday party I didn't have another party until forty years later. The fact that my oldest granddaughter was also born on May the 8th in 1980 guaranteed that no one was going to pay any attention to my birthday after she was born.
I enjoyed my stereo for many years and had a rather large record collection. Since Jeanne didn't care for music I had a set of earphones with an extension cord that would allow me to listen to music in other parts of the house. The stereo was also a nice piece of furniture and it occupied a central part in our living room. I had that stereo until we moved to McKinney seven years ago. I did buy a small stereo to replace the piece of furniture. The new little stereo would also play tape and cds. Now, on my 80th birthday my gift was a iPod. That small three and a half inch by two inch gadget that will fit in my shirt pocket. I have twenty-six albums on it and I'm only using a fourth of the memory. I will be able to put over a hundred albums on the thing.
I'm concern now what I might receive on my 100th birthday. I know I'm not going to make 120 years, but I'm bent and determined to make one hundred. That still won't be the record. The record is currently held by two sister that lived in Campbell, Texas just east of Greenville. Ethel Abbott Hall died in 2002 at the age of 106 and her sister Hattie Abbott Share died the same year at 104. Never will forget my asking Ethel how she was taking it celebrating her younger sister's 100th birthday back in August 1997.
I asked one of my friends who is up-to-date on the new electronic gadgetry what I might expect to get on my 100th birthday. He said that it will probably just a earphone that plugs into your ear and you would just speak the name of the song you wanted to hear and it would start playing. I'm looking forward to not having to charge up the battery like I have to do with the iPod.
I was telling my doctor about my birthday and I asked him if he thought I would make my 120th birthday. He didn't think I would but felt like I could make my 100th if I would forget about sex. He then took my blood pressure and said that my blood pressure wouldn't kill me -- in fact he said, "I don't think I could kill you with a stick -- I couldn't do it with a heart attack or lung cancer."
1. Go to "Genealogy.com" site at: http://www.genealogy.com/index_r.html
2. At the top of the page click on "Community"
3. At the search section type in "Amos Coffman"
4. That will take you to a listing of Coffman family trees. About a fourth of the page down you will find "History & Genealogy of Coffman, Ashby, and Willson Families". If you click on this it will take you to my Home Page and you can click on the "Descendants of Jacob Coffman" This will give you just five generations of the descendants of Amos Coffman. I didn't put more on in order to protect the privacy of living people.
*************
This fits Harold so much.
Poem by Unknown:
Beatitudes of a Family Genealogist
Blessed are the great-grandmothers, who hoarded
newspaper clippings and old letters,
For they tell the story of their time.
Blessed are all grandfathers who filed every legal
document,
For this provides proof.
Blessed are grandmothers who preserved family Bibles
and diaries,
For this is our heritage.
Blessed are fathers who elect officials that answer
letters of inquiry,
For some, they are the only link to the past.
Blessed are mothers who relate family traditions and
legends to the family,
For one of her children will surely remember.
Blessed are the relatives who fill in family sheets with
extra data,
For them we owe the family history.
Blessed is any family whose members strive for the
preservation of records,
For theirs is a labour of love.
Blessed are the children who will never say, "Grandma,
you have told that old story twice today.
Author Unknown
COFFMAN, HAROLD RAY,
Passed away on Friday, July 27, 2007. Harold was born May 8, 1925 in Josephine, Texas. He was the son of Ray Coffman and Euleta Taylor Coffman both of Collin County. While Harold was born a country boy, the son of a cotton farmer, he lived as a county boy only a few years. In 1930 the Coffman family moved to Dallas where Harold grew up in Oak Cliff, East Dallas and the Lakewood area. He graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in January 1943. Upon graduating from high school he attended SMU for a term before enlisting in the United States Coast Guard where he served for almost three years during World War II. Most of his time in the Coast Guard was spent on convoy and anti-submarine warfare service out of New York. Upon his discharge in 1946 he returned home and reenrolled at SMU and began working for a life insurance company in Dallas. He graduated in May 1949 with a bachelors degree in accounting and finance. Harold married Jeanne Gallaher of Dallas in September 1948. Jeanne was also a graduate of Woodrow Wilson and of Hockaday Junior College. Harold and Jeanne moved to New York where Harold attended New York Graduate School of Business. After he graduated, he and Jeanne moved back to Dallas and Harold worked for Republic Bank of Dallas and later as a Municipal Bond salesman for a local brokerage firm. In March 1943 he was employed by Oak Cliff Bank & Trust Company where he helped established the first bank credit card system west of the Mississippi River. He remained with the bank until September 1987 when he retired as a Senior Vice President after thirty-five years of service. Harold was active in many civic affairs and represented the bank in numerous community service functions including his beloved Oak Cliff Optimist Club. He was very involved in both partisan and non-partisan political activities. Jeanne and Harold were both active in the Lakewood Methodist Church and Glen Oak United Methodist Church. In 1979 Jeanne and Harold moved to a new home in Cedar Hill. Jeanne died in January 1983 of ALS (Lou Gehrigs Disease). After Jeannes death Harold married Jane Harris Sellars of Dallas. They continued to live in Cedar Hill before moving to McKinney in Collin County in 1998. At the time of Harolds death, they were members of the Stonebridge United Methodist Church. He has two sons, Steve Coffman who is a Captain of the Dallas Fair Department and his oldest son, Robert who is the owner of Innovations Controlled Access Systems. Harold is survived by his wife of 24 years, Jane Coffman of McKinney; two sons and their wives, Robert and Una Coffman of McKinney and Steve and Nancy Coffman of Dallas; two stepchildren Dean (Judy) Sellers and their children and Jodi (Steve) Smith and their children; three grandchildren, Kimberly Weston, Dustin Coffman Caldwell, and Amanda Coffman; his sister Anna Lou Hager of Tyler; and numerous nephews and friends from all over North Texas. Visitation will be at Restland Funeral home on Monday, July 30, 2007 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The funeral service will be held at Restland Funeral Home on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 11:00. The internment will follow the service at Restland Cemetary. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his honor to the American Diabetes Association.
********************************************************
This is a story Harold wrote me in 2005. It was sent in a email.
***
Nancy,
It is certainly good to hear from you and I am happy that things are going well with you. How is your daughter and your grandchildren? Are they still living with you?
Jane and I are doing well these days, but we are getting older. I just had my 80th birthday on May the 8th, and I have noticed that I am more inclined to tell my age then I was last year. Saturday, May the 7th was a big day for me. My sons gave me a birthday party -- the first one I have had since I was forty years old back in 1965. Never eill forget that day. It was a Friday evening in January 1965 that for a reason I didn't know then I was kept at the bank by the President until the bank closed at six o'clock. I delayed a few minutes then headed for home. When I walked into the house I discovered that the sliding door to the living room was shut and went an opened it. To my surprise there were about twenty people in the living room and when the door opened they broke into the Happy Birthday song.
I acknowledged everyone and then asked Jeanne why were they celebrating my 40th birthday in January when my birthday was not until May. She answered that I had been acting like I was 40 so long that they decided to celebrate my birthday early.
The truth then came out, Jeanne had ordered a stereo that I had admired and the gentleman who was a friend of my parents decided to give it to me instead of me buying it and he wanted to sent it out early to get it out of his store.
After my 40th birthday party I didn't have another party until forty years later. The fact that my oldest granddaughter was also born on May the 8th in 1980 guaranteed that no one was going to pay any attention to my birthday after she was born.
I enjoyed my stereo for many years and had a rather large record collection. Since Jeanne didn't care for music I had a set of earphones with an extension cord that would allow me to listen to music in other parts of the house. The stereo was also a nice piece of furniture and it occupied a central part in our living room. I had that stereo until we moved to McKinney seven years ago. I did buy a small stereo to replace the piece of furniture. The new little stereo would also play tape and cds. Now, on my 80th birthday my gift was a iPod. That small three and a half inch by two inch gadget that will fit in my shirt pocket. I have twenty-six albums on it and I'm only using a fourth of the memory. I will be able to put over a hundred albums on the thing.
I'm concern now what I might receive on my 100th birthday. I know I'm not going to make 120 years, but I'm bent and determined to make one hundred. That still won't be the record. The record is currently held by two sister that lived in Campbell, Texas just east of Greenville. Ethel Abbott Hall died in 2002 at the age of 106 and her sister Hattie Abbott Share died the same year at 104. Never will forget my asking Ethel how she was taking it celebrating her younger sister's 100th birthday back in August 1997.
I asked one of my friends who is up-to-date on the new electronic gadgetry what I might expect to get on my 100th birthday. He said that it will probably just a earphone that plugs into your ear and you would just speak the name of the song you wanted to hear and it would start playing. I'm looking forward to not having to charge up the battery like I have to do with the iPod.
I was telling my doctor about my birthday and I asked him if he thought I would make my 120th birthday. He didn't think I would but felt like I could make my 100th if I would forget about sex. He then took my blood pressure and said that my blood pressure wouldn't kill me -- in fact he said, "I don't think I could kill you with a stick -- I couldn't do it with a heart attack or lung cancer."
1. Go to "Genealogy.com" site at: http://www.genealogy.com/index_r.html
2. At the top of the page click on "Community"
3. At the search section type in "Amos Coffman"
4. That will take you to a listing of Coffman family trees. About a fourth of the page down you will find "History & Genealogy of Coffman, Ashby, and Willson Families". If you click on this it will take you to my Home Page and you can click on the "Descendants of Jacob Coffman" This will give you just five generations of the descendants of Amos Coffman. I didn't put more on in order to protect the privacy of living people.
*************
This fits Harold so much.
Poem by Unknown:
Beatitudes of a Family Genealogist
Blessed are the great-grandmothers, who hoarded
newspaper clippings and old letters,
For they tell the story of their time.
Blessed are all grandfathers who filed every legal
document,
For this provides proof.
Blessed are grandmothers who preserved family Bibles
and diaries,
For this is our heritage.
Blessed are fathers who elect officials that answer
letters of inquiry,
For some, they are the only link to the past.
Blessed are mothers who relate family traditions and
legends to the family,
For one of her children will surely remember.
Blessed are the relatives who fill in family sheets with
extra data,
For them we owe the family history.
Blessed is any family whose members strive for the
preservation of records,
For theirs is a labour of love.
Blessed are the children who will never say, "Grandma,
you have told that old story twice today.
Author Unknown
Passed away on Friday, July 27, 2007. Harold was born May 8, 1925 in Josephine, Texas. He was the son of Ray Coffman and Euleta Taylor Coffman both of Collin County. While Harold was born a country boy, the son of a cotton farmer, he lived as a county boy only a few years. In 1930 the Coffman family moved to Dallas where Harold grew up in Oak Cliff, East Dallas and the Lakewood area. He graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in January 1943. Upon graduating from high school he attended SMU for a term before enlisting in the United States Coast Guard where he served for almost three years during World War II. Most of his time in the Coast Guard was spent on convoy and anti-submarine warfare service out of New York. Upon his discharge in 1946 he returned home and reenrolled at SMU and began working for a life insurance company in Dallas. He graduated in May 1949 with a bachelors degree in accounting and finance. Harold married Jeanne Gallaher of Dallas in September 1948. Jeanne was also a graduate of Woodrow Wilson and of Hockaday Junior College. Harold and Jeanne moved to New York where Harold attended New York Graduate School of Business. After he graduated, he and Jeanne moved back to Dallas and Harold worked for Republic Bank of Dallas and later as a Municipal Bond salesman for a local brokerage firm. In March 1943 he was employed by Oak Cliff Bank & Trust Company where he helped established the first bank credit card system west of the Mississippi River. He remained with the bank until September 1987 when he retired as a Senior Vice President after thirty-five years of service. Harold was active in many civic affairs and represented the bank in numerous community service functions including his beloved Oak Cliff Optimist Club. He was very involved in both partisan and non-partisan political activities. Jeanne and Harold were both active in the Lakewood Methodist Church and Glen Oak United Methodist Church. In 1979 Jeanne and Harold moved to a new home in Cedar Hill. Jeanne died in January 1983 of ALS (Lou Gehrigs Disease). After Jeannes death Harold married Jane Harris Sellars of Dallas. They continued to live in Cedar Hill before moving to McKinney in Collin County in 1998. At the time of Harolds death, they were members of the Stonebridge United Methodist Church. He has two sons, Steve Coffman who is a Captain of the Dallas Fair Department and his oldest son, Robert who is the owner of Innovations Controlled Access Systems. Harold is survived by his wife of 24 years, Jane Coffman of McKinney; two sons and their wives, Robert and Una Coffman of McKinney and Steve and Nancy Coffman of Dallas; two stepchildren Dean (Judy) Sellers and their children and Jodi (Steve) Smith and their children; three grandchildren, Kimberly Weston, Dustin Coffman Caldwell, and Amanda Coffman; his sister Anna Lou Hager of Tyler; and numerous nephews and friends from all over North Texas. Visitation will be at Restland Funeral home on Monday, July 30, 2007 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The funeral service will be held at Restland Funeral Home on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 11:00. The internment will follow the service at Restland Cemetary. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in his honor to the American Diabetes Association.
********************************************************
This is a story Harold wrote me in 2005. It was sent in a email.
***
Nancy,
It is certainly good to hear from you and I am happy that things are going well with you. How is your daughter and your grandchildren? Are they still living with you?
Jane and I are doing well these days, but we are getting older. I just had my 80th birthday on May the 8th, and I have noticed that I am more inclined to tell my age then I was last year. Saturday, May the 7th was a big day for me. My sons gave me a birthday party -- the first one I have had since I was forty years old back in 1965. Never eill forget that day. It was a Friday evening in January 1965 that for a reason I didn't know then I was kept at the bank by the President until the bank closed at six o'clock. I delayed a few minutes then headed for home. When I walked into the house I discovered that the sliding door to the living room was shut and went an opened it. To my surprise there were about twenty people in the living room and when the door opened they broke into the Happy Birthday song.
I acknowledged everyone and then asked Jeanne why were they celebrating my 40th birthday in January when my birthday was not until May. She answered that I had been acting like I was 40 so long that they decided to celebrate my birthday early.
The truth then came out, Jeanne had ordered a stereo that I had admired and the gentleman who was a friend of my parents decided to give it to me instead of me buying it and he wanted to sent it out early to get it out of his store.
After my 40th birthday party I didn't have another party until forty years later. The fact that my oldest granddaughter was also born on May the 8th in 1980 guaranteed that no one was going to pay any attention to my birthday after she was born.
I enjoyed my stereo for many years and had a rather large record collection. Since Jeanne didn't care for music I had a set of earphones with an extension cord that would allow me to listen to music in other parts of the house. The stereo was also a nice piece of furniture and it occupied a central part in our living room. I had that stereo until we moved to McKinney seven years ago. I did buy a small stereo to replace the piece of furniture. The new little stereo would also play tape and cds. Now, on my 80th birthday my gift was a iPod. That small three and a half inch by two inch gadget that will fit in my shirt pocket. I have twenty-six albums on it and I'm only using a fourth of the memory. I will be able to put over a hundred albums on the thing.
I'm concern now what I might receive on my 100th birthday. I know I'm not going to make 120 years, but I'm bent and determined to make one hundred. That still won't be the record. The record is currently held by two sister that lived in Campbell, Texas just east of Greenville. Ethel Abbott Hall died in 2002 at the age of 106 and her sister Hattie Abbott Share died the same year at 104. Never will forget my asking Ethel how she was taking it celebrating her younger sister's 100th birthday back in August 1997.
I asked one of my friends who is up-to-date on the new electronic gadgetry what I might expect to get on my 100th birthday. He said that it will probably just a earphone that plugs into your ear and you would just speak the name of the song you wanted to hear and it would start playing. I'm looking forward to not having to charge up the battery like I have to do with the iPod.
I was telling my doctor about my birthday and I asked him if he thought I would make my 120th birthday. He didn't think I would but felt like I could make my 100th if I would forget about sex. He then took my blood pressure and said that my blood pressure wouldn't kill me -- in fact he said, "I don't think I could kill you with a stick -- I couldn't do it with a heart attack or lung cancer."
1. Go to "Genealogy.com" site at: http://www.genealogy.com/index_r.html
2. At the top of the page click on "Community"
3. At the search section type in "Amos Coffman"
4. That will take you to a listing of Coffman family trees. About a fourth of the page down you will find "History & Genealogy of Coffman, Ashby, and Willson Families". If you click on this it will take you to my Home Page and you can click on the "Descendants of Jacob Coffman" This will give you just five generations of the descendants of Amos Coffman. I didn't put more on in order to protect the privacy of living people.
*************
This fits Harold so much.
Poem by Unknown:
Beatitudes of a Family Genealogist
Blessed are the great-grandmothers, who hoarded
newspaper clippings and old letters,
For they tell the story of their time.
Blessed are all grandfathers who filed every legal
document,
For this provides proof.
Blessed are grandmothers who preserved family Bibles
and diaries,
For this is our heritage.
Blessed are fathers who elect officials that answer
letters of inquiry,
For some, they are the only link to the past.
Blessed are mothers who relate family traditions and
legends to the family,
For one of her children will surely remember.
Blessed are the relatives who fill in family sheets with
extra data,
For them we owe the family history.
Blessed is any family whose members strive for the
preservation of records,
For theirs is a labour of love.
Blessed are the children who will never say, "Grandma,
you have told that old story twice today.
Author Unknown
Family Members
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