Brick Wall

I have a question.  Why do you put somebody's name on a tombstone, with the date of birth, but leave out the date of death?  Uncle Nick has been the only dependable Riley--he participated in censuses--from 1880-1930.  I found a record of his marriage on familysearch.org.  Ancestry.com is where I found obits for his wife and a date of death for his daughter and son in law.  But I cannot discover when the man died, and it's frustrating.

Reading this, people might wonder why I placed so much emphasis on Mr. Riley's reliability?  Firstly, his brother, Andrew, my great grandfather, went out on an errand one day and never returned, abandoning a wife, and at least three sons.  My grandmother had already been adopted by her uncle, Tom Riley, before her father left home.  I've searched all available records, and cannot find birth certificates for Grandma or her brothers.  The first time they appear in a census is 1900 for Grandma, and 1920 for my great grandmother, and her sons.

Add to this the mysterious Uncle Charlie.  I never knew Grandma had a third brother until I searched ancestry.com and found a Charles Walter Riley, living with my great grandmother, listed as her son.  His WWI draft card named my great grandmother as his mother, and a search of findagrave.com showed he died in 1957.  Grandma never told Mom about him, and when I told her, Mom's reaction was ' he's not my uncle because we were never formally introduced". 

A Learning Curve

I have more fun following irrelevant stories than doing family research.  The style of 19th century journalism is beyond amusing, with the quaint language and old moral attitudes.  It does get a bit offensive at times.  While searching for 'Andrew Riley"  I found a story about a 19th century crap game on the Upper West Side of NYC.  Since all the defendants were Black, the writer treated it as a minstrel show skit, with such phrases as 'roll 'dem bones, brudder". 

Interesting to read what James and John Rileys were up to over 100 years ago.  The saddest story took place in Manhattan, in the middle of July.  James Riley, segar maker, had died, so his brother John came to NYC to attend the funeral.  The weather was hot, and poor John died of heat stroke. 

There was John Riley, who had shot a police officer in 1863--spent 20 years as a fugitive, only to be caught and extradited to NYC.  The surviving witnesses had a hard time identifying him because John had lost all his curly brown hair.  I wonder if the prosecutor got a conviction?

I did find a story in the Brooklyn Eagle about my Grandmother's Uncle Tom Riley, a police officer.  He was sent to arrest a trolley conductor who had left the scene of a fatal accident.  Mom said she recalled that Uncle Tom was a solid, strong looking man, even in his late sixties. 

Dinner is ready: must dine with the Aged Parent.