These families are the basis for making a chronicle of where we came from.
The Gibbs family in America started in Colonial Times with John Gibbs who lived in Jamestowne. See more about the Jamestowne story.
The Johnson family started with Oliver’s grandparents who migrated to the U.S. in 1869 from Denmark.
Anne’s parents came from Limerick Ireland and immigrated in 1884. There is an interesting story about that in Eugene Lawless’ story that begins with his first visit to Nebraska in 1880.
The stories, photos, videos, and other information comes from a variety of sources. Two on-line sources were used: FamilySearch and FindAGrave. FamilySearch has census records and millions of other sources. FindAGrave has birth/death and family relationship information and sometime it has obituaries.
Family records were inherited from Victor Johnson (including letters from his mother Anna and her sister Eugenia). Victor was a photographer and is the source of photos and videos. Bessie Gibbs saved letters. The Johnson family exchanged letters regularly. Ray Gibbs sister Katherine often wrote letters about the Madison Gibbs family.
The challenge is to organize and compile all the sources into a family timeline and history.
It is a fascinating journey to put all the pieces together. It is where we came from and is a continuing lesson – how did we get to where we are?
Betty