When people think of handing down things, often they think of people handing down clothes to younger siblings or handing down family heirlooms to the next generation. This article, however, takes a look at some of the other things, many non-material, that were handed down from one generation to the next in the Peelle family.
Handed Down In Families
Families also pass down skills, abilities, interests, beliefs, lifestyle, culture, longevity, stories, tendencies for particular diseases and more. Some of them genetically and others via teaching or sharing with their children. All things they “hand down” to the next generation are important as they are important components in making the next generation who they are.
This article takes a look at some physical traits and then touches on several other things that were passed down in the Peelle family.
Hair & Eyes
Physical traits handed down from generation to generation are more obvious in some families than others. The Peelle family is one family where physical traits are interesting.
Passco & Martha
It was said that Martha (Johson) Peelle had very dark or black hair and dark eyes. The first photograph, which is believed to be Passco and Martha (Johnson) Peelle soon after they married, shows that she has very dark hair. The details aren’t clear. However, her eyes do appear dark. Passco appears to have a bit lighter hair. His skin appears a bit ruddy, likely from being in the sun.
The next two photographs show Martha and Passco in their later years. Their hair has grayed; however, it is clear that Martha has dark eyes. Passco’s eyes, on the other hand, are not clear in the photograph.
The Kids
The next group of photographs show six of Passco and Martha’s eight children. Unfortunately, I didn’t have photographs of all the children. Additionally the children vary in age, which is not ideal.
The first image is Mossie Lea (Peelle) Wilkie. Although her hair and eyes do not appear as dark as Martha’s, she clearly favors her mother. She has brown hair and brown eyes.
The second image is Emaline “Lillie’ (Peelle) Potter. Since she is older, her hair color is not known. However, she clearly has brown eyes.
William Johnson Peelle is the third image. His hair is a much lighter brown and his eyes appear to be light. Thus, likely blue.
On the next row is Rachel (Peelle) Benson. Her hair is very dark, possibly black. However, her eyes do not seem as dark as Lillie’s. They appear to possibly be blue.
The next is Elzena “Jennie” (Peelle) Lewis. Her eyes appear very dark and her hair, although not well seen appears to be reasonably dark.
The last photo is of Sarah (Peelle) Longnecker. Her hair is dark, but possibly not as dark as some of the others. However, she seems to have lighter eyes.
The Grandkids
Example: Rachel’s Children
Using Rachel (Peelle) Benson and her children as an example, it can be seen that three of the four appear to have dark brown hair with one having lighter brown or blond hair. The three females appear to have brown eyes with her son William’s eyes being unclear in the photograph.
William’s military draft record, however, clarifies the situation stating that he has brown hair and blue eyes. His brother Emmerson’s records say that he also has blue eyes and states that his hair is dark.
Overall View
I took a look at the hair and eye color for as many as of Martha and Passco’s grandchildren where I could determined even one of the two attributes. Much of the information came from draft registrations. I supplemented it with my best guess of each by looking at photographs. Given that the photographs were almost all black and white, it is a bit of a guess. Yet, it is quite interesting. When looking at hair color a majority had brown, dark brown, or black hair. About 30% had light or blonde hair. It is interesting that given the hair color that over 50% of the grandchildren had blue eyes.
With the exception of one of Passco and Martha’s children, all of them appeared to have had children with a range of hair color from light to dark. In that particular family, none of the kids had light hair or blue eyes. The remaining families had either a mix of blue and brown eyes or exclusively blue eyes.
Example: Grandma & Her Sister Lydia
The photograph demonstrates the differences in coloring between Grandma Nellie (Peelle) McCracken and her sister Lydia. Grandma’s hair is light and she had very light blue eyes. Meanwhile, Lydia’s coloring is much darker as she had brown to dark brown hair with brown eyes.
Grandma clearly favors her father’s coloring (See William Johnson Peelle above). Lydia, on the other hand, appears to be darker than her mother and her grandfather John Jury, Sr. Thus, it would appear that she probably got part of her hair and eye color from Martha Peelle.
That is, if she is in fact a full sister to Grandma Nellie. Given the stark differences in their coloring, I have considered if she was actually William J. Peelle’s daughter or not. Her mother Matilda (Jury) Peelle was pregnant when she married William J. Peelle. Thus, adding even more intrigue. However, this question will likely never be answered since Lydia did not have any children.
Their brother Pat’s coloring was somewhere in-between Grandma’s and Lydia’s. This makes it seem more likely that they were all full siblings.
The Hair Line
Another thing that was passed down to many of the Peelle men is the hairline. It is shown of an unknown man in the Peelle family. If you look at William Johnson Peelle’s hairline and Passco’s hairline, you will see that they are similar. Passco’s is more noticeable in the picture when he was younger.
Longevity
Passco and Martha each lived into their eighties, giving their descendants a good foundation for a long life.
This chart clearly shows that if a person in the family made it to adulthood, that they had a high chance of living into their seventies or eighties. It is not uncommon that multiple people had heart related issues that caused or contributed to their death. This occurs a lot in families.
One set of deaths that is a bit unusual is that of Mossie Lea (Peelle) Wilkie and her son Ollie Wilkie. Mossie took a cold in 1905 and it quickly worsened. Nine days later she died of pneumonia. Two years later, her son Ollie became suddenly ill while visiting friends. A few days later, he died from pneumonia. It seems that they both had a weakness that allowed pneumonia to quickly overtake them.
Personality
Although each person has their own personality, some personality traits tend to run in families. One of the areas that the Peelle’s were similar is being strong minded.
Strong Minded
In my experience the Peelle’s and their descendants were very strong minded. As Grandma Nellie, who to most people would seem as a quiet, very nice lady, would say, “My head is made up!” This meant that you didn’t need to even argue your case that something was different than her point of view because she had already decided. I know a few cousins where this definition fits. I have also communicated with distant cousins where this was definitely the case. They were sure they were right no matter what evidence exists or doesn’t exist.
Interests/Skills
Occupation
When considering occupations, one has to dig a big deeper as Martha and Passco had only one son. That said, most of this branch of the family farmed as their primary occupation. However, the Peelle family also continued an interest in law as Passco’s brother and multiple of Passco’s brother John’s children practiced law. In our family line, William Johnson Peelle did not practice law, but was very interested in it. He attended trials from time to time. In addition, he was involved in several inquests when someone died.
Does that interest and knowledge transfer to the next generation automatically via DNA? Or, does the next generation learn and absorb via being around family members? I can’t answer that question with certainty. However, I have been accused by multiple people of having a background in law. And, I know that my parents did not express that interest to me while I was growing up.
Education
Another area of interest seemed to be education. Both the McCracken and Peelle families seemed to emphasize education. Great grandfather William Johnson Peelle was always attending different events in the evening – literary, spelling classes, debate, etc. He also practiced his writing by writing brief entries in his journals. It would be interesting to do a survey of the Peelle family and see the grade level of education attained through the generations.
Jack of All Trades
Life in the 1800s led many people to be jack of all trades. This was true of women and men, although it was different skills for the men and women. However, this seemed to be more prominent in the Peelle family than it was in some other families. For instance, William J. Peelle was a carpenter and farmer by trade. What is interesting is that his carpentry included making anything and everything. He made tools, wagon beds, crutches, rudimentary furniture, and houses/rooms added to houses.
His carpentry skills clearly meant that he had good visualization skills as he had no set of plans or diagrams to work from. In some cases, he didn’t even have another similar item to view before making the new item. Dad also had excellent visualization skills, which I suspect he got from both his mother’s and father’s families. Matter of fact, he had a semi-photographic memory as does one of my sons. Dad could visualize pages from books that he had read. This skill came in handy when working on cars and machinery as he could visualize how the parts needed to go back together.
The Stories
Most families hand down some stories. In the case of the Peelle family, the most famous story they handed down is that Passco’s grandmother Tabitha (Dunigan) Peelle was the daughter of President John Adams, conceived out of wedlock. It was assumed by cousins that this relationship was the reason that William Adams Peelle, Passco’s brother, was given the middle name of Adams.
A scrap of paper exists with the claim of Tabitha’s parentage written on it by a member of the family back in the 1800s. However, it also has other incorrect information on the same paper.
Personally, I have not seen any actual facts that lead me to conclude that the story is true, but some distant cousins have their heads made up! (See, they got it, too!)