Deedy.com Blog

Among the photos found in great-aunt Mae's apartment was this portrait of her father, Edward B. Deedy (or before he changed his name - Edmund B. Deady). Pin-pointing just when this photo was taken is a bit difficult (as always, click on photo to view larger). It does have the stamp of a Worcester photography studio (Park Studio Cor. of Main & Park Sts Worcester Mass). Since it is just Edward in the photo, likely this was taken prior to his marriage to Johanna Donovan on November 8, 1899. According to his October 17, 1899 Naturalization paperwork, he had been a resident of the United States for at least five years.

It is possible that Edward arrived in the US on May 11, 1891, since an Edm'd Deady was passenger #410 on the S.S. Pavonia according to this record. However, Edward shared his name with a cousin who also immigrated from Ireland to Worcester around this same time - so I can't be 100% sure this record belongs to my Edmund Deady.

Looking at the photo, he is clearly a young man, but how young? He played a bit fast and loose when declaring his age on various documents - but he reported that he was born in 1875. So if this photo was taken about 1899 he would have been 24 years old.

Labels: Deedy

Among the items in the Dowd Collection was this photo of a thatched roofed home located somewhere in the county of Roscommon, Ireland. In 1966 the Dowd family visited Ireland and located the McDonough homestead. Along with this picture were others on 35mm slides. The slides are a series of images of the house, the surrounding views of the countryside from the farm, and images taken along the road leading to or from the farm.

Unfortunately, while scanning the slides I experienced some technical difficulties. I have other images of the home and farmstead to share in future posts, but one image in particular I am missing - a photo of a sign post which must be near the old McDonough farm. While I am missing the image, I do have the information on the sign.

Pointing left to Geevagh 5 1/2 and Drumshanbo 17 and right to Ballygawley 4 and Sligo 10



If you click on the map above to view larger, you will see that I have found and circled three of the four locations from the sign. It appears that the most likely area of Roscommon that the farm is located is in the Northern area and near the Sligo boarder.

The Roscommon riddle that we need to solve is this - given the information in the postcards, the picture, information from the sign, and locations on the map - can we narrow down a specific location for the farm?

As always any additional information or suggestions are welcome either by email or in the comments.

Labels: Dowd_Collection, McDonough

Among the collection of Dowd images, was this photo of Bartholomew McDonough (Father to Mary McDonough Dowd and Uncle to the McDonough children of 1 View Street). As you can see the original photo was not in the best shape. I spent a few hours today fixing the image to the best of my ability.

I wanted to highlight this work to assure anyone out there who has old pictures that are not in perfect condition - these images can be saved!

Labels: Dowd_Collection, McDonough

My Father and I just returned from a lovely afternoon with Tom and Dianne Dowd. During our visit they shared with us their amazing collection of photographs, newspaper articles and other family history mementos.

I brought along my scanner and laptop and set-up "shop" in their dinning room and captured as much as I could. I can't thank Dianne and Tom enough for their generosity in sharing the collection and in their good humor and patience during the hours that we imposed on their hospitality!

Here is my first post regarding the material collected today. I have tagged this with both the McDonough tag and a new Dowd_Collection tag to help me stay organized.



This was one of the first images Dianne handed me. On the back is marked Agnes McDonough Thompson, who was the 8th of the 10 children of Thomas & Mary McDonough and born June 7, 1893. Here she is seen clutching her jump rope and striking a very cute pose. She appears to be about 3 years old. Finding this photo among the Dowd collection of photos provides a clear link that yes - we are definitely connected and belong to the same McDonough family tree.

Labels: Dowd_Collection, McDonough