Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Family History

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier:  Photo grabbed from Ann Lauren

Jackie Kennedy Onassis (at the time, Jacqueline Lee Bouvier), maybe the greatest American style icon, babysat my husband's grandmother once.  Wow.

The fam and I were having dinner at Water Street Brewery last night, and the in-laws were telling me some really fun facts about their family history.  Hub's great grandfather played chess (Wait, was it chess? And should there be one more "great" in there?) with Jackie O's father, which, I imagine, is how Jackie came to watch Gram one time.  We're supposed to remember these stories to pass them on to future generations, so I better get the facts straight before then.  And as you can probably already tell, I'm a terrible storyteller.

From the maternal side of the family (Right?  Dangit, I should've been taking notes) comes the owner of  Ballantine Brewery (For you designer-types out there, please excuse the blinding yellow background, center-aligned text, and Comic Sans font on this web page.), which, at its peak, was the 4th largest brewer in the US, according to Wikipedia.  Apparently, Milwaukee has always known good beer because Pabst Brewing Co. acquired Ballantine Ale in 1990, and it is now brewed by Miller.  It can be found and consumed today at Yankee Stadium.

I am truly not a history buff at all.  I enjoy reading historical fiction, and that's about it.  But, I do like fashion, and I do like beer, so both these stories were fun to hear!  Totally didn't mean to rhyme that.

In my own family tree, is Betsy Ross, who was rumored to have created the first American flag. Do you have fun historical figures in your family trees?

1 comment:

  1. I am related to Benjamin Franklin (mom's side). My great grandfather (mom's side) played golf with Willy Nelson and also fixed, detailed and painted tour buses for a bunch of famous people and musicians such as Alabama, the country group and only one I can remember.

    My brother actually was given my great grandfathers set of golf clubs, which also belonged to Willy Nelson.

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