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Attached pages are family tree information for Kentner Family from upstate
NY. Current oldest living member is Ray Kentner at 100+. Much of this
information came from Ray. Additional data was obtained from New York Census
records and recently Donald Maxwell and Dottie
Clark. They have both contributed huge amounts of effort to the Kentner
family tree. Ray Kentner Photo and news
article (written by Ray) at age 100 in Waddington, New York. Kentner
Coat of Arms: Below is a recent email from Dottie Clark & Don Maxwell talking about a
recent lunch with Ray: > Hi Kent!
> ---------------
>
> Had a grand visit with Ray (100 yrs old and counting!), and Don got to
hold the medal that Conrad ("Coonrad") KENTNER won for his
participation at the Battle of Crysler Farm! He also held a pair of dress
boots of Ray's father.
> We looked at many, many old pictures in albums of our ancestors, and
Ray kindly let me borrow a few to scan and make copies. I love the one of
Coonrad! There is also one of his third wife, Eliza PRATT...one of his
sister Lovina's husband, David SHELL... and one of
Lovina KENTNER
herself. Stats on the back of Lovina's pic: > Lovina KENTNER b 7 Jan 1816 Madrid Twp, St Lawrence Co, NY (Dau of Conrad (Coonrad)
KENTNER b Osnabruck, Stormont Co, ONT, Canada 1793 and Elizabeth COONS b Matilda
Twp, Dundas Co, ONT 1798) Lovina m
David SHELL 1832/33 - Left Madrid Twp 1850 for Wisconsin. Died
> Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin 30 Oct 1894
> Have any of you ever seen a hair wreath? The "hair
wreath" is intruiging! It was made of very fine wire all curly-cued up into
different flower shapes - a real work of art! BUT...fastened amongst the
delicate wire flowers were locks of all different colors of hair. The ladies
told me that it used to be the
custom that when anyone visited the KENTNER homestead, if their hosts thought
they had really nice hair, they would ask the visitor for a lock of
their hair, right then and there! The locks of hair were intertwined in
the wreath, then the whole shebang was hung on the wall in a glass-front frame
about 4"-5" deep. Very unusual, but from what the ladies said, this
was not just a KENTNER thing - it was fairly common, and the resulting 'work of
art' was always hung in a deep frame and proudly displayed. Have any of
you ever heard of anything like that?
> While there, we saw the spinning wheel that belonged to Ray's grandmother,
I think it was. Also the flax wheel, which had beautiful woodworking
detail on it. The ladies showed me love letters of ancestors, and we marveled at
the expressions and phrases used, eg. from one suitor to his lady-love: "I
pray that my dear friend gives me a fleeting thought now and then" or
something akin to that. Not anything X-rated, that's for sure! Everything was
ultra-polite.
After
visiting with Ray, his daughters took us to lunch at a
Diner/Restaurant near Ray's home. Next
door to the Diner was a wonderful old barn built by Ray's father, Darwin
KENTNER. Later we saw saw the house where Coonrad lived and died. We went to the
cemetery in Waddington! We saw so many familiar surnames!
Just a few: RUTHERFORD, SHAVER, KENTNER, COONS, MARCELLUS/MARSELLIS, CLINE,
CASSELMAN, LEWIS, LEIZERT, EAMAN, UTMAN...etc.
It is a wonderful, warm feeling to meet cousins, and it was definitely no
exception yesterday!
> Dottie
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