Grandma

  I am in the process of trying to reorganize my house.  I have gotten past the getting rid of huge rafts of things and now am tweaking it to move more efficiently.  The problem with Hubby and I, we are both keepers.  So, past the stuff that we use on a daily basis with our 5 person household, the rest is like a museum of family items.  I was digging around in my recipe cabinet and found Great Grandma Laura (Gill) Duff's recipe book.  What a treasure!  It was also a reminder to me to check everywhere for family references!  As I perused the pages, I came across a recipe for "Grandma Tarver's fruit cake".  That made me stop.  Who is Grandma Tarver?!? I went back to the drawing board. I did have both of Grandma Duff's grandmas accounted for, but did this go further back past them?  I couldn't let it rest!
  How to figure such a thing out.  First I did some basic searches on Ancestry and Google combining Gill (Grandma Duff's maiden name), Duff, Tarver, and Pennsylvania (where the Gills and Duffs were from).  No dice.  Second I did a search in Osage County, Kansas for Tarvers, assuming it may have been a family friend.  I found an Edmund Tarver, born in 1815 that immigrated to that county in Kansas in 1867.  The Duffs came in 1871.  Sounds good.  Edmund Tarver and his wife Rebekah were born in England.  They resided in Valley Brook township (proximity) and are buried in Lyndon cemetery where the Duffs and Gills are buried as well.  I can only assume at this point that since Grandma Duff left both of her own Grandmas in Pennsylvania, she found a wonderful Grandma on the Plains of Kansas to help fill that void:)  I can't imagine, leaving your family a half a country away, possibly never to see them again.
  Doing all that reminded me of how I proved that a "Grandmother Glenn" was Grandma Duff's real grandmother.  In some of the things Hubby inherited was a large amount of Victorian calling cards.  They span the time period from before the Gills/Duffs left Pennsylvania to after they arrived in Kansas.  Many are family, and some just friends. Several years ago when I sorted through them I found one that stuck out - "Grandmother Glenn". 

The majority of these cards were Laura's.  I knew her Grandmothers to be Martha (McKee) Gill & Harriett (Stewart) Morehead.  So who was this gal?  Then I came across a memorial cabinet card for a Harriet Glenn and an obituary for the same who was a "grandmother to many".  So was I looking at a grandmother figure like "Grandma Tarver", or since Harriett Morehead had the same first name was this her remarried?  

  A comparison of birth & death dates & also finding corroborating evidence on-line I concluded that it was in fact Harriett (Stewart) Morehead who married a Robert Glenn after her first husband passed.  Interestingly, Robert's first wife was a cousin to Harriett's first husband. 
  So, we should conclude that we should never assume, but always check out any lead - who knows what you'll find! :)