One of the things I'm often asked about by new visitors to the office, are the old photos in the lobby. Yes, those really are relatives of mine. The top photo is my great grandparents, my maternal great grandmother (my mother's mother's mother), Elsie Sullins Webb and Andrew Webb.

She was 96 years old when she died in 1966. I was 6 years old and she and I used to go for walks together.

The photo, well it is not actually a photograph, it is a charcoal drawing, was made on her wedding day in 1888 when she was 18 years old. They didn't look very happy in the picture as they were not smiling, but having a portrait made at that time was a serious event.

The picture on the bottom is Elsie's parents, my great great grandparents, Joshua Sullins and Anna Taylor Sullins. He fought in the Civil War and survived it.

Anna died in October of 1919 and Joshua died in the following month of November of 1919, both from the Spanish Influenza Pandemic that began the year before in 1918. I'm unsure of the date of this portrait, but like the other, it is actually a charcoal drawing. Both are in the original frames, actually the lower one is in two frames, a smaller one that was later placed in a larger frame. Both are held up with old hay baling wire.