My Great-Great Grandmother

While I was trying to organize stuff for my altered books this afternoon, I found this cabinet card my grandmother gave me years ago. It’s a picture of my great-great grandmother who ran an academy for young ladies in London, England with her two daughters. She’s holding a magnifying glass and a book, so presumably she viewed herself as an educated woman, not just an instructor of deportment and tea pouring.
I found this out from Dad tonight who is all excited about seeing this picture. He didn’t even know it existed, and he loves working on the family genealogy. Apparently my great-great grandfather was an autocrat, so her son James immigrated to Canada where my grandfather Edwin was born in 1888.
It’s hard to know just when this picture was taken. After looking at Victorian costumes on the Internet, my guess is that it’s sometime in the 1870s. But I’ll have a better idea when my dad digs out the family tree. I’ll also find out her name. The sad thing is that that my great-great grandmother probably never saw her son again because she writes on the back: “To my son James…wishing him a Happy New Year. May we in heaven meet.”
I spent quite a bit of time repairing great-great grandmother’s face in PhotoShop. The rest of the picture is damaged too, but I don’t have time to fix it now because I’m going away to Andrea’s cottage for our annual get-together. Because the cottage is on Lake Mazinaw where the Group of Seven liked to paint, we’re taking our watercolors. Talk to you Wednesday.