bethb's Diaryland
Diary
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I'm only as cool as my family
my boss was talking about a book about women in Shanghai and I mentioned my great grandmother being a missionary in China in the 30's and 40's and at some point, she was kidnapped. And rescued or at least freed somehow.
The fact that I had a relative kidnapped in such an exotic land fueled many childhood playtime scenarios for me- coupled with a movie I always thought was "Perils of Pauline" (turned out not- or at least none of the Perils... on Netflix. I'm still trying to find that movie- i need someone with ridiculous movie knowledge because I remember a few key things about it- crumbling wall, teaching an indian kid who gives her a jeweled apple, which I think translated into her agreeing to marry him but she didn't know that it meant that....oh the hijinks)
Anyway- my family never (or really barely) talked about it. I found an article about it lining the drawer of a dresser in the shore house in Seaside. I wonder if it was because Minerva was Pop pop's second wife. I don't know how much my mom knows or doesn't know about her grandmother. But on the off chance I could find another newspaper article, I googled her name +kidnapped +the town she was from and found a hit on the Yale Library website. I emailed them to see if I could read the document that mentioned her and the librarian wrote back to tell me she had in fact written a short booklet and I guess donated it to Yale and would I like a copy? There's a chapter entitled "My 17 days with the bandits". She (the librarian) also says "she never mentions her fear, only her faith" which....I'm not sure how that sits with me. Other than I am thrilled beyond belief to have found this and grateful for a kind librarian who was able to find a momento from one of the cooler parts of my family history. I can't wait to read it.
3:21 p.m. - 2010-02-03
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