Pastdiscovery

Pastdiscovery As a Certified Genealogist, I am passionate about bringing the past alive and helping you to discover your roots!

I've always been fascinated by Colonial gravestones. This was taken at the Burial Hill Cemetery in Plymouth, MA. This wa...
11/12/2025

I've always been fascinated by Colonial gravestones. This was taken at the Burial Hill Cemetery in Plymouth, MA. This was a child's headstone. 😇

For many Americans, memories of Thanksgiving morning are inseparably tied to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. This ye...
11/24/2024

For many Americans, memories of Thanksgiving morning are inseparably tied to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. This year marks the 100th anniversary of this nostalgic New York City event. The first Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was held in 1924. It was initially known as the "Macy’s Christmas Parade" and was staged to promote holiday sales and welcome Santa to New York. The floats were based on nursery rhyme themes, with Santa riding the most elaborate one. There were clowns, wild animals from the Central Park Zoo, ba****ck horse riders, and brass bands. The parade ended at Macy’s, where they unveiled fanciful window decorations. Most parade participants were Macy’s employees, although a few professional performers also participated. The parade proved a big success, and a new annual tradition was born.
~from Newspapers.com

My grandmother was born in 1903 and graduated from high school in 1917 after completing the 8th grade. She went to work ...
11/19/2024

My grandmother was born in 1903 and graduated from high school in 1917 after completing the 8th grade. She went to work for the NY Telephone Company as a switchboard operator.
According to Ellen Stern in "Once Upon A Telephone: An Illustrated Social History" (1994), the ideal employee was “obedient, virtuous, and…unmarried.” If she married while employed, she lost her job. She also put herself in jeopardy if she didn’t dress “prim and proper,” didn’t keep focused on her switchboard, didn’t sit perfectly straight, spent time “chattering” with other employees or callers, crossed her legs, blew her nose, or wiped her brow “without permission” from an overseer. Height, weight, and even “arm length” were also important considerations, ensuring that one could transfer calls efficiently. Also, women under five feet tall, or those with “foreign” accents, need not apply. One’s attitude was also a big deal: operators had to “respond quickly, efficiently, and patiently” to all customers, no matter how irate the customers might be—or how tired they themselves were. Considering that a large part of their job consisted of answering “Number please” on “the average of 120 times every hour,” it was easy to become less than enthused about answering calls—and when you got an irate customer, it could be even harder.

Have you heard of mourning rings? Mourning rings are jewelry worn to remember someone who has died, and if one was creat...
10/24/2024

Have you heard of mourning rings? Mourning rings are jewelry worn to remember someone who has died, and if one was created in memory of one of your ancestors, you might be able to learn more about them and their family in the papers.
Mourning rings were engraved with the person’s name and death date and often contained a hand-painted image or a lock of hair. The tradition of mourning rings dates to ancient times, though they gained popularity during the Victorian era.

Below: Mourning ring for William Byshop. Somerset County Gazette: July 2, 2015

Address

41 Kendall Avenue
Rutland (city), VT
05701

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Pastdiscovery posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share

Category