We were on a weekend fun trip to the Gold Country. We planned to go to the Placer County Museum in Auburn, CA. My Great Great Grandfather was the last city marshal there, and we were interested in the area’s history.
We located the museum. It looked like a school building, not an old one, but rather like something from the ’60s. It wasn’t at all like the old courthouse we had just visited. The courthouse was magnificent and built in the 1800s.
Anyway, we walked into the museum and dropped our donation into the little glass box near the entry. Louise and I started wandering around. We were the only people in the museum except for a woman we thought was the curator or a volunteer. The middle-aged woman walked over to us and started to greet us when she covered her mouth as she was saying, “Oh my God.” I looked around to see why she was so surprised. I checked to make sure my fly wasn’t open. She chuckled then motioned for us to follow as she introduced herself. “I’m Kate Greene, the museum curator. Sorry about my reaction to you, but you have to see this.”
We followed her through the museum to a wall with enlarged reproductions of old newspaper articles about the area, mainly from the late 1800s and early 1900s. She pointed to a photo of several men together, most having substantial handlebar mustaches. I sang in a barbershop quartet and had a handlebar mustache myself. The man in the middle looked like me and was taller than the other two. The caption under the photo read, “City and County Officials, 1898.” It described who they were. The one in the middle was my Great Great Grandfather, Anson A.S. Waldo.
I said, “Wow. I look like him”. That’s my Great Great Grandfather, and he is tall like me.”
The curator was very excited and tried to talk Louise and me into moving up to Auburn and being part of the historical society. She allowed us to look through records in the back that were not normally open to the public. It was a great day.
When it was time to leave, the curator said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you guys. But, seriously, consider relocating up here, or at least maybe just belonging to the historical society.”
We told her we’d think about joining and said goodbye.
After the long drive home, I went online to Newspapers.com and looked up the article we had seen at the museum. It was in the Placer Herald, April 25, 1898, and the photograph was much clearer than the display in the museum. So I clipped it and printed it out.
I could see that Anson Waldo had the same mole as me above his left eye. I thought to myself, so that’s where I got that from. I looked closer and saw a scar on his nose and a nasty scar on his cheek. The spot on his nose looked like the scar I have from when I had cancer removed from my nose. I went and got my magnifying glass and looked more closely at the photo.
I ran into the living room, where Louise was playing games on her iPad. I shouted, “Louise…you aren’t going to believe this!” I showed her the photo and pointed out the scar on the nose.
Louise said, “Well, he does look like you except an older you. Yes, I see the mole and the scar on the nose. I hope you do not think that could be you. It can’t be you 125 years ago. Besides, you don’t have a scar on your cheek.”
“Of course I don’t think it is me; that is crazy.”
I went back to the computer to see if I could find more newspaper photos of Anson Waldo. I decided to call it a night when Louise shouted to me that it was garbage night. I went into the garage, opened the garage door, and wheeled the garbage can out. I was still thinking about the photo, not paying much attention, when I tripped over a hose on the lawn, fell, and cut my cheek pretty deeply on a sprinkler.
(Fiction)
Scattered Thought 