Portland 1912

PORTLAND, OREGON 1912

This 8x10 picture hung on my g/grandmother's wall for many, many years. She owned and operated a millinary shop on Fairling St., while my g/grandfather built houses for a living. Perhaps he's one of the men in this beautiful old photograph? She was, Ella Rosetta Shawver Gess and he was, George William Gess, both previously of Boise, Idaho. G/Grandma died Mother's Day 1965 at 94 years of age. Born in 1866, she would have been 46 at the time of this picture and he would have been 44. The Shawver family migrated by way of wagon train from Kansas and the Gess family migrated by way of the Chandler wagon train from Randolph Co., Missouri in 1862. Some of the Gess family stayed in Oregon while some made the Boise Basin their home. I guess my g/grandfather couldn't make up his mind? I'm told that he ran back and forth, living in Idaho and attending church on Burnside in Portland, Oregon. By 1912 they were living in Portland full-time. The Gess's had three boys, two who survived and three year old Layton, who was sadly attacked by wild pigs and died in 1893. He rests in eternity near his grandparents at the Joplin Pioneer Cemetery in Caldwell, Idaho. In 1928 tragedy struck again when Ella lost her loving husband of forty years. Two years later-1930, she lost another son in a horrible logging accident at Shaw/Bertram Camp in Grants Pass, Oregon. Still, with a heart full of sorrow she survived, as well did this photo that cast the biggest shadow off her little bedroom shrine.

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