Her Search For Her Mother Touches An Entire Chinese City

This story made me cry when I heard it the other day - one of those stories that you stay in your car to hear the whole thing, even though you have arrived at your destination.

I wanted to embed the interview, but I am not clever enough to figure out how to include it. Click here to find it.

Jenna Cook was born in China and abandoned on a street in the huge city of Wuhan in 1992 when she was just a baby.

Cook was adopted by a single American woman, a schoolteacher in Massachusetts, and later co-adopted by her godmother, who is her mother's partner.

Cook was accepted at Yale University, and at 20, she decided to go back to Wuhan in search of her birth mother.

A local newspaper in Wuhan wrote an article about her, touching off a strong response in the city and far beyond. Cook says she was contacted by people in every province in China. Some said they had given up children and others said they were simply taken by her quest.

Cook ultimately met with 50 families to see if she was their daughter.

In those talks, she discovered many things, including the collective pain of Chinese families who had given up children. In most cases, the families had wanted a boy and decided to give up the child when it turned out to be a girl.

Her efforts in China became her college thesis at Yale and an article in Foreign Policy. She spoke about her experience with Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep.

On how she went about searching

Maybe it was really naive of me, but I was hoping that maybe somebody would see my face and think, "Oh, she kind of looks like my cousin," or something like that. Like maybe my own body could serve as a type of evidence of my family, of where I come from, my own genes. I also ended up publicizing the story in Wuhan through the newspapers and through the television.

On who came to see her

In the end we met with almost 50 families that summer. So we heard 50 different stories, and I imagined that it would be mostly women, but I was definitely wrong. There were birth mothers who came alone, but there were also many birth fathers who came alone, and some families brought like the entire family. There would be moms and dads with the grandparents and then other siblings and then the grandkids. There would be like eight or nine people in the room. It was really incredible.

On what she heard from birth families

If I had to kind of extract one coherent narrative, I think they talked a lot about missing this daughter and they really worried about her. They wanted to know if she had survived and if she was OK — kind of like people coming out of a war or refugees or someone emerging from a large disaster and just wondering if the other side had also survived as they had.

On parents who hoped she might be their daughter

One birth mother brought a piece of cloth. She had used the cloth 20 years ago to sew a baby suit for the day that she and her daughter would part. And then she hoped that if she and her daughter were to reunite later, her daughter would have the baby suit and then she would have the scrap. It would be kind of like a lock and key. But I definitely didn't have such a baby suit.

On what she heard from mothers who gave up a baby

For most people it was the combination of needing a son, wanting a son, and also the fact that they already had so many children. I have to say, it was surprising, because in the U.S. we hear "one-child policy," we think, "Oh, there's just one child that the families kept." But I don't think I met any families with one child. They all had like three, four, five, six, seven or even eight children, and there was a pattern in that most of the children of higher birth order were female and then they would keep having children until they had a son. And so the missing daughter was usually not the first daughter. They would usually keep that one. The missing daughter was usually the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, etc.

On whether she found her birth family

I didn't. But I feel like going through the search and listening to the different stories has given me some idea of who they might be or what kinds of things they might have confronted. I am still looking but in a less active way. My DNA was left at a local police station. I figure I just kind of leave it up to fate.

I put one copy of the search poster in my file at the orphanage. It was like the first 30 pages were all other people writing about me, this small infant with no voice and really no ability to choose her destination or fate in the world. And to be able to come back 20 years later with a search poster that I had written about myself and to kind of add that in as the last page, that was really something that felt satisfying.

Controlling parents, mean kids

You thought I was MIA, didn't you? I suppose I have; lots going on.

In the meantime:

Totally scary! (And the study was with girls, no less. What about the boys?) I am very worried about the effects of helicopter parents. The whole idea of them terrifies me in general. I try to imagine what parenting was like in the past... I certainly didn't feel watched over all the time. We did have TV, though we were not aloud to watch a lot of it. We did play with neighborhood friends a lot... and even on the slow streets behind our houses.

The toxic effects of helicopter parenting may not end once children head off to college. A new study shows that undergrads who’ve been raised by controlling, manipulative moms and dads may take their anger and stress out on other students. Researchers from the University of Vermont interviewed 180 predominantly female college students about their relationship with their parents as well as their tendency to behave aggressively. Those with domineering parents were more likely to exhibit “relational aggression,” which often involves spreading rumors and backstabbing as well as excluding or publicly embarrassing friends, reports Medical Daily. The students’ physiological response to stress influences how they unleash this hostility on their peers, the study shows. Those who perspired more and grew more agitated while recounting a difficult experience were considered impulsive, while the students who sweated less and reacted calmly were deemed more calculating and manipulative. “If you’re calm, you can be strategic and planned in your aggression,” says lead researcher Jamie Abaied. “You can really use your aggression to control your relationship and stay dominant over your peers.”

Taken from The Week, the February 12th edition.

Happy Easter 2016!

Dolce & Gabbana Needlepoint

I was flipping through a fashion magazine and this image caught my eye *because* of the needlepointed rose on her shoulder... Maybe as a needlepointer I'm not so uncool, after all.

Though, this dress looks terrible as shown here. Their magazine ad is better.

Klaralund & Noro Silk Garden yarn

Oh my gosh.... I think it could be as many as 8 years later and I have finished one of my sweaters. Just in time for warm/hot weather in New Orleans and then later in Washington, DC. Sigh.

Yarns have been made after this Noro came out which seems to be much better quality and look very similar. The colors of the Noro Silk Garden yarns are particularly pretty, but there is so much junk spun in to the yarn. Hard, scratchy things that are tough to pull out.

I like the result, but though I followed the pattern, the sleeves are a little long for me. I made the Large, allowing for a 41" bust.

I bought the yarn at Wool Winders in Rockville, MD. I can't tell when I bought it, but like I said, probably 6 to 8 years ago....

Mes Amis Quilt Shop

I spent a wonderful afternoon with Cathy and Melissa at Mes Amis Quilt Shop in New Orleans. We talked quilts, genealogy, restaurants, history, fashion and a variety of other subjects. I went with the intention of finding Mardi Gras fabric which the web site indicates they carry all year so that I might make myself a skirt for 2017 Mardi Gras.

Here are the fabrics I bought today:









I started with all Mardi Gras themed fabrics and branched out when I didn't like the combinations. Of course after I had picked out my fabrics I turned around and there was a quilt with many of the Mardi Gras fabrics coordinated very nicely.

I ended up buying three yards of the bird fabric... it is a glorious fabric and I thought I might make another skirt or dress.

1919 Movies

I was curious about what films were released in 1919. You can see a list here and a list of those from 1918 here. What do you suppose these movies say about the time? I mean, right now our movies are about blowing up the world, diseases, zombies and alien invasions... What were they worried about at the end of the war?

March 3, 1919

Dearest Family,

It’s the day for writing you, but I’m blessed if I know what I am to write about.

I’ve done nothing but fool around and go to the movies since last week and I expect to keep up that schedule for some time. The Section is doing a bit more work now, having taken over some new territory. We’ve been detached from the 13th Division and attached to the 21st Army Corps, so we have to do all the work of evacuation in the territory over which the corps has jurisdiction. Fortunately this region isn’t a devastated one so we don’t have any of this civilian supply work to do. If you see, since the armistice ambulances are permitted to be used for all sorts of hauling jobs so we’re lucky we haven’t a lot of that sort of thing to do.

At last I’ve heard the first really definite news about going home. Barring accidents SSU 580 will leave for the U.S. between the 1st and the 15th of May. That’s not so soon as I had hoped for but its sooner than I had expected that probably means that I’ll be out of uniform before July 1st – with luck. So here’s hoping I have luck.

Since my last letter to you I’ve had a letter from you and one from Nelly Graham. I don’t know of just what date your letter was but it must have been around Feb. 8 or 9.

The cold weather is all gone around here and some of the trees have started budding. It continues very rainy.

I’m writing to Chas today – just a few lines to let him know I’m still alive. I haven’t written him in at least a month. I’m behind on letters to everyone but you. But honestly there’s not a blooming thing to write about. It’s like being a million miles away from the world to be here. Thank Heaven it can’t last forever.

Be sure + tell me how Harry made out.
As ever your son,
Herbert

Believe it or not this individual with his hat on all wrong and the sour look is your son. Honestly I don’t feel so mean as I look. The picture was taken in Luxembourg near Nagen.


I don' know if this is the picture Herb enclosed with the letter... But he does look sour! And he did complain of the rain at this point, didn't he? Who might have taken the photograph?

Here's a movie made in Denmark in 1918 that caught my eye - a peaceful, vegetarian civilization!

A group of the researchers from the Earth in a spaceship traveling to Mars, where, to big surprise, finds a peaceful vegetarian and pacifist civilization.

Olive Lee Retires - February 29, 1968

I post Olive's announcement forty seven years after she announces her retirement after forty three years of service to Cluett Peabody & Company. She doesn't sound exactly thrilled at the company, which is a shame.

Just as an FYI, from wikipedia:

Cluett Peabody & Company, Inc. once headquartered in Troy, New York, was a longtime manufacturer of shirts, detachable shirt cuffs and collars, and related apparel. It is best known for its Arrow brand collars and shirts and the related Arrow Collar Man advertisements (1905–1931). It dates, with a different name, from the mid-nineteenth century and was absorbed by Westpoint Pepperell in the 1980s. The Arrow name is still licensed to brand men's shirts and ties.

The company manufactured shirts and collars in a historic building at 123 First Street in Leominster, Massachusetts.

The building was constructed in 1902 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1989.

I have no idea what happened - did she break her leg/hip at work, hence the joke? Obviously she was at home for quite a while recuperating.

And who is 'we' she refers to? I know her mother, Nellie Jane, was living with her. Were sister Margaret and husband Myron living with her, as well? It seems she has moved with her mother to Bronxville by November of 1968.

I'm afraid I don't recall where I took these Cluett Peabody & Co. photos - I can't seem to recreate my search to give them credit. Oops. Could have been wikipedia or could have been the Rensselaer County Historical Society.

Olive is the third from the right in the back row.
The Cluett Peabody Ladies 

Olive is standing on the far left
Was this her retirement luncheon?

The sin of ‘cultural appropriation’

Ok, this doesn't have a lot to do with genealogy... maybe travel and fiber art, because of sources of inspiration. Mostly I just thought it was interesting. I found it here, from the Week Magazine.

Katy Perry dressing like a geisha in a music video. White American women learning to belly dance. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston allowing visitors to try on kimonos made in Japan. All of these have been angrily attacked in “the new war on cultural appropriation,” said Cathy Young. Today, any artist or person who incorporates or experiments with styles, music, or ideas from another culture—no matter how positively—is condemned for committing “a creative sin.” The concept of cultural appropriation began as a justifiable critique of the literal cultural theft of art and artifacts by colonial powers, and of “glaring injustices” such as white artists getting rich off black musical styles without sharing the wealth. “But the hunt for wrongdoing has run amok.” Culture cops now rebuke non-Asians for wearing jewelry with yin-yang symbols, or the museum in Boston for engaging in “yellow face” by letting non-Japanese try on a kimono. “What will be declared ‘problematic’ next? Picasso’s and Matisse’s works inspired by African art?” Non-Asians cooking Thai food? To respectfully blend cultures is no sin. In fact, it’s the American way.

Cathy Young
The Washington Post

Hanging in Epinal

February 23, 1919

Darling Mother,

Since I last wrote you I have had two letters from home – those of January 26 and February 2. There’s literally nothing new around here. The weather has been quite rainy for some time and threatens to continue that way. We’re still stationed in Epinal and I expect that we are to be here for some time.

The list of Sectors to start for home up to the end of March has been given out but SSU 580 doesn’t appear on it. At any rate I’m thankful that we’re in a city instead of some two by four village where nothing ever happens except morning noon and night. Here at least there are always moving pictures and sometimes regular shows.

I’ve been wondering how Harry made out with Barrows. I do hope he gets a chance at it because I think it’s an excellent opportunity. Barrows is a pretty big man in that game.

I’ve thought several times about that proposition of moving to N.Y. as Chas suggests and if Harry comes through I think it would be a good idea. But there’s plenty of time for that later.

I hope Dad gets that extra money he’s hoping for. It certainly must be needed in these days of the H. C. of L.

You have probably seen in the papers that a new system of leaves has been inaugurated in the A.E.F. I’m pretty near due for my next leave, but don’t think I’ll take a long one. However I do expect to take one of the three days leaves in Paris. Of course I was there for a day on my other leave but one can’t see much in a day and it’s a shame to have been in France over a year without knowing Paris a little. And of course Paris wasn’t really Paris at the time because it was all dark at night because of the air raids. I don’t believe I told you that there was a raid the night I was there about 3 a.m., one of the last of the war. I woke up out of a sound sleep and was half scared to death for about five minutes till I got my bearings. Of course air raids were no new experience to me because from July 15 to August 15 they were bombing within two miles of our camp every single night and sometimes several times a night but I wasn’t expecting anything like that in Paris. That was the night of September 16th I think.

This time, if I do get to Paris, I shall trot around to Mr. Rankin’s friend with my letter of introduction that is now over eighteen months old. It may still be good.

Your loving son,
Herbert

Looking at the History Channel for what was happening on September 16th 1918 I found this about September 16, 1916, to end in September 1918:

On September 16, 1916, one month after succeeding Erich von Falkenhayn as chief of the German army’s general staff during World War I, General Paul von Hindenburg orders the construction of a heavily fortified zone running several miles behind the active front between the north coast of France and Verdun, near the border between France and Belgium.

This “semi-permanent” defense line, as Hindenburg called it, would be the last line of German defense; its aim was to brutally crush any Allied breakthrough on the Western Front in France before it could reach the Belgian or German frontier. The British referred to it as the Hindenburg Line, for its mastermind; it was known to the Germans as the Siegfried Line.

After waging exhausting and bloody battles against the Allies at Verdun and the Somme, and with the U.S edging ever closer to entering the war, Germany’s leaders looked to improve their defensive positions on the Western Front. In February 1917, the German army began a well-organized withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line, a move calculated to give a period of respite before the Allies could begin their attacks again. The withdrawal reduced the length of the line the Germans had to defend by 25 miles, freeing up 13 army divisions to serve as reserve troops. On their way, German forces systematically destroyed the land they passed through, burning farmhouses, poisoning wells, mining abandoned buildings and demolishing roads.

After the withdrawal, which was completed May 5, 1917, the Hindenburg Line, considered impregnable by many on both sides of the conflict, became the German army’s stronghold. Allied troops would not breach it until the last days of September 1918, barely one month before the armistice.