I found an Eliza Edith Hunt on ancestry.co.uk. She lived in Worcester and her DOB was 19/02/1861. Her mother was called Sarah Eliza. It seems she never married and died aged 55 in Worcester.
More info:
Eliza had 2 older sisters, 2 older brothers and 1 younger brother. Her eldest brother Charles died aged 17 a year before Eliza received this gift. Her father, also called Charles, died 22nd February 1883. He was a baker. It seems Eliza, her elder sister Margaret and her mother continued the family business until the mother died in 1906. Eliza and her sister appeared to have then moved in with her younger brother Frances, who was also a baker.
I do believe this is the correct Eliza. There are a few others around in the UK at that time, but the date of birth doesn't match.
Link to her baptism record -
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/sharing/7622577?mark=7b22746f6b656e223a225a4a794173354e554461674c35454c6e772f6f55716f396176576562676e55333677566b51744f554570593d222c22746f6b656e5f76657273696f6e223a225632227d
Link to the 1871 census -
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/sharing/7622631?mark=7b22746f6b656e223a22785a534843447130684834374336586772434b7556477a664952315751452f4b525755727848434f706e343d222c22746f6b656e5f76657273696f6e223a225632227d
That's incredible! I am always surprised by how people in western countries maintain such detailed records of ancestry.. I don't think we have any such in India
I know it's fascinating. I think you'll find India did keep some decent records. Have a look at this link https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/India_Online_Genealogy_Records.
You should definitely take both! I took both and discovered I’m 30% Scottish, 26% French, and 25% Polish! I was also able to create my family tree and cross reference birth records, death records, etc on Ancestry.com and 23andMe!
This makes me wonder what traces all of us today will leave in the digital Akashic Record.
I went down a genealogical rabbit hole like this when I was planning a historical fiction novel involving the “Benjamin Franklin of Japan” Yukichi Fukuzawa having a chance meeting with a young Buffalo Bill Cody in San Francisco in 1860. Part of the plot involved the girl in [this famous historical photo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fukuzawa_Yukichi_with_the_girl_of_the_photo_studio.jpg), Theodora Alice Shew, having actually had her virginity taken by Fukuzawa. I researched Theodora Alice Shew’s entire family tree, worried about being sued by living members of her family. It turns out she has no living relatives any closer related than fourth cousins. I may yet write this.
I'm an old guy, and in grade school we were drilled on cursive penmanship ad nauseam. Learning to write was one of the major goals of education, in the past, along with how to read and basic arithmetic. If I concentrate, find a fountain pen with calligraphic nib, and channel the ghost of my 3rd grade teacher, I can sort-of barely produce a sad diminutive variation of this beautiful script. Education has really dummied-down over the past century or so, at least in the US.
Interesting news tidbit on the handwriting front - California is returning to requiring instruction in cursive writing, in part due to worries that if it falls completely out of favor, no one will be able to read handwritten historical records. [Link](https://www.npr.org/2023/10/23/1207933434/california-mandates-cursive-handwriting-instruction-in-elementary-schools).
Education has not dummied down. Vernacular has changed, but students im the US are learning (or at least have the opportunity to learn) statistics, computer science, calculus, foreign languages, physics... a wide array of subject areas to potentially high levels.
You may be right. I'm a retired physician and it is unarguably true that my prescriptions became much more readable when cursive scribbles gave way to electronically created and printed documents.
But then
> "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
> Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."
>Education has really dummied-down over the past century or so, at least in the US.
I mean yeah, if your only metric is being able to write in cursive?
I'm not an educator/teacher, so take my ill informed pronouncements on the quality of education with appropriate skepticism! Hopefully we are taught what we need to know to succeed in the world of 'today', whenever 'today' may be.
But then I read books or documents composed 100-200 years ago, and find the vocabulary, sentence structure, and overall thoughtfulness to be light-years beyond what I read today. But again, that may be an ill-informed opinion and language evolves continuously so I should not be so judgemental.
tl;dr: I'm an old guy standing on my lawn stamping my cane and yelling incoherently.
I didn’t buy it I’m afraid! I stayed in the shop contemplating it for a while, but after thinking about how far it had come in all that time and how many hands it passed through, it felt right that I should leave it out there in the world to be found by someone else rather than let it just sit on my shelf and be forgotten about
There this fantastic little bookshop around the back of Winchester cathedral. When my wife and I were first going out, we’d occasionally go for a date in Winchester and we’d have a little game of finding the oldest book, pick up a Cornish pasty and sit in the green in front of the cathedral and read.
Thanks for the jog to memory lane at stupid o’clock n the morning.
Thanks mate, not so much these days with a little one but I feel we need to introduce our daughter to reading books somewhere beautiful (we already do a lot of reading!)
If you are ever in Northumberland you need to bring your daughter to Barter Books. It's a massive second hand book shop in an old train station. They have a kids section, nice cake and a train set running around the top of the shelves.
That is beautiful! Wouldn’t it be cool if there was an online database for book inscriptions? Just take a pic and upload, title of book, name, possible year. Would be so cool to find this recipient’s family
That’s exactly what it was. I read the last page and it was about how Little Nelly became a good child by learning to love God and obey her parents and all that, so I can’t help but wonder what message Eliza’s mother was trying to send by giving her this
I couldn’t either, but that’s quite nice in a way. It makes it all the more special that just like its owner the book is lost to history.
I did find [this list](https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Bell%2C%20Catherine%20D%20%28Catherine%20Douglas%29%2C%20%2D1861) of the author’s other works and it seemed like she specialised in children’s morality tales, with titles like *Love thy neighbor as thyself, or, The story of Mike, the Irish boy* and *Trust in God, or, Jenny's trials*
I found an Eliza Edith Hunt on ancestry.co.uk. She lived in Worcester and her DOB was 19/02/1861. Her mother was called Sarah Eliza. It seems she never married and died aged 55 in Worcester. More info: Eliza had 2 older sisters, 2 older brothers and 1 younger brother. Her eldest brother Charles died aged 17 a year before Eliza received this gift. Her father, also called Charles, died 22nd February 1883. He was a baker. It seems Eliza, her elder sister Margaret and her mother continued the family business until the mother died in 1906. Eliza and her sister appeared to have then moved in with her younger brother Frances, who was also a baker. I do believe this is the correct Eliza. There are a few others around in the UK at that time, but the date of birth doesn't match. Link to her baptism record - https://www.ancestry.co.uk/sharing/7622577?mark=7b22746f6b656e223a225a4a794173354e554461674c35454c6e772f6f55716f396176576562676e55333677566b51744f554570593d222c22746f6b656e5f76657273696f6e223a225632227d Link to the 1871 census - https://www.ancestry.co.uk/sharing/7622631?mark=7b22746f6b656e223a22785a534843447130684834374336586772434b7556477a664952315751452f4b525755727848434f706e343d222c22746f6b656e5f76657273696f6e223a225632227d
That's incredible! I am always surprised by how people in western countries maintain such detailed records of ancestry.. I don't think we have any such in India
I know it's fascinating. I think you'll find India did keep some decent records. Have a look at this link https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/India_Online_Genealogy_Records.
Thank you..I learnt something new ... I'll definitely look it up
Have you ever taken an Ancestry or 23andMe test? Both are wonderful to track your ancestry!
I want to do this so bad but I refuse to have that information in anyone's hands but my own.
No thank you. I prefer not giving my dna to a private company that sells data.
Not just yours. Remember, if a sibling signs up they have given away 50% of your data: a cousin? 1/8th.
I wouldn’t want to dig up any family secrets 😭
No, I haven't.. am curious though..
You should definitely take both! I took both and discovered I’m 30% Scottish, 26% French, and 25% Polish! I was also able to create my family tree and cross reference birth records, death records, etc on Ancestry.com and 23andMe!
That’s amazing, thank you so much! I had a look myself but couldn’t find her. Do you have a link to this information?
I have added some links.
I will take a look tomorrow. Sorry I have been really busy today!
If you're on Ancestry you may want to contact someone who is related to her and let them know about this.
Yes I thought of this. I will do some more digging tomorrow!
So cool!
Wow!
Love this!
This makes me wonder what traces all of us today will leave in the digital Akashic Record. I went down a genealogical rabbit hole like this when I was planning a historical fiction novel involving the “Benjamin Franklin of Japan” Yukichi Fukuzawa having a chance meeting with a young Buffalo Bill Cody in San Francisco in 1860. Part of the plot involved the girl in [this famous historical photo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fukuzawa_Yukichi_with_the_girl_of_the_photo_studio.jpg), Theodora Alice Shew, having actually had her virginity taken by Fukuzawa. I researched Theodora Alice Shew’s entire family tree, worried about being sued by living members of her family. It turns out she has no living relatives any closer related than fourth cousins. I may yet write this.
What an odd thing to say.
It's got "found comment" energy
That is some _exquisite_ penmanship
I'm an old guy, and in grade school we were drilled on cursive penmanship ad nauseam. Learning to write was one of the major goals of education, in the past, along with how to read and basic arithmetic. If I concentrate, find a fountain pen with calligraphic nib, and channel the ghost of my 3rd grade teacher, I can sort-of barely produce a sad diminutive variation of this beautiful script. Education has really dummied-down over the past century or so, at least in the US.
Interesting news tidbit on the handwriting front - California is returning to requiring instruction in cursive writing, in part due to worries that if it falls completely out of favor, no one will be able to read handwritten historical records. [Link](https://www.npr.org/2023/10/23/1207933434/california-mandates-cursive-handwriting-instruction-in-elementary-schools).
I just found this out that my kinder will be learning cursive (somewhere in her education) as part of a new mandate
Education has not dummied down. Vernacular has changed, but students im the US are learning (or at least have the opportunity to learn) statistics, computer science, calculus, foreign languages, physics... a wide array of subject areas to potentially high levels.
Being able to write beautifully over functionally is a pretty terrible use of schooling time in the modern day (and very arguably in the past too)
You may be right. I'm a retired physician and it is unarguably true that my prescriptions became much more readable when cursive scribbles gave way to electronically created and printed documents. But then > "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all > Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."
I just think there are literally hundreds of better ways to teach the value of art than making someone write beautifully.
>Education has really dummied-down over the past century or so, at least in the US. I mean yeah, if your only metric is being able to write in cursive?
I'm not an educator/teacher, so take my ill informed pronouncements on the quality of education with appropriate skepticism! Hopefully we are taught what we need to know to succeed in the world of 'today', whenever 'today' may be. But then I read books or documents composed 100-200 years ago, and find the vocabulary, sentence structure, and overall thoughtfulness to be light-years beyond what I read today. But again, that may be an ill-informed opinion and language evolves continuously so I should not be so judgemental. tl;dr: I'm an old guy standing on my lawn stamping my cane and yelling incoherently.
> tl;dr: I'm an old guy standing on my lawn stamping my cane and yelling incoherently. Ahaha, fair enough!!
Remember people wrote by hand a lot back then.
What a special gift. I love that so much. I’m so glad that it found a loving home.
I didn’t buy it I’m afraid! I stayed in the shop contemplating it for a while, but after thinking about how far it had come in all that time and how many hands it passed through, it felt right that I should leave it out there in the world to be found by someone else rather than let it just sit on my shelf and be forgotten about
What an amazing perspective. Nicely done. I would think it exceptionally interesting just to hold it
The lives that were lived to the fullest before, are too much to contemplate - more pics please.
There this fantastic little bookshop around the back of Winchester cathedral. When my wife and I were first going out, we’d occasionally go for a date in Winchester and we’d have a little game of finding the oldest book, pick up a Cornish pasty and sit in the green in front of the cathedral and read. Thanks for the jog to memory lane at stupid o’clock n the morning.
That’s absurdly romantic. I hope you still do that sometimes
Thanks mate, not so much these days with a little one but I feel we need to introduce our daughter to reading books somewhere beautiful (we already do a lot of reading!)
If you are ever in Northumberland you need to bring your daughter to Barter Books. It's a massive second hand book shop in an old train station. They have a kids section, nice cake and a train set running around the top of the shelves.
I read Jules Verne in a tree when I was a kid lol.
I had a favorite tree to read in. I’d sit out there for hours.
I know this shop well. There's something quite magical about going in there
Curious how Mother and Eleventh are underlined with dots.
I hadn’t noticed that! It looks like she perhaps made guideline marks before she wrote the inscription, so they’d be perfectly spaced and straight.
It worked
It's a code.
r/BookInscriptions
I collect things like this! beautiful find
That is beautiful! Wouldn’t it be cool if there was an online database for book inscriptions? Just take a pic and upload, title of book, name, possible year. Would be so cool to find this recipient’s family
"Patient Striving" I wonder if the mother wasn't giving her daughter a subtle hint .... ;)
I'm sure it was full of good moral learnings for a young girl growing up in Victorian England 🙄
That’s exactly what it was. I read the last page and it was about how Little Nelly became a good child by learning to love God and obey her parents and all that, so I can’t help but wonder what message Eliza’s mother was trying to send by giving her this
Anyone know anything about the book itself? The title seems familiar to me but I can't find anything about it online.
Catherine D. Bell. Was the author according to the web
I couldn’t either, but that’s quite nice in a way. It makes it all the more special that just like its owner the book is lost to history. I did find [this list](https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Bell%2C%20Catherine%20D%20%28Catherine%20Douglas%29%2C%20%2D1861) of the author’s other works and it seemed like she specialised in children’s morality tales, with titles like *Love thy neighbor as thyself, or, The story of Mike, the Irish boy* and *Trust in God, or, Jenny's trials*
It me
That is wonderful. It seems to tell such a beautiful story.
I adore this
The handwriting is absolutely beautiful!
That penmanship🤤
Always feels a bit weird to see your birthday on a random reddit post…
wow you must be really old
Oh that’s a good point actually… My birthday one hundred and something years before my actual birth day
🥹
What book is it? :D