THE BEGINNING.

I was born on June 15, 1957 to Donald Leon Ashley and Edna Mae"Jeri" Murphy in Sacramento, CA at Mercy General Hospital. They took me home to 4777 Mead Avenue where we only lived for a few months before packing up and moving to Anchorage, AK. It was to be one of many moves in the next few years, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Why I'm here started along time ago.

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ASHLEY

Who knows exactly where we came from in our family history because face it, in the 1600's you could disappear to a different city or country and change your name from Smith to Jones and start all over. Of course DNA has helped prove or disprove our roots along with a paper trail of records. So as time goes on I might add or change some of this story as more and more information becomes available. So here goes with what we have so far! On my Father's side, John Ashley my 3rd Great Grandfather came over from England to St. John's New Foundland in the early 1800's. He married Ellen McCarl who was born in New Foundland. Their son William was born in St. Johns December 24th, 1840. The earliest document I have found so far is the marriage of my 2nd Great Grandfather, William Ashley to Bridget O'Dell sometime between 1861 and 1868. William was a lumber scaler as stated on his death record. The record also confirms his Father John was born in London, England and his Mother Ellen was born in New Foundland. They had 6 daughters of which my Great Grandmother Helen was the 2nd oldest. By the end of the 19th century William and family moved to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in the city of Cheboygan. My Great Grandmother Helen was briefly married to Fred Moses in 1897 as this birth record shows, with my Grandfather William Kenneth being a Moses. By the 1900 census Fred is not with them. My second Great Grandmother Bridget died in 1909 and the 1910 census shows my 2nd Great Grandfater William living with his oldest daughter Cathrine and family and still in Michigan. In the 1920 census my 2nd Great Grandfather, Great Grandmother and Grandfather are all 2100 miles away living in Aberdeen, WA! My Great Grandmother Helen was the owner of the Strathcona Hotel at 409 1/2 Wishkah Street as her DEATH CERTIFICATE shows. It is a parking lot for a furniture store as of today. She passed away in 1924 at 50 years old and is interned here at the Fern Hill Cemetery along with my Grandfather Kenneth. My Great Great Grandfather William returned to Michigan and died two years later leaving Grandfather Kenneth in Aberdeen.

THORSTONSEN

My Paternal Grandmother's side is descended from Russian fur trappers marrying Aleutian women in the early 1800's. My 2nd Great Grandfather Nicholaus Gregorief married Matrona Chimovitski and had six children of which my Great Grandmother Tatiana was the oldest. She married Louis Thorstenson and they show up on the 1900 census living on Chenaga Island, Prince William Sound, AK. My Grandmother Minnie shows up in the 1910 census showing my Great Grandmother living in Ellamar, AK as an Aluet and a widow because Louis, a fisherman drowned in 1909 around Hawkins Island, AK. In my mind I envision something along the lines of the TV show "Deadliest Catch"! He was just 50 years old. Tatiana died of "consumption" at 64 years old. In 1920 Minnie is still living in Ellamar a small mining camp in Prince William Sound close to where Louis drowned. The family (Gregorieff's, Thortonsen's and Anderson's) were more than half of the listed people on the census page. Grandmother Minnie was in a short marriage before she met and married Kenneth Ashley. Kenneth worked in a saw mill and had a hearing problem as shown on his WW1 draft registration. My father was born in 1929 in Cosmopolis, WA 2 years after his sister Juanita was born. As the story goes, Minnie became pregnant with a 3rd child and it being the Depression, had an illegal abortion and she died just 27 years old. In 1930 the family was living in Grays Harbor, WA. Kenneth too only lived to be 43 years old when he passed. Not a lot of longevity on my fathers side, huh?

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CRAIG

Now my Maternal Grandfather's side of the tree has alot of documented history. The Craig family came over from Scotland to New Jersey in 1685. They descend from James Craig born 1400 which you can saw on the previous link. My 8th Great Grandfather John Craig and his son Archibald my 7th Great Grandfather came over on the ship Henry and Francis to New Jersey in 1685. There is a gap in documentation between Archibald and my direct decendent David Craig born in 1756. He is shown in the 1790 census living in Ballston, NY which eventually became part of Saratoga County. He is listed as postmaster of "Craigsboro"in Sartoga County from 1832 to 1835. David and his wife Catherine are buried in Chatfield cemetery in Greenfield, NY. Their son John, my 5th Great Grandfather and Grandmother Elisabeth lived their entire lives in New York as farmers. My 4th Greatgrandfather Sylvester and family were the start of the Westward movement first moving to Waterloo, Canada in 1851 for sure with alot children including my 2nd Great Grandfather, Francis. This is where my Great Grandmother Mary was born in 1868. Two year later in 1870, Sylvester then moved the family to Harmony, Minnesota for how long I am not sure but by 1880 they were in Republican City, Nebraska. and finally for him by 1885, Spink, South Dakota where he is interned. At the time of this writing I'm not sure what happened between 1885 and 1900 because the 1890 census was destroyed, but my Great Grandmother Mary Agnes Craig got married to a Thomas Martin and had 3 boys and either got divorced or Thomas Martin passed but by 1900 she shows up in Puyallup, Washington with her new husband George Murphy, her 3 sons from Tom Martin and her daughter Hazel with George. Also her Mom Jennie, Dad Francis and siblings are with them. Jennie passed away in 1919 while Francis died 4 years later. I will try to trace the Murphy side next.

MURPHY

I still don't have a lot of documentation on the Murphy side but I know for sure my 2nd Great Grandfather Green Murphy was born in Illinois, before becoming a farmer in Caldwell, Missouri where my Great Grandfather George Washington Murphy was born in Lamar, Missouri. Just like other families that lived in Lamar at that time, we had Jesse James as a family friend but of course no proof. So my Great Grandmother Mary Craig who had moved down from Canada, met and married George and they had their first child Hazel there in Missouri. As stated in the Craig story above, they show up in the 1900 census in Puyallup with her parents and other family. The two families were working for Ezra Meeker a famous pioneer. By 1910 they had moved to Toppenish where they too had a home built on Franklin Avenue. Bill, John and Pearl were born there. George and Mary helped raise Mom and Aunt Jan in their early years. Mary died in 1944 while George remarried before passing away in 1956, the year before I was born.

GROSSNIKLAUS

My Maternal Grandmother's side comes from Switzerland and is the only branch of the family across the ocean that we have contact with. We can trace our family way back in time over there, but this is mainly our American story. My Great Grandfather John Gawiler immigrated to the United States in 1902 where his sister Elisabeth and husband Edmund Ruedi had settled in New Jersey the same year. After hearing of the riches to be made in Alaska being a gold miner, he worked on the railroad across to Seattle. There he met his friend Arthur Gloor who had been mining in Alaska the last couple of years and together they headed North becoming partners gold mining. In 1910 he returned to Switzerland where his father Anton was a customer at a resturant that Emma Grossniklaus worked at. After Anton introduced them I guess it was love at first site because when John asked Emma if she would like to return to Alaska with him she agreed. Getting married in Switzerland was a drawn out process and because of the short mining season in Alaska they decided to get married in the States. Emma and John soon returned back to the gold fields in Council, Alaska. John and his partner Arthur had a few men working with them while they did a type of placer mining. My Grandmother Margaret was the born there in Council. (Paul and Helen were born in Haycock.) . Arthur had married also and his wife Berti and Emma became fast friends raising their kids and making a homestead. Expanding their claims, they went to Haycock where on their way the barge capsized and they lost a lot of their belongings. Because the barge had other commitments, the familys were left there on the sand bar to recover as much as they could and wouldn't return to get them for a couple of weeks. After 10 years of pretty successful mining they decided to move back to the States for a little easier life. John rented a home in Seattle on 10th and 55th near the University and left them for 2 years while he went back to Alaska to sell their equipment and claims. One of his friends and fellow miner Mr. Gibb had bought 80 acres in Toppenish, WA and not knowing exactly what he wanted to do, John decided he would be a rancher/farmer too and bought 80 acres also. First they bought a few cows and thinking of selling the milk from them. That didn't amount to much money so they invested in chickens and that one did! John built quite the chicken farm with multiple hatcheries and through the Farmers CoOP were selling their eggs across the United States. He even patented a "Pecking Shield" to keep them from fighting and hurting each other. Their last child Ruth, was born there and sadly Paul at 13 drowned in a local canal.

DON ASHLEY

So with both my Paternal Grandmother and Grandfather living short lives, my father at 18 months ended up living with his Great Aunt Elizabeth in Tacoma, while his sister Juanita was a foster child first and then moved to San Diego living with her Aunt Margaret Thortenson. They did not grow up together and it would be over a 20 year seperation before they found each other again. Great Aunt Elizabeth died when Dad was 16 and for a short time he moved in with the schools principle and then with the Parish family as shown in this 1950 census. Dad attended Stadium High School in Tacoma, WA and had life long friends there such as Carl Herzog and Claire Haycock of Haycock Petroleum in Las Vegas. A couple of other friends were Sam Baker who accidently kicked his front teeth out punting a football and Clara Bowe who ended up marrying Robert Stack. He told me the story that shortly after graduation, he and a couple of friends rode the trains to Arizona and buckarooed there for the summer. At 19 he was an oiler on the SS William Beaumont and made it as far away as Pusan, Korea. Coming back home, he became a radio dispatcher for the Washington State Police.

In 1952 he married Geraldine Tafoya. They had two children Marcella and Donald. Not sure what ended the marriage, but it didn't last long as he married my mother in 1956. He even squeezed in a brief marriage between them to a Mary Tulley. There was only sporadic phone and letter contact with his children and it was quite a few years before he actually saw them again. Dad ended up moving to San Francisco, CA and first working at a furniture store and then moving to San Rafael and worked at a grocery store with friend Freddie Boracchi who would play a key role in introducing my mother and him.

JACK MURPHY

My Grandpa John Murphy met my Grandma Margaret Gawiler at Toppenish High School where they both attended. She married him at 19 years old. Their first child, my mother was born in 1931, followed by her sister Jeannette in 1933. Margaret couldn't cope with the stresses of life and was committed to a hospital after just a few years of marriage. Mom and Aunt Jan moved in with their Grandpa and Grandma Murphy while their father relocated to Seattle for a managing job at Safeway. There he met and married a lady Margaretta and had the girls move in with them. They soon moved to Bremerton where John Murphy managed a sporting goods store. He also was a game warden which caused him to be away for days at a time. While away, the "wicked" stepmother would force them to eat cereal with salt in it, food that was too hot to eat, she would beat them for no reason (Mom got the brunt of it) to the point where she went to school with black eyes. When the school tried to intervene, Mom who was scared to say much in fear of more beatings covered for her. Mom even got hit over the head with pruning shears that resulted in the loss of sight in her right eye. Well it seems this lady was definitlely an early pioneer of child abuse. One day Aunt Jan at around 16 years old was fed up with it and ran away for a couple of days. She hid in a lean-to structure on the side of an upholstery shop. After the second night she snuck into the unlocked shop and seeing a telephone decided to call home and see who would answer. Well the police were tracing the phone calls coming in and soon found her hiding spot. She was taken to the hospital and after questioning and some further investigation the authorities knew what was going on and so did Jack. He got an apartment away from her. Believe it or not, now that Margaretta was exposed, Mom with her new found power she stayed with Margaretta for a couple of months just so she could torment her. She wasn't afraid of her anymore!

EDNA MURPHY (AKA "JERI")

Mom attended Kitsap High School where she blossomed and began to enjoy life without the wicked step mother. She worked in Bremerton at Triple X Drive-in where she was a car hop, then Bremer's Department store first as a switchboard operator then moved into accounting. Her Dad, John had moved to Alaska with his 3rd wife Alice Baldwin and was working for the Northern Commercial Company. He suggested Mom move up there, which she did and ended up working for the CAA the predecessor to the FAA. Living with her parents above the NC company she attended a party and met a life long friend Bea Walker who was a stewardess. When mom had enough of Alaska she moved back to Washington living with her Great Aunt Pearl and not long after moving there she recieved a letter forwarded from her Dad and it was from Bea. In her letter she spoke glowingly about Sacramento, CA where she was living and suggested she move there. She did and ended up working for a few different architechs, Charles F. Dean, then Satterlee Tomich and finally Nicholas-Tomich. Now both my father and mother who were born and raised in Washington are now living in California, just 90 miles apart!

JEANETTE MURPHY

During the same time period her Sister Jeanette became a receptionist at Velos & Yolanda's a dance studio in Bremrton, WA. The Manager George Farah caught her eye and after a whirl wind romance they decided to get married. They took off for Nevada with some friends but only made it to Oregon where one of the friends hit a bridge sending her and her significant other to the hospital. George and Jeannette ended up taking a bus and arrived late to the Minden Hotel in Minden, NV (It's still there) and the manager woke up the local justice of the peace who came over and married them! It was 1952. After the honeymoon they returned North to meet George's parents in Portland, OR before packing up and moving to Los Angeles, CA. Jeanette ended up working in a cleaners and George of course in a dance studio. (Arthur Murrays). Apparently George was a snappy dresser and enjoyed nice clothes for both he and Jeanette. Money was no object for the wardrobe budget but the rent budget not so much. After living one step ahead of landlords they ended up in Sacramento with Jeanette's sister Edna. This was the end of their marriage and after moving to Las Vegas, George was killed in 1960 in a head on collision before they could divorce.