A few days, a few successes

It's only been a few days since posting the photos from my third great-grandmother's photo album on this blog and so far four photos have been successfully identified! Some came from the assistance of close relatives, while others from distant cousins I only know through email and a shared interest in family history.

A few photos from Grandma Sabin's album have been identified as her daughter, Delilah Pearl (Sabin) Reinig as a little child. Delilah Pearl was born in 1878, so the photos date to the late 1870s. You can see those photos here and here.

Grandma Jackson

Another photo (this one) has been tentatively identified as William W. and Sarah E. (Jester) Jackson, Grandma Sabin's parents. That came from careful comparison with a more recent image of a much older woman with the handwritten label "Grandma Jackson" on the back. Comparing the face of the elderly "Grandma Jackson" to the face of the woman in this tintype image has led several people to name them as the same woman, making her my fourth great grandmother.

William and Sarah both died in 1911, so it surprised me we never had any photos of them. Now I know they just weren't labeled!

Yet another photo was identified (or half identified) but the eagle eye of a distant cousin through the Jackson family, who spied George Jackson, brother to Grandma Sabin, as a young man. We still don't know his companion in this photo, but maybe one day someone will recognize the face. The Jacksons had several young men who died in their late 20s and early 30s in the 1870s and 1880s, so we may never know his identity if he was one of those siblings. Still, we won't give up hope.

I'm encouraged by these early revelations. Hopefully it's the start of more to come.