The prompt this week in “Heirloom” and I hope you will enjoy this true story.   It is a story handed down in my father’s family about his mother’s heirloom cameo brooch.  This story has been verified by a letter I was fated to find- a letter written to my dad in 1980.   His mom was Cammie Lyster Swanson Lyons whom I have wrote about in earlier blogs.  My dad, LaFon Lyons,  had two sisters, Coralie ( the youngest) and June (see last week’s blog).  They all play a part in this ghostly story of the missing cameo brooch!  Parts of the story were told to me by my Aunt Coralie and the rest of the story comes from a letter that Coralie wrote to my dad, LaFon, in June of 1980.  I think I was destined to find this long lost letter and now can bring the mystery of the cameo brooch to light as all who were involved have now passed.

My grandmother Cammie owned three cameo brooches.  One was given to her by her husband and was a family heirloom.  She always treasured it.  A second cameo was given to her by a friend who brought it back from a trip to Europe for her.  She used to work caring for these dear friends.  The third cameo was sent to Cammie by her son LaFon when he was stationed in Alaska in WWII.  They were all beautiful brooches and all were treasured.  One brooch, the family heirloom from her husband, Clarence,  was especially meaningful to her but one day it disappeared!  It was searched and searched for.  It was not to be found until 15 years later when Cammie was visiting her daughter June.  Cammie caught June polishing it!  June reluctantly did give it back to her mother with some dubious explanation!

(I never saw the cameo brooch but I imagine it looked like this!)

Cammie lived with her daughter Coralie and her family for years leading up to her death in 1964.  Several years before she died, Cammie wanted to be sure the cameos were passed down after she died according to her wishes.  She instructed Coralie to keep the heirloom cameo brooch for herself as Coralie had cared for her so many years.  Also to give the brooch from LaFon to LaFon’s wife, Elma and give the third brooch from her friends to her oldest son Bill’s wife, Marion Lyons.  Of course, Coralie promised she would carry out her wishes.  When Cammie passed, Coralie, in her grieve, mistakenly gave the heirloom cameo brooch to June but gave Elma and Marion the brooches designated for them.  June had asked for the brooch, most likely claiming a right to it as being the eldest daughter.   At that time, Coralie felt she was doing the right thing.  However, in June of 1980, she wrote a letter to LaFon about the brooch and doubts surfaced.

Before I discuss the letter, please understand that Coralie and my dad were very level-headed and practical people.  Just ordinary folks!  My grandmother did, however, believe in spirits and came from a family of “healers”, midwives and, perhaps as the rumors have it, gypsies!  But my dad and Coralie were not ones to believe in spirits or ghosts!  Also know that Coralie lived in lower Michigan and LaFon in Upper Michigan, about 650 miles apart.

 

Coralie’s own words from her letter of June 30, 1980 can tell the story best.  She wrote, “I have my doubts about giving the Cameo to June.  This is why.  Several months ago I was lying in bed, wide awake I thought, waiting for Wayne (her husband) to get home from a meeting in Port Huron.  I suddenly became very cold and uneasy and saw mom, just her face but she seemed to be trying to tell me something but I couldn’t make out what…I just dismissed it as a dream.  Now, again about 2 months ago I was awakened from sleep, felt cold and as if someone had shaken me awake and I had the impression that mom was there and telling me to get the cameo from June, that she meant for me to have it, not June.  I can’t put into words the experience I had and I thought I should just forget it and I was just getting flaky in my old age.  Well, now I am sure that there’s more to it than that.”

Coralie goes on,  “Two weeks ago, everyone was in bed and I …was sitting in the front room reading the newspaper when I had the feeling or something that the rocker across the room had moved, I was startled to say the least.  I put the paper down and of course the chair wasn’t moving, but I did hear mom’s voice as plain as could be in my head and she said, ‘Ask LaFon, he knows, he’ll help you!!’  For two weeks now, I’ve tried to dismiss it from my mind but there just seems to be an urgency about it.”  The rest of the letter asks LaFon for advice on whether she should ask June for the Cameo and how to do it and how LaFon could help.    Coralie sent this letter to my dad’s place of work, the Forest Service in Bessemer MI instead of sending it to his home.  Her reasoning was that if LaFon’s wife read it first, she may question Coralie’s sanity! (I am sure my mom wouldn’t have!)

Now the surprising thing is that LaFon also had two or three visions of his mother around the same time period unknown to Coralie!  He told me back then how his mother’s face appeared to him near our front door and she told him to get the cameo brooch from June and give it to Coralie!  Now, this was not something my dad would make up and he believed what he saw.  All this happened  before he got the letter from Coralie!  Knowing how much the heirloom meant to his mother, he was understandably upset that June had the brooch, not Coralie.  Coralie thought that if she asked June for the brooch, “June would have some excuse why she couldn’t give it back.  Anything from her right to it to it being lost again or missing or something.” (Quote from letter)

I want to think that Coralie got the brooch back and this story had a happy ending but unfortunately it doesn’t.  Coralie and LaFon did discuss the issue I know but were never able to recover the brooch from June.  Although June passed away before Coralie, it was never returned to Coralie and the heirloom cameo brooch’s whereabouts are still a mystery to this day.

LaFon and Coralie in about the 1950’s!

Sources for this blog are conversations with my Aunt Coralie and my dad plus the letter Coralie wrote to LaFon in 1980.  Copies of the letter can be shared with interested relatives!

 

 

 

 

This week’s prompt is “Valentine”  and I have chosen to write about my Aunt Dreama June Lyons Cranston Schultz who was born on Valentine’s Day.  We never called her Dreama – just Aunt June.  I have no idea where the name “Dreama” came from but a lot of people in my father’s family had unusual names!  Aunt June was my dad’s sister – he had 2 sisters (a third sister, Rosemary, died as an infant) and 2 brothers.  If you look back on earlier blogs, you will find more about the family.  I want to give you an introduction to Aunt June this week as she will be in the “heirloom and ghost story”  blog I plan for next week!

Aunt June was born in Lynchburg, Campbell County, Virginia on the 14th of February in 1922.  Her parents were Clarence Edward Lyons and Cammie Lyster (Swanson) Lyons.  At that time, the family was living at 602 Richmond Avenue in Lynchburg.  Her father, Clarence Lyons was a carpenter.  Dreama June was the first daughter in the family and had 3 older brothers, William Lilburn, Edwin McWayne, and LaFon Camlyn.  (See what I mean about unusual names!)

When June was about a year old, in 1923, the family moved to Detroit, Michigan.  The families of Clarence’s brother James and sister, Mary Ann moved with them, too.  Times were hard and they were seeking jobs in the auto industry in Detroit.    By 1930, the family was living in their home on St Aubins St. in the ninth ward of Detroit.  Clarence was working as a mechanic in Aeroplane Manufacturing.   Aunt June was 8 years old then.   Her sister Coralie Jean was born the next year in 1931.  Their father, Clarence died in 1939 of tuberculosis.  It must have been hard on the family as the boys had to quit school and work to help the family.  Aunt June was 17 at the time and still in high school.

I do know that Aunt June had mastoiditis as a child and lost her hearing.  She had to have several surgeries which restored part of her hearing and she wore hearing aids all the rest of her life.   My dad used to say that his mom spoiled June because she was so sickly as a child.   When she was 19, she married Francis Phillip Cranston.  Francis was 25 at the time and he was born in Ramsey, Minnesota, the son of Leroy Cranston and Helen DaPron.

In 1942, Aunt June and Francis had their first child, Phillip Domman Ralph Cranston.  Phillip had red hair and freckles and everyone just called him “Rusty”.     This is “Rusty” at about 6 years old in 1948.  Aunt June and Francis had another son, Jon Francis Cranston, in 1943 or 1944, that died prematurely.   I believe there was another child that died prematurely as it was mentioned in her obituary.

I know that Francis Cranston and Aunt June divorced but haven’t found the records yet.  Francis Cranston eventually moved to Sacramento, California and remarried to Alice Brewer Gardner in 1961.  Aunt June later married Ernest Wilber Schultz in 1957.  “Uncle Ernie” was born 26 November of 1924.  He was a World War II veteran and was a happy guy – always joking around.  He was the son of Ernest W Schultz and Dora J Sibbie.  They lived in Mount Clemens area mostly and also lived a few years in Upper Michigan near June’s brother LaFon.

In 1966, Aunt June’s son, Philip (Rusty), married Diana L Frohm in Clinton township and they had 5 children: Phillip Cranston Jr., John Robert-Kennedy Cranston, Clarence Edward-William Cranston, Dawn Cranston and Ernest Patrick-Wayne Cranston.  Philip died on May 30, 2015 at age 73.  He had worked for the Chrysler Corporation for over 27 years and was a member of the UAW.  He had 18 grandchildren.

Uncle Ernie died in 1988 in Mount Clemens, Michigan.   Eventually, Aunt June lived with her son’s family.  She worked as a dietician assistant at the former St. Joseph East hospital in Mount Clemens and later as a nurse’s aid at various nursing homes including Lakepointe Villa in Clinton township.  She was a member of the First Baptist Church of Mt. Clemens.  She also belonged to the Ladies Auxiliary of the VFW.  Aunt June passed away on May 6, 2007 at the Mount Clemens Regional Medical Center at age 85.

I remember her quite well.   She was a petite woman with reddish hair and was always nice to us children.  You always had to talk louder to her but she was very soft-spoken.  At times, she did cause some upset in the family but that is for next weeks blog!  Stay tuned!

Aunt June and her brother, my dad, LaFon Lyons, taken in Bessemer Michigan in 1970’s.

Sources:

1930 United States Federal Census, Wayne County, Michigan, FHL 2,342,202.

Find A Grave Memorial for Dreama J. Schultz,  #19374355.

U. S. , Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007, database on-line, Provo UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015.

United States Public Records, 1970-2009, database, FamilySearch.org, Phillip D Cranston.

Michigan, Marriage Records, 1867-1952, database on-line, Provo, UT, USA, Ancestry.com Operations, Inc. 2015.

U. S. Cemetery and Funeral Home Collection, Ancestry.com.