Progress and interesting views in the discovery process on Emmett Wilson’s life.
For 17 years, my husband and I owned and lived in a 98-year old row house in Washington, D.C. about 10 blocks from the U.S. Capitol. We loved our neighborhood — the Victorian (and older) row houses had history and character despite the fact the neighborhood was sketchy, the front […]
Sometimes I catch myself wondering what the hell I’ve been doing with Emmett, who has taken over my research life for the past six years. I did not go looking for Emmett; rather, years ago before Emmett, I’d started out writing about someone else, Rosa LeBarte Countryman, my great-grandmother. When […]
Piled high with boxes, the floor thick with dust and recently scraped paint chips, this room, like much of the building, is a work-in-progress. Aaron Ritz, one of the owners, has been hard at work all morning; he’s determined to bring his patient, Pensacola’s landmark 1915 Gothic Revival hospital built […]
Of course, I’d love to have had everything available about Emmett Wilson to be accessible via the Internet. It would have certainly made my life easier as I dug around for primary sources in a variety of libraries and archives, both near and far, over the past five years! But […]
Here’s something that finally answered one of my big Emmett Wilson puzzles over the past five years of research: Check this out: The line drawing (above) is a screen shot of the duplex 211 West Cervantes, as it appeared in 1907. Note that this one structure had TWO numbers (211 […]
I’ve been spending the last few days of 2017 checking in with old databases and past sources, to tie up any loose ends, or to check on any updates. Surprise! A ‘new-to-me’ publication found on Google Books, The Train Dispatcher (1950, Vols 32-33, p. 674), has a retirement article on Emmett’s […]
Today, I visited Boligee, Alabama, population 328, in search of Mt. Hebron Cemetery, in a quest to locate Emmett’s grandparents, Cephas Love Wilson Sr. and Emily B. Wilson. Using the information posted on Find-A-Grave, and typing the address into Waze, I set out with my husband on Interstate 20/59 West, […]
I often wonder what kind of employee or boss Emmett was? Was he considerate and competent? Quiet and hardworking? A lunch-stealing backstabbing jerk, perhaps? An excellent source of information on Emmett-as-colleague would be the office records — a desk calendar, case files, or even an office journal. I don’t doubt […]
I found this book on Alibris, a book reseller website. I like to check back for obscure Florida texts and anything that has Emmett’s name listed. This one’s been out of print for awhile. It was purged from the Dickinson Memorial Library in Orange City, Florida. It was cheap. […]
Want to know why writing Emmett’s book has been taking so long? I submit: I found this during my ‘go back and check databases for updates’ routine. Something I do every other month or so. The Chronicling America database is huge, which is why one would want to limit the […]
Tell my story. 