Family History Writing Challenge Day 5: Fallows

The Fallows family is one of my favorites to research and write about, I think because there is SO much information on them. They were fairly wealthy and so there's hundreds of mentions of them in their local newspaper and dozens of surviving photographs - even a scrapbook I think my great grandmother made! Plus, my grandmother collected some more personal and character information on them, I gather from her mother-in-law before she died. This adds a personal touch to it, which can be rare in some parts of genealogy - we collect facts but how much do we really know about the character of these individuals?

Originally, the Fallows were a poor family from the Oldham/Royton area of Lancashire, England during the industrial revolution until my 3rd great grandfather, Josiah Fallows, immigrated to America in the mid-19th century to make a better life for himself. And that he did! By the time he died, he owned a large estate in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania and produced a brood of seven boys (what a household that must have been to grow up in!). The Fallows married into the Godshall family.

So here's the latest update of one of my longest family histories - 3,134 words, 23 sources, 14 photographs (I mean to add more photos, there are literally dozens more): Fallows.

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