The Importance of Memory

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • June 1, 2012

Of more of a personal note, my husband’s father passed away last week. My husband’s mother passed away in 1999. They were collectors – collectors of pieces of history not their own and collectors of pieces of family history. My mother-in-law was adopted as an infant and my father-in-law lost his mother at age two. When his father remarried, another family became part of the family history so there are all sorts of roots and stories and grandmas and grandpas that may not be blood related but all are family.

As we took in all of the things in the house, I realized we did not know the history behind each and every piece. As a curator and a collector of historic items and family stories as well, I was overwhelmed. Living so far away, we had to spend some time sorting at a very tough time. When it comes right down to it, it is stuff – things – and we know things are not important. But, when you feel the weight of family history and you know these items were important to someone, or were carried from a far distant land so that one could maintain a connection and have something familiar with them in a strange new place, it makes it harder.

The stories however are the most important. Stories are important to pass down through generations so that family members know where they came from and know those who had the strength and courage to make decisions to insure that the next generations lived strong and well. I certainly would not have the courage or emotional strength to come from where my family came from. Imagine leaving family behind to arrive in a new world after a long voyage, not speak the language, and have no place to live? And then, having to start from scratch.

At the lunch after the services, my husband’s aunt told us her memory of the mother she lost when she was only five – she is the full blood sister of my father-in-law. She says she only remembers her as a ghost-like figure. A kidney disease left her bedridden and she died two years before a treatment was found for what ailed her. Aunt MJ remembers being brought into her bedroom once per day so that she could see her two children and they her. That is the only memory MJ has of her mother but at least she has one. I do not think my father-in-law remembered that daily visit with his mother.

That is a sad memory. But other memories abound that are happy or funny. Such as Great Grandma Behnke at age 100+ shooting squirrels on her roof (Horrors! She and I would indeed have a fight on that one.) – they were destroying her house. My husband remembers her stalking through her home in Indiana as a tornado drew close – she ordered him to hide away but she was out to keep track of its movements to protect her family. Feisty is not strong enough a word for her and I have always admired the photograph we have of her – her strong, steady gaze at the camera as she fishes from her canoe. When we would visit my in-laws, we would sleep under her handmade quilt – squares individually stitched, stuffed with pantyhose, and then all stitched together. Cold winters are no match for that quilt. And now, it will rest in my home.

These stories are important to pass on in order to help us to understand where we have come from and who came before us. I also firmly and most importantly believe that by telling these stories and talking about those in the past that they continue to live on. So, I will keep telling the stories of the Mitchell family to visitors at the Mitchell House and recounting stories of my own family and my husband’s. Because each time I speak the name of a person no longer with us, she or he lives on.

Recent Posts

By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger May 27, 2025
This is what our landscaper for MMA calls it. “The ancient vine.” He tells the people who work for him not to touch the “ancient vine.” I have probably made him – and all of them – terrified of it. I am even terrified of it to some degree. I refer to the grape vine behind the Mitchell House this is supposed to be Peleg Mitchell Junior’s grape vine – Maria Mitchell’s uncle who inhabited the house from about 1836 to his death in 1882. It has two trunks but one died several years ago. Because of that, each year I try to root shoots. It’s fairly easy to do – when you cut back the vine in late fall/early winter. I have had success but not success protecting the shoots I baby all winter from bunnies and other critters try as I might. I started doing this when the one trunk died – I was PANICKED! The landscaper stays away because I have told him if anyone is going to accidentally harm or worse yet, kill, this grape vine it would be me so I only have myself to blame. So each November/December – once ALL the leaves have fallen off – I climb my ladder and quietly, carefully, and fearfully cut back the stems typically to two buds. I have been somewhat successful in spurring grape production – and these grapes attract some amazing birds in the fall. It takes me some time – and I pretty much hyperventilate the entire time – and then, I stare at it all winter. Passing under it multiple times a day to reach my office. Hoping, and yes, praying, it will come out in the spring. It’s a late budder so just recently the buds started to show themselves – thank goodness! – and I was rewarded today (May 5, 2025) with this wonderful hot pink color on the edges of the leaves as they are uncurling. JNLF
By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger May 19, 2025
May 27. {1857} There is this great difference between Niagara and other wonders of the world, that is you get no idea from descriptions or even from paintings. Of the Mammoth Cave you have a conception from what you are told, of the Natural Bridge you get really a truthful impression from a picture. But Cave and Bridge are in still life, Niagara is all activity and change. No picture gives you the varying form of the water of the change of color; no description conveys to your mind the ceaseless roar. So too the ocean must be unrepresentable to those who have not looked upon it. Maria Mitchell would tour the Mammoth Cave and the Natural Bridge during her trip to the southern United States as Prudence Swift’s chaperone – I have written of these travels and Prudence before. Niagara Falls is a place she likely saw on her way to visit her younger sister Phebe Mitchell Kendall, who once lived with her husband in Pennsylvania. I was a bit surprised that she feels the way she does about the Cave and Bridge being well-represented by images but I do kind of se her point. But Niagara, the ocean, any moving body of water – she is right. You don’t fully comprehend it until you hear it, touch and taste it, see its colors, and feel it splash, sprinkle, or mist across your face. Niagara certainly mists across your face – sort of like a breezy day at the beach and the salt mist that slowly builds across your face and coats the beach grass so that it shimmers in the sunlight. JNLF
By Jascin N. Leonardo Finger May 12, 2025
I have been watching it. Waiting. Today, I was rewarded with the scent as they have now started to open. From late fall, all through the winter and early spring, there is a very large patch of dirt with traces of roots and purple-like portions of some sort of plant. Then, they slowly start to send their shoots forth – up from that dusty pile of dirt come little greenish pips that become the leaves. Then, you start to see the stems tightened against the leaves and then lovely chartreuse buds are visible that then turn to white and slowly open from top to bottom. As soon as they star to open, I wait. Knowing that one morning I will walk by soon and then I will get a delicious waft of Lily of the Valley. I have written about this patch at the Mitchell House before. I have always been fascinated by the fact that these grow in full sun – they have no shade whatsoever. And this patch is old. I’m not sure how old – I do not think late nineteenth century but possibly – or maybe very early twentieth century. We have one or two images in the collection from the early 1900s but one does not show the ground, and the other not so much either. I also think this is one of the earliest flowering patches of Lily of the Valley on island – let me know if you’ve seen others this early. And in FULL sun to boot! But in any case, today was the day – May 5, 2025 – that I got the first waft. Saturday when I was here, they were not ready yet. But now, they are! And when I smell it, I know why it was my mother-in-law’s favorite flower. JNLF
Show More