When I started my research on the Hoover family of Estill County, Kentucky, I didn't know what to expect. Would I meet other members of my birth family? Would they accept me? Well, not only did they accept me, they shared information and photographs with me willingly, helping me discover the people who made me...me.
Charles Cox, a cousin in Kentucky, shared this photograph with me, and what a photograph it is!
According to some family members, this is, reading left to right, John Andrew Jackson Hoover, Sarah Ann Richardson Hoover Reece and Elijah Reece. Look at the surnames. See where this is headed? John and Sarah were married approximately 1857 in Owsley County, Kentucky. Unfortunately, we don't know the exact date because the courthouse burned. They divorced and they both remarried. But this is where this photograph gets sticky. Elijah Reece is Sarah's second husband. According to the stories, John and Elijah were good friends, and remained so throughout their lives.
In doing research and paying genealogy favors forward, I shared this same picture with some other cousins. When I gave their names, I was told that the information I had was incorrect. It was actually Elijah on the left and John on the right.
To make this even more confusing, I've got this photograph. Obviously, this is Sarah, but is it Elijah or John? If it's John, why would she have her picture made with him? But then again, why would she have her photograph made with her two husbands, past and present?
This and more will be continued....As the Mountain Turns....
