Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Happy 92nd Birthday to our 41st President!

Hello, this is Richard Howie, and I thought I should get spiffied up for the birthday.  George Herbert Walker Bush was born ninety two years ago, on June 12th, 1924 to Prescott Sheldon Bush and Dorothy Walker.   There probably isn't much I can tell you about about our former President, than you don't already know.  He was the second of the five children born to Prescott & Dorothy. His father came from Columbus Ohio and his mother from Walker's Point Maine.  His father moved to New Haven Connecticut to get an education at Yale University.  Prescott and Dorothy got married August 6th, 1921 in Kennebunkport, Maine.  The P.S. Bush family lived on Grove Lane, in Greenwich Connecticut for over twenty years. In 1940, at sixteen years of age we find that young George has left home for Phillips Academy in Andover Massachusetts.  Not sure if this was by choice, or his fathers wishes.  Anyway, you have to love sending your son off to boarding school that advertised Chesterfield cigarettes in the yearbook of that day.  Another image I found interesting in the yearbook of his senior year at the academy was the arial image of the campus which clearly showed a cemetery. When I researched the Phillips Academy Cemetery I discovered the final resting place of
Harriet Elizabeth Beecher Stowe, the American author of the famous anti slavery novel titled Uncle Tom's Cabin.  You may see her virtual memorial and read more of her bio by clicking on the link in her name above.  I find this notable because she had died just forty years before George attended the Academy.  So I would think he might have taken at least one break from the books to gander over to her final resting place.
The years that George spent at the Academy helped prepare him for the journey to The White House.  Browsing through the yearbook it appears that every boy was accepted to an Ivy League school of higher learning.  Harvard, Yale, Princeton.

Phillips Academy Andover Massachusetts 1940
After graduation from the Academy, George H.W. Bush at the age of 18, then went on to join the United States Navy on his birthday June 12, 1942.  Where he served aboard the aircraft carrier the USS San Jacinto cvl 30.
15 July 2010 Pres. GWH Bush aboard the USS San Jacinto
Above is a tribute to President George Bush aboard the aircraft carrier.  In January 1945 he and Barbara got married. He was discharged September 1945.  He and Barbara then moved to Midland Texas to begin their family and oil business.  The rest is history.

Now I am sure you want me to get to the point of how our 41st President of the United States is also our 8th cousin.  We both descend from Nathaniel Richardson (1673 ~ 1729).

Nathaniel Richardson of Woburn, Middlesex, Massachusetts is my 7X Great Grandfather and George's 8X Great Grandfather.  I probably don't share much dna with George H.W.Bush, even if they were to make his dna results public.  We both share this match through our paternal line.  Paternal lines are great for blue bloods, making Kings, and sharing of family crests and surnames, but horrible for passing along dna.  I would share more with Barbara Bush, and their four sons. Well, this isn't a study of mitochondrial dna, so I will end here.
Well this was just a quick journey, to say Happy Birthday to both of the Bush's, George & Barbara Bush. I hope you enjoyed it!