Maryland autumn going into winter somehow, like Winston Churchill’s famous pudding: lacks theme. I need the leaf scattered rain-drenched days when nature, real northern nature, for a brief, shining moment, is wearing her most beautiful clothes.
Snow, good New York snow, is also something we never see this far south. My cross-country skis sit unused in the attic, as though they resent the move and are no longer on speaking terms with me. I might need to go up to Saranac Lake in the next few months, ostensibly to interview the subject of an article, so maybe we’ll have the chance to get re-acquainted then. Hope springs eternal.
Jason,
Very interesting, while doing a quick search on some info concerning my grandfather (James Crate Larkin SR. of Bufflo NY), I came accross your name. James Larkin is fairly common but the Crate (my great great grandfather was James Crate) is not. Are we related? My family are the Larkins of the Larkin Co. branch.
James Crate Larkin III
Dear James,
I am from the Buffalo New York region, though I am not sure that we are related. The “Crate” moniker is something I adopted from family tradition that held that it was the maiden surname of a distant aunt (Elsa, Ellen?). I decided to use it largely for it’s uniqueness and it’s name retention with editors. I continued to use it as a nom de plume in the kinds of tech. writing jobs I was doing in the eighties and nineties, later abandoning it altogether.
Please have the happiest of holidays and I wish you the very best of luck in your research of your family tree.
All Best,
Jason C. Larkin