<Begin Segment 8>

FS: I have a young grandson, great grandson, in Issaquah Public Schools who delights in telling his classmates that his, my grandfather was a pirate.

EG: Oh?

FS: And he's probably really true. Because on my father's side, go back three or four generations, and they apparently originated in the Fresian Islands, off Denmark, at a time when about the only income the Fresian Islanders had, was by raiding Viking, Norwegian, Swedish ships, and so in effect they were pirates. The Fresian Islands are simply sand dunes that are pushed up in the shallow waters of the North Sea, and there's almost no agriculture except some dairy business, and fishing. And so piracy was at a time, their means of survival. Today, today they have a --

EG: There aren't many little kids in the school that can say their grandfather, or great grandfather, or that they came from pirates. You have a tremendous family, with so many people in it now that the different children can tell all kinds of stories, I'll bet.

FS: I got seventy people there, I think.

EG: And then there's some additional since that time. There's some more family members since the picture was taken.

FS: This is at my one hundreth birthday party.

EG: Your one hundred what?

FS: One hundreth birthday party.

EG: Hundreth birthday party. I thought you said 110th and I said, Come on. You don't look no 110.

FS: On my next birthday I'll be 103.

EG: Yeah, yeah

FS: And in the meantime there have been several additions, one darling little baby. I just got her picture. She's only about three weeks old now. And several of these are adopted.

EG: How far does it go to the young ones? The youngest would be great grandchild?

FS: What?

EG: The youngest on there would be a great grandchild? You don't have any great, great grandchildren, do you?

FS: Well, this last one is the granddaughter of a granddaughter. I guess that makes her a great, great granddaughter.

EG: Yeah.

FS: There is only one of that generation so far.

EG: That's some kind of a family. Boy.

FS: Yes. I'm the oldest person in this retirement home, and I'm also -- we had a Father's Day luncheon on Saturday. I was the father of the largest family living here.

EG: They had a gathering here, they had a gathering here of families?

FS: Yes.

EG: And you had more than anybody. You had more than anybody.

FS: Yes.

EG: Yeah. I'm not surprised.

FS: But most of these people are not local now.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.