grandmother's autograph book.
While not over the moon romantic, the entry in my great great grandmother’s autograph book from my great great grandfather reveals the uncertainty of life in the 1800s and the awareness that there is a need for one another. My great great grandparents, Thomas and Lovina Record Carson, married at a young age. They traveled together from Illinois to Kansas and made a home in Cowley County. At age 37 my great great grandfather died of typhoid fever. Lovina never married again, living thirty seven years as a widow. She raised their two children by working as a milliner. Six years before his death, Thomas R. Carson wrote the following in his wife's autograph book: "Vina, looking back over the years gone by, just when they went, we cannot tell. Certain: one thing, they have gone and soon in the dust we'll lie. Then let us make the best of our situation, resolving within ourselves that we will endeavor, come what will, to lighten the burden of each other. Your husband, T. R. Carson Rock, Cowley County, Kansas January 31, 1881"