Hello, family! Cousin Carolyn and I just got back from a trip to the St. Louis area. We got a chance to visit Portage des Sioux, Missouri. This was the village where Felicity and her husband, Francois, lived from approximately 1807 until the late 1830s. After living in Missouri most of her life, middle-aged Felicite traveled up the river to Davenport, Iowa to be near her son, Joseph. (In my imagination, she took a steamboat up the river.) Portage des Sioux is a small village located on the southern banks of the Mississippi river (the river is heading east/west at this point). The village is north of city of St. Louis and the Missouri river. This map from approximately 1850 shows the location. It's named for the Sioux who used it as a place to portage (carry their canoes) between the Mississippi and Missouri river to save time, evade enemies or other reasons of convenience. The village was founded in 1799 by Spanish Lt. Governor Zenon Trudeau and Francois ...
In honor of Veteran's Day, I want to salute one of our family veterans, Rev. Laurence Henry Keating (1907-1987). Father Laurence was a Lieutenant Colonel with the U.S. Army serving as a Chaplain in the 7th Armored Division. He served in four battles or campaigns in World War II and earned a purple heart, a bronze star, and numerous other medals. Father Laurence was fairly well known throughout the family, so I hope you will all find this information about his military service to be interesting. Laurence was the 7th child of Eleanor Motie Keating and Edward M. Keating. My grandfather, Louis, was one of his older siblings. Laurence, Irma, and John were the youngest three and grew up in Palos Park, a suburb outside of Chicago. I am not sure why the Keating family moved from the city to the suburbs (really rural at that time), but they did. My father believes the family moved to Palos for the children's health, grandpa's sister, Mary Felicite*, may have had h...