From 14 realitives to over 2,000 At the age of 64 I reflected back on my life and the direct members of my family I realized I grew up knowing only about 14 family members. My birth father left my mother before I was born. I never realy knew his full name or anything about him or his family. I lived in Hutchinson, Kansas, and at the age of 15 I was to attend a High-Y meeting in Kingman, Kansas. I was High-Y president and was being sent by my school to the state convention. My mother informed me for the first time in my life that I had an aunt in Kingman, Ks. by the name of Gladys Hoover. When I got to town I looked her up and went to her home, knocked on the door and introduced myself as the son of Carl James Freeman, her brother. She appeared shocked. All I asked was to see a picture of my father, she said she had none. My reception was cool at best. I put this incident out of my mind and believed if my father was not interested in me, it really was not important to me. This chance incident was told to my wife and children many years later. When I graduated from college my wife called this aunt to inform her that I had completed college and sent her a graduation announcement. She could not promise anything as his current family (wife, and 3 sons) plus a dead daughter had no knowledge that he had been married before and had a son. I was not aware my wife had made this contact. When my oldest son got interested in my past he too contacted the aunt in Kingman, Kansas to attempt to learn more about his grandfather. No one in my family had ever spoken about my father or any of his family. I did not know the names of my grandparents or any of the ancestors. Rob was directed to a 92 year old that was the sister in-law of my aunt who was also named Hoover and Rob had a conversation with her that ended in him leaving his name and phone number. In 1998 what turned out to be a cousin of mine from California interviewed the sister in-law and was astonished to learn that his uncle Carl had been married before and had a son. He called my son Rob and disclosed that my father was deceased as was his wife but that I had three half brothers all living in Alaska. He had called them to tell them of my existence and they were excited about it. They began calling me for long conversations. I inquired about our grandparents and they too had no knowledge of even their names. Now I was hooked on this geneology stuff and having recently retired and being the oldest brother vowed to get to the bottom of the ancestory. Brother Carl Jr. discovered an entry in their mother's bible that gave our father's mother and father's name and birth dates. "John E. Freeman born 1886, Atchison, Kansas and Mary Etta (Mollie) Freeland, born 1886, Effingham, Kansas. This is all anyone alive knew. That is all I had to go on. One of my brothers is also named Robert Freeman. Bob drove from Buluga River, Alaska to meet me, and stay with me for three weeks. We drove to Kingman, Kansas and discovered our Aunt Gladys Hoover in a care home and 93 years old, with no ability to speak. We visited the sister in-law and she was now 93 and quite articulate. She knew our grandmother Mary Etta Freeman who died in the flu epidemic of 1918. We researched her to discover she had married John E. Freeman in 1904 lived in Atchison, Kansas had three childred two daughters and our father Carl. I learned she divorced John E. in 1916 and moved to Kingman, Kansas to live with her mother and father. Her mother was also named Mary Etta Freeland. Mollie remaried a local farmer age 56 with two sons. All we could learn about John E. was he dissapeard early in the family and no one knew what happend to him. There was a rumor he committed a crime. I contacted the Kansas Historical Society and inquired mainly about the fact he worked for the railroad...Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe. But mentioned to the researcher he may have committed a crime. Two weeks later he called me very excited. He found my grandfather, he had shot and killed his sweetheart on the steps of the Post Office in Atchison, Kansas in broad daylight in front of witnesses, the ran to his model A Ford and fled. This was a shocker to me. But now I had a picture of him, his crimanal record his parents names and the names of his 9 sisters. His crime is well documented in the two newspapers in Atchison, Kansas. His capture, his trial his conviction for first degree murder, what brought it on, his sentence to life in prison in the Lansing State Prison. John was walking on the streets of Atchison, Kansas one year after the sentence. He went to prison in 1917 but the constant letter writing by his mother Amanda and his 9 sisters to release him to help on the farm as his mother and father were ill and he was the only son, motivated the governor to give him a six month paroll, that led to fourteen six month parolls He was later called back to prison and was not released until he was 68 years old. I could not trace him from there. I now have traced a total of almost two thousand ancestors from this sparse beginning. I have just learned that our Freeman line came from Nottingham England but cannot dig any further on that end. The Freemans mostly settled in and around Gettysburg, Pa. I have some wonderful pictures of my father, my grand parents, and dozens of other ancestors thanks to the Freeman decendents I have located in various parts of the country. It has been a great journey the past two years. I now have ten albums of pictures, documents and stories of the Freemans, Freelands, Bransons, Clampitts and others with the same DNA. I just wished I had known more of them personally. Bob Freeman 5/25/00