Honors To This Generation's Great-Grandmothers

A 2025 edited and re-published article first posted in 2018.   

Fifty Norway Spruce Trees will be planted in a clearing off our western woods in the Town of German Flatts, Herkimer County, NY, USA. The containerized seedling spruce trees were purchased from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Tree Nursery in Saratoga Springs, NY, USA.  The baby tree plantings are scheduled between Earth Day (22 Apr  2018) and Arbor Day (27 Apr 2018), with honors and grateful thanks to the fond memory of our generation's four great-grandmothers. And as Mother's Day 2018 approaches on Sunday, May 13, it is certainly as important to acknowledge the strongly important role these fine ladies played in our ancestral family history. Without their high dedication to family, we obviously would not be present to post these thankful thoughts today.   

 

Multiple biographical updates done in early May 2025

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Our mom's (Lillian Agnes Ouellet-Paul) paternal Grandma Suzanne Agnes (LaLonde) Wagner-Ouellet, born 8 Jun 1864 at Moose Creek, Ontario, Canada, the daughter of Alexis and Julienne (Campeau) LaLonde.  Ms. Suzanne LaLonde-Wagner married Emile W. Ouellet in Roman Catholic ceremonies at Roxborough, Ontario, Canada on 26 Sep 1887. The couple has six children: Ida, Alexander, Bertha, Ector, William, and Doris. Suzanne also has an older son John Wagner from her first marriage to Richard Wagner, Richard died unexpectedly at a young age in 1885. Suzanne died while living at a Tupper Lake, NY retirement property owned by her eldest daughter Ida on 14 Dec 1946. She is interred with her beloved husband of fifty-nine years Emile W. Ouellet (he died earlier in 1946) at Saint Alphonsus Cemetery in Tupper Lake, Franklin County, NY, USA.

Note: The Ouellet surname links our family directly to France via more recently to Frenchmen in New France (aka Quebec, Canada), the first settlers and our stone-masonry French colonial progenitor Rene' Ouellet (1635-1722) and his articulate and well-educated young wife Marie Anne Rivet.  Marie is a French "King's Daughter" -- an orphan raised and schooled by Catholic Nuns in a Church-based residential institution (aka orphanage) supported by the French King Louis XIV.

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Our mom's maternal Grandma Agnes M. "Angie" (Anderson) Seney, born 30 Oct 1863 at Campbellford, Northumberland County, Ontario, Canada, the daughter of James and Caroline Griselle (Kiernan) Anderson.  Miss Angie Anderson married Joseph Seney Sr. at Campbellford, Ontario, Canada on 18 Jun 1883, and the couple has twelve children: Lillian, Caroline, William, James, Adolphus, Clara, Minerva, Edna, Pearl, Mary-Ellen, Fannie, and Joseph Jr. Angie died 18 Jul 1938 at home in Ilion, Herkimer County, NY, USA.  She is interred with her beloved husband of thirty years Joseph Seney Sr. (he was killed in a December 1913 accident) at Oak Hill Cemetery, West German Street, Herkimer, Herkimer County, NY, USA.

Note: Angie's parents James and Caroline Anderson -- James hailed from eastern Scotland (Aberdeen); whereas, Caroline was originally thought to hail from Ireland... but it's now believed from several DNA estimates and matches that Caroline probably hailed from western Scotland.  (updated May 2025)  

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Our dad's (Stephen Paul Jr,) paternal Grandma Petronelli "Anna" (Serva) Poceus-Paul, born 2 Oct 1872 at Janapole, Telsiai, Lithuania, the daughter of Anthony and Petronella Serva.  Miss Anna Serva married Dominick "Dom" Poceus-Paul in 1889 Roman Catholic ceremonies at an unknown Lithuanian location. The couple emigrated to the United States and became USA naturalized citizens in 1900.  Anna and Dom have six children: Stephen, Peter, Anna, Stella, Matilda, and Alexander. She died 28 Dec 1951 at a hospital near home in Whitesboro, Oneida County, NY, USA.  Anna is interred with her beloved husband of forty-eight years Dominick Poceus-Paul (he died 1937) at Saint George Lithuanian Catholic Cemetery, Wood Road, Whitesboro, Oneida County, NY, USA.   

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Our dad's maternal Grandma Effie Julia (Odell) Gorton-Moegling, born 15 Oct 1862 at Summit, Schoharie County, NY, USA, the daughter of Albert and Elizabeth A. (Clegg) Odell. Ms. Effie Odell-Gorton married Edward William Moegling 4 Jul 1889 in Christian ceremonies at Utica, Oneida County, NY, USA. The couple has two children: Edna and Elizabeth.  Effie also has twin daughters Alice and Agnes (born 1885) from a previous marriage to Jim Gorton, that short marriage ended in divorce -- Jim being "an unreliable husband" according to the significant genealogical research complied by our paternal Aunt Margaret Rosella "Pudgie" Paul-Eccleston.  Effie died 9 Sep 1924 at home in New York Mills, Oneida County, NY, USA.  She is interred with her beloved husband of thirty-two years Edward Moegling (he died 1921) at Forest Hill Cemetery, Oneida Street, Utica, Oneida County, NY, USA.

Note: The Odell Lineage and the various more distant surnames more distant and off our Odell Line Tree (icluding Smith, Brainerd, Hubbard, Stanton, Sheldon, Seldon, Denison, Richardson, etc., etc.) take us back to our early-to-mid 1630 New England colonial progenitors.  

The four "Great Grandma Norway Spruce Trees" were planted on Arbor Day, April 27, 2018 in accordance with our plan.  In twenty years these trees will likely be about 25-to-39 feet tall.  These are the same "Grandma Trees" that are now about 10' tall in May 2025, and all healthy and doing well.  

How our "Grandma Trees" look today -- in May 2025: