I find myself in the unusual position, at age 73, of having outlived both my father and my son. My dad, Phil Marton, died at age 36, when I was 8 years old. My son, Tom Marton, died at age 42, when I was 62 years old. I think of them both often and sometimes […]
Category Archives: ancestors and family
My niece Maureen scanned some old family photos and sent them to me recently. I would like to share some of those pictures on this site, and for now I will post two pictures that were taken at the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco, which took place in 1939 and 1940. The first […]
In a previous post I wrote about my aunt Gertrude, Tommy’s great aunt, who was my dad’s older sister. I recently came across the photo posted above, which was taken on a visit that Tommy and I made to her house in 1975. My aunt Gertrude lived most of her adult life in Riverside, […]
I found some pictures of my son Tommy in an old cigar box recently, and I’m posting a few of them here. The cigar box actually belonged to my Aunt Vivian years ago and dates back to her childhood in Los Angeles in the 1930s. Vivian’s father (my step-grandfather), Ernie Voigt, was a California […]
An important and happy transition and achievement: my niece Maureen recently received her Master’s degree and started a new job. Maureen is Tommy’s first cousin and Garrett and Sadie’s second cousin. She recently began her new position as the Decorative Arts Intern at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute in Utica, New York. Maureen is a graduate […]
My brother Fred recently sent me a video clip containing some great photos and his own audio comments about the Venice canals. There are some photos from the 1970s (and earlier) including pictures of Fred, my mom, my brother Billy, Tommy, and others. The clip includes photos of the canals and also the old Venice […]
Recently I went through my family photos and found a few to add to this blog. The first is a photo that Tom took of me in the Marin headlands, one of Tom’s and my own very favorite hiking places. I posted it under “hiking in marin: the batteries, the dipsea trail, and beyond.” Also, I […]
My brother (Tommy’s uncle) Fred recently sent me a couple of photos taken recently. Below is a picture of Fred and his daughter, Maureen. Below is a photo of his oldest daughter, Patience. After serving with the Peace Corps in what was then Zaire (and now Republic of Congo) for a number of years, first […]
I’ve been looking through some old boxes, and found quite a few old photos that I’d like to share on this blog eventually. I’ll post a sampling for now. The picture below was taken when Tommy was seven years old. At the time he was a 2nd grader at Will Rogers School on 14th Street in […]
On Saturday I drove down to the Bay Area to visit a couple of the places we lived when Tommy was small. I stopped first in El Sobrante, then Point Richmond, and on the way home I spent the night in Paradise in Butte County. It was about a six-hour drive to the Bay Area, […]
memories of tommy 