Proving my Kezar Line I - Marjorie Elizabeth Dean

Last summer my mother and I went to North Hatley, Quebec for a family reunion. On the way home, we stopped at a cemetery that was once part of the farm of my fourth great-grandparents, Moses Bean(e) and Betsey Kezar. That inspired me to work on Bean research but I took a detour in September when I found a genealogy of the Kezar line compiled in the 1980s by a distant cousin. This genealogy claims to go back to my 10th great-grandfather and that he came to America with the Winthrop Fleet; I am fascinated. This line will be my primary research focus for 2018.

Marjorie Elizabeth Dean was my maternal grandmother. Her mother was a Bean and her second great-grandmother was a Kezar. She was born in North Hatley, Quebec on March 4, 1904, to James Louden Dean and Eva Maude Bean.

She was baptized at the Methodist church in Lenoxville, Quebec on July 31st of that year.

Grandma was the oldest of five children born to Louden, or J.L., and Eva.

1911 Census of Canada

My grandmother lost her mother just days before her own 12th birthday.

1921 Census of Canada

Thankfully, although her father did not remarry for more than seven years, my grandmother was still able to attend school regularly and once her father did marry again in 1923, she took the secretarial course at nearby Stanstead College.

It was while she was working as a secretary for The Asbestos Corporation in Thetford Mines, Quebec that she met the second youngest son of a large family who was also in asbestos mining, Francis Parker Smith. Thankfully, for me, things did not work out between my Grand-uncle Parker and my grandmother, but she did meet another of the Smith sons and they fell in love.

Marjorie Elizabeth Dean married George Washington Smith on August 10, 1935, at the Minton Methodist Church right down the road from the farm where she was born.

My grandparents welcomed their only child, my mother Janet, in 1937.

My Grandpa George died on Easter Monday, April 17, 1979. Grandma passed away on May 19, 1996. They are buried at Elmwood Cemetery in Sherbrooke, Quebec.

(1) Dean, Marjorie Elizabeth. Photograph taken ca. 1905, privately held by the author [ADDRESS FOR PRIVATE USE,] Rockville Centre, NY, and digitized in 2017. The photograph was given to the author by her mother, the subject's daughter in the summer of 2017.

(2) “BIRTHS - DEAN,” The Sherbrooke Examiner, 9 March 1904, p. 4, col. 5; digital images, Google News Archives (http://news.google.com/newspapers: accessed 26 May 2017).

(3) Work in progress. In the meantime, follow this link http://bibnum2.banq.qc.ca/bna/ecivil/affichage.html?serie=05S_CE501S81&a=g_l > 1904 > janvier-decembre > p. 12B

(4) 1911 Census of Canada, Subdistrict 10-Hatley, Stanstead County, Quebec; population schedule p. 10, dwelling 115/family 116. Margary [Marjorie] Dean; digital image Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed February 7, 2018); citing Statistics Canada Fonds microfilm reels T-20326 to T-20460.

(5) 1921 Census of Canada, Sub-District-06 - Hatley Centre (Township), Reedsville (Village), Stanstead County, Quebec; population schedule p. 9, dwelling 106/family 109. Margary [Marjorie] Dean; digital image Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com: accessed February 7, 2018); citing Statistics Canada Fonds.

(6) Work in progress. In the meantime, follow this link - https://www.ancestry.com/interactive/1091/d1p_31880951/6484381?backurl=https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/6288705/person/-487745612/facts

(7) Dean, Marjorie Elizabeth and Smith, Janet Isabella. Photograph taken in April 1937, privately held by the author [ADDRESS FOR PRIVATE USE,] Rockville Centre, NY, and digitized in 2017. The photograph was in an album given to the author in 2016 by her mother, Janet I. Smith.

(8) Headstone of Dean, Marjorie Elizabeth. Photograph was taken on August 6, 2017, privately held by the author [ADDRESS FOR PRIVATE USE,] Rockville Centre, NY.