Thomas Francis (1842 - 1910), my Great, Great Grandfather, was born in Ireland. His parents, Daniel and Mary Francis relocated to Schuylkill Haven, Pennsylvania. In the photograph below, their house is second from left. Thomas married Bridget Collins on January 5, 1865. The Collin's family house is on the extreme right of the photograph. Thomas was a boatman, carrying loads of coal from Schuylkill Haven, down the Schuylkill River to Manayunk, Philadelphia. In the photograph is an example of the barge that Thomas utilized to haul the coal south on the river.

With the help from this obituary from October 16, 1893 in the Reading Eagle Newspaper, I was able to ascertain, exactly, what my Great, Great, Great Grandfather, Francis Hillanbrand had as an occupation. I knew he was an engineer, but this obituary said he was a hoist engineer. He would lower men and equipment, down through the mine shaft via the hoist elevators. His was the last face that the miners would see, before he would lower them below. The picture on the right is one of the hoists left in Mahanoy Plane. He had worked at the Lawrence Colliery, which was abandoned in the 1930s.

Dad's class picture of 1947 of Roman Catholic High School, Philadelphia. Dad is seated bottom row, right.

After perusing through some old family photographs, I have stumbled upon two pictures of my Great, Great Grandfather, Frank Hillanbrand (1856-1899), that I have never published before. I had to conduct some detective work, but have confirmed, that it is him. Enjoy!

So, in the past, I had talked about our family's plight in Ireland during the latter part of the 19th century. Around 1879, in Killasser, a Relief Committee was formed, consisting of prominent parishioners and chaired by the parish priest, to apply for and administer subscriptions for various funds which were set up to help those in need. In the parish, by 1880, 1,750 out of 1,800 families were receiving relief because of the failure of crops and general distress.

In addition to the Relief Committee, the Killasser Land League was formed to protest evictions upon the land from the landlords that charged abusive rent to the tenant farmers. On one such occasion, January 4th, 1881, a crowd of people descended upon one of the landlord's land agents and assaulted him. Among those arrested and charged with riot and assault were my Great Grandfather, James McLoughlin, his brother Thomas McLoughlin, my Great Grandmother, Bridget McNulty and her brother and sister, Martin and Mary McNulty. Both of my Great Grandparents were 20 years of age, at the time of their arrest. My Great Grandparents are pictured below.