My days of genealogy research are mostly behind me. My main work in genealogy now is consolidating files and documenting family history, though I still dabble in raw research from time to time. I last reported on this blog about writing the story of how I learned who my natural paternal grandfather was.

A couple of years back, I decided to find out a little more about my step-grandfather, Edgar J. Dorion. He was a big part of our lives, as he and our grandmother often had to take care of us kids when Mom was in the hospital and Dad continued to work his nightshift job. But all I really knew about Edgar (we called him Gar) was that he was career Coastguard, had been in both WW1 and WW2, and a few other tidbits he threw our way.

It was somewhat late (I may have been 10) when I learned he was a step-grandfather, that he had been married before, and that he had daughters from that marriage. For whatever reason, I left him till late in my research efforts. The first thing I found out was not particularly flattering, an instance of severe miliary discipline from a stint in the US Navy before WW1 (though he was later pardoned), something he conveniently didn’t tell us about. Maybe that was one of the reasons I let research into his life go by the wayside for a while.

I picked it up again last July and got a little farther. Found an obituary for his first wife and one for one of his daughters. That gave me names of children and grandchildren and even let me find a great-granddaughter on Facebook. I sent her a message, but we haven’t made contact yet.

I picked this up again just after Memorial Day, and did my best to document what I found, save important stuff electronically, and prepare a good, comprehensive summary document. I found an obituary for his other daughter, got the name of her son, and found him on Facebook. He and I are step-first cousins who knew nothing about each other for the first 70+ years of our lives. I sent him an introductory message; he responded fairly quickly, and we’ve had some good message conversations since. Importantly, I now have a copy of an excellent studio photo of a young Ed Dorion, and he now has some snapshots of an older Ed Dorion. We both have a more complete picture of the life of a man who was important in both of our lives.

And, as far as genealogy research goes, a triumph like this wants me to do more and find other, previously unknown relatives.