A Larcenous Lineage

Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd descends from a sweet-toothed criminal and an underwear thief.

Researchers looking into Mr Rudd's family history discovered that his fourth great-grandfather, Thomas Rudd, was transported to Australia in 1801 to serve a seven-year sentence for "unlawfully acquiring a bag of sugar".

However, his crime is eclipsed by that of the prime minister's paternal fifth great-grandmother Mary Wade, a London street urchin who made a pittance by sweeping streets and begging.

In 1788, aged 12, she and an older girl coaxed an eight-year-old girl into a toilet where they relieved her of "her dress, petticoats, a linen tippet, and a cap and absconded". [Link]

The details of the dastardly deeds will be found here and here.

Queen Had a Considerable Caboose

Queen Victoria's very large bloomers have sold at auction for £4,500.

The knickers have a 50in (127cm) waist and date from the 1890s, which indicates the monarch had a large girth as she approached her old age.

Auctioneer Charles Hanson said: "These pants, considering their provenance and pedigree, are very exciting... we know that they are hers [Queen Victoria]."

Mr Hanson said the bloomers were an interesting piece of social history that indicated Queen Victoria was "a very big lady of quite small stature with a very wide girth". [Link]

A Jeanealogical Post

Someone is selling a really old pair of Levi's on eBay.

This old pair of LEVI'S were found in a mine in the Rand Mining District, on the Mojave Desert,. California. They are covered in candlewax from the candle's the miner was using to light the tunnel he was working in. They were found with and old paper bag with the name of a mercantile store which operated between 1895 and 1898 in the town or Randsburg. Their was also a gunny sack with the initials A.P.K. and Randsburg marked on it. A.P.K. is through to be Adam P. Kuffel who was a partner in the mercantile store. [Link, via Reference Library by way of kottke]

Plaid for the Promised Land

Rabbi Mendel Jacobs has helped design the first official Jewish tartan.

The Tartan playing field has widened considerably in recent years: The Tartans Authority has registered patterns for Sikhs, Chinese, the state of Indiana and the Fire Department of New York’s bagpipe band. But it wasn’t until last year that Jacobs, a Glasgow Lubavitch rabbi, decided it was time for the members of his congregation and beyond to be able to “combine their Scottish heritage and Jewish heritage together.”

“People connect with their Judaism in different ways,” he told The Shmooze. “They might not wear a regular kippah, but they might wear a Jewish Tartan kippah.” [Link]

Nasty Nazi Nearly Denuded

Axel Nelson and his family went to the North Dakota Heritage Center last Thursday to view a Nazi uniform he donated back in 1958.

Scott Nelson recounted the story his uncle told him.

The war was coming to an end in the spring of 1945, and many of the soldiers and leaders were taking off their uniforms and to keep a low profile.

Staff Sgt. Axel Nelson was traveling through Germany with his division when they came across a Nazi politician in Ortsgruppenleiter uniform who was "showing obvious contempt" for the American soldiers passing by.

Sgt. Nelson, who spoke German, pulled his jeep over and told the man to remove his uniform. When the Nazi refused, Nelson pointed his weapon at the man's head and repeated his demand. Nelson then left the man standing in his underwear. [Link]

Aussie PJs MIA

An Australian city has asked Queen Elizabeth to return her uncle's pajamas.

The handmade silk bedclothes were in fact a gift presented to the then Prince of Wales, who was later crowned King Edward VIII, during a visit to Ballarat in southeast Australia in 1920.

But now the people of Ballarat want their gift returned so it can be publicly displayed with the city's other historical relics.

Local historians wrote to the Queen at Windsor Castle asking for the Royal Collection to be searched and the pyjamas returned. [Link]

Royal archivists believe that Edward may have taken the pajamas with him when he abdicated to marry Wallis Simpson in 1936.

Blow-up Bra Blows Up

StoryCorps captured this gem from 94-year-old Betty Jenkins. When she was a young, flat-chested woman, she was given an inflatable bra by her mother. Things went well until she found herself on a plane trip in South America.

It turned out the cabin was not pressurized, and the bra was expanding.

"As the thing got bigger, I tried to stand up," Jenkins said, "and I couldn't see my feet."

The instructions said that the bra's pads could be inflated up to a size 48.

"I thought, 'What would happen if it goes beyond 48?'" Jenkins recalled.

"I found out what happened," she said. "It blew out." [Link, via YesButNoButYes, by way of Neatorama]

They're Gone, But Their Soles Remain

Workers at the Hancock-Clarke House in Lexington, Mass., discovered six 18th-century shoes hidden inside a wall.

The shoes, known as concealment shoes, were discovered while the house was being refurbished and reconstructed. They were used to bring good luck and ward off evil spirits. These shoes were hidden away in the historic house’s walls with a cartridge box, a child’s corset, a shoe buckle, and a letter dated 1768. [Link, via Boston 1775]

The Northampton (UK) Museum maintains an international index of concealment shoes.

About half the shoes registered in the concealment index are children's shoes. Women's shoes are more common than men's. Shoes are almost invariably well worn, perhaps because the donor didn't want to waste an expensive new shoe on the project, or perhaps because a well-worn shoe is more likely to retain the shape of the wearer's foot and hence his spirit. Though shoes are the common denominator, more than two hundred different personal possessions--coins, spoons, pots, goblets, food, knives, toys, gloves, pipes, even chicken and cat bones--have been found hidden with them. [Link]

Family History, After a Fashion

Designer Ralph Lauren's parents were natives of Belarus in the former Soviet Union. They came to this country with nothing more than the ever-so-fashionable clothes on their backs.

He knew the "Russia, mixed with Jewishness" of his parents only through the meld of Russian, Polish and Yiddish they spoke when they didn't want their children to understand them. And through their artefacts: the European furnishings that impregnated his taste and the sepia photographs of his 16-year-old parents' wedding. ("I remember especially my father's suit," Lauren says.)

Then there was his mother's Persian lamb hat that inspired a Russian-themed show - Cossack tunics, greatcoats and Bolshevik tweeds - back in 1993. [Link]

They're Still Looking for His Pants

Val Gregoire of Maine was hit over the head in Boston in 1951, and woke to find his wallet and pants missing. Last month—on the 56th anniversary of the incident—the wallet was discovered by a demolition worker at the Paramount Theatre in Boston.

"I was stunned," said Jeannette Gregoire, 75, of Lewiston, after receiving a call from the worker's wife, Kathy Bagen. "How could this have survived?"

More than a dozen photos, a copy of Val's Augusta birth certificate and a pair of identification cards seemed preserved inside the Boston landmark.

One of the cards was an Armed Forces Liberty Pass dated April 11, 1951—the day it was stolen.

Why did they take his pants, too?

"He was wearing those sailor bell-bottoms," Jeannette said. "Maybe they liked the buttons." [Link]

A Well-Worn Heirloom

When 3-month-old Alexis Penner had her first formal picture taken last week, she wore a hand-me-down dress.

The simple white gown was previously worn not only by Alexis's 22-month-old sister Zoe, but also 136 other descendants of Lieuzetta Schonlau, the matriarch of [Alexis's grandmother] Judy's side of the family, who created the dress in 1896.

"It has become a tradition that at the age of 3 months, the children have their picture taken in this dress," said Judy, who was descendant No. 24 to experience it.

The dress travels with books that contain family photos, a history of the garment, and a list of descendants who've worn it. Judy says not every eligible infant has donned the dress.

"We've had a couple of fathers who have said, 'I'm not putting my boy in a dress,'" she said. "There might be 20 out there who never had their picture taken." [Link]

A Corset, But No Corpse

From The Monessen (Pa.) Daily Independent of May 17, 1948:

READING, Pa. (UP)—Genealogists delving into the history of Reading and Berks County, Pa., for their bicentennial anniversary this year, have been puzzling over a curious epitaph recorded here.

The inscription reads: "Here lies the clothing of the living Anne B——," and has researchers bewildered to explain why anyone would want to bury the clothes of a living person.

With an eye to current styles in women's fashions, one genealogist hazarded the unscientific opinion that Annie B's husband may have taken the drastic step to express his displeasure with 18th century female dress.

A Genealogist's Special Jeans

Like me, Steve Danko was tagged by Jasia. His fifth fact about himself has us all intrigued.

5. My blue jeans were on display at the Smithsonian Institution (The National Museum of American History) in Washington, DC from 1985-2006. They are now in storage while the museum undergoes renovation.

I visited the NMAH a couple of times in that period, and don't remember seeing Steve's jeans. Perhaps I would remember if they had been worn by a bearded woman breastfeeding.

What They Wore Under There

You may know your great-grandfather's middle name and cause of death, but how much do you know about his underwear? A site called Vintage Skivvies claims to have "the world's first e-museum totally focused on what American men have worn under their trousers."

Throughout this modern marvel called Vintage Skivvies, you'll find news clips, special features and fascinating facts — everything to ensure you are a hip and informed consumer, an enlightened enthusiast of the fine art and science of men’s classic underwear.

[Hat tip: Neatorama]

Whitetail or Shirttail

Quilts to be displayed at a Pennsylvania tavern this weekend testify to the poor marksmanship of generations of local hunters.

The late Helen Kuzma, who owned the Beechwood Inn in Ogletown with her husband, John, from 1947 to the 1970s, made quilts by hand using the shirttails she snipped from patrons who missed getting a deer.

The many plaid and solid-color flannel and wool shirttails were embroidered with the owner’s name, so there was a record when a hunter would claim they never missed a shot.

Each year, Kuzma would hang that year’s quilted record of misses as well as previous years’ quilts. [Link]

Too Big For Their Britches

Studies show that the average man in the Civil War era stood 5 feet, 7 inches tall and weighed 147 pounds. Since then, the average man has grown 2½ inches and packed on an extra 44 pounds. For anyone trying to walk a mile in his ancestor's shoes, that means a tight fit.

Don Hotchkiss, a civil engineer in Las Vegas and a descendant of Civil War veterans, is an avid Civil War re-enactor. Early on, he and his brother tried to sleep in an exact replica of one of the old tents.

It was too small, Mr. Hotchkiss said. He is six feet tall and stocky. His brother, a police officer in Phoenix, is thinner, but 6-foot-2. The tents were made for men who were average size then. “In the past 145 years, we’ve ballooned up,” Mr. Hotchkiss said.

At a recent meeting of a Las Vegas chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, eight burly men crowded into a library meeting room. All had experienced the equivalent of the Civil War tent problem.

“At the re-enactments, all the directors, all the costume directors say the re-enactors are just too darn big,” said George McClendon, a hefty 67-year-old retired airline pilot. [Link]