Laura Emogene (Pettibone) Bradish (1848 - aft. 1944)

Born 26 Mar 1848 in Stockholm, St. Lawrence Co. NY

Ancestors

Wife of Albert Bradish — married 18 Nov 1879 in Winnebago, Illinois, United States

Biography

A newspaper article written in 1944 about Laura Emogene (Pettibone) Bradish when she was ninety-six years old reveals that even at that advanced age Laura was a bright, lively, independent, and thoroughly interesting person. On that occasion she was returning from San Diego, California, to Chicago after a three-year absence to take up residence in the home of her grandson, William E. Bradish, of 4735 Diversey Avenue and his wife and two of her three grandchildren. Accompanied on the long trip by her grandniece, Patsy Pettibone, a student at Mills College, Oakland, California, Laura got off the train without any help and walked a block or two down the platform, "as sprightly as you please," according to the article. But she was glad when a porter hurried forward with a wheelchair and placed her in the contraption and wheeled her out of the train shed. She was met by her grandson, her nephew Holman Dean Pettibone, President of the Chicago title and Trust Company, and a dozen other relatives, and was interviewed by a reporter from the Chicago Sun. In answer to the reporter's first question about whether she remembered the time she had first arrived in Chicago at least seventy years earlier, she asked, "You remember the Chicago fire?" He admitted he did not remember the fire, and she said, "Well, it was just after the fire, and I've lived here most of my life since then - except for the last three, years which I spent in San Jose, California." Laura reminisced about her late husband, Albert H. Bradish, who had been captain of an Illinois regiment in the Civil War, and when asked when they were married she answered that she was married to him a few years after the fire. That reminded her that the reporter did not remember the fire, and she said, searching her memory, "When was the fire? It was in '71. I was married - well, make it in '75."

Her nephew asked Aunt Laura whether she had had a nice trip, and she answered, "We did." "And if you asked me whether Patsy took care of Aunt Laura, or she took care of Patsy," her grandniece added, "I wouldn't know how to answer."^[1]

Both Aunt Laura and her husband were remembered by another of her nieces, Jane (Eklund) Ball, as marvelously warm-hearted people who for many years were hosts of an annual family gathering filled with fun and delicious food, and who opened their home to Laura's parents, Sylvester and Eliza Pettibone, for the last remaining years of their lives when the parents finally gave up their own home at the respective ages of 89 and 91 years.

^[2]

Sources

• Tom Bredehoft, Pettibone Registry, page 402, see K. Pontius Click the Changes tab for the details of edits by Tom and others. ^[3]

Footnotes

1. ↑ ["Pioneer Chicago Woman Comes Back Home at 96," The Chicago Sun, April 23, 1944, from Pettibone family records of Marie (Pettibone) McKeown, Piedmont, California.]
2. ↑ Entered by Tom Bredehoft.
3. ↑ Entered by Tom Bredehoft 15/7/2013.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Tom Bredehoft for starting this profile. Click the Changes tab for the details of contributions by Tom and others.