A place in our family history

While on a recent visit to California, my mom and I took the time to make some genealogy stops along the way.  My mother, Linda Irene Tapley, grew up in Yucaipa, California, which is about 70 miles east of Los Angeles. She went to and graduated from Redlands High School in 1960.  Her 50th high school reunion was the main reason for our visit.

In 1942, her parents, Charles Morgan Tapley and Ethel Irene Ranney Tapley, were living in Los Angeles.  They appear on the California Voter Registrations for 1900-1968 on Ancestry.com in 1942 at 15749 Vintage Street in Los Angeles, Los Angeles County.  My mother was born on Saturday, September 5, 1942, and this is the house her proud parents brought her home to that Labor Day weekend.  (Interesting side notes:  The hospital was filled beyond capacity due to it being wartime, and my grandmother talked about her bed being parked in the hallway, along with many others, after she gave birth.  Also, due to it being the holiday weekend, the hospital didn't want to accept my grandfather's check; he had to threaten to leave his wife and new baby there before the hospital gave in and took the check!)

15749 Vintage St., Los Angeles, CA; picture taken September 2010

Amazingly, the house on Vintage Street is still there in 2010!  I try to imagine how happy my grandparents must have been to bring their new baby daughter home to this house, even if it was uncertain times.

Shortly after this joyous day, Pop Pop had to go off to serve his country in the war, and Grandma moved home with her mother for the duration.  By 1946, the war was over and the Tapley family had moved to Avenue E in Yucaipa.  The family moved several times during the next 3-4 years because Pop Pop was following work.  By 1950, the family settled on 11th Avenue back in Yucaipa, and Mom lived there until she graduated from high school.  Unfortunately, that house is gone and we only found an empty field.

It is said that we can never go home, but it is neat to go back and visit.  It meant so much to me to see where my mother grew up.