Sidney

Tintype.

In the album sleeve, in the handwriting of an old person, under the young man on the right, is written: Sidney.

Sid Reeves was born in 1872, which might help in dating this photo. The boy on the left is unidentified.

Sid, Jennie

Tintype with "Sid, Jennie" written on album sleeve.

Siblings Sid and Jennie Reeves, born in 1872 and 1869. This would've been taken during the 1872-1884 "lost years" where I cannot account for their whereabouts. What is intriguing is that these studio props show up in a few other tintypes with different people in the album.

According to family legend, their father, William Francis "Frank" Reeves served as a civilian scout for the Army on the Western frontier at some point in those dozen years, and the family sort of moved around on the edge of the frontier behind him. If that is so, these two children with serious expressions waiting by an empty chair seems a little heart breaking.

One family story tells about the Mother and her three Reeves children basically scraping by in a modest cabin in the dead of winter out in the middle of Nowhere, Kansas while Dad was gone on a long scouting mission. The local tribe took pity on the family and left a freshly killed deer at their doorstep to help them get by.

Sid

Written on album sleeve: Sid

Sidney A. Reeves. I'm guessing this was taken in the early 1890s in Centralia, Washington.

Lafe

Tintype

Barely legible on verso: Lafe

Charles LaFayette Reeves (Aug. 18, 1862-June 4, 1939) was better known as Lafe. He was the older brother of my great grandmother, Jennie. 

Lafe accompanied his family from Michigan to Centralia, Washington Territory in 1889. He married a woman named Elizabeth (Bessie) in 1903 and they both were Christian Scientist converts. When my grandmother Leona survived the influenza epidemic in 1918 she credited Lafe with her recovery.

Lafe was a barber and I only recently learned worked just 7 miles from my home over in Elma, Washington during the early 1900s. In spite of the expression in this photo, he is remembered as a big, friendly man who was also a ventriloquist. 

Charles and Bessie had no children. We visit their graves every year and the headstones are eroding away down there in Centralia.

OK, now here's a mystery for you research wizards. Between the birth of Sidney A. Reeves (Lafe's youngest sibling) in Michigan, Mar. 28, 1872 and the year 1884 when the family is safely back in the Wolverine State but a bit further north, I cannot account for the whereabouts of the Reeves family. There are some pretty wild stories, all unconfirmed, which include George Armstrong Custer and Little Bighorn. I'll get to it eventually here. It would seem this tintype of Lafe was taken during this lost chunk of time. And he looks worn beyond his tender years. There's a good story somewhere in there.

Sid

Written on album sleeve: Sid

Written on verso: S.A. Reeves, 1891, Mrs. Theo. Hoss

Printed: T.R. Williams, Centralia, Wash.

Sidney A. Reeves was the youngest of three. He was born Mar. 28, 1872 in Michigan. When the Reeves family moved to Washington Territory in 1889 he was still a teenager. In this photo he is 18 or 19 years old.

They tell me he was employed as a butcher and was an avid hunter. He never married and lived with his sister Jennie and her husband Theodore Hoss until 1920. Eventually he moved to the country where he raised hunting dogs.  

Sid died in Centralia, Washington Aug. 21, 1938. He is buried in Centralia's Pioneer Cemetery under a rapidly eroding simple headstone.