Stories Aunt Emilie told me

Aunt Emilie is a very important person in the history of this family. She was the one who took care of my mother when her mother and father couldn't and she is the one who started me, encouraged me and had most of the facts about the family history in her head to tell me.
  I first became interested in genelogy after root's, Alex Haley's book about his family history. I don't know how, but it was most likely through my mother that I found out Aunt Emilie knew alot about the family history. And there was someone, at least one other person before her who delved into the family tree. There are papers, very brittle that spell out in a fancy handwriting from some time in the late 1800's members of the Hardens, the Darrows and the Westervelts. That was later typed up on some grey paper added to by Aunt Emilie and finally after her death acquired by me. I have expanded on the family history of the Smith's of Smithtown. The original history I had was the branch of the family named Smith were related to Richard 'Bull' Smith. Aunt Emilie didn't have the person by person relationships but she had a few stories about Smiths.
  The first one about her father, Walter Charles Smith going to North Dakota to try and farm in the badlands. He gave up after about two years of rough going. Wally, her son, has a story about the badlands attached to him in the genealogy.
  The next story was about her grandfather, Charles Walter Smith, how he served during the Civil War.
She showed me his mess kit and I think his hat or his powder horn, I'm not sure. After Aunt Emilie's death they were lost.
  The final story about the Smith's, for now is about Richard Madison Smith. He was the youngest of about fifteen children and when he grew to be a man he became a patient medicine salesman. I have a 1970's photo copy of the ingredients.It's a poor copy, the original like so many other items were misplaced after Aunt Emilie's death. The medicine contained mostly mead wine.
  Armed with all of this information I wrote a few letters to the Smithtown historical society and to my amazement the wrote me back saying that most of the information that I had sent them they did not have on file. They also said the name Muller did not appear anywhere in the book. I wrote back to them several times and they finally connected up Richard Madison Smith and sent me photo copies of his genealogy all the way back to Bull Smith. I found out they had a book called ten generations of Richard Smith for twenty-five dollars, which I purchased. They also said that a foot note would be placed in the book that I provided the information. I asked that Emilie Smith be put as the supplier. I had the impression that a new copy of the book was coming out soon. That was in the early eighties. I visited the Smithtown historical society in 2007 expecting to find a new edition. There was none and the historical society was a little disappointing. It was a Monday after all so maybe Tuesday was a busier day.