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HOME > SURNAMES > ESTES > BOOK: DESC THOS ESTES > DEDICATION |
DEDICATIONThis book is dedicated to my family. The family whose good opinion I value and covet. The family to whom I am indebted to for a family reputation for honesty, hard work, patriotism, sobriety, faithfulness, and self reliance. You are the ones before whom I have taken marriage vows, celebrated holidays, shared joys and sorrow, exchanged family stories, laughed with, sang songs with, fought with, sought advice from, gave advice to, turned to in time of need, and worshiped with.Our family history and fate is linked to and bound up with America. Colonists with our surname were in America before the Plymouth Colony was founded. We are of a modest and humble descent. The good reputation we enjoy is created anew by each succeeding generation. Any wealth we have, we acquire through our own efforts. Any loss of good name we must accept as our own doing. Our predecessors did the best they could with what they had in the times they lived. We do the same. Within this little book are traces of those who have gone before this generation that is now passing on, and generations coming into being. These were and are real people, who make us what we are. No matter what we do or fail to do will add to our family history and our family reputation. I pray that we may be worthy of those who have gone before as well as those who follow. From the War of Independence to Vietnam, our family has been represented. Our fathers and grandfathers cleared virgin land and built homes. Our mothers and grandmothers toiled alongside their men in all types of labor, and continued to struggle with those chores and duties tradition has identified with women's work. Some of our ancestors have chosen lives of religious service, while others have taken different paths. Few have been found on the wrong side of the law.
I dedicate this book to all of you. |
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HOME > SURNAMES > ESTES > BOOK: DESC THOS ESTES > DEDICATION |