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Jane's Illness: What Did Acute Mania Look Like in the 19th Century?

A woman diagnosed as suffering from hilarious mania, colour lithograph, 1892, after J. Williamson, 1890. (Wikimedia Commons) Since I began writing about Jane Darragh, my great-great-grandmother, whose cause of death was noted as "acute mania," I've heard from several readers with various theories of what might have happened to her. There are certainly many different angles to consider. More than one reader suggested that perhaps Jane's diagnosis was a case of her being deemed "hysterical" as a catch-all for any number of ailments. Others thought her diagnosis could have been an easy way to "get rid of her" if she was being troublesome to her husband or family. Another reader suggested that physicians of the day—being male—dismissed women's complaints as being imagined or that her symptoms might not have been seen as remarkable if displayed today. All are excellent points. There's much I don't know about Jane's situation, as her deat...

GENEALOGY CHALLENGE 2021 - Generational Photo

GENEALOGY CHALLENGE 2021

Generational Photo - January 12th entry of a 31-day challenge to post a document, photo or artifact on social media every day in January.  

by Nancy Gilbride Casey


 

BOOMER! 

I love this three-generation photo of my husband, son and father-in-law, for a few reasons. 

All three are died-in-the-wool University of Oklahoma fans. Jim and Papa (the kids' term for their paternal grandpa), both born and raised in Oklahoma, grew up rooting for OU. As far as football was concerned, OU was the most important football thing going. James was quickly initiated into the OU fold as soon as he was old enough to hold a football. So when it was time to pick a theme for a multi-generational photo, an OU-theme photo it was.

Ironically, our son now attends OU. OU may have been his last college visit of three, but it was the school that quickly rose to the top, the dream school. Somehow it just felt right that he would choose OU, and fulfill the unspoken generational dream that someone from the Casey family would attend there.

It's also not lost on any of us that another Casey family favorite—the Cleveland Browns—now possess a former OU quarterback in Baker Mayfield. It came as a complete shock to me to learn in the early days of my relationship with Jim, that both he and his dad were not only lifelong OU fans, but also lifelong Cleveland Browns fans as well. That's right, these Okies had been rooting for this gal's hometown team for years. A marriage made in heaven? In more ways than one!

OU is inextricably woven into our life as a a family. 

And that's OK.

  SOONER!



 

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