April Layher's Pride of Ohio Block

WOW! April Layher is the second Genea-Quilter to submit her entry for the Genea-Quilters 2011 Block Challenge to benefit the Southern California Genealogical Society's Jamboree scholarship fund. April has also graciously volunteered to piece all our blocks together and prepare the quilt for tying during Jamboree 2011 in June.

Here's what April has to say about her "Pride of Ohio" block:

"I chose this quilt block because it represents generations of my family. Although I am not the historian that my sister is, I do know that our family helped to settle Ohio and has been in Northeastern Ohio for many generations. My favorite place in the world was my Grandfather’s dairy farm in West Farmington, Ohio.  

My Aunt Polly and Uncle Elton Bland owned a grocery and dry goods store with plank flooring and hitching posts in West Farmington. They were the dearest people in the world to me. Many cousins still live there, their homes sandwiched in between Amish houses. I fondly remember waking up in the upstairs bedroom of the farmhouse to the clattering of hooves and buggies driving past.

The little cemetery in town, Hillside Cemetery, features the names and dates of my ancestors, going back over 200 years, and some of the stones are so worn now, that only a rubbing will clearly discern the names. Osmer, Hosmer, Curtis, Hatch, Christy – so many familiar names in one graveyard that make me feel a part of this little town in Ohio, even though I have never lived there."

 Here are some of April (and Tami's) Ohio ancestor photos:

 My grandfather Addison Osmer as a young man.

 My Dad at 17 in his town baseball  uniform.

My Mom, Marcelle Burge Osmer and her little brother Bruce Burge.

"For all these reasons, I chose the Pride of Ohio block because my family, though simple, working people, formed the backbone of Ohio and, indeed, of our country. I am grateful and proud to have such ancestry."