Ranum, Ranum, Everywhere

DECEMBER 1931
12 31 Mr. And Mrs. Otto Ranum and children from Warren were here to spend New Years at the home of Mr. And Mrs. Benhard Ranum.



What? Children? Betty Lou Katherine was born in 1926 and Chesley Patrick in 1940. What do they mean children? I will need to ask Patrick. Pat lives in Oregon. Pat and I are 1/2 first cousins. His father, Otto and my grandfather, Benhard had the same father. Benhard had Siri and Otto had Kari, as mothers.



I am going to talk about it and send the same note to Patrick and see what the story is. This is what I think.



Knute and Siri had several children. The second oldest was Alfred.

Alfred married Hulda, the two of them had ten children.

Glen was born in 1923.

Hulda died in 1924.

Otto and Lorine, married in September of 1923, raised him.

In the 1930 census, Glen is listed as an adopted son.

Glen was the plural of children in the opening paragraph.

Glen died at Iwo Jima in 1943. He is buried at Fort Snelling.



Now, this whole Ranum thing is a tangle of fish line or is that fine gold chains?



We know that Benhard and Otto were half brothers.



But Alfred and Hulda continues....

Alfred married Clara Olson who had children with Oskar Ranum, he died

So when Alfred and Clara married, she was Clara Olson Ranum, Ranum.



I understand when I hear this group are first cousins, once removed

Florence

Knute

Isabell

Alice

Lloyd

John

Elsie

Sanford

Kenneth Sidney

Stanley



I even understand Clara and Alfred (First cousins once removed0

Delores

Margaret



Clara and Oskar children are my first cousins once removed

Marceline

Oscar

Maynard

Oral



But where do these first cousins once removed come in?

Lloyd

Myron

Junice

Ray

Arlene

Orrin

Ferrel

Sherwin





OH! They are John and Olga Ranum's, (Grandpa's brother) children!





On New Years Eve of 1966, Otto and his wife, Lorine, and a friend named Mrs. Pete Mellem played cards at my Grandfather's house. "Lena Pete" had become a widow in September of 1966 and my grandfather, Benhard, a widower in November of the same year. At midnight, they were having a lunch after several hours of card playing. Otto and Lorine lived with my grandfather that winter; he stated he needed someone to wake him from his nightmares since his wife of 55 years had died. He slept on the hide-a-bed; they slept in the bedroom.



About the time the clock struck midnight, a snow mobile came around the corner of 13th and Horace too fast and asked Benhard for a shovel to dig the skis out of the snow bank made by the city while plowing the street. I know all of this because Rachel and I stayed up and watched Guy Lombardo usher in the new year.