Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1903-07-16
FACTS ABOUT MARRIAGES.
GeneaIOGiSt Sets Forth Some Inter
estinE observations Bearing
Upon MatrimOny.

The marriages of a family are a
good guide to go by in determining its
characteristics" said a woman, whose
business it is to hunt up pedigrees, ac-
cording to the Chicago Inter Ocean. Il
should warn any girl who has many
old maid aunts and bachelor uncles not
to daily with her first proposal if she
would not be an old maid herself. Like
wise, I believe that a girls chances
for remarriage, if widowed early, can
be judged pretty accurately from the
annals of her family in this respect.
when in the course of my work |
am in doubt about the identity of a fam
lily | am guided a good deal by the char
acter of the marriages set down. For
these illustrate the dominant family
traits which govern as much in love
matters as in other concerns of life.
"In some families early marriages
predominant. The men invariably
marry before they are rs, and the wom-
en- at a corerspondingly early age.
Again, late marriages will be the rule
with members OF either sex.
Some family trees show few second
marriages, and rarely a third marriage.
no matter how soon the married state
came to an end. Other records are re-
plete with second and third and even
fourth marriages on the part of widows
and widowers.
"Often it occurs that in families OF
nine or more brothers and sisters, only
two or three have married, and the de-
scendants of those two or three dis
played a similar %proneness to bachelor
hood and spinsterhood.
"'Our family are not great on mar
rying,' a girl, II of four single sisters,
remarked to me lately regarding the
family likenesses she was showing all
grouped together on n wall panel.
and | could not but feel that thai
array of Notwithstanding single en-.
titles among her ~kinspeople must ex-
ert some influence on her own matri,
monial prospects.
Some families display a marked
tendency to marry their kinsfolk, OF
the connections or relations of their
kinsfolk. Others again seem by COM
mon impulse to have gone as far from
home quarters as possible in search OF
mates.
IN records that go back only a few
generations, there are instances Of
men who have taken three sisters sue
cessively to wife, and of women mar
rying theiS brothers in law and cousins
in law, or their stepfathers, the same
tendency to race utilization cropping
out again and again in the line. In
neighborhood and environment not 8
single instance of marriage with rela-
tons or relations in law occurs.
zone upon families in which
an unmarried member of either sex is
a great rarity and families in which
marriage seems to have come easily
and as a foregone conclusion, and ir
which none of the widows or widowers
stayed single for any length of time.
I'm studying out relationships II
4uulllIly olu-IuoliollCu IolllllullltlCf
n u n upon families that seemed
bound to marry at cross purposes, a.
it were, both as to age and standing
of the mates chosen. A widower take!
for a third wife his sons s~tepdaughter
or a widow marries the son of the maj
whom her daughter married. Just 81
there are family records in which
marriage at a very advanced age Of
with a partner of lower rank socially
never occur
81 thing fortune tellers could add tt
the effectiveness of their prophetic!
in love matters if they could have tn
advantage of scanning the family an
: nails of the applicants.
There is no phase of genealogical
research SO fascinating as noting tn,
record implied by the marriage on
t family tree. But the genealogist of thu
, future will have more complicated
work in tracing out lines and trait
than exists now on account Of the di
vorces figuring in the matter"