|
|
|
|
This page was last updated on 10/26/06.
Well, the first Russell Reunion happened and it came off without a hitch! I had a wonderful time and seemed like the 70 attendees did too, even the weather cooperated, warm and balmy with little to no humidity! The week before the event, the hotel event manager called me to say he was hearing about the reunion from his staff and was worried that we would overflow the meeting room for our dinner, so they gave us their breakfast restaurant with no charge. It was definitely more comfortable and we did fill it up!! The slide show given by Leon Cooper made our photos come alive with history, it was better than I could possibly have imagined. THANK YOU Leon!! He says he’ll be making that slide show cd available so if you want a copy, just contact either Leon (lcooper96@comcast.net) or me and one of us will get it to you. Thanks to all of you who added things to the charts, I’m still getting the new info added. I have compiled a list of the attendees with mailing as well as email addresses; so if you’d like a copy, contact me. If you took photos, please send me copies and we’ll post them on the site as well as sending copies to the folks who couldn’t come and don’t have computers. I’m sure they’d enjoy them. If you want to email them to me, no problem and thanks to those of you who have already sent them. We had folks from: Washington state, California, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Kansas, Missouri and of course Arkansas. I’m amazed that we don’t have more folks on the east coast; I guess the ancestors took the “go west young man” saying for real. It was fun to watch people’s eyes as they meet and read each other’s nametags to figure out how they were related then the light bulb above their heads would go on and they’d smile and say “I remember when” and “You were only about this big the last time I saw you.” What a wonderful thing to see for someone who has a little family (that’s why I married Roger, he has such a large family). Folks seemed to have enjoyed the activities; some went to Jail, some to Pea Ridge, some to the Gravette Museum, some went cemetery visiting, some just visited the town and the farmer’s market. We’ve talked and decided to do this again in TWO YEARS, so mark your calendars for a Russell Reunion in 2008! We’re trying to decide if we should have it in Bentonville again or maybe this time move it up into Missouri where the Russell’s lived. That way we could visit Fort Scott and some Indian Museums local to the area. Discussions still on going, if you’d like to participate, get in touch with me. There are lots of folks I can’t find. If any of you have names/addresses for descendants for: Stella Russell, Bessie Russell, Lenora Russell and Perry Russell (all children of Andrew Russell), please give me a jingle or email me. I’d love to have someone from each line at the next reunion if possible. Oh yea, if anyone wants any of the items that were up on the front table like, a binder with a narrative of the Russell descendants of Samuel Russell and Josephine Jackson or one of the Russell Reunion bags, a shirt with the reunion logo, a tree (one filled with names) bag or something with Louisa Bell on it, I can make more, get in touch with me. Well, enough for now, Diana Russell at diana@russellreunion.com or call 707 257-2549
|
