HAMEFARIN - COONTIN KIN

The trouble sometimes with trying to trace ones ancestors was the tendancy up until very recently to name the newborn after their father, grandfather, mother, grandmother etc. etc. While I wouldn't have had it any other way, four of our own family with exactly the same name were alive and kicking at one time, which was not unusual at all, but did cause the occasional confusion especially at Banks, Building Societies and Christmas time. This was in the days long before computer ID's, PIN numbers or Passwords and the cartoon by A. Wallis Mills (1878-1940) chosen for today highlights a similar circumstance.

Transcript below:

ELIMINATION

                                STRANGER: "Can you tell me where Mr. Tooley lives?"

                                NATIVE: "There's fifteen families o' Tooleys."

                                STRANGER: "Mr Samuel Tooley?"

                                NATIVE: "There's twenty Sam Tooleys."

                                STRANGER: "He is, I believe, a carpenter."

                                NATIVE: "Ten o' em's carpenters."

                                STRANGER: "His age is seventy-eight."

                                NATIVE: "Ah, that must be me. What can I di fur ee?"