Larry Allen Crosby (1943–), 9th great-grandson of Simon Crosby, has always wanted to know where he came from. As a child he knew the names of his father’s brothers, but they were distant. He knew very little about them.
In early 1967 he was in the army, at Fort Lewis, Washington, on his way to Viet Nam as an infantry officer. Two uncles he had never met lived in Portland and Salem, Oregon. He drove to see them. After he came home, he and Carol moved to the Northwest. He met his grandfather’s sister Bert and brother Floyd Howard. Uncle Floyd gave him a copy of the 1968 family history.
That book sat in his files for about 30 years while he worked and raised two children. When he retired in 1999, he and Carol Kay Crosby (1942–) planned a 30-day trip around the United States. They visited Crosby families, cemeteries, and research libraries. For two years Larry worked with relatives. He expanded the work of Aunt Bert and Lula, and he built a website so the stories would be easy to find.
Grandchildren then took the years. Later, with more time, he took the work up again — trunks, albums, family histories, and the daily work of putting the material in order. He was more interested in the people and their stories than in charts. There is little here about those still living. Most of the material is about past generations. Future generations can write what this one did.
Pat Crosby wrote that her brother Larry was always an inspiration. Years later she sent a DNA sample to Ancestry and found other relatives who had put trees and papers online. She hoped the site would show how the path of ancestors can be researched, and that older family members would be included while they can still be asked.
Best regards, cousin Larry Allen Crosby. 9th great-grandson of Simon Crosby. May 2018.