Miriam's Wordpress Blog

Pictures from Miriam's past and present.  These people and their shenanigans and misadventures are the background from which the Double Cousins books spring, including both the term "double cousins" and the characters themselves.

These pictures will also help you visualize several scenes in the book(s).

Childhood Daze (pun intended) at the Ranch

Cousins outside the back door of the ranch house.  The ranch is south of Berwyn, Nebraska.

Side door (south) of the ranch house.

What in the world possessed Dad to let kids (Miriam, her brother, and a cousin) on top of his car!?!  Grandpa sure looks pleased with himself there in front.  The shovel in her sister's hand means they're headed out to cut musk thistles.

Best buds.  Miriam's Cousin (age 7) and Brother (age 6).
The opening to "under the grandstand" is behind them.  Miriam's booth to officially launch the first book is in that space.

Miriam's cousin is either getting ready to show his calf at the Custer County Fair or has just done so.

Aerial view of the Ranch in 1981.
(Large format print scanned in sections, corrected for fading, and "stitched" together to recreate original scene).

Miriam's nieces and nephew reading the book as soon as it arrived.
The humor of the situation was, the book had NOT YET arrived at Miriam's house, so they saw it before she did.
This picture was sent by e-mail so she could see the book.

Miriam on TV (NBC Affiliate in Rapid City, South Dakota, 29 July 2009)

Chris Orr invited Miriam to be a guest on his morning show to talk about her book.  Miriam lived in Rapid City for 10 years, and some of her former coworkers at the hospital saw the segment when it aired live (6:45 a.m.).

2009 Custer County Fair, 1-5 August 2009

The Fair was a lot of fun and much more to her than just the official launch of the first book.  A number of people shared memories of her grandparents and their family.

Miriam is riding in the parade in her Uncle's 1931 Ford Model A Town Sedan.
The Broken Bow Municipal Building is in the background.

Miriam and two of the Cousins that used to be with them at the Ranch.

Miriam and some of the extended family.
They're sitting in the covered bleachers near where Grandma always sat to keep an eye on them as they ran hither and yon trying to see everything.
They thought they were free and unsupervised, but Grandma could see everything from her vantage point.

Miriam and Cousins at the Fair -- we looked for a sign to "prove" time and place.

"And the beat goes on . . ."  This is the next generation from the 1973 pictures above, the daughter of one of Miriam's Cousins, who showed these sheep.

This train has just passed behind the grandstand at the Fairgrounds.
The fence runs between these trees and the embankment.  If you look closely, you can see some of the fence posts.

One Cousin had to leave just before another one arrived.  These two worked really hard posting flyers and staffing the booth to help Miriam SELL BOOKS.

And speaking of SELLING BOOKS, this is Miriam's booth under the grandstand, next the Farm Bureau booth.  If you look closely at the table, you can see the cowboy boot (mug) full of candy that was the centerpiece of a contest for the kids.  The one who guessed ("estimated", as one was careful to point out) closest to the actual number won the mug and contents.

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Last modified: August 29, 2009