more from Paul

 In response to one of the pics I asked him about:

" the problem I have is no one wrote on the back who was in the pictures so although I found a lot of small pictures while clearing out the old house I have no idea who is in most of them.  It was only then when I found memorial cards for the likes of your grandfather that I first knew  I had relations in America shortly after I was contacted by Fran. I don't believe the Mc Callion men were great at keeping in contact and I often wonder did any of them come home at the times of their parents' deaths but I also know that your grandmother did keep in touch and one person was James' sister Annie in Co Wexford. One other thing that Fran told me was that when Michael was killed James snr and Mary offered to raise the 3 children if they were sent back to Ireland .So to give you a outline of your grandfather James' siblings that stayed in Ireland I will start with John:

John Mc Callion Married Margret Mc Ginley in 1906 and had the following children:

Mary born 1907 Died 1994

Anna Born 1908 died 2003 

Veronica born 1910 died 1996 

Bridget born1912 died 1998 

James born 1914 died 1915 

John born 1919 died 1979 

Hugh born 1921 died 1999 

My father  John  first worked with his father at road building then joined the railways and then a conductor on the buses . Hugh worked driving lorries and buses then became a bread delivery man. Vera and Bridie worked in a shirt factory and Mary ran the local Post Office. It was Mary that your mother met while over here. Anna worked in her later years as a bookkeeper for a local  mill but looked after the home most of her life as Margret her mum died in 1935.Also my Grandfather John had a stroke and she cared for him at home for years."

Josephine to Fran

Note & letters from Josephine to Fran, 1980. This is how cousins handled things in the days before the internet!

Thanks Fran for sharing!

John McCallion (Pop's brother)

 

from Paul: "This picture had my Grandfather up on his steam engine (in right rear) working at road building for  Donegal Co Council. My father also worked with him breaking stones. John was a Engine driver even as far back as the 1901 census and worked all his life at it. My father and he would sleep in the wagon behind because they would be working miles from home and the engine was very slow and the boilers had to be fired up early to make steam to drive."

Also from Paul:

" I will start at the beginning James and Mary lived in a townland called Tieroneil in a small cottage with 16 acres of farm and had 10 children. The old cottage is still standing but used as a cow shed and is now owned by a family called Gallagher.

James McCallion   snr was born in 1836 and died in 1926  

Mary McCallion nee Hagney born 1856 died 1933

John my grandfather born 1875 died 1958

James your grandfather born 1877 died 1954

Daniel born 1879

Patrick born 1881 died 1960

Michael born 1882 died in a accident in NY

William born 1885 died 1962

Mary Anne born 1887 died 1939

Annie born 1889 died 1963

Sara born 1892 died 1976

Joseph born 1894 died 1895

I will send you more on each  family member that I know of that stayed in Ireland. I got most of my information from my aunt Mary who was a postmistress and had a great interest in family and also was brought up by her grandmother who told her all the stories. Aunt Mary was born in 1907 so also lived when the previous generation were very much alive ."

Note: Mary the postmistress marries John Sweeney. This is the woman Mom (Josephine McCallion) was in contact with and provided that contact to Fran Miller.

James (Pop) McCallion's brothers

Fran Miller is the granddaughter of Pop's (James McCallion's) younger brother Michael, who dies tragically in a trolley accident in NYC in 1913.

Fran has put me in contact with Paul McCallion, grandson of James's older brother John. John stayed in Donegal, and his grandson Paul is still in the Lifford area.

From Paul: "This my Grandparents and Father taken in the 20s. Your grandmother was in our Great Grandparents house on the night of the 1911 census with her first 2 children while James was already in the USA. I am the second youngest of a family of 10 born in 1964. "

"This picture is of Patrick McCallion and his wife Helena and Daughter. Patrick is very like your grandfather his brother"

Helena's maiden name is Leonard, I wonder if any relation to the Leonards that marry into the Meehans?

We've seen the marriage cert before but Paul's comment is of interest:

"This is the marriage cert for your grandparents. He was a agent for Singer sewing machines and she was a seamstress so maybe they met over a Thread."

The cert says "machine agent", I just didn't know that meant an agent for Singer sewing machines. 

One of James's later forms lists him as an insurance agent, plus all the 'engineer' entries we see on the U.S. census.

"I believe this is our great grandparents James McCallion and Mary Hagney who married in Murlog in 1874. Mary was from Falcarragh and probably came to the hiring fair in Strabane."