Have you read Peter’s book on George Doane? He made it public e-book, available for all to read, with a click of your mouse!
I’m not even finished yet, but I had a few questions for the author! First, I thought we should have a photo of where Peter has been spending most of his life since he tackled this project July of 2013. Here you see him perusing some Robert Asher photos, including some of Mr. Doane, of course. Peter pointed out the pink Palomar Mountain Summit Grove felt pennant by the light on his desk… it’s part of his Palomar Mountain collection. (Double-click the photo to enlarge).
That manuscript was countless hours of work… the more I read, the more I realize that Peter really invested a tremendous amount of time.
Peter said that he visited the various historical collections in San Diego (San Diego History Center; Escondido Public Library Pioneer Room; Escondido History Center; SD City Library downtown). He searched old newspapers online in two sources. He used ancestry.com, searched Google, and Escondido newspapers on microfilm since they are not online.
A great find was descendants of the siblings of George Doane’s wife in Louisiana! Peter talked to them via phone and then via email with a key family genealogy person to get Hayes family information. Peter shared with them what he had learned. They knew nothing about their family members’ time in California other than that Doane’s wife was married to someone named Doane and moved out to Palomar, then moved to Imperial Valley, and then divorced. They didn’t know that mother, brother and sister moved out here, following along with Doane’s wife, and didn’t know a lot else about Doane’s wife. So blanks were filled in.
Significantly the Louisiana Hayes family descendants did not have a photo of Doane’s wife Irene (the great aunt of the Louisiana woman with whom Peter has been conversing). You see that photo in the Doane biography, which was in an Escondido collection.
Even better, Peter surfaced a photo of the woman’s grandfather Leonidas in Doane’s cabin. The photo did not have him identified, but his Louisiana connection had the photo you see of Leonidas at age 34. Peter had that Doane cabin photo with Leonidas at age 20. He image-edited the heads out of both photos, made them the same size, and combined them into one image to compare facial features of Leonidas fourteen years apart. Facial features matched in his estimation, and the Louisiana relatives agree.
She told Peter the Doane story was a big hit at the Hayes holiday family gathering.
I had to ask Peter, “Who took the photos in the cemeteries?” So curious.
The photo of Baby G Doane’s cemetery marker in Valley Center was taken by Peter-the-Author, himself. He read in an old newspaper item that the baby was buried in Valley Center, so he walked through the cemetery there until he found his marker. Then Peter put his info into findagrave.com
The photo of John Doane, and family cemetery markers, were also taken by Peter. When he was visiting his mother in King City, Peter was twelve miles south of Greenfield, California, where John Doane is buried. Peter is an avid cyclists so rode his bike to the Greenfield cemetery, walked around and found the graves. Photos of their markers were already in findagrave.com but Peter went and took his own for fun.
The photo of Charles Doane’s cemetery marker came about because Peter made a cemetery finding request on findagrave.com. Someone helpful in the area then went to the cemetery and found Charles Doane’s cemetery marker laying in a rough state, and photographed it for Peter.
And, for all of us!
Thank you so much Peter!
Bonnie-on-the-Mountain
Palomar Mountain News 