God Bless James

Dear Hearts,

March 10th is the anniversary of the birth of James Conick, my great-grandfather, born in Ireland in 1855. He descended from Irish and Scottish Highland warriors, the Scots having descended from Cornish rebels who migrated to Scotland 1000 years ago, and was a life-long cop himself, a detective sergeant on the Chicago Police force. His mother was Mary Ronan, a relative of the first West Pointer killed in action, in 1812 at Fort Dearborn, Chicago, George Ronan.

James emigrated through Canada, getting a start there, as did Jeremiah Sullivan, giving us our long tie to Canada. He married Anastasia Raftis (daughter of Edmund Raftis and Margaret Bolger), and they had Booma/Mom, Anna Mildred Conick Sullivan, wife of Lefty and our grandmother. Their other children were Alice Buckley and Eleanor Mitchell.

There are many apocryphal stories about Grandpa Conick--he went to Europe every year, always taking some grandchildren or nieces and nephews, so there were witnesses to his doings. In Venice, the old man, who went to bed at 8 pm, hung out the window as the singing gondoliers went gliding by, and yelled, "Shut up ye damned foreigners and let a man sleep."

He slept with his gun under his pillow. When Big Sully was little, he slept with Grandpa Conick and would try to get the gun, but Grandpa always woke up. Now and then he would wake up from a whiskey dream and shoot up the house, and one night there actually was a burglar in the house and Grandpa nailed him with two rounds in the butt, hamstringing him and laying him out until the cops arrived.

Grandpa had a lot, a lot, of money--as a Chicago cop. Go figure. Today is the 165th anniversary of his birth. God bless you, John. We pray you are enjoying eternity with all the ancestors and our Father.

God bless us and save us and keep us from harm.

Love, Jim & Patty