Lost children, lost years, enduring quest - Part I

[jjbrannon]

     To adequately explain what unfolded next after my Tuesday, 1 December 2009 meeting with Lisa Scottoline and her family, requires one to know that her previously released book was Look Again about an adoption by a single-mother reporter which led to a custody battle with the supposedly biological father from whom the child was kidnapped at

Comments

So moving!

[jaywile]

What a great post! I had no idea about most of your family history. It was touching and revealing, and even humorous. I do love the line that your father "sold iceboxes to Eskimos."

[m_francis]

A very affecting story.

Film footage

[jonnyquest72]

Hi Jim, I'm a friend of the Kelly girls and want to offer the following to you:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpGGPeyuKCE

This footage from a 1956 wedding contains your father, grandmother Pauline and grandfather Harry. If you are privy to other movie footage of them, please let me know.

---Mike Bowman

Re: Film footage

[jjbrannon]

Mike, thank you for the footage.

Oddly, I only heard your name yesterday for the first time at the family Labor Day picnic [at Pauline's sister Beverly's son Tommy's house] from Richard Stout.

Dotty Kelly referred to the Wiki entry writer, which I encountered I suppose about a year or so ago at Christmas, for Harry Brannon as "someone from the Woodbury church".

While my step-grandfather had a great gift, he allowed other aspects of his nature to control his life, which -- sadly -- placed his light under a bushel of his own weaving.

In great part I owe my writing the IMDb bio entry and Wikipedia piece on my grandfather Hedgie to your prompting. I felt it an injustice that Harry Brannon who, while talented in his own light and almost made a movie, had a Wiki article while my biological grandfather, who appeared in or worked on over a hundred television, movie, and short reel productions, aside from his touring nationwide in thrill shows for nearly five decades, languished in relative obscurity on the Internet

Re: Film footage

[jonnyquest72]

Glad to offer it, Jim. I had ammased alot of material on HB and was hoping to do something with it as a history project until I was more enlightened about Him through Richard this past week. Now I don't know what to do except pass it on to the "rightful owners" - those who lived it in more ways than one:(

Harry Woolman

[ext_1055820]

I knew Harry when I was a young man, renting a house from him when I was 17 years old. I would get home from work at the phone company and he would often come over and have coffee with me. Harry would share stories of his youth with me and often involve me in pranks. I loved the old guy and he was a great influence on my life. I can still here his voice, "Eddie! Come over here and have a look..." as he would pull out some memento from his storied past and start relating an adventure. My friends often told me I was crazy for listening to him and that he was making stuff up. They had to eat crow when the Los Angeles Times did a piece on him in the 'Calendar' section (I believe in 1976).

Re: Harry Woolman

[jjbrannon]

Ed, I appreciate your comment.

I only had the chance to meet my grandfather once, during our summer 1964 cross-continental drive to Alaska.

Gary Kent writes about my grandfather in his Shadows & Light: Journeys with Outlaws in Revolutionary HollywoodMy grandfather did embroider his adventures a tad to make a better story but, where I have been able to verify either from either news accounts or primary witnesses to events, there has always been a core truth to his tales

Re: Harry Woolman

[ext_1055820]

Jerry, What a wonderful read this has been. My dad, your grandfather Harry S. Woolman did lean to exaggeration. I think that was due to his lack of education because of dyslexia and never learning to read. I often wonder how it would feel to be looked down on by peers and elders in a day when you were labeled dumb if you couldn't learn to read. How would that effect ones personality as an adult if you had no mentor. Perhaps he overcompensated from an early age to gain attention by keeping people entertained so they wouldn't question his intelligence. Perhaps deep in his heart he believed he was flawed, but cleverly learned that the more colorful the words, the more others found him interesting to be around, so over the years his stories were spun with bolder color. I actually have no idea, because I did not know him when he was young. But I do remember meeting Spencer Tracy as a young child. And I remember being pulled out of the water on a California lake by Andy Devine after I fell over the side of an outboard motor boat

Re: Harry Woolman

[jjbrannon]

Oh! So good to hear from you, Aunt Donna! [And, like military titles, there are technical references -- e.g., Lieutenant-Colonel, addressed as simply "Colonel" -- and personal references, so whatever our technical relationship, you're plainly "Aunt" to me.]

We haven't spoken since before the millennium. Like so many people these days, apparently you've switched from a landline to a cellphone and the number I had for you no longer works. Same holds true for you email address. Cousin Judy at Woolman Central didn't have a good e-address for you. I've had mine for almost 20 years now.

I can still be reached at jjbrannon (at) aol-dot-com [written so to deter skimmer-bots].

While I was mostly called "Jerry" when a child, I'm mostly known as "Jim" or "James" these days [and in the SF community, by "JJ"], except by some elder relatives. It's what my younger of my two aunts from this side of the family still calls me, so you're fine with that.

When we last spoke, your daughter's son was living with you. He seemed to be a Star

Uncle Jerry

[anonymous]

Jerry

Re: Uncle Jerry

[jjbrannon]

Thank you sharing that, Audrey.

I'm concerned about your mother.

Give me a call this week or drop me an email.

Love,
JJB