One of my earliest memories is seeing my pop walking down the driveway of my childhood home (see picture). That old familiar driveway, the garage doors, not worn out and hanging off their hinges as I remember them, Aunty Phillis and Pop Sutton (pop's step-father, my mum with the long dark hair in a beehive hairdo holding me in her arms with a look of bewilderment on my face. Note I'm the only one looking at the photographer) and you can see my sister's long thick plait nearly hidden behind Nana. Boy, the memories of my childhood at Wyadra Avenue North Manly will remain with me forever. My last memories of 95 Wyadra Avenue are the driveway being chipped and worn, the garage doors being so old and worn that we replaced them with a new aluminium rolladoor, wow! I can still picture every bush and flower around the garden, the bird of paradise, the christmas bush, the tiny pink flower bushes that attracted bees and I used on more than one occasion as my make believe bridal bouquet.
(Pop and Nana on their 50th wedding anniversary in Canberra 1968 with most of their grandkids-Im not there but thats my oldest brother Bede Joseph (BJ) looking off to the right, in a sort of daze, and my sister Jenny 2nd girl standing 2nd left, next to my cousin maria, and Peter in the bow tie and his sister Jenny.) The shameful thing, on their part, is that me and my other brother Billy are missing from that picture. For whatever excuses they gave, this picture is incomplete for we are not all there.
It all started out so innocently one sunday lunch at a friend's house. I, sat next to a lady who was born Jewish but married a christian. I knew very little of my Jewish roots back then. I guess its not really something, a catholic family tend to advertise. Based on the generations back to the Jews in my family I told her I was one sixteenth part jewish, to which she replied, "There's no such a thing, either you're jewish or you're not". And from that moment on, I started wondering about the whole jewish catholic thing in my father's family. I will create a new blog with that story later.
For now, I would like to draw the story of my mother's family tree. Her mother, Edna Clausen, was the daughter of a norwegian sailor who jumped ship, so the story goes, in sunny Sydney and never looked back again. 
(Picture-My pop and nana on their wedding day 1919 Leeton NSW Catholic Church. Both were 21. She the daughter of an irish man and widow from South Australia(yet to research) and he the son of a Jewish father Albert Lipman and Irish Catholic mother Mary Kennedy.)
Basically that's all I knew. I can vaguely recall when I was about sixteen, asking my mother about him, who we always referred to as Claus Clausen, and his daughter was always grandma clausen, even though she's twice married and became a Brown then a Bousser (although I don't believe she married that french guy (my grandfather) until well into old age, but still, until the day she died and even still, she was is and always will be refered to as grandma Clausen.
Basically that's all I knew. I can vaguely recall when I was about sixteen, asking my mother about him, who we always referred to as Claus Clausen, and his daughter was always grandma clausen, even though she's twice married and became a Brown then a Bousser (although I don't believe she married that french guy (my grandfather) until well into old age, but still, until the day she died and even still, she was is and always will be refered to as grandma Clausen.
(My father holding some kid with pop Lipman and Uncle Norm and 2 other brothers in Tasmania in 1950, guess dad was 21. My parents hadn't even met yet, so he wasn't my dad then....just my dad to be).
Claus Clausen died the year I was born, so now, I like to think that his life, was a seed that was planted in the ground the year I was born, and I've blossomed and grown into one who steps back into the annals of time, to give their names meaning and write their stories that I sure they've not been able to write. Rumour had it that Claus Clausen couldn't read or write, as was the case with so many nordic venturers, which as I discovered just last week on my trip to Bergen Sjøfarts museum (Maritime), many young boys as young as 13-15 who came from poor families became sailors as a ways to escape hard times and gain some sort of trade and education, through the many trade schools that were on offer at the busy sea ports, Bergen being a major import port from as early as the middle ages and medieval times when the Bryggen was build by the Hanseatic merchants, right through to even now where is got to be one of the most tourist infested, cruiseship lined wharf I've ever had the pleasure to hang out in. Gosh, this jolts my memory, as young as age 10, I was a little "wharfie" myself, hanging out on weekends and school holidays, at Manly Wharf and the fun pier in the land downunder, Sydney. It was a scene in itself and we were known as "wharfies" or "wharf rats" by the locals. Little did I know back then, that my great grandfather ("Oldefar" in norsk språk) was doing the same thing, at the same age, in Bergen less than 100 years before.
(Pop Lipman aged 2, so 1900- Norman Leslie Lipman 1 July 1898-1979)
What has fascinated me thus far in my 21 years of family tree research, are the patterns that tend to illuminate and reappear throughout the generations. Its as if a golden thread is weaved in and out through each passing generation, no matter where and when, these patterns emerge that give the tree a unique scent that belongs only to that tree, whether good or bad, I'm not judging, they simply just are.
So without further ado, I will blog my journey back home to my nordic ancestors as it happened. It was around April 2002, I was in a semester break of my final year of my social science degree when I was "hooked up" to the internet and I suddenly "got interested" in my norwegian roots. By this stage, I had found the convict ancestors and the jewish immigrants from the east end of London, but what had not even been thought of til now, was my nordic roots. Now I tend to become a little obsessive when I get excited about something and so I totally immersed myself into every nordic that I could find, joining a yahoo norway group as a means of "getting to know" my fellow kin, as it were.
+and+sister+Madge.bmp)
(Picture Mary Kennedy in later years with her sister Madge (Margaret-my middle name ).
So without further ado, I will blog my journey back home to my nordic ancestors as it happened. It was around April 2002, I was in a semester break of my final year of my social science degree when I was "hooked up" to the internet and I suddenly "got interested" in my norwegian roots. By this stage, I had found the convict ancestors and the jewish immigrants from the east end of London, but what had not even been thought of til now, was my nordic roots. Now I tend to become a little obsessive when I get excited about something and so I totally immersed myself into every nordic that I could find, joining a yahoo norway group as a means of "getting to know" my fellow kin, as it were.
+and+sister+Madge.bmp)
(Picture Mary Kennedy in later years with her sister Madge (Margaret-my middle name ). Much to my complete delight I found that genealogical research had come a long way since the days when I started when it was all about going to the State Archives in The Rocks, Sydney and doing the old microfische searches, which my years in banking had made me an expert with the "fish". I thought I'd unearthed some magnificent treasures back then, by finding out the name of my father's father's father's wife and kids, but this was nothing compared to what I was stepping into with my norwegian forebears (spellcheck??). I was virtually stepping into a time machine that has taken me back to the very farm itself high above the hills of Bergen, to Smørdal gård, to the land of my norwegian ancestors.
(Picture my pop and nana Lipman with their 9 children in Young NSW where they spent their growing years at "Cooinoo" the house my pop designed. They all very very much country folk and all of those sibblings remained in various parts of country NSW, except my dad Bill who met my mum in Sydney, where Pop was born and eventually moved to Manly in the 1950s I think). 
Pop and nana Lipman outside church 1947)
Come along with me as I share with you my wandrings, my findings, my great joys and moments of sorrow, as I retrace the paths my ancestors trod, so many years ago. This is a rare tale indeed, which few of you will ever know, mind you, the guy who told me about this blog space, has himself done the very same thing, so maybe I'm not as unique as I would like to think (thanks Frank http://ellingmonsen.blogspot.com/). But to anyone reading this who themselves have nordic roots I send out this offer, it is my dream, my wild imaginings to start up some sort of business plan, where I do for others, what I have already done. That is, find your nordic roots and take you on a trip to your ancestral farm, because believe me, at the heart of every norwegian family tree, is a farm somewhere, and back in the day, the surname were your identification tags which told everyone who and where you came from. For example, my oldefars name was known on some records (and please note, their names can change from record to record, and with patience you will learn why through my blog) Claus Claussen Smørdal. This tells all who care, that Claus was the son of Claus from the place of Smørdal, place mostly being a farm. Incidentally that's how the rural towns and places emerged, from farms, so you will still find today, all over Norway, that people's surnames are a place somewhere on the map of Norway, and more often then not, these people still reside in the same fylke or even kommune where there surname place is, so for them they haven't moved far from their roots. I've read that its very typical for Norwegians not to move more than 100 km from their birthplace. Of course there are many acceptions, my grandpa Claus for one and the many nords who sailed to America and other places in search of a better life, to escape the poverty and hardships that were Norway 100 years ago.
Today Norway is rich because of the 1960s oil finds, but before then, Norway was a mostly rural farming country with simple, sturdy folk of the land who were largely uneducated and fought the harsh natural elements of a cold hostile climate. But oh, how sweet the summers can be, when the air is gentle and the colours of the flowers feast your eyes in every direction. I've really developed a fine appreciation for flowers and plants in the 3.5 years that I've lived here and having been raised in a hot climate where the sun is your enemy, I'm beginning to gain a new found respect for the sun because as they saying goes, "you don't know what you got until its gone", and this I know full well.
