James V. Bennett spent much of his childhood living among extended family on the Peyton Homestead, along with his favorite sister Lizzie. This photo depicts Lizzie on the Peyton farm (I believe around 1900), smoking a cigar and wearing notably masculine dress. This gender play is fascinating--perhaps denoting an affinity for bloomerism and the suffragette movement?

After sailing with family members to New York in 1893, Eilert Osmundsen returned to America in 1896, arriving May 8 on the White Star Line SS Germanic out of Liverpool. 

He is listed as a sailor and intending a protracted stay in New York. This time he is not accompanied by other family members. 

He was 31 years of age. As we know, he had a wife and four children back home in Farsund.

A big question we are trying to understand is why some members of the Osmundsen/Eilertsen family chose to resettle in the United States while others did not. 

We know that Jskob and Camilla stayed in close contact with their families back home, and made multiple trips back to visit. Nor were they the only family members living in New York. There were cousins from Spind in New York and in midwestern locales like Milwaukee. 

When Kate and I visited her Eilertsen grandparents in Bay Ridge several times in the late 1970s, the other family member we met was Kate's great aunt Amy, the sister of Camilla Eilertsen.

I thought at the time that she was a maiden aunt, or what was called a spinster. Of course Kate knew better and I am only catching up now as I research the family history. 

Aunt Amy's name in Brooklyn was Amy Jensen. She was married for 30 years to George R. Jensen, an American of Norwegian descent. The had one son, Gordon Jensen, born in December 1925.

Yesterday I wrote about the Geni user from Farsund who posted Eilertsen family photos on the site. Geni has a feature to discover your family relationship to another selected user.

In this case, it worked perfectly, revealing Vidar to be Kate Eilertsen's third cousin. His greatgrandfather Isak Ludwig Osmundsen Farbrot was the brother of Jack Eilertsen's father Eilert Osmundsen.

Here is the full relationship chart as provided by Geni.

A Geni user named Vidar Arne Kroslid from Farsund posted photos "from the album Bernt Odd Kollevoll's photos," including priceless images of Jakob Eilertsen as a young man, of his mother Johanne Marie Jacobsdtr Vik, and of his two brothers.

Both Vik and Kollevoll are small hamlets very close to the Osmundsen/Eilertsen farm in Farbrot. Another nearby town is Dåreid, which is where the Geni user is from.

It seems that Bernt Odd Kollevoll was related to Eilert Johan Eilertsen, brother of Jakob. More to learn there.