Orville Clarence Taylor

I belong to a FB group that shares funny, unusual, or weird things we discover in thrift stores. One game that people in the group like to play is to adopt “instant ancestors.” Basically you find old photos of people you don’t know, but that you’d like to have in your family tree, then you name them and develop a backstory.

Today I adopted my first fake ancestor! It’s a boy! 😉 Isn’t he great? I couldn’t be more proud. I’m going to buy him a little picture frame and he will live on my piano. He is my fake great-great uncle thrice removed.

He reminds me a little of a young Orville Reddenbacher (the popcorn guy), so I’m going to name my new ancestor Orville. A good, solid Midwestern name from the early 20th Century. Orville’s last name, of course, is Taylor.  His middle name, Clarence, was his maternal grandfather’s first name.

Orville grew up in Terre Haute, Indiana. This photo was taken on Orville’s graduation from Wheaton College in Chicago where he received his PhD in Biblical and Theological Studies. Orville headed from Wheaton to New Brunswick that August to pastor his first church.

Before leaving the area to pursue his pastoral calling, Orville married his high school sweetheart, Corinne Magnuson. Their wedding was the social highlight of the summer, and many of Terre Haute’s finest citizens turned out to wish Orville and Corinne the best in all their future endeavors.