Favorite Photo

Sure, I have tons and tons of favorite photos – photos of those no longer with us, photos that evoke fond memories, photos that are just plain funny.  But this photo is right up there, and I don’t even know who she is.

I know she’s one of my many grandmothers.  But all that is written on the back is “Tom’s mother.”  That’s a lot of information, especially in a branch of the family that seemed to love the name Tom or Thomas. 

So, given the relative Victorian period partial mourning appearance of her clothing (in facts, she looks rather like the aged Queen), I’m going with the mid to late nineteenth-century.  I wish I could see the photo on the table beside her a little better.  I imagine it is a photo of her husband, most likely deceased.  I could say she is my great-great-grandmother Susanna Turner Goodwin Harris, mother of my great-grandfather Tom (full name David Thomas Goodwin Harris, born in 1870), but I have a photo of her, and this woman does not really resemble that photo of Susanna. 

It was in a large batch of family photos passed down through the Harris line, so I’m still looking at that branch of the family.  Susanna’s father was also a Tom, but he was born in 1814.  I suppose, if his mother was young enough, then in her older years, this could have been her, but earlier in the century than it would have been if it was Susanna (born in 1842).  So, this could very well have been Susanna’s paternal grandmother.  Unfortunately, I still don’t know who she is.  I don’t yet have a name for Thomas Goodwin’s parents.  What does the future hold for this aging photograph?