A New Way to Waste Time; In Which I Restore Angeline

   

     This post is a follow-up on a recent blog post containing a photo that may, or may not, be my great-great-great-grandfather Jermiah Garner.  I've written lots about Jeremiah, who led an out of the ordinary life, and since my blog is searchable you can read more about him if you are so inclined.

     

     This is the photograph that started it all.  It was labeled, Jeremiah Garner and his [third] wife Angeline Peck, the couple in the front row. I had my doubts about this photo.  For one thing, the lady seated next to Jeremiah looks older than him to me; Angeline was younger than Jeremiah.  She also seems a tad old to be the mother of the young child standing next to her.  However, it's a sad but true fact that women don't age as well as men.  I've looked this up in my research and it has something to do with hormones, or a lack thereof.  Which we are not going to delve into further in this blog.

     Today I thought I would take another look at this puzzle, so I uploaded a close up of Angeline from the group shot to my favorite photo editing site, BeFunky.com

     It appears poor Angeline may have been suffering from hair loss at the time this picture was taken.  Various illnesses and syndromes could be responsible, it's not the first time I've seen this in my tree.  BeFunky has lots of tools to play with, and I've used them many times, but today I noticed a brand new plaything, Old Photo Restorer!  I had to try that.

     After restoration, this is what Angeline looked like...

     That is remarkable!  And much, much better than the job Ancestry does at restoring photos.  I had one more trick up my sleeve though.  I uploaded Angeline's image to my Paint application, then shaded in more of the bonnet she appeared to be wearing.  Apologies for my clumsy editing, but Paint doesn't really allow for fine detailing.  

    I had noticed BeFunky also offered a colorizing tool, so of couse I tried that too...

     You can see Angeline now looks younger.  No spring chicken, but I could easily believe this lady was around the age of thirty-nine, which she would have been at the time.  After my edits,  Angeline's age in the photo no longer really concerns me.  I'm still going to keep digging though, it's hard to trust that online photos are always who they claim to be.  For instance, there is one circulating on Ancestry right now purporting to be the wedding photo from Angeline's first marriage (see below).  

     Angeline was twenty-six years of age when she married John Dent Collins. I think the lady in this photo looks a good deal older than twenty-six, and the groom looks nothing like other portraits of John Collins online.  Then again- 

    

      Nope, she still is over twenty-six.