Some interesting history about one of my family members......

I have recently discovered some interesting information about my Grandpa, not my real Grandpa, but the person my Grandma married after my real Grandpa died. Before I continue, I should probably add that my real Grandpa died long before I was ever born, and my Grandma married the person that I knew as my Grandpa long before I was born.

Henry "Tart" Ramme.

I knew him as "Tart" or "Grandpa Tart" but I really didn't KNOW him. There was always something, even as very young child that seemed different about him. It wasn't until long after he and my Grandma died that I learned any of this.

Here is a link to his obituary from a local newspaper that confirms everything that I have been recently discovering in very random strange ways.

"He was also a member and Past Worshipful Master (1956) of the Rochester Masonic Lodge and has one of the greatest longevity of members who have served in that office."

[link to www.postbulletin.com]

Basically, what I am saying is that the person that I knew as my Grandpa was Freemason.

The first time that I had been made aware of this was from my dad telling me. I didn't really believe him, but I thought I may as well investigate this a bit further.

The first evidence I found supporting my dad's claim was a piece of mail addressed to "Henry Ramme" from the "Osman Shrine" that I found stashed away in some of my Grandma's belongings.

On the envelope, above the words 'Osman Shrine' is says.. A.A.O.N.M.S. This stades for "Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine"

"In order to be a Shriner you must first be a Master Mason. That means that you have petitioned a local Lodge, been voted on and have been initatiated, passed and raised to the Sublime Degree of a Master Mason."

[link to osmanshrine.org]

[link to www.shrinersinternational.org]

I was definitely surprised that my Grandpa was not only a Freemason, but he was "Shiner" as well.

If you read the obituary, that I provided a link to above, you might recall that...

"Tart was a founding member of the Rochester Eagles Cancer Telethon."

Now this information kind of blew my mind! This telethon is a big deal for some people here in Rochester, Minnesota. They have it once a year, and it gets televised for 24 hours straight on NBC (KTTC) around these parts. My dad didn't even know this piece of information. The only reason I mentioned the Eagles Cancer Telethon is because they just had the annual event the other day, January 20th, coincidentally.

I don't really know what the point to all of this is, I just wanted to share some of this information with some like-minded people. I think it is interesting that I discovered GLP, and many other interesting sites like it, many years before I learned that my own Grandpa was Freemason.

There is more that I probably should add this thread, but I'm starting to lose my focus and I realize that most people probably don't really care.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot to mention that about a year before he died, he and my Grandma separated, but they didn't get divorced. The obituary didn't even mention my Grandma (Doris Ramme) or anybody from this side of the family. That's fine, I don't care on way or the other, but I think the fact they chose not to mention any of my side of family says a lot, without saying anything.

If anybody has any insight to what the implication of this could be, or if you have any at all to say, I would interested in what you have to say.

Thank you.