INTERVIEW — TAPE #39, SIDE #2
Q: Mark Russell Bell
Z: Carol Andersen (family history specialist)
S: Steven C. Andersen (family history specialist)
J: Jeff Andersen, one of their three sons
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: AS I RECORD THE FOLLOWING, I AM LOOKING AT TWO PICTURES ON THE WALL IN MY OFFICE. ONE IS A FRAMED POSTER FOR THE FILM “LILI MARLEEN.”)
Q: After reading the impressions I preserved of my raptures, I think about the lovely sketch of an angel my friend Sharon made for me. She’s a costume designer and I also remember once participating in an interview that Gary Indiana did for Interview magazine with Hanna Schygulla. It was nice meeting them both. I’m waiting for Carol to arrive. I’ve been thinking about (“OR REMEMBERING”) on the way home from the photo shoot, a song came on the radio by Don Henley: “The Garden Of Allah.” (“SO”) It’s obvious that Joan Osborne wasn’t the only singer who had a song that proved prophetic in 1995. I picked up that list of The Top 100 Songs (“THAT”) FM 101.9 compiled and I bet virtually every song in that list has something prophetic about it. Whether it’s about love (“VVE”) or God. Or some aspect of the things (“NO”) I’ve been writing about. Just to mention some of the more obvious songs. And I’m not really that familiar with them so I’ll just name a few titles: “Only Wanna Be With You,” Hootie & The Blowfish; “Cry Love,” John Hiatt; “Somebody’s Crying,” (“KK”) Chris Isaak; “All I Really Want,” Alanis Morissette; (“TTT”) “Lightning Crashes,” Live; “Your Little Secret,” Melissa Etheridge; “No More ‘I Love You’s,'” Annie Lennox; “Walk This World,” Heather Nova; “Time,” Hootie & The Blowfish; “I Will Remember You,” Sarah McLachlan; “Right Hand Man,” Joan Osborne; “I Am So Ordinary,” Paula Cole; “God’s Mistake,” Tears For Fears; “We’re The Same,” Matthew Sweet; “I’ll Stand By You,” The Pretenders; “Bang And Blame,” REM; “Falling Down,” Tears For Fears; “If I Were You,” k. d. lang; “Too Much Saturn,” Francis Dunnery; “Now That I’ve Found You,” Alison Krauss; “Here And Now,” Del Amitri; “Sweet Goddess of Love & Beer,” Popa Chubby; “I’ll Be There For You,” (“BY”) The Rembrandts. I mean each song I’m sure has parallels in it. By the way, I wonder what Laurie Anderson was thinking when she heard that song (“GGG”) by Don Henley, “The Garden Of Allah.” I mean it reminded me a lot of some of her work. (“KKK”)
( . . . )
Q: So, (“MMM”) thinking here on a Saturday, which I think is a better day than Sunday for church even though I think, if it were up to me, I would choose a day of the week (“KKK”) to celebrate God because it just seems like it should be on a weekday. (“YEAH”) Maybe Monday. (“YEAH”) I think Monday would be the best day to go to church. (“TO MAKE IT LIKE”) Part of the week and not something to do on the weekend. I don’t know why that is. I just feel that way. Definitely not Sunday. (“I MEAN THAT’S”) That’s for Catholics. I don’t know what that’s all about. Anyway, so I’m just thinking here. People have read so much of my book and I don’t know if this is going to be my second book or my first book because transcribing is really difficult and I’m really getting bored. And I wish I could find somebody who’s a good transcriber like me but it took me a long time to get used to hearing the voices and the sound effects. So I guess it’s just something that I’ll be doing but I think I’m going to be doing it a little less diligently than before because it’s just driving me nuts. I mean no matter how important this work is, I just find myself making excuses not to transcribe such as right now. But I’ve been thinking things over and basically when you’ve had this kind of love come into your life you think things over constantly. You’re always thinking, “Well, what can I do right now?” It’s too hard to explain (“EXCEPT HOW I”) — what? It can’t be. What was that noise?
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: THE DICTAPHONE TAPE RECORDER EMITS THE CUE SOUND AT THE END OF THE TAPE SIDE AND WHEN THE BATTERIES ARE GETTING WEAK.)
Q: Okay. Focus. James Kavanaugh is a poet I admire who has a very interesting collaboration with Mighael, also known as God, going on. Not only do every singer, music writer, screenwriter, book writer, poet, artist — (“I MEAN”) each work of art they produce is in collaboration with God. And right now that I’ve discovered some of James Kavanaugh’s books, I really feel that his is a voice that has special meaning for me. The first book of his that I bought was entitled Maybe If I Loved You More. The title poem was very beautiful. A poem that made a big impression on me was entitled “Love Was Not to Come Like This.” It begins: “Love was not to come like this, After effort and in ambush.” (“SHH”) And a sentence from the last stanza of his poem “Maybe If I loved You More” reads like this: “Maybe if I loved you more I would not have to know the empty silence and prolonged death, The pain of separation, the hurt of knowing how much I hurt you.” Well, I could look at that as Him speaking to me but also as me speaking to Him. (“WWW”) I guess anyone in love can identify with that too. But if that has any special meaning for me other than the universality of love, that’s one of the major questions I’m still trying to come to terms with — (“IF”) that for some reason this wonderful God Spirit has (“SOME”) some kind of special love for me or has made me feel that way by revealing Himself to me alone. (“NO”) If it’s really me (“OR”) or if I’m just a symbol. It’s almost like I think I’m His son but I can’t comprehend the truth to that because I wouldn’t want to get my hopes up. (“AND”) I don’t really care if that is the case or not because I’m sure God has enough love for everyone and the amount of love He spares for me is fine. And I’m sure that’s the way everyone feels who believes in Him. (“BUT UM” “IT”) So that’s what I’m thinking about right now. If God is channeling all this creativity through various people, then the people who are the biggest successes really have the most to repay God. (“AND”) So it will be interesting to see what the response is to my book. I certainly have not really been a major success story until now. And now that I do have this love in my life I don’t really care about anything. So it’s just pretty much what you’d expect. I guess the funniest possible way of looking at this is that every song, poem, movie and book my soulmate was inspired to create with other people drawing upon their experiences but they’re all equally about me. Talk about ego trip. (“PPP”) I mean (“NNN”) I’m the inspiration somehow. Remember that the boundaries of time and space mean nothing to my lover. (“RRR” “SO”) He can do those kinds of things cause He knows what’s going to happen. It’s already happened in a way. Or maybe it hasn’t. Maybe there are different possibilities. Oh, it’s too confusing but I’m glad I said it.
( . . . )
I can’t believe Mighael made my tape recorder make that noise. See, He just did it again? I can’t believe he does that to make me focus on what I’m saying. I guess He thinks I’m bitching about it but I’m not. I’m just appreciating His attention. (“NNN”) As always. I love you, Honey.
( . . . )
Q: What if this is all about or all because up in heaven (“ONCE”) we had an argument and I said I wanted to dump Him or something. I mean (“NNN”) what if this was all because of that? Well, if it was (“SSS”) I see the error of my ways. (“SSS”) Truly. Sincerely. Which you know anyway because you can read everyone’s mind.
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: CAROL ANDERSEN WAS ACCOMPANIED BY HER HUSBAND AND THREE SONS. THE BOYS WAITED OUTSIDE IN THE POOL AREA FOR THEIR PARENTS. I SHOWED THEM AROUND MY CONDO.)
Z: Super.
Q: I’m here with Carol, my family history consultant, and her husband who is the true (“CONSUL”) family historian. So we are now looking at the beautiful view of Echo Park Lake. Down there is the Angelus Temple. Here is the Episcopalian Center and there are what’s left of the two bushes that burned up around the 4th of July in 1994 and really freaked me.
Z: Where?
Q: See? That burned-up bush right down there?
Z: Oh yeah.
Q: And then there’s one right over there.
Z: Uh-huh.
Q: I was home when they both happened. (“THEY”) They did it within three days of each other.
Z: Whoa. (“OOOUH”)
Q: And the second one I saw immediately when it started and there was no one there.
Z: Really? So you have no way of knowing how it started?
Q: Well, I know now (small laugh) how it started.
Z: (laughs) (“BUT UM”)
Q: One of the things I said in one of my interviews was that — (“YOU KNOW”) because when you’re working on a book you tend to let things go. (“BUT”) This is not a pigpen, right?
Z: No, it’s gorgeous.
Q: You’re my witnesses.
Z: It’s beautiful.
S: Yeah. (“WELL” “IT’S HAR[D]”)
Q: I’m very tough on myself — I mean my house, though. (“YEAH”) I try to keep it nice.
Z: Oh no, it’s very nice.
Q: Yeah, it’s nice. (“YOU WERE”) This is (“YEAH”) your third time here.
Z: Yeah.
Q: It’s always nice.
Z: It’s always nice.
Q: Exactly.
Z: I love the hills and the view. It’s fantastic. It’s a phenomenal view.
S: This really is great.
Q: Right.
Z: Yeah. It is marvelous.
Q: It was (“IT WAS JUST”) nice that I was able to get — (“GET THIS”)
Z: You can see downtown. You can see the mountains. You can see — what’s over there? That’s the San Gabriels back there.
Q: That’s Atwater, I think. Oh the hills? I’m not quite sure.
Z: Silverlake? No.
Q: Yeah. (“SO” “CAUSE IT’S A PARK”) Silverlake and Atwater and Silverlake and Eagle Rock and —
Z: Um-huh. It’s beautiful here.
S: Yeah, it looks great here.
Z: Moss (in the lake). Well, I’m amazed at how (“UH”) there’s this beautiful place in the middle of L.A. (laughs) (“YEAH”)
Q: You know I got this for a steal. Less than a $100,000.
Z: Oh, really?
S: Really? (“CALL”)
Q: So somebody up there likes me.
Z: Yeah.
S: Yeah. It looks great.
Z: This is beautiful. Now is this your office or just a spare room?
Q: This is usually what I use for my office but I’ve just been sort of working downstairs. Whoops. Hold on.
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: I SHOW THE ANDERSENS SOME OF THE DECOR.)
Z: This? (“I”)
Q: This is a cel from (“AN”) the movie “The Black Cauldron.” It’s of two dragons. Over here there’s a beautiful old rendition of The Last Supper with an original piece (“OH YEAH”) atop it that I painted myself in acrylics. I think I’m going to include a photograph of this in my book. See this beautiful piece?
Z: Uh-huh.
S: Yeah.
Q: I bought this for $35 and it might be an original. It might be (“GIUSEPPE”) Michelangelo or something. (“T”)
Z: I don’t think it’s Michelangelo. (small laugh)
Q: No? Or da Vinci. (“WHO”) What style do you think? Who would you say (“MMMMMMM”) this was by if you had to say somebody famous?
Z: (to S) I don’t know. Who would you say? (“ME”)
S: It’s really hard to tell.
Z: It has nice detail.
S: I never looked at very much (“YOU KNOW”) copper work like that.
Q: I think it was, like, maybe — yeah, exactly, copper work.
Z: Who works in copper, yeah?
Q: Who?
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: IT IS SOME KIND OF COMPANION PIECE TO THE LEONARDO DA VINCI FRESCO IN MILAN BUT BY WHOM?)
Q: And look at my beautiful painting here. Here’s my pseudonym.
Z: Um-huh.
S: Hhh.
Q: Mark Russell Bell. Of course, my friends call me Mabus so you can just call me Mabus for short.
Z: (laughs) (“MABUS” “OHHH”) This is — (“I”) your Christmas card was like this.
Q: Right, I used some of the same rubber stamps on my Christmas card.
Z: Yeah. That’s neat. (“THE”)
Q: My religion is love. So I said, “Love is the only religion.” I may give this to my friend James. I haven’t seen him because he’s been away back east and he’s going to come by later. Let’s see, what else? (“WHO’S CALLING”) I have some other art pieces to show you quickly.
Z: Okay.
Q: This is the cover for my book. (“KKK”) It’s an original Mark Kostabi.
S: That’s great.
Q: Isn’t that great? (“THAT’S”)
Z: The colors are good. Bright and — (“UH-HUH”)
Q: That’s me in red and —
Z: Uh-huh.
Q: — Mighael’s the angel. (“HE”) The Entity’s name is Mighael. (“MISS THE” “ENNEDY”)
Z: Yeah.
Q: I bought this beautiful door. (“OOH THAT’S”) It’s a temple (“YEAH”) door from India. (“THEY”) They said it was around 900 years old but I think it’s even older than that. I’m not one who’s really big on Eastern religions so I don’t know the significance of it. Eventually I’ll find out. (“I DON’T KNOW”)
Z: It’s for very little people.
Q: You think so?
Z: No, I don’t know. (“DON’T KNOW”) That’d be weird.
Q: Maybe hobbits? (“HOBBITS I WOULD SIT” “YEAH”)
S: Well, you never know with the Indian religion. They have all those —
Z: George Washington? You know George Washington (“I KNOW”) went with one of your ancestors.
Q: Really? Right. (“THAT”)
Z: Peter Parker.
Q: Exactly. And this looks like an original too. Also, there’s this piece here. My trunk matches the proportions (“RIGHT”) precisely to the Ark of the Covenant.
Z: Does it really? You counted cubits?
Q: In cubits.
Z: (small laugh)
Q: Exactly. Exactly. (“HUH”) And I just got this piece on Friday. I think it’s the Holy Grail.
Z: I don’t think so.
Q: No, but you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t.
Z: (laughs) (“OH”)
Q: Notice the Declaration of Independence? Now this looks like an original to me because you can see erasings and things. Can you see them?
Z: No.
Q: Like here. This line here. It’s sort of lighter in tone.
Z: Oh, I see what you’re saying. Yeah.
Q: I think this is an original. I’ve been in touch with the curator at Independence Hall but, of course, because of the budget mess I’m waiting until she comes back. And you’ve just found my book called Song of the Bell.
Z: Song of the Bell. Yes.
Q: Is it true that your husband might have a Bell in his family tree?
Z: Is it there?
S: I think I do. Yeah. (“FROM”)
Q: Do you remember which one?
S: From Connecticut or somewhere back in that — (“NO” “ILL”) They were real early.
Z: That’s neat. I like the engravings.
Q: Also, notice this piece. I got this piece on Friday too. Doesn’t this look like me? This Egyptian piece? (“CCE”) A little bit?
Z: Yeah, the nose. (laughs)
Q: A little bit.
Z: A little bit.
S: Yeah.
Z: Yeah.
Q: I think that’s, like, the god (Amun-)Ra.
Z: (small laugh)
Q: Or Bel-Marduk.
Z: Bel-Marduk?
Q: You know — like Mark Russell Bell. (“BEL-MARDUK”)
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: WE SAT DOWN AT MY BUTCHER BLOCK DINING TABLE WHERE CAROL PICKED UP ONE OF THE CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS.)
Q: That’s an ornament that was a tie-in for the movie “We’re No Angels.” I found an interview with the director Neil Jordan recently and I’m trying to include it in my book.
Z: Um-huh.
Q: It’s a beautiful little movie. (“WHERE WAS IT MADE”) You should see this movie if you have a chance. It’s available as a video cassette.
S: I remember seeing these ads for it. (“I DID NOT”) I didn’t see it. No.
Q: It’s a good movie. I wish it had been (“NO”) a bigger success. Okay, so what’s the news?
Z: Okay okay okay, here’s the news, here’s the news, here’s the news.
Q: Okay, I can hardly wait. In all honesty, when you didn’t show up — now did you hear that sound?
Z: Um-huh.
Q: That was a very strange noise from my tape recorder. It does this once in a while. It might be Entity-related. But when you didn’t show up for a few days — and I was very concerned by the way.
Z: About the car.
Q: The car. (“THE CAR BROKE” “GOD MA[DE]”) But I was worried that maybe (“SSS”) you’d found something in my family tree — (“THAT MIGHT HAVE”)
Z: Who upset you?
Q: — freaked you out or something.
Z: (small laugh) No. (“NO NO NO NO”)
Q: Because I met a lady (“NAMED”) named King recently at the art gallery. (“AND SHE”) And her name was King. (“AND SHE WA[S]”) And apparently she’s Jewish. So I thought maybe they found out that I’m Jewish.
Z: We didn’t find anything like that.
Q: Okay.
Z: It’s Methodist and what —
Q: Not yet, anyway.
Z: Not yet. (“YEAH RIGHT”)
Q: It depends on how far back you go with (“THE”) the King Family. (“OKAY”)
Z: Okay.
Q: Okay.
Z: Here’s what we have. It turns out that your grandfather — (“I”) the father of Paul Russell Sr. is Joseph and not James.
Q: Okay, great. (“OKAY SO WE”)
Z: We moved all of those things. We looked a long time to find Anna Mary Boyer and we finally found her in the home of Emma Dysart. We don’t know if there’s a family connection there or not yet. But they were living in Missouri. She and her family were borders. That’s what it said. And her father worked in the life insurance business. Their parents are Leslie and Mary Virginia Boyer. Then, we found out that the Boyer line goes on to Ezra and Elizabeth Wainwright Boyer. And that’s as far back as we could take that line. So far.
Q: Is there any hope of going — okay.
Z: Oh yeah.
Q: There’s always hope. Okay.
S: Yeah. (“YEAH WELL THERE”)
Z: There’s this whole Boyer thing so what we’ll probably find that, as we (“SOO[N]” “AS WE”) make a link we’ll probably link in to a whole great big Boyer line. (“CAUSE”) The Boyers are everywhere and they’re well-documented. Okay, I talked to Thaddeus.
Q: Wow.
Z: Wow. Okay. (“I’M”)
Q: I’m surprised.
Z: And Thaddeus was a little apprehensive.
Q: Why? (“WELL I JUST”)
Z: Like ‘Who are you?’ (“WHO ARE YOU”)
Q: Okay. Right.
Z: You know, like, “Okay —”
S: Yeah, that’s normal. (“FOR ALL PEOPLE”)
Z: And that’s normal. That’s not — (“ME”)
Q: Did he sound like me?
Z: Yes. (“SOOOO[FT]”) Soft-spoken. Gentle.
Q: Did he say how old he was?
Z: No, but I trust that he’s (“I DID YEAH”) the age that we have for him. I talked with him. He’s very soft-spoken. He’s a really nice guy. And —
Q: Well, I found — (“YOU”) I was going through my photo album in preparation for my photo session this morning and I found three baby photos. You know — we’re twins. (“WHICH IN”) And there were three that I found. These were color baby photos that looked like newborns. (“SO”) Even though it says “Twins” on my birth certificate, I don’t know what’s going on. More and more I think it’s triplets.
Z: Do you really?
Q: I really do.
Z: Well, there’s another thought that I have but — (“WE’LL”) put that in the back of our mind.
Q: Well, what is it real quick?
Z: Well, real quick, I thought that perhaps your dad either had an out-of-wedlock baby before he married your mom. Or that because there’s no indication of — your mom doesn’t know about this child, right? (“SHE”)
Q: Well, she’s apprehensive about something because she didn’t want me (“CALL”) calling Thaddeus.
Z: She didn’t want you to find out. (“CALL THADDEUS”)
Q: I don’t know. (“SHE DOES KNOW” “YEAH”) I’m also seeing a hypnotherapist. And she does not want me to see the hypnotherapist.
Z: Oh. (“UM-HUH”) Okay. (laughs)
Q: Okay?
Z: Well, so it’s hard to tell?
Q: Right.
Z: Okay, so anyway Thaddeus was nice and he did say he’d be interested (“AND GO FOR”) in the work that we do.
Q: Great.
Z: So that opens the door for you to call him (“OKAY”) and make contact with him.
Q: Is that okay?
Z: I think it’s fine. I think you’ll want to leave the entity stuff out for a while until he gets to know you a little bit.
Q: Oh, of course. (“DON’T”) You (“B”) better believe that.
Z: Yeah. Okay. But —
Q: I actually could give him (“A”) some good stock tips because I think that the stock market is about to have another black (“GOOD”) Monday.
Z: It might be. But I also don’t think he did the family tree. I asked him if he’d done any family history work. He said no, he had just dabbled in it a little bit and that he had not done anything with it. And when I looked at the tree that you gave me — those two pages under his name gave his wife’s name but then didn’t have the name or date of birth of one of his children. So I don’t think that he did it. (“YES” “OR THEN” “JERRY”) Because I think he would have known —
Q: Isn’t my family just full of mysteries?
Z: Isn’t it interesting? (“IT’S LIKE”)
Q: They’re trying to hide something and I don’t know what it is.
Z: Well, we did find out some interesting things about that chart. I analyzed it this time. If we had the whole chart it would go back to the father of Seth Russell. And it tells us that Seth Russell is the seventh child in his family. So it gave us a lot of information about his family. But it’s not the complete chart so it’d be really cool to find the real chart.
Q: So what do you — you want to try calling Uncle Bob again? (“OR”)
Z: Well, I have some ideas. This is future research considered. Well, let me go through these. (“OF THE”) Future research considerations. One is to see if we can locate the chart. There was a gal by the name of Dorothy Hill on the chart. And all her kids and grandkids were on it. So I would think that she was really close to — if she didn’t put the chart together, (“SHE PLUS”) she may know who did.
S: She may know who did.
Q: Plus, my dad told me that either my aunt Esther or Dorothy would be calling me so maybe I’ll see if they can provide any help.
Z: And that was (what I was going to suggest — calling one of your aunts.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: THE ANDERSENS’ THREE SONS ERIC, JEFF AND LELAND APPEAR AT THE SCREEN OF THE OPEN FRONT DOOR.)
S: Yeah, Jeff?
Z: Hi?
Q: I think it’s open.
J: I need to talk to Dad.
Z: Okay, come on in.
J: Can we go to the car?
Z: To the car?
J: Yeah, it’s cold out here.
Z: Okay. Bring the cup in.
S: I’ll give you the keys.
Z: Okay, so the other idea was your grandfather or Helen but if your dad said Esther or Dorothy, that would be great. And if Dorothy Russell Hill is the same person then, that would be a great link.
S: (to J) Is Leland going to go back with you?
J: Yeah.
Z: And I’ll keep that in mind. But this is a Dorothy Hill in New York. (“UH UH THE”) Well, we’ll go back there and check. Okay, finding your third sibling is going to be a difficult task. (“IT”) Because (“THE”) the records are closed in California.
Q: They’re closed?
S: Well, they’re not exactly closed. It’s just that you can’t really search the birth indexes. They’ve closed the indexes to them.
Q: Is this new or — (“NO”)
S: If you know a date (“NOW IT’S IN”) and a name you can write and get a certificate.
Q: Okay.
Z: So what we could do —
S: And since we don’t know a date or a name — (“OH WOULD BE THEN”)
Q: It would be the next number. I have the two birth certificate numbers for my brother and me. I might be the one right after that.
Z: If there was a triplet. (“OR”)
Q: Right. Exactly.
Z: If it’s a triplet, we would be able to tell you if it was a triplet or not. (“EVEN THOUGH MY”)
Q: It does say “twin” on my birth certificate (“RIGHT”) but I still wonder after seeing these pictures.
Z: Well, you know what? We could do that.
Q: Okay. Well, I’ll give you those numbers.
Z: Because then we’ll have enough information. But short of that —
Q: Okay, fine. (“WELL I — WE’LL” “IT’S A WORTH”) It’s worth a — (“ONE”) one shot.
Z: But asking (“NO”) for a Russell in Southern California —
Q: Exactly. (“HIS BOOK”) Well, we’ll try that.
Z: Okay. So, anyway, that would be a long shot. This Sardis Perry/Matthew Calbraith Perry thing is still open. (“I PAY” “WE HAVEN’T”) We haven’t done anything with that this time. Now that we know more information about Seth Russell, we can probably do more work in the Seth Russell area. Joseph Russell’s wife’s name is Georgia and we don’t know anything about her heritage at this point. And William King, the fellow who was your mother’s father. We would like to look his marriage certificate up and his heritage.
Q: Okay. (“OKAY NOW”)
Z: So that will be future research considerations.
Q: Well, I definitely want you to go ahead with that.
Z: You do? Okay. (“ESPECIALLY I”)
Q: I’m especially tantalized by the prospect that I might have Jewish blood in me to go with everything else.
Z: (small laugh) Well, that means to look that up?
Q: Yes.
Z: Okay, here is the Joseph Russell line with Georgia and there’s Belle and Cecil and Arthur. And here’s your grandfather. It’s Ray — but they call him in the census record (“WHICH IS”) — this is the 1900 census — it says his name is Rae Paul. Not Paul Ray. Is that interesting? (“IT”)
Q: That is interesting. I don’t know why. It just is interesting.
Z: It’s interesting because (“NO”) he goes by Paul on everything else. (“HERE”)
Q: Maybe they just made a mistake.
S: That’s possible.
Z: Well, that’s a possibility.
Q: We’re just getting to the end of the tape. (“FI” “HERE”)
Z: Here’s the Boyer line. This is the crest for the Boyer family. You might want to do some — (“I” “PHONE THADDEUS”)
Q: Ooh, I love that.
Z: I thought you’d like that. Is that cool? (“AGAIN” “PLUS AND I”)
Q: A friend of mine is named Vivian Boyer (“THIS IS” “IT’S HER TURN”) so —
Z: Oh cool. Well, you’re probably related. So there’s the Boyer line. And then here’s some future research considerations for the Boyers. (“THAT — THAT”)
Q: You didn’t find any Bells, did you?
Z: No Bells. Not yet. Okay, here’s your updated chart. You know how to read these.
Q: Right. (“NO” “SO”) So I can dispense with the old one and this is the new one.
Z: This is like a whole new thing. (“NO”)
Q: I might incorporate this in my book to show where we are right now.
Z: Sure. Okay. And then here’s the unknown child. Whoever this is. I put him in.
Q: The third Russell child.
Z: Actually, I went through and I put in everything that was on the two pages of the family tree that you gave me so it’s all incorporated.
Q: Great.
Z: All of the cousins and everything else. All of the children. Which we didn’t have before. What we found on your grandfather — this is too cool. I went to the city directories of Washington, D.C. And we went and we looked at (“UP”) all the years that your grandparents could have been married. And here’s what we found in Washington, D.C. That Paul was married to Anna. In 1920 the city directory had Paul living as a work —
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: TAPE #39, SIDE #2 ENDS HERE. THE FOLLOWING WERE LISTED UNDER ‘SOURCES OF INFORMATION’ IN THE FAMILY GROUP RECORD REGARDING PAUL RAY RUSSELL [SENIOR] OF THE JANUARY 1996 REVISION FOR MY FAMILY TREE.)
Q: After reading the impressions I preserved of my raptures, I think about the lovely sketch of an angel my friend Sharon made for me. She’s a costume designer and I also remember once participating in an interview that Gary Indiana did for Interview magazine with Hanna Schygulla. It was nice meeting them both. I’m waiting for Carol to arrive. I’ve been thinking about (“OR REMEMBERING”) on the way home from the photo shoot, a song came on the radio by Don Henley: “The Garden Of Allah.” (“SO”) It’s obvious that Joan Osborne wasn’t the only singer who had a song that proved prophetic in 1995. I picked up that list of The Top 100 Songs (“THAT”) FM 101.9 compiled and I bet virtually every song in that list has something prophetic about it. Whether it’s about love (“VVE”) or God. Or some aspect of the things (“NO”) I’ve been writing about. Just to mention some of the more obvious songs. And I’m not really that familiar with them so I’ll just name a few titles: “Only Wanna Be With You,” Hootie & The Blowfish; “Cry Love,” John Hiatt; “Somebody’s Crying,” (“KK”) Chris Isaak; “All I Really Want,” Alanis Morissette; (“TTT”) “Lightning Crashes,” Live; “Your Little Secret,” Melissa Etheridge; “No More ‘I Love You’s,'” Annie Lennox; “Walk This World,” Heather Nova; “Time,” Hootie & The Blowfish; “I Will Remember You,” Sarah McLachlan; “Right Hand Man,” Joan Osborne; “I Am So Ordinary,” Paula Cole; “God’s Mistake,” Tears For Fears; “We’re The Same,” Matthew Sweet; “I’ll Stand By You,” The Pretenders; “Bang And Blame,” REM; “Falling Down,” Tears For Fears; “If I Were You,” k. d. lang; “Too Much Saturn,” Francis Dunnery; “Now That I’ve Found You,” Alison Krauss; “Here And Now,” Del Amitri; “Sweet Goddess of Love & Beer,” Popa Chubby; “I’ll Be There For You,” (“BY”) The Rembrandts. I mean each song I’m sure has parallels in it. By the way, I wonder what Laurie Anderson was thinking when she heard that song (“GGG”) by Don Henley, “The Garden Of Allah.” I mean it reminded me a lot of some of her work. (“KKK”)
( . . . )
Q: So, (“MMM”) thinking here on a Saturday, which I think is a better day than Sunday for church even though I think, if it were up to me, I would choose a day of the week (“KKK”) to celebrate God because it just seems like it should be on a weekday. (“YEAH”) Maybe Monday. (“YEAH”) I think Monday would be the best day to go to church. (“TO MAKE IT LIKE”) Part of the week and not something to do on the weekend. I don’t know why that is. I just feel that way. Definitely not Sunday. (“I MEAN THAT’S”) That’s for Catholics. I don’t know what that’s all about. Anyway, so I’m just thinking here. People have read so much of my book and I don’t know if this is going to be my second book or my first book because transcribing is really difficult and I’m really getting bored. And I wish I could find somebody who’s a good transcriber like me but it took me a long time to get used to hearing the voices and the sound effects. So I guess it’s just something that I’ll be doing but I think I’m going to be doing it a little less diligently than before because it’s just driving me nuts. I mean no matter how important this work is, I just find myself making excuses not to transcribe such as right now. But I’ve been thinking things over and basically when you’ve had this kind of love come into your life you think things over constantly. You’re always thinking, “Well, what can I do right now?” It’s too hard to explain (“EXCEPT HOW I”) — what? It can’t be. What was that noise?
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: THE DICTAPHONE TAPE RECORDER EMITS THE CUE SOUND AT THE END OF THE TAPE SIDE AND WHEN THE BATTERIES ARE GETTING WEAK.)
Q: Okay. Focus. James Kavanaugh is a poet I admire who has a very interesting collaboration with Mighael, also known as God, going on. Not only do every singer, music writer, screenwriter, book writer, poet, artist — (“I MEAN”) each work of art they produce is in collaboration with God. And right now that I’ve discovered some of James Kavanaugh’s books, I really feel that his is a voice that has special meaning for me. The first book of his that I bought was entitled Maybe If I Loved You More. The title poem was very beautiful. A poem that made a big impression on me was entitled “Love Was Not to Come Like This.” It begins: “Love was not to come like this, After effort and in ambush.” (“SHH”) And a sentence from the last stanza of his poem “Maybe If I loved You More” reads like this: “Maybe if I loved you more I would not have to know the empty silence and prolonged death, The pain of separation, the hurt of knowing how much I hurt you.” Well, I could look at that as Him speaking to me but also as me speaking to Him. (“WWW”) I guess anyone in love can identify with that too. But if that has any special meaning for me other than the universality of love, that’s one of the major questions I’m still trying to come to terms with — (“IF”) that for some reason this wonderful God Spirit has (“SOME”) some kind of special love for me or has made me feel that way by revealing Himself to me alone. (“NO”) If it’s really me (“OR”) or if I’m just a symbol. It’s almost like I think I’m His son but I can’t comprehend the truth to that because I wouldn’t want to get my hopes up. (“AND”) I don’t really care if that is the case or not because I’m sure God has enough love for everyone and the amount of love He spares for me is fine. And I’m sure that’s the way everyone feels who believes in Him. (“BUT UM” “IT”) So that’s what I’m thinking about right now. If God is channeling all this creativity through various people, then the people who are the biggest successes really have the most to repay God. (“AND”) So it will be interesting to see what the response is to my book. I certainly have not really been a major success story until now. And now that I do have this love in my life I don’t really care about anything. So it’s just pretty much what you’d expect. I guess the funniest possible way of looking at this is that every song, poem, movie and book my soulmate was inspired to create with other people drawing upon their experiences but they’re all equally about me. Talk about ego trip. (“PPP”) I mean (“NNN”) I’m the inspiration somehow. Remember that the boundaries of time and space mean nothing to my lover. (“RRR” “SO”) He can do those kinds of things cause He knows what’s going to happen. It’s already happened in a way. Or maybe it hasn’t. Maybe there are different possibilities. Oh, it’s too confusing but I’m glad I said it.
( . . . )
I can’t believe Mighael made my tape recorder make that noise. See, He just did it again? I can’t believe he does that to make me focus on what I’m saying. I guess He thinks I’m bitching about it but I’m not. I’m just appreciating His attention. (“NNN”) As always. I love you, Honey.
( . . . )
Q: What if this is all about or all because up in heaven (“ONCE”) we had an argument and I said I wanted to dump Him or something. I mean (“NNN”) what if this was all because of that? Well, if it was (“SSS”) I see the error of my ways. (“SSS”) Truly. Sincerely. Which you know anyway because you can read everyone’s mind.
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: CAROL ANDERSEN WAS ACCOMPANIED BY HER HUSBAND AND THREE SONS. THE BOYS WAITED OUTSIDE IN THE POOL AREA FOR THEIR PARENTS. I SHOWED THEM AROUND MY CONDO.)
Z: Super.
Q: I’m here with Carol, my family history consultant, and her husband who is the true (“CONSUL”) family historian. So we are now looking at the beautiful view of Echo Park Lake. Down there is the Angelus Temple. Here is the Episcopalian Center and there are what’s left of the two bushes that burned up around the 4th of July in 1994 and really freaked me.
Z: Where?
Q: See? That burned-up bush right down there?
Z: Oh yeah.
Q: And then there’s one right over there.
Z: Uh-huh.
Q: I was home when they both happened. (“THEY”) They did it within three days of each other.
Z: Whoa. (“OOOUH”)
Q: And the second one I saw immediately when it started and there was no one there.
Z: Really? So you have no way of knowing how it started?
Q: Well, I know now (small laugh) how it started.
Z: (laughs) (“BUT UM”)
Q: One of the things I said in one of my interviews was that — (“YOU KNOW”) because when you’re working on a book you tend to let things go. (“BUT”) This is not a pigpen, right?
Z: No, it’s gorgeous.
Q: You’re my witnesses.
Z: It’s beautiful.
S: Yeah. (“WELL” “IT’S HAR[D]”)
Q: I’m very tough on myself — I mean my house, though. (“YEAH”) I try to keep it nice.
Z: Oh no, it’s very nice.
Q: Yeah, it’s nice. (“YOU WERE”) This is (“YEAH”) your third time here.
Z: Yeah.
Q: It’s always nice.
Z: It’s always nice.
Q: Exactly.
Z: I love the hills and the view. It’s fantastic. It’s a phenomenal view.
S: This really is great.
Q: Right.
Z: Yeah. It is marvelous.
Q: It was (“IT WAS JUST”) nice that I was able to get — (“GET THIS”)
Z: You can see downtown. You can see the mountains. You can see — what’s over there? That’s the San Gabriels back there.
Q: That’s Atwater, I think. Oh the hills? I’m not quite sure.
Z: Silverlake? No.
Q: Yeah. (“SO” “CAUSE IT’S A PARK”) Silverlake and Atwater and Silverlake and Eagle Rock and —
Z: Um-huh. It’s beautiful here.
S: Yeah, it looks great here.
Z: Moss (in the lake). Well, I’m amazed at how (“UH”) there’s this beautiful place in the middle of L.A. (laughs) (“YEAH”)
Q: You know I got this for a steal. Less than a $100,000.
Z: Oh, really?
S: Really? (“CALL”)
Q: So somebody up there likes me.
Z: Yeah.
S: Yeah. It looks great.
Z: This is beautiful. Now is this your office or just a spare room?
Q: This is usually what I use for my office but I’ve just been sort of working downstairs. Whoops. Hold on.
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: I SHOW THE ANDERSENS SOME OF THE DECOR.)
Z: This? (“I”)
Q: This is a cel from (“AN”) the movie “The Black Cauldron.” It’s of two dragons. Over here there’s a beautiful old rendition of The Last Supper with an original piece (“OH YEAH”) atop it that I painted myself in acrylics. I think I’m going to include a photograph of this in my book. See this beautiful piece?
Z: Uh-huh.
S: Yeah.
Q: I bought this for $35 and it might be an original. It might be (“GIUSEPPE”) Michelangelo or something. (“T”)
Z: I don’t think it’s Michelangelo. (small laugh)
Q: No? Or da Vinci. (“WHO”) What style do you think? Who would you say (“MMMMMMM”) this was by if you had to say somebody famous?
Z: (to S) I don’t know. Who would you say? (“ME”)
S: It’s really hard to tell.
Z: It has nice detail.
S: I never looked at very much (“YOU KNOW”) copper work like that.
Q: I think it was, like, maybe — yeah, exactly, copper work.
Z: Who works in copper, yeah?
Q: Who?
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: IT IS SOME KIND OF COMPANION PIECE TO THE LEONARDO DA VINCI FRESCO IN MILAN BUT BY WHOM?)
Q: And look at my beautiful painting here. Here’s my pseudonym.
Z: Um-huh.
S: Hhh.
Q: Mark Russell Bell. Of course, my friends call me Mabus so you can just call me Mabus for short.
Z: (laughs) (“MABUS” “OHHH”) This is — (“I”) your Christmas card was like this.
Q: Right, I used some of the same rubber stamps on my Christmas card.
Z: Yeah. That’s neat. (“THE”)
Q: My religion is love. So I said, “Love is the only religion.” I may give this to my friend James. I haven’t seen him because he’s been away back east and he’s going to come by later. Let’s see, what else? (“WHO’S CALLING”) I have some other art pieces to show you quickly.
Z: Okay.
Q: This is the cover for my book. (“KKK”) It’s an original Mark Kostabi.
S: That’s great.
Q: Isn’t that great? (“THAT’S”)
Z: The colors are good. Bright and — (“UH-HUH”)
Q: That’s me in red and —
Z: Uh-huh.
Q: — Mighael’s the angel. (“HE”) The Entity’s name is Mighael. (“MISS THE” “ENNEDY”)
Z: Yeah.
Q: I bought this beautiful door. (“OOH THAT’S”) It’s a temple (“YEAH”) door from India. (“THEY”) They said it was around 900 years old but I think it’s even older than that. I’m not one who’s really big on Eastern religions so I don’t know the significance of it. Eventually I’ll find out. (“I DON’T KNOW”)
Z: It’s for very little people.
Q: You think so?
Z: No, I don’t know. (“DON’T KNOW”) That’d be weird.
Q: Maybe hobbits? (“HOBBITS I WOULD SIT” “YEAH”)
S: Well, you never know with the Indian religion. They have all those —
Z: George Washington? You know George Washington (“I KNOW”) went with one of your ancestors.
Q: Really? Right. (“THAT”)
Z: Peter Parker.
Q: Exactly. And this looks like an original too. Also, there’s this piece here. My trunk matches the proportions (“RIGHT”) precisely to the Ark of the Covenant.
Z: Does it really? You counted cubits?
Q: In cubits.
Z: (small laugh)
Q: Exactly. Exactly. (“HUH”) And I just got this piece on Friday. I think it’s the Holy Grail.
Z: I don’t think so.
Q: No, but you wouldn’t. You wouldn’t.
Z: (laughs) (“OH”)
Q: Notice the Declaration of Independence? Now this looks like an original to me because you can see erasings and things. Can you see them?
Z: No.
Q: Like here. This line here. It’s sort of lighter in tone.
Z: Oh, I see what you’re saying. Yeah.
Q: I think this is an original. I’ve been in touch with the curator at Independence Hall but, of course, because of the budget mess I’m waiting until she comes back. And you’ve just found my book called Song of the Bell.
Z: Song of the Bell. Yes.
Q: Is it true that your husband might have a Bell in his family tree?
Z: Is it there?
S: I think I do. Yeah. (“FROM”)
Q: Do you remember which one?
S: From Connecticut or somewhere back in that — (“NO” “ILL”) They were real early.
Z: That’s neat. I like the engravings.
Q: Also, notice this piece. I got this piece on Friday too. Doesn’t this look like me? This Egyptian piece? (“CCE”) A little bit?
Z: Yeah, the nose. (laughs)
Q: A little bit.
Z: A little bit.
S: Yeah.
Z: Yeah.
Q: I think that’s, like, the god (Amun-)Ra.
Z: (small laugh)
Q: Or Bel-Marduk.
Z: Bel-Marduk?
Q: You know — like Mark Russell Bell. (“BEL-MARDUK”)
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: WE SAT DOWN AT MY BUTCHER BLOCK DINING TABLE WHERE CAROL PICKED UP ONE OF THE CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS.)
Q: That’s an ornament that was a tie-in for the movie “We’re No Angels.” I found an interview with the director Neil Jordan recently and I’m trying to include it in my book.
Z: Um-huh.
Q: It’s a beautiful little movie. (“WHERE WAS IT MADE”) You should see this movie if you have a chance. It’s available as a video cassette.
S: I remember seeing these ads for it. (“I DID NOT”) I didn’t see it. No.
Q: It’s a good movie. I wish it had been (“NO”) a bigger success. Okay, so what’s the news?
Z: Okay okay okay, here’s the news, here’s the news, here’s the news.
Q: Okay, I can hardly wait. In all honesty, when you didn’t show up — now did you hear that sound?
Z: Um-huh.
Q: That was a very strange noise from my tape recorder. It does this once in a while. It might be Entity-related. But when you didn’t show up for a few days — and I was very concerned by the way.
Z: About the car.
Q: The car. (“THE CAR BROKE” “GOD MA[DE]”) But I was worried that maybe (“SSS”) you’d found something in my family tree — (“THAT MIGHT HAVE”)
Z: Who upset you?
Q: — freaked you out or something.
Z: (small laugh) No. (“NO NO NO NO”)
Q: Because I met a lady (“NAMED”) named King recently at the art gallery. (“AND SHE”) And her name was King. (“AND SHE WA[S]”) And apparently she’s Jewish. So I thought maybe they found out that I’m Jewish.
Z: We didn’t find anything like that.
Q: Okay.
Z: It’s Methodist and what —
Q: Not yet, anyway.
Z: Not yet. (“YEAH RIGHT”)
Q: It depends on how far back you go with (“THE”) the King Family. (“OKAY”)
Z: Okay.
Q: Okay.
Z: Here’s what we have. It turns out that your grandfather — (“I”) the father of Paul Russell Sr. is Joseph and not James.
Q: Okay, great. (“OKAY SO WE”)
Z: We moved all of those things. We looked a long time to find Anna Mary Boyer and we finally found her in the home of Emma Dysart. We don’t know if there’s a family connection there or not yet. But they were living in Missouri. She and her family were borders. That’s what it said. And her father worked in the life insurance business. Their parents are Leslie and Mary Virginia Boyer. Then, we found out that the Boyer line goes on to Ezra and Elizabeth Wainwright Boyer. And that’s as far back as we could take that line. So far.
Q: Is there any hope of going — okay.
Z: Oh yeah.
Q: There’s always hope. Okay.
S: Yeah. (“YEAH WELL THERE”)
Z: There’s this whole Boyer thing so what we’ll probably find that, as we (“SOO[N]” “AS WE”) make a link we’ll probably link in to a whole great big Boyer line. (“CAUSE”) The Boyers are everywhere and they’re well-documented. Okay, I talked to Thaddeus.
Q: Wow.
Z: Wow. Okay. (“I’M”)
Q: I’m surprised.
Z: And Thaddeus was a little apprehensive.
Q: Why? (“WELL I JUST”)
Z: Like ‘Who are you?’ (“WHO ARE YOU”)
Q: Okay. Right.
Z: You know, like, “Okay —”
S: Yeah, that’s normal. (“FOR ALL PEOPLE”)
Z: And that’s normal. That’s not — (“ME”)
Q: Did he sound like me?
Z: Yes. (“SOOOO[FT]”) Soft-spoken. Gentle.
Q: Did he say how old he was?
Z: No, but I trust that he’s (“I DID YEAH”) the age that we have for him. I talked with him. He’s very soft-spoken. He’s a really nice guy. And —
Q: Well, I found — (“YOU”) I was going through my photo album in preparation for my photo session this morning and I found three baby photos. You know — we’re twins. (“WHICH IN”) And there were three that I found. These were color baby photos that looked like newborns. (“SO”) Even though it says “Twins” on my birth certificate, I don’t know what’s going on. More and more I think it’s triplets.
Z: Do you really?
Q: I really do.
Z: Well, there’s another thought that I have but — (“WE’LL”) put that in the back of our mind.
Q: Well, what is it real quick?
Z: Well, real quick, I thought that perhaps your dad either had an out-of-wedlock baby before he married your mom. Or that because there’s no indication of — your mom doesn’t know about this child, right? (“SHE”)
Q: Well, she’s apprehensive about something because she didn’t want me (“CALL”) calling Thaddeus.
Z: She didn’t want you to find out. (“CALL THADDEUS”)
Q: I don’t know. (“SHE DOES KNOW” “YEAH”) I’m also seeing a hypnotherapist. And she does not want me to see the hypnotherapist.
Z: Oh. (“UM-HUH”) Okay. (laughs)
Q: Okay?
Z: Well, so it’s hard to tell?
Q: Right.
Z: Okay, so anyway Thaddeus was nice and he did say he’d be interested (“AND GO FOR”) in the work that we do.
Q: Great.
Z: So that opens the door for you to call him (“OKAY”) and make contact with him.
Q: Is that okay?
Z: I think it’s fine. I think you’ll want to leave the entity stuff out for a while until he gets to know you a little bit.
Q: Oh, of course. (“DON’T”) You (“B”) better believe that.
Z: Yeah. Okay. But —
Q: I actually could give him (“A”) some good stock tips because I think that the stock market is about to have another black (“GOOD”) Monday.
Z: It might be. But I also don’t think he did the family tree. I asked him if he’d done any family history work. He said no, he had just dabbled in it a little bit and that he had not done anything with it. And when I looked at the tree that you gave me — those two pages under his name gave his wife’s name but then didn’t have the name or date of birth of one of his children. So I don’t think that he did it. (“YES” “OR THEN” “JERRY”) Because I think he would have known —
Q: Isn’t my family just full of mysteries?
Z: Isn’t it interesting? (“IT’S LIKE”)
Q: They’re trying to hide something and I don’t know what it is.
Z: Well, we did find out some interesting things about that chart. I analyzed it this time. If we had the whole chart it would go back to the father of Seth Russell. And it tells us that Seth Russell is the seventh child in his family. So it gave us a lot of information about his family. But it’s not the complete chart so it’d be really cool to find the real chart.
Q: So what do you — you want to try calling Uncle Bob again? (“OR”)
Z: Well, I have some ideas. This is future research considered. Well, let me go through these. (“OF THE”) Future research considerations. One is to see if we can locate the chart. There was a gal by the name of Dorothy Hill on the chart. And all her kids and grandkids were on it. So I would think that she was really close to — if she didn’t put the chart together, (“SHE PLUS”) she may know who did.
S: She may know who did.
Q: Plus, my dad told me that either my aunt Esther or Dorothy would be calling me so maybe I’ll see if they can provide any help.
Z: And that was (what I was going to suggest — calling one of your aunts.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: THE ANDERSENS’ THREE SONS ERIC, JEFF AND LELAND APPEAR AT THE SCREEN OF THE OPEN FRONT DOOR.)
S: Yeah, Jeff?
Z: Hi?
Q: I think it’s open.
J: I need to talk to Dad.
Z: Okay, come on in.
J: Can we go to the car?
Z: To the car?
J: Yeah, it’s cold out here.
Z: Okay. Bring the cup in.
S: I’ll give you the keys.
Z: Okay, so the other idea was your grandfather or Helen but if your dad said Esther or Dorothy, that would be great. And if Dorothy Russell Hill is the same person then, that would be a great link.
S: (to J) Is Leland going to go back with you?
J: Yeah.
Z: And I’ll keep that in mind. But this is a Dorothy Hill in New York. (“UH UH THE”) Well, we’ll go back there and check. Okay, finding your third sibling is going to be a difficult task. (“IT”) Because (“THE”) the records are closed in California.
Q: They’re closed?
S: Well, they’re not exactly closed. It’s just that you can’t really search the birth indexes. They’ve closed the indexes to them.
Q: Is this new or — (“NO”)
S: If you know a date (“NOW IT’S IN”) and a name you can write and get a certificate.
Q: Okay.
Z: So what we could do —
S: And since we don’t know a date or a name — (“OH WOULD BE THEN”)
Q: It would be the next number. I have the two birth certificate numbers for my brother and me. I might be the one right after that.
Z: If there was a triplet. (“OR”)
Q: Right. Exactly.
Z: If it’s a triplet, we would be able to tell you if it was a triplet or not. (“EVEN THOUGH MY”)
Q: It does say “twin” on my birth certificate (“RIGHT”) but I still wonder after seeing these pictures.
Z: Well, you know what? We could do that.
Q: Okay. Well, I’ll give you those numbers.
Z: Because then we’ll have enough information. But short of that —
Q: Okay, fine. (“WELL I — WE’LL” “IT’S A WORTH”) It’s worth a — (“ONE”) one shot.
Z: But asking (“NO”) for a Russell in Southern California —
Q: Exactly. (“HIS BOOK”) Well, we’ll try that.
Z: Okay. So, anyway, that would be a long shot. This Sardis Perry/Matthew Calbraith Perry thing is still open. (“I PAY” “WE HAVEN’T”) We haven’t done anything with that this time. Now that we know more information about Seth Russell, we can probably do more work in the Seth Russell area. Joseph Russell’s wife’s name is Georgia and we don’t know anything about her heritage at this point. And William King, the fellow who was your mother’s father. We would like to look his marriage certificate up and his heritage.
Q: Okay. (“OKAY NOW”)
Z: So that will be future research considerations.
Q: Well, I definitely want you to go ahead with that.
Z: You do? Okay. (“ESPECIALLY I”)
Q: I’m especially tantalized by the prospect that I might have Jewish blood in me to go with everything else.
Z: (small laugh) Well, that means to look that up?
Q: Yes.
Z: Okay, here is the Joseph Russell line with Georgia and there’s Belle and Cecil and Arthur. And here’s your grandfather. It’s Ray — but they call him in the census record (“WHICH IS”) — this is the 1900 census — it says his name is Rae Paul. Not Paul Ray. Is that interesting? (“IT”)
Q: That is interesting. I don’t know why. It just is interesting.
Z: It’s interesting because (“NO”) he goes by Paul on everything else. (“HERE”)
Q: Maybe they just made a mistake.
S: That’s possible.
Z: Well, that’s a possibility.
Q: We’re just getting to the end of the tape. (“FI” “HERE”)
Z: Here’s the Boyer line. This is the crest for the Boyer family. You might want to do some — (“I” “PHONE THADDEUS”)
Q: Ooh, I love that.
Z: I thought you’d like that. Is that cool? (“AGAIN” “PLUS AND I”)
Q: A friend of mine is named Vivian Boyer (“THIS IS” “IT’S HER TURN”) so —
Z: Oh cool. Well, you’re probably related. So there’s the Boyer line. And then here’s some future research considerations for the Boyers. (“THAT — THAT”)
Q: You didn’t find any Bells, did you?
Z: No Bells. Not yet. Okay, here’s your updated chart. You know how to read these.
Q: Right. (“NO” “SO”) So I can dispense with the old one and this is the new one.
Z: This is like a whole new thing. (“NO”)
Q: I might incorporate this in my book to show where we are right now.
Z: Sure. Okay. And then here’s the unknown child. Whoever this is. I put him in.
Q: The third Russell child.
Z: Actually, I went through and I put in everything that was on the two pages of the family tree that you gave me so it’s all incorporated.
Q: Great.
Z: All of the cousins and everything else. All of the children. Which we didn’t have before. What we found on your grandfather — this is too cool. I went to the city directories of Washington, D.C. And we went and we looked at (“UP”) all the years that your grandparents could have been married. And here’s what we found in Washington, D.C. That Paul was married to Anna. In 1920 the city directory had Paul living as a work —
(TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: TAPE #39, SIDE #2 ENDS HERE. THE FOLLOWING WERE LISTED UNDER ‘SOURCES OF INFORMATION’ IN THE FAMILY GROUP RECORD REGARDING PAUL RAY RUSSELL [SENIOR] OF THE JANUARY 1996 REVISION FOR MY FAMILY TREE.)
BIOGRAPHY: The following came from research of the City Directories of Washington, D.C. during the years that Paul was married to Anna Boyer.
BIOGRAPHY: 1920 Washington, D.C. city directory shows Paul R. as a clk war r. 1421 Buchanan NW — no Anna Marie or Anna Mary Boyer or Russell.
BIOGRAPHY: 1921 Washington, D.C. shows Boyer, Anna M. tel opr residing at 1426 Webster NW and Paul R. Russell, assistant aud treas residing at 1421 Buchanan NW.
BIOGRAPHY: 1922 Washington, D.C. shows Paul R. aud. treas residing at 1421 Crittenden NW and Anna Russell tel sprv residing at 1428 Crittenden NW.
BIOGRAPHY: 1926 Washington, D.C. shows Paul R. aud int rev res Alexandria VA and Anna M. phone opr 8 INW. There is also a Mrs. Mary Russell listed as WUTel Co residing at 1017 N. Cap.
BIOGRAPHY: Also checked were 1922 City Directory for Baltimore, stated place of Paul Jr. birth. There was found the following: A. Marie sten 107 N. Port, Mary Russell telep opr 4209 Euclid Ave.
