Marlow Cemetery

 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks
Week 20, May 14 – 20, 2026
#52ancestors
Prompt: At the Cemetery

 If my Mother’s family had a family cemetery, it would have to be the Marlow Cemetery in Marlow, Oklahoma.  My Mom’s family has lived in that area since it was Indian Territory. I remember even as a child visiting the cemetery, not often as we lived in Texas. We didn’t go on most visits back to Oklahoma or at least, I didn’t. Now I wonder if some of the times that I was playing with cousins and my parents left, if they had gone to visit the cemetery. There are 17 of my relatives buried in Marlow Cemetery, however it a very large cemetery with over 10,000 graves.  It is still an active cemetery, so I can imagine there are other families who might consider it their family cemetery.

 My Mother’s family:

 Grandparents, Thomas Osa McCarl (904-1975) and Gladys Mamie Sample McCarley (1914-1995)

 Great Grandparents, Sidney E. (1873-1958) & Mattie Niblett (1871- 1968) McCarley.

 Grandaunt & uncle, Carl Henry (1906-1981) and Opal Mary Collier (1814-1991) McCarley.

 Grandaunt & uncle, Sidney Floyd (1909- 1996) & Dorothy B. Forth 1911-2003) McCarley.

 Granduncle, Wilbern Newton McCarley (1911-1990)

 Great Grandaunt & uncle, Walter Leslie (1881-1961) & Anne Robinson (1891-1962) McCarley.

 1^st cousin, 2x removed, Earnest Edwin (1911-1985) & Ollie Marie Smith (1912-2009) McCarley.

 Great Grandaunt & uncle, Tilmon Andrew & Tressie Evelyn Fowler Niblett

 My Father’s family:

 Aunt & Uncle, Don & Opal Golightley Sorrels. 

A question unanswered

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks
Week 19, May 7 – 13, 2026
#52ancestors
Prompt: A question the records can’t answer 

Sidney E McCarley was born to Mitchel W. and Nancy R. McDuffie McCarley on December 29, 1873.  Despite an extensive search of every record found on Sidney, no record reveals what middle name the E represents. Not even his children knew what the E stood for as he refused to answer any questions about it. 

Almost every record searched listed him as Sidney E. McCarley. There are a few records that don’t list him as Sidney E or Sid.  One is the 1900 Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory Census when he was 26 years old. It very clearly says, Sidney J McCarley.  The other record is his WWI draft registration. He signed it, Sidney Johnston McCarley.  The 1900 Indian Territory census (different from the Chickasaw Nation Census) lists him as Sidney J. McCarley. Maybe he was experimenting with a new middle name in 1900 or was his name Sidney E Johnston McCarley?  Johnston sounds like a surname, but none of his ancestors carried that name, so where did it come from? 

There has been some speculation that the E stands for Ezekiel because his great grandfather’s name was Ezekiel. His father didn’t know his grandfather, so would his father have named Sidney after a man that died before he was born? The E was there when he was a child and carried throughout his life.  His son, Carl, listed his father as Sidney E (only) McCarley on his WWII draft registration card. When Sidney refused to tell his children what the E stood for, he didn’t say he only had an initial for his middle name.   Two of his other boys, Floyd and Wilbern listed his name on their draft registrations as Sidney E. McCarley. 

The records haven’t revealed his name yet, and they may never reveal the answer. This is one time I would really like to talk to his parents because I know he wouldn't tell me. 

Christmas Eve Gift

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks
Week 18, April 30 - May 6, 2026
#52ancestors
Prompt: Tradition 

Christmas Eve morning the phone rings. My mother answers the phone but instead of Hello, she says “Christmas Eve Gift”. Then seconds later she starts laughing. She got one over on her sister.  After talking to her for a little while, she hangs up and calls her other sister.  But her sister knows that trick, too.  She starts laughing again before she wishes her sister Merry Christmas.  The phone rings again and it is her brother.  Christmas Eve morning was a time that my Mother always talked to her brother and 3 sisters. It didn’t matter that long distance was expensive back then. What mattered was counting coup on her siblings. 

The McCarley siblings with their Mother
Jean, Gwonda, Ted, Vadie, Sadie
Mother, Gladys Sample McCarley 
Thank you, Kerry McCarley Balthrop for the photo 

“Christmas Eve Gift” was a game they played as children that their parents had taught them.  The first person to say “Christmas Eve Gift” was to receive a gift from the person they beat to it. I don’t know if they really gave gifts as kids. I don’t think they did as adults. It was really all about being the first to say it.  My siblings and I don’t do it very often but some years I call them to say, “Christmas Eve Gift”.  

I had never heard of anyone else playing this game, so I thought it was just one of the strange things my family does. One day I decided to do a little research on it. One website said it started in Scotland. That made sense to me since my mother’s maiden name was McCarley with other Scots-Irish names sprinkled into her background.   In anticipation of this post, I decided to look up that information again but couldn’t find it. However, I had an interesting conversation with an artificial intelligence (AI). 

There doesn’t appear to be any documentation that this game was ever played in Scotland. In fact, Christmas was barely celebrated in Scotland for centuries after the reformation. Their main winter holiday & gift giving was at Hogmanay (New Year Eve).  One of the first documented mentions of the “Christmas Gift” game was in a letter from Thomas Jefferson in 1809. He wrote to John Wayles Eppes that his nephew and his cousins were running about “bawling out 'a merry christmas' 'a christmas gift' “  The game with “Christmas Gift” came before “Christmas Eve Gift”.  

It’s first mentioned in Virginia, then documented in the Appalachia area of TN, SW Virginia, and Western NC. The tradition follows the same migration route that many of the Scots-Irish traveled going south and then west.  From SC, many went to Tennessee  or Alabama, then Mississippi and East Texas. Perhaps that is why my first research thought it came from Scotland. 

The mentions of “Christmas Eve Gift” came later but has been documented in Kentucky and Tennessee families as well as in Texas especially with families with ties to the Appalachia. The Scots-Irish were strongly represented in the Appalachia area. The core of Appalachia is considered Western Virginia, Eastern Tennessee & Kentucky, Western North Carolina, and all of West Virginia. 

The McCarleys were in Spartanburg, SC in the 1700s, then moved through Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas before settling in Indian Territory in the early 1900s.  Spartanburg, SC is in the edge of the Appalachia with a heavy Scots-Irish settlement. 

The McCarleys were in Tennessee and that may be where they started playing the “Christmas Eve Gift” game.  Maury County, TN is outside of the Appalachia, but it was heavily settled by people from the Appalachia core. By the time the McCarleys were in Tennessee, the “Christmas Gift” game had a variation, “Christmas Eve Gift”. If not in Maury County, it may have been while they lived in Marshall County, MS which was within the extended area of Appalachia and was heavily settled by Tennessee migrants.

It kind of makes me sad that “Christmas Eve Gift” is dying out in our family. 

 

Sources: 

Cassidy, F. G., & Hall, J. H. (Eds.). (1985–2013). Dictionary of American Regional English. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 

Christmas gift (exclamation). (n.d.). In Wikipedia. Retrieved April 29, 2026, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_gift_(exclamation) 

Heckert, A. (2016, December 23). “Christmas gift!” The roots of a Southern holiday saying. Garden & Gun. Retrieved April 29, 2026, from https://gardenandgun.com/christmas-gift-the-roots-of-a-southern-holiday-saying/ 

Jefferson, T. (1809, December 25). Letter to John Wayles Eppes. In The Papers of Thomas Jefferson.  https://www.monticello.org/encyclopedia/christmas 

Thomas, J. (1942). Blue Ridge Country. New York, NY: Holt. 

Wilson, T. (n.d.). Christmas gift. Blind Pig and The Acorn. Retrieved April 29, 2026, from https://blindpigandtheacorn.com/christmas-gift/