Newfound cousins
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We had been working on the Hoyle line of our family history since 1970 with very little progress until about 1980. Our lineage is through Edward Hoyle, and we have been able to fairly well document him and his descendants. For Edward's brother, Thomas, we knew very little except he married and was the father of girls. We were able to locate records for three girls.
Last summer, we located the probate records of Thomas and found he had five daughters who all married. The record gave the name of each daughter and her husband. Using the Church's FamilySearch Web site, we were able to locate and copy most of the original birth and marriage documents for Mary Jane, Anna Cecilia, Alice Elizabeth, Henrietta and Emma Irene Hoyle.
Last fall, using the information gleaned from the above records, we located on an Internet site the full obituary for Herman C. Diehl, the husband of Mary Jane Hoyle. His obituary gave clues that led to an index on another Web site on which we found a reference to an obituary for Mary Jane and their son Edward J. Diehl. We obtained copies of those obituaries, and after a search of the Social Security Death Index, we figured the two daughters of Edward were probably still living. From the Internet, we located the addresses and phone numbers of both children.
We called both of them and spent over an hour on the telephone with each. The sisters thought their line was the only one alive. We shared many family stories with each other and committed to keeping in touch. One of the sisters had a box of old records she received from her father and his mother, Mary Jane Hoyle.
Our branch of the family has successful people in many professions, including athletes and even an Olympic gold medalist. The new branch added a Texas Ranger, a major labor union activist and many other professions. We look forward to meeting all of our newfound cousins.
— Edward A. Hoyle, Goldendale Ward, The Dalles Oregon Stake
