I Can Identify

 This week's prompt is "I can identify." I thought I'd interpret it by identifying people in a picture. One of the pictures I was sent that had belonged to Carl and Mildred Strand was a picture of a child and 3 men labeled "4 generations." No names were attached to it. At first I thought maybe it was from the Strand side. I wasn't able to find 4 generations of Strand men that would work. I also looked on the Pulsipher side. No luck there either. I thought the younger looking man looked a bit like Mildred's uncle William Truman so I looked for 4 men that would work on the Truman side. No luck. I put the picture away for awhile. Later, I was working on the Bellingar side and was untangling the messy personal life of Mildred's older brother Ray. That was when I realized he had his first born son in 1917, and that Ray's grandfather David Bellingar didn't pass away until 1921. Ray and his family were also living in Michigan at the time his son Elwyn was a toddler, about the age of the child in the photo. It also makes sense that Mildred would have a picture of her nephew, older brother, father and grandfather. Finally, I had a plausible explanation for the men and child in the 4 generations photo. David, Charles, Ray, and Elwyn Bellingar are the only 4 generations on the Strand or Bellingar side that were alive all at the same time and make sense for Mildred to keep. The mystery had been solved!

I uploaded the photo to Ancestry and MyHeritage. They have technology on their websites that can repair and colorize old photos. I tried both and this one came out the best, I think. 

L.to R. Charles Bellingar, Ray Bellingar, Elwyn Bellingar, David Bellingar.