I picked out a bunch of ghost story books that I believe certain of my family members should read. I have these books in my possession already. Nobody has to go out and buy anything. I won’t be able to tell my family in person that these books are really great – because when I see my family in person, everyone talks at once. Hence, this blog post.
I don’t actually benefit financially if anyone else out there purchases any of these books. I’m a huge fan of some of the people that I mention below. I might possibly stalk some of these people if I lived closer to them. Nothing more.
I blogged before that after the 2020 Covid lockdown started, I got hooked to Adam Selzer’s work. Selzer posts daily virtual tours on his “Mysterious Chicago” Facebook page. I discovered Selzer when I searched for “virtual ghost tours.”
Selzer himself wrote Young Adult fiction. He also wrote adult non-fiction and established a Chicago “ghost” and “True Crime” tour company. Because writing Young Adult fiction doesn’t actually pay the bills. Selzer himself alluded to this. Selzer and I are almost the same age. I am impressed by all that he accomplished. I might blog about Selzer’s own books in a future post. However, I actually blog today about the YA books that he promoted for another author: Lindsay Currie.
Selzer posted last year that Currie’s new YA book, Scritch Scratch, featured a ghost tour guide based on Selzer. The book described a Chicago ghost tour of locations and stories that Adam featured during his own real ghost tours. Selzer promoted the release of Scritch Scratch by posting his own virtual ghost tour of the places and stories featured in Scritch Scratch.
Plus, R.L. Stine wrote a quote for Scritch Scratch‘s cover.
R.L. FREAKING STINE!
R.L. Stine wrote some Point Thrillers, which were the only things in the world that I read in seventh grade. He also wrote Goosebumps. R. L. Stine might be the reason that I know how to read chapter books.
Currie wrote this before she wrote Scritch Scratch. I would have never read this book had I not first discovered Scritch Scratch. This title does not summon me to read it.
However, the plot included visits to a real Chicago cemetery and a real Chicago grave. The junior high school kids in this story solved a mystery about a real person buried at this grave. This real person is the star of a real cemetery ghost story.
Adult Jenny really enjoyed this spooky book written for kids.
Here’s what happened: During Covid lockdown, I watched a virtual talk about historical fiction. I won a history trivia challenge question. I forget the question, but the answer was “the French and Indian War.” I submitted the first correct answer. The contest hosts promised to ship me a book as my prize.
I won a paperback copy of Bellewether. I won a paranormal suspense / romance that look place in the modern day with frequent flashbacks to the French and Indian War in the 1700’s. The flashbacks explained why a ghost from the 1700’s haunted the present day. Everything took place in the Lake George / Fort William Henry / Fort Ticonderoga area of upstate New York.
Now, Jonathan and I spent a week in this exact area with Jonathan’s sister S. (so, my sister-in-law S.) and S.’s now-husband E., and also with Jonathan’s parents.
(FYI: The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper took place at Fort William Henry during the French and Indian War. Cooper based his novel on actual events at the fort.)
I read Bellwether in one day, even though it isn’t a YA novel.
However, my sister-in-law S. will also love this book. So, S., when I see you, I will hand you my “won” copy of Bellewether.
Phipps Conservatory, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Phipps Conservatory was constructed in 1892-1893. The first exhibit at Phipps consisted of plants purchased from the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. (Photo: Jenny Gaffron Woytek)
My sisters and I used to play “Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon.” If you’re not familiar with the game, it’s based on the theory that everyone in the world can be linked by six or fewer relationship connections. So, when you play “Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon,” one player picks a famous person from Hollywood, and then the other players try to link that person by six connections or fewer to Keven Bacon.
So, since Halloween was coming up, I thought that it would be fun to play “Six Degrees from H.H. Holmes.”
Very briefly, H.H. Holmes was a serial killer (as well as a medical school graduate, body stealer, and con artist) active in the Eastern United States, Chicago, and Canada in the late 1800’s. He was executed in Philadelphia in 1896. He confessed to 27 murders, but some writers speculate that he actually killed hundreds of people.
Holmes owned a building located three miles from the location of the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. The building came to be known in popular culture as Holmes’ “Murder Castle.”
Writers theorized that Holmes took advantage of the large crowds in Chicago for the fair in order to pick out new victims. They conjectured that Holmes pretended to be a hotel owner and brought these victims to his Murder Castle under the guise of providing lodging. Then, he allegedly killed these out-of-towners.
Erik Larson’s novel “The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America” ran with this particular narrative. In 2017, I took an architecture boat tour of the Chicago River. My tour guide referenced “The Devil in the White City” several times. I left the tour with the impression that this was a non-fiction book. I learned later that the book is NOT non-fiction. Larson even conceded in his remarks at the end of the book that many of the things that he wrote about Holmes’ murderous activities were conjecture.
If you want to learn about H.H. Holmes based on documentation and research, then I recommend Adam Selzer’s “Mysterious Chicago” Facebook page. Selzer has posted several “virtual tours” exploring Holmes on this Facebook page. He also wrote his own non-fiction book about Holmes. I didn’t read the book, but I watched all of Selzer’s Facebook videos.
Some writers claim that H.H. Holmes was also Jack the Ripper. However, Selzer discovered documentation that showed that Holmes was in the United States at the same time that the Ripper murders occurred in London.
So, back to the “Six Degree”thing.
Henry Phipps (a businessman who belonged to the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club whose dam caused the Johnstown Flood of 1889) had Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens in Pittsburgh erected in 1892 – 1893. The conservatory lists this history on its website. (The Phipps Conservatory website does NOT include that part about the Johnstown Flood.)
During one of my visits to Phipps Conservatory, I learned through an exhibit that representatives from the conservatory travelled from Pittsburgh to Chicago in order to acquire the plants that were exhibited at the 1893 World’s Fair. The Phipps representatives purchased these plants (they outbid several other parties), then had the plants shipped by train from Chicago to Pittsburgh. These plants from the 1893 World’s Fair became Phipps Conservatory’s opening exhibit in 1893.
So, maybe the original plants at Phipps Conservatory in Pittsburgh were originally viewed – possibly even enjoyed – by the serial killer H.H. Holmes. Maybe H.H. Holmes lured one or more of his victims among these plants. Maybe H.H. Holmes attempted to prey on the people who travelled from Pittsburgh to Chicago, looking for Phipps Conservatory’s first flowers. Maybe these plants are the ancestors of plants that I now enjoy when I visit Phipps.
You see, Erik Larson, I too can speculate about H.H. Holmes and his activities at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago.
Here’s my call to action: If you enjoy (or hate read) my blog, please share it with others would would also enjoy (or hate read) it.
Chicago, Illinois. June 2017. (Photo: Jenny Gaffron Woytek)
In June 2017, my husband Jonathan and I took the Amtrak from Pittsburgh to Chicago for a week. Jonathan had a business trip and I tagged along to do the tourist thing. Jonathan hates to fly, thus the train.
Our trip began in a large crowd of Cubs fans. We walked into an Amtrak station reeling from an engine fire, a passenger train stranded in the mountains, a rescue from Norfolk Southern, and another train stranded by a severe storm.
And this was all before we left Pittsburgh.
Two different Amtrak routes stop in Pittsburgh. Just to simplify things, I am only going to describe the East – West Routes for each of these.
The Pennsylvanian runs between New York City and Pittsburgh, with a crew change in Philadelphia. The Capitol Limited runs between Washington, D.C. and Chicago, with a crew change in Pittsburgh.
When things happen the way that they are supposed to, the westbound train for the Pennsylvanian stops in Pittsburgh earlier in the evening. Then, the westbound train for the Capitol Limited stops in Pittsburgh shortly before midnight. Therefore, a passenger can board the Pennsylvanian in New York, disembark in Pittsburgh, wait around the Pittsburgh station for a little bit, and then board the Capital Limited to continue into Ohio.
(In the past, Jonathan and I rode on the Pennsylvanian for weekend trips to NYC. We rode the on the Capitol Limited for trips to Washington. And we also previously rode on the Capitol Limited to Chicago as the first leg of longer trips out west.)
We planned to leave Pittsburgh for Chicago on a Friday night. We had booked a sleeping car for our trip. We intended to sleep through most of the trip across Ohio and Indiana, then wake up shortly before we reached Chicago the next morning.
We both went in to our jobs in Pittsburgh that Friday. We had respectable thunderstorms throughout the day. After our work days ended, we ate dinner at a restaurant a block away from Pittsburgh’s Amtrak station.
The Chicago Cubs were actually playing the Pirates IN Pittsburgh that same evening, and also for the next several nights after this. So, when we walked from the restaurant to the Amtrak station in Pittsburgh, we stepped into a crowd of people wearing Cub’s jerseys.
The Capitol Limited to Chicago was scheduled to leave shortly before midnight that evening. We arrived at the station about 2 hours early. (Jonathan loves to watch trains, and we showed up extra early to do just this. Many freight trains pass the Pittsburgh Amtrak station.)
We barely found a place to sit down in the Amtrak station.
The station was full of people waiting to pick up loved ones from The Pennsylvanian’s return trip from New York City.
The Pennsylvanian was late.
Why?
Well, that’s because the Pennsylvanian’s engine caught fire near Altoona, Pennsylvania. The train lost its air conditioning and the toilets no longer worked.
Now, Altoona is near a summit of the Allegheny Mountains. So, the train had broken down near the top of a mountain.
Later that evening, I spoke with a fellow passenger of the westbound Capitol Limited who had been on the Pennsylvanian for this adventure. He travelled on the Pennsylvanian from his former home in Lancaster to Pittsburgh, with the intention to travel from Pittsburgh to his new home in Ohio. He told me that when the Pennsylvanian’s engine burned out, someone ran down the aisle yelling “Fire!” The train cars all carried the burning smell. The crew passed out the remaining food and drink from the snack car. This all happened during a thunderstorm.
An hour after we arrived at the Pittsburgh station, two Norfolk Southern freight engines towed the Pennsylvanian into the station.
All of the Pennsylvanian passengers rushed into the station. (I wonder how many of them went looking for the indoor plumbing.) They and their family left, except the ones who were connecting in Pittsburgh to the Capitol Limited.
All of us learned that the Capitol Limited would be a half hour late. Then an hour late.
We sat by the tracks, and we saw a train heading towards us.
It was a freight train. Not the Capitol Limited.
Another half hour passed. Another freight train passed us.
The station made an announcement. One of the storms had blown tree debris onto the tracks just outside of Pittsburgh. The Capitol Limited would not arrive in Pittsburgh until the tracks were cleared.
The Amtrak employees passed out bottled water to the crowd. A few people bitched.
The Capitol Limited finally showed up in Pittsburgh.
Jonathan and I boarded at about 2:45. Our train porter had our sleeping car set up with our beds. I fell asleep.
When I awoke, the sun was up and we were halfway through Ohio.
I went to eat breakfast in the dining car. Breakfast is included in the cost of a ticket for the sleeping car. Back in pre-pandemic days, if you had less than four people in your party, they sat you at a table with strangers. I sat with a mother and daughter who had travelled into Pitttsburgh from Latrobe on the Pennsylvanian. (Remember that photo that I posted of the oil-covered engine? Well, that photo happened – several years earlier – directly in front of the Latrobe Amtrak station.)
The train pulled into Union Station in Chicago a bit later than scheduled, but at least we were in Chicago.
That evening, we ate dinner at a Chicago restaurant full of televisions showing the Cubs playing in Pittsburgh.
At the end of our trip, Jonathan and I got back into Pittsburgh two hours late. Another storm had blown debris onto the track in front of the Capitol Limited, this time outside of Toledo.
We had no trouble with wind during our time in the Windy City, though!
I’ve posted on Facebook and on this blog about the virtual tours and livestream lectures about ghosts, true crime, and cemeteries that I enjoyed since March. However, I wanted to put my main thoughts together in one place. I picked up some ideas that I think can be useful to very local history and tourism groups.
I’m going to start off with American Hauntings. American Hauntings is the blanket name for a business owned by Troy Taylor and Lisa Taylor Horton. When I first discovered American Hauntings, the operation included ghost tours, true crime tours, ghost hunts, in-person “Evening with” catered dinner experiences, and books.
In 20017, I went on a search for new podcasts about the paranormal, specifically related to American history. I listen to several hours of podcasts each week. I am very picky about allowing new podcasts into my listening schedule. If a podcast host sounds as if he or she didn’t bother to research anything beyond a one minute Google search, or if the host shoots the breeze for several minutes at the beginning of each episode, then I almost always shut off the podcast.
So one morning in 2017, I waited for the bus and discovered Season #1 of American Hauntings, hosted by Troy Taylor and Cody Beck. I was hooked.
American Hauntings the podcast didn’t include advertisements for anything except for other American Hauntings products and services. Part way through each episode, Troy plugged the tickets for his in-person experiences.
The “Evening with” dinners that Troy promoted intrigued me. The approximately $50 per person ticket price for these included a catered meal at the Mysterious Mineral Springs Hotel in Alton Illinois, followed by a live lecture given by Troy on that night’s topic. However, I live outside of Pittsburgh, so I don’t think that I will ever make it to Alton for an in-person “Evening with” dinner.
Then, in March 2020, most of the governors of most of the states shut down everything fun. This included the in-person American Hauntings tours, ghost hunts, and in-person “Evening with” dinners. Troy began to post livestreams every Friday night on his Troy Taylor Facebook page. Sometimes he gave lectures about topics that are not included in his “Evening with” dinner talks. (For instance, one night he spoke on Facebook about the time that grave robbers attempted to steal Abraham Lincoln’s body.) Sometimes he held Q&A sessions about the many topics that American Hauntings covers. In each livestream, he promoted the sale of his books (he offered a Shelter in Place discount) and advanced bookings on his in-person experiences when they resumed. He added a virtual tip jar for viewers who chose to tip him for the livestream entertainment. When he had to cancel the June 2020 Haunted America Conference, he sold tee shirts to offset the costs that he had already incurred for it.
Then Troy made an announcement that made me very happy. He scheduled several of his most popular “Evening with” dinner talks as Zoom lectures. I could pay $13 to receive a log-on link to a live “Evening with” dinner talk over Zoom.
I listened to three of Troy’s Zoom “Evening with” talks so far. I made sure to have in my house food and drink that I enjoyed so that I could pretend that I was eating a catered dinner at the Mysterious Mineral Springs Hotel during the lectures. The Zoom participants all have the option of shutting off their own computer’s camera or leaving it on. So, when I participated in these talks, I could see who some of the other participants were. We could chat with each other during the talk using Zoom’s chat function. At the end of the talk, Troy answered questions from the Zoom audience.
So, these are my observations of how American Hauntings handled the Shelter in Place order and the Covid-19 “quarantine.”
However, even the American Hauntings company didn’t produce enough podcast and video content to keep me entertained from March 15 until now. So, I searched the internet for other virtual tourist experiences that I would enjoy.
I purchased the Virtual 360 degree tour from the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, CA. If I ever make it to see the house in person, I know which rooms I want to focus my attention.
I typed something like “Chicago” and “virtual tours” into the Facebook search function because I visited Chicago once for a week as a tourist and I enjoyed the trip. I discovered the Facebook page for Mysterious Chicago, owned by Adam Selzer. This guide gave in-person tours up until mid-March. He also wrote several books, including such topics as ghosts, H.H. Holmes, Roaring Twenties true crime, and Abraham Lincoln.
As of now (July 12), several other Chicago tour companies have restarted their in-person tours. However, Mysterious Chicago has not done this. Instead, Mysterious Chicago posts virtual tours multiple times each week on Facebook. It’s free to watch these on Facebook, but each tour includes information about how to donate to a virtual tip jar. There’s also a Patreon page for Mysterious Chicago, but I have not subscribed to it. I watched every Mysterious Chicago video posted to Facebook.
Here’s where I compare American Hauntings to Mysterious Chicago.
All of the American Hauntings livestreams and “Evening With” Zoom presentations that I watched consisted of Troy sitting in his spooky-looking American Hauntings office. In these presentations, I saw in the background lighted candles, the books that Troy wrote, and fake (I hope!) skulls. He shared his computer screen, onto which he pulled up photos of the people and places mentioned in his presentation. His partner, Lisa Taylor Horton, joined all of the Zoom presentations. Lisa handed all of the requests for technical assistance. Lisa also moderated the Q&A sessions at the end of each Zoom presentation. It was clear from watching the presentations that Troy and Lisa were either in separate rooms or separate buildings.
Everything that I watched from Mysterious Chicago came from Facebook. No Zoom. These tours happened several different ways:
1.) Some of the tours were real-time cemetery tours, taking all social distancing precautions including the use of a face mask. These tours happened at times when there were no or else very few other people around.
2.) Some of the tours were real-time tours on the streets of Chicago, taking all social distancing precautions including the use of a face mask. These tours happened at times when there were very few other people around.
3.) Most of the tours took place completely in Adam Selzer’s living room. He didn’t wear a face mask during these tours. He shared pre-recorded video footage during these tours. He also shared photos – something that he wasn’t able to share during his live tours.
(To be clear, Adam Selzer made a point of taping footage of himself wearing the face mask while he was outside traversing the Chicago cemeteries and streets.)
Finally, I watched three virtual tours of New Orleans narrated by long time New Orleans tour guide Alexander Addams. (He said, “I have been doing this for many, many – God knows – many years.”) I found two of these videos under the Facebook page for Crawl New Orleans, and I found the third video under the Facebook page for Crawl USA. These were three completely different video tours by the same guide. I’m not sure why they were on different Facebook pages. Oh, well. I very much enjoyed all of these tours.
Just like the companies mentioned above, Crawl New Orleans used photos and pre-recorded video footage. However, unlike the other two, Crawl New Orleans also had video footage recorded from the air. That was very cool. There was a link to a tip jar. The tour guide encouraged viewers to book in-person tours with Crawl New Orleans once the Covid-19 restrictions had ended. He even provided a code for 20% off all tours: CORONA.
Here’s why I took such an interest in this: in the past, I purchased tickets for tours of local cemeteries and historic neighborhoods. Almost all of these tours were put on by local civic groups and staffed by volunteers. These tours raised funds in order to maintain and preserve said cemeteries and neighborhoods. For instance, one of these cemeteries held tours every October in order to raise enough money to pay somebody to mow the grass. This was the very cemetery which included the graves of that community’s founder and his entire family. I wonder how many of these tours will be able to continue in this era of Covid-19.
I’m not personally involved with any of these civic groups. However, I think that maybe some of these groups will be able to continue their tour fundraising efforts by taking them online. For instance, a member of said group could go out alone and take the video footage needed for the tour. Then, they could put the footage up on a free Facebook livestream. Viewers would be asked to donate to a virtual tip jar for the benefit of this organization.
Well, that’s just my suggestion. Off to watch more ghost and true crime tours.
So, shortly after the New Year, the children of friends and co-workers (and also my niece!) will sell Girl Scout cookies.
I spent years as a Girl Scout and attended Girl Scout camp many summers. However, I did all of this long before we all had social media. So if I’m mistaken about the social media guidelines, please reach out and let me know. I’ll even add you to my newsletter mailing list!
For the record, one of the Girl Scout troops that I joined had a bake sale fundraiser which we didn’t report to our local council so that we wouldn’t have to receive approval OR share our “profits” with them. Since we didn’t have social media or access to the internet, and since we lived over an hour’s drive away from our council headquarters, we got away with this.
I have a ton of happy memories about being a Girl Scout. So, thank you, thank you, thank you to all of my former Girl Scout leaders.
Also, thank you to the ghost of Juliette Gordon Low, the founder of Girl Scouts of the USA.
I used to own a Girl Scout handbook that included a short biography of Juliette Gordon Low.
The biography mentioned that Low permanently lost part of her hearing on her wedding day. This happened after a wedding guest threw rice at her and the rice got stuck in her ear. The biography also mentioned that she was born right before the Civil War to a Yankee mother and a Confederate soldier father.
This biography left out Low’s family connection to a “massacre”/ “battle” on the site of present-day Chicago and the scandal in her own marriage. Here’s a short history about all of that:
So, when I was a kid, I didn’t realize that Girl Scout founder Low came from arguably one of the most elite families in the United States. Low’s mother grew up in a wealthy family that settled in Connecticut in the 1600’s. Low’s father inherited Georgia cotton and railroad money. Low married the son of Andrew Low II, one of the richest men in Savannah in the 1800’s. Low’s Georgia family owned slaves up until the Civil War. Yeah, my old Girl Scout handbook didn’t talk about this.
So let me start with Juliette Magill Kinzie. She became Juliette Gordon Low’s maternal grandmother. She grew up in Connecticut as Juliette Magill and married John H. Kinzie, the son of fur trader John Kinzie.
Juliette Magill Kinzie’s future in-laws ran their fur trade business on the Great Lakes. In fact, in 1812 the Kinzies actually ran their trading operations across the Chicago River from Fort Dearborn. This local area sits on the shore of Lake Michigan. Do you know what we now call the section of the Chicago River that meets with Lake Michigan? Chicago. We now call that place Chicago.
The Kinzie family in 1812 identified as Canadians, not as United States citizens. This is important.
During this time period, the white American settlers attempted to settle further and further west. Various Native American communities attempted to stop them. Almost all of us learned about a watered-down version of this in school.
In 1812, the young United States and Great Britain entered into a war with each other that we now call the War of 1812. Great Britain and its Native American allies took Fort Mackinac in Michigan from the United States. This fort sat on the Straits of Mackinac, which connect Lake Michigan with Lake Huron. So, once the United States lost Fort Mackinac, they had no way to send supplies or extra troops to any U.S. holdings on the shores of Lake Michigan.
The U.S. forces evacuated Fort Dearborn. However, during the evacuation, Native Americans ambushed the evacuating soldiers and civilians. Dozens of soldiers and civilians, including children, died.
One of the things that I learned from this above-linked article is that for decades after this event, the public referred to it as the “Massacre at Fort Dearborn.” Native American advocates pointed out that, generally, incidents which resulted in defeat for white settlers were commonly referred to as “massacres” while engagements that resulted in defeat for indigenous peoples were referred to as “battles.” Many sources no longer refer to the Fort Dearborn incident as a massacre. Wikipedia calls this the “Battle of Fort Dearborn.”
When I visited Chicago a few summers ago, I stood on the sidewalk marking that commemorated the actual site of Fort Dearborn. I stood at the site of Fort Dearborn and I looked across the river at Chicago’s own Trump International Hotel and Tower.
So, Girl Scouts of the USA founder Juliette Gordon Low’s Canadian Kinzie ancestors ran a trading post along the Chicago River, very close to where the Trump high-rise now sits.
The Kinzie clan didn’t die in the Battle of Fort Dearborn in 1812. In fact, Juliette Migill Kinzie’s mother-in-law safely evacuated before the attack started. Remember, they were Canadians and they had relationships with the local Native Americans.
Since John H. Kinzie survived the Battle of Fort Dearborn in 1812, he could marry Juliette Magill from Connecticut in 1830. Juliette Magill had a relatively elite education for her day. So, she could read and write. Which she did.
Juliette Magill Kinzie moved to the Midwest with her husband and then she wrote several books.
She wrote about her Kinzie in-laws’ experiences during the Battle of Fort Dearborn. Juliette Magill Kinzie’s writings became a well-known source of information about the battle. Critics maintained that she wrote about the event from her in-law’s point of view and therefore made the Kinzie family out as the “heroes” of the event. Again, read this article from Chicago Magazine. It gives some good insights about the controversy around Juliette Magill Kinzie’s work.
Juliette Magill Kinzie and her husband John had seven children. Four of their sons served in the United States Army during the Civil War.
The Kinzies’ daughter Eleanor married William Gordon II of Savannah, Georgia. Gordon and his relatives served with the Confederate Army during the Civil War. William Gordon was the son of a politician and railroad president. He worked as a cotton and rice broker. You can read on Wikipedia all about the Gordon family’s prominence in Georgia in the 1800’s.
William Gordon II and Eleanor Kinzie Gordon had a daughter in 1860 that they named Juliette. Little Juliette Magill Kinzie Gordon. The Civil War started a few months later.
In 1886, Juliette Gordon married William Low. I learned in a Eugenia Price historical novel and also from this website that William Low was the son of Andrew Low, a Scottish immigrant who became one of the richest men in Savannah.
Juliette Gordon Low’s husband had affairs and then asked her for a divorce.
She moved on and started the Girl Scouts of the USA.
The United States posthumously issued a postage stamp in Juliette Gordon Low’s honor and also awarded her a Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Low’s supporters worked have to her birthplace listed as a National Historic Landmark.
I don’t know what kind of legacy William Low left behind because he doesn’t actually have his own page on Wikipedia.
Here’s what I learned from reading about the Kinzie and Gordon families: Juliette Gordon Low, the founder of the Girl Scouts of the USA, came from wealth and incredible privilege. She came from a family fortune built on the exploitation of non-white people.
But Juliette Gordon Low also came from people who survived things. The Kinzies survived the Battle of Fort Dearborn in 1812. The Kinzies and the Gordons survived the Civil War. She herself survived a Victorian Era divorce from a prominent husband.
