Frank's Niece!


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Cathy,

Welcome to OL.

I don't have anything of significance to add to the discussion other than that I can support the claim that many people continue to call their aunts and uncles by those terms for the entirety of their lives. It's quite common in the south, actually.

(A related fun fact: in certain areas in the TN Appalachias it's common for adults to still refer to their mothers as "mommy.")

Calling aunts and uncles by those terms is also still common up here in the north. And the same is true of teachers. I can't help but call my old high school teachers "Mr." or Mrs." even after they've asked me to call them by their first names.

J

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Yeah. "It could have been Brant." It almost was.

--Brant

I enjoyed all the different weaponry I got to fire--revolvers to assault rifles to machine guns to mortars--and all the aircraft and watercraft I got to ride in--but not the hundreds of dead CIDG bodies from a fucked up operation

And in peacetime, for non-veterans, it is just boys and their toys.
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Cathy,

Welcome to OL.

I don't have anything of significance to add to the discussion other than that I can support the claim that many people continue to call their aunts and uncles by those terms for the entirety of their lives. It's quite common in the south, actually.

(A related fun fact: in certain areas in the TN Appalachias it's common for adults to still refer to their mothers as "mommy.")

Calling aunts and uncles by those terms is also still common up here in the north. And the same is true of teachers. I can't help but call my old high school teachers "Mr." or Mrs." even after they've asked me to call them by their first names.

J

I vote that we just call Kacy an effete egalitarian non-downhome guy and move on.

Carol

Still scared of Mr. Leland(Grade 10)

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Brant, I didn't know about the affair till 70/71. I read today that the affair went on for a few years...I didn't know that, I thought only a few months. Also I learned today Aunt Alice being Atheist since she was 10. I am just so overwhelmed by it all. Sadly, the specialness of Aunt Alice teaching us the Russian prayer isn't there anymore. Jonathon, Yes I heard they were Atheist (at least Aunt Alice was) through the conversation in 70/71. Uncle Frank was raised just as Catholic as I was...he did believe in God, I don't know what made him change his beliefs. I knew he painted, he said it was his hobby, but never painted when he visited. I don't have any of his paintings. I mostly remember the magic tricks. He did magic a lot. ~Cathy~

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Cathy,

I would seriously think twice about posting your birth certificate on the Internet. Once it's up, anyone can copy paste it for anything they please and there is zero control you have over that.

Here's a suggestion if you wish, but only that. Make a short YouTube video. Use a webcam or something. Say "Hello, great out there!" :)

Then everybody can see you and know you exist. (But not for me--I'm losing my own doubts.)

There's far less damage the bad guys can do with a video than with your personal information.

Let me show you a very easy thing to pull off. Do you live near Bloomington, Indiana. Say around Sullivan?

Michael

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I believe it was George Smith or John Hospers who commented on Rand's knowledge of Russian Orthodox prayers.

I doubt, however, that Rand would have instructed a child on a Russian prayer to say before bedtime as Cathy implies.

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http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=35266557&PIpi=30162539

I read the SOLO thread. Gregster posted links to a Find A Grave site.

The link is to a wonderful photo of Frank looking just how I think of him. He was very good-looking IMO.

I forgot how to get the command bar to show, also what the command is for an embedded image.

J, maybe you could embed the image.

About the IPad, I love it for reading material, but I'm still at beginner stage trying to use it to post.

I'll get back to the art topic. That's what I looked at OL yesterday early am to read the latest posts, but I became distracted by this thread.

I think that Cathy is exactly who she says she is.

Ellen

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I believe it was George Smith or John Hospers who commented on Rand's knowledge of Russian Orthodox prayers.

I doubt, however, that Rand would have instructed a child on a Russian prayer to say before bedtime as Cathy implies.

Neil, it may have been a Russian lullabye or Yiddish prayer, something soothing for a child.
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I believe it was George Smith or John Hospers who commented on Rand's knowledge of Russian Orthodox prayers.

George Walsh commented on Rand's knowledge of the Orthodox liturgy. He said she would casually correct him when he made an error about details which he was researching.

Ellen

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Neil, I don't care what you think! She taught us a prayer in Russian...not that it matters much now because she was an Atheist since she was 10!I was a little girl...this was the first time I had ever known anything in another language and would recite it for all my friends to hear! You just don't get it Neil...I am an O'Connor but not proud of it! The O'Connor family is full of lies, secrets, atheism. adultery, and abortions...yeah, that makes me very proud to be one!

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Cathy, I don't question that you are who you say you are. I question whether you have first or second hand knowledge of the things you say you have.

I don't believe that Ayn or Frank would have told your family of the affair, since they kept it secret from everyone else.

-Neil Parille

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Neil, I don't care what you think! She taught us a prayer in Russian...not that it matters much now because she was an Atheist since she was 10!I was a little girl...this was the first time I had ever known anything in another language and would recite it for all my friends to hear! You just don't get it Neil...I am an O'Connor but not proud of it! The O'Connor family is full of lies, secrets, atheism. adultery, and abortions...yeah, that makes me very proud to be one!

Oh, Cathy,

All families are full of those things, and as I mentioned before, you were cut off from that branch of your family so young. The O'Connors did betray you,yes they did, families betray and lie . And they remember, as you are doing, and that is the most we can do.

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Neil, In the O'Connor family...what is said in family and at home, stays in the family and at home. If I was taught to "tell" I would have went to school and told of our step mother beating us! Or showed them the marks and bruises on our bodies! Or how she starved us for 2 weeks...as my father sat quietly by...the O'Connor's ARE the BEST KEPT SECRET! Why do you think all the O'Connor's had a falling out from...all of this! Then I'm told what a wonderful life Aunt Alice and Uncle Frank had...when they knew what was happening to us! It was my Aunt Agnes that started the whole war sticking up for us. I got up one morning to get ready for school. I looked for Aunt Agnes but she was gone. There was a note on the table from her and it read...Bill, I have been up all night with a nose bleed, I am afraid I am going to have a stroke. I can't believe how you would let your wife treat your girls they way they have been treated, especially how we grew up. Grow some balls, your a yellow coward. We never seen Aunt Agnes again. So what you read isn't what you get...I live it...I didn't read about it!

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Thank you daunce, I appreciate what your what your saying.

Cathy, it is spooky, Claire on Solo just made a so similar comment to mine, down to the prayers! In case you are getting weirded out about the Internet, Claire is not me. Maybe she is just a mother also, or just a sensible person... there actually are a lot of them here.
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Cathy, this is a gripping story. Two generations of O'Connors, abused and dispossessed by stepmothers - by weak fathers, by betrayal--it strikes me very personally. My whole family descends from a stepmother, who raised 8 stepchildren after the death of her husband after four years of marriage. She was the onl grandmother I knew. How strange life is. You and your sister are indeed the last of your O'Connors, and I am among the Excess of our Stuarts.

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I have not been part of the O'Connor's since I was 13. I never looked back...until six months ago. I guess I'M ashamed of Frank letting that affair go on, just like I'm ashamed of my father, for letting his wife do to us what she did. But I guess it all comes down to, I'm just like them. I didn't say anything all these years, I didn't try to find any of them...its been me and my sister always. If I didn't love my children so much, the O'Connor's wouldn't have even been a memory.

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I have not been part of the O'Connor's since I was 13. I never looked back...until six months ago. I guess I'M ashamed of Frank letting that affair go on, just like I'm ashamed of my father, for letting his wife do to us what she did. But I guess it all comes down to, I'm just like them. I didn't say anything all these years, I didn't try to find any of them...its been me and my sister always. If I didn't love my children so much, the O'Connor's wouldn't have even been a memory.

I have not been part of the O'Connor's since I was 13. I never looked back...until six months ago. I guess I'M ashamed of Frank letting that affair go on, just like I'm ashamed of my father, for letting his wife do to us what she did. But I guess it all comes down to, I'm just like them. I didn't say anything all these years, I didn't try to find any of them...its been me and my sister always. If I didn't love my children so much, the O'Connor's wouldn't have even been a memory.

Yes, we are all just like each other when it comes down to it, and I am glad you have your sister and children to love, and sustained through your hard years the ability to love them.
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thank you daunce. I guess I should have told everyone...my dad went by Bill. Very few would go by their real names. Frank's real name was Charles, MiMi was Muriam, marna was Dockey Harry's was Nick and so on. But all this has made me tired. Good night daunce...and thanks again.

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I have carefully read the accounts posted here and on Solo by Cathy Dupler, and the responses to her posts by others. Then I went back and re-read the relevant parts of the three Rand biographies. To say that there are serious discrepancies between the accounts of the relationship between Ayn and Frank on one hand, and the rest of the O'Connor family (particularly those living in Ohio) on the other, is an understatement.

Either the biographers, Barbara Branden and Anne C, Heller - (Burns does not cover it) have it wrong, or Mrs. Dupler does. Many of the date sequences don't match, along with when and where, and for how long, and under what circumstances, that Ayn and Frank were visiting the O'Connor family in Ohio..And these are not minor discrepancies - somebody has it seriously wrong.

The personality and methods of interpersonal relationships of Ayn Rand, as recounted by the biographers, do not match the account given by Mrs. Dupler, which also appears to change between some of her posts (maybe she is remembering additional details, which requires newer versions...you know how memory is).

So, Mrs. Dupler, you may be exactly who you claim to be, Frank's niece. But if so, either you have engaged in some creative enhancement of the nature of your relationship with "Aunt Alice" - or the biographers have it wrong, and yours as written - is the correct account. Or other possibilities.

You might wish to connect with Anne C, Heller, about corrections needed to be made in the next edition of her Rand biography. Barbara Branden would certainly be interested. Also, the Ayn Rand Archives at the Ayn Rand Institute wants to be a repository for the complete picture of her life (even if they may not share it yet with everyone) and would certainly be interested in your story.. Additionally,Professor Shosana Milgrim is planning to come out with a new biography of Rand and may also be interested.

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Jerry,

I'm trying to be a gracious host to our newest member and set a cordial tone (especially in light of what I believe she will encounter in O-Land after the newness wears off), but you raise concerns I have thought about.

I was going to go into some of these things in a non-threatening manner to her as we went along, but I believe you have hit a great tone of your own.

I hope she sees it the same.

Thanks.

Michael

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Mrs. Dupler says she heard a discussion about the affair when Ayn and Frank were visiting in 1970 or 1971.

Now this is of course 2 or 3 years after Branden was expelled for good. What would be the purpose of a discussion about Rand's affair with Branden? To rub it in his face?

And by 70/71 Frank's health was starting to decline. I can't imagine him driving to Ohio, and Rand didn't like to fly. Of course, they could have arranged it, but I don't get the impression that they were doing much traveling by that time.

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Neil, that which exists is possible. Discount would.

Cathy, in my family there were brothers of our stepmother who thought the way she was treating the stepchildren, especially my older sister, was very wrong. There was no public scene I witnessed between Mother and our uncles, but one uncle told my sister that if things got too bad, she should come and stay with them. It was good for her to know that someone saw that what was going on was not right.

Delighted to hear your stories of Frank and Nick and Alice. The only biographical things I have read about Ayn Rand are that portion in Chris Sciabarra's Ayn Rand - The Russian Radical and in Nathaniel Branden's My Years with Ayn Rand. I look forward to the biography in the works by Shoshana Milgram, covering Rand's life to 1957. There is a film about Rand's life and thought you might enjoy titled Ayn Rand in Her Own Words. I liked it a lot.

Stephen

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