The thrill of seeing an ancestor’s face for the first time

I was scanning some documents that a cousin had shared with me today. I was near the end of a long stack of mostly newspaper clippings of cousin’s marriages and obituaries, and thought that I had already found most of the juiciest bits. And then, suddenly, a discovery. A photo drops out from the bottom of the stack, and on the back it says “Grandma Brendel” (crossed out) and then written in “Great Grandmother Haberberger.”

As it turns out, it is a photograph of a woman whose picture I had never seen before. It was my third great grandmother, Katharina Margaretha Kürzdorfer (married name Haberberger), born 2 Feb 1831 in Körbeldorf, Bavaria. I had chased down her name after a long hunt for her daughter’s birthplace. I had not really ever expected to find a picture of her since she never immigrated to the United States like her daughter.

Seeing the face of an ancestor for the first time is amazing.

Katharina Margaretha Kürzdorfer, it is nice to see you!