My cousin, Alan Ulick, the son of my Father’s sister Gert died in his home yesterday. His marital partner of 25 or so years, Harry Small, was at his bedside. I think he was 83. Very Sad.
On the wall in my gallery hangs a picture of his Mother and my Father when they were kids. I had a second image and decided to look him up and give it to him, along with a picture of our Grandmother, Hannah Duckman, after whom my Brother, Henry Hannah, and his Daughter, Hannah are named. This image was made in 1921.
Other than a brief meeting, a few minutes or less, in 1954, when he was a teenager and I was a kid, we had never seen or spoken to one another. This past winter, Google found him living nearby in Hollywood FL.
I called. We spoke. Alan and Harry came to our home for lunch. I learned about him. He learned about me from the internet (no time to explain), plus I told him the little family history there is of the remaining Duckman family.
I gave him the pictures, an outdated family genealogical history done by cousins Jerry Winter and Herb Sumliner (in which he is named) and shot this image, along with a few others. We hugged and they left.
We agreed we would get together again, but his illness and treatments prevented it. I would have liked knowing him better.
