Our Family Heritage

Oh end of year school projects.  Paul had a big family history project called "Paul's Prelaureate Project"  (by the way I don't know what "Prelaureate" means or if it's actually spelled correctly)  Besides the fact that I was running around like a chicken with it's heard cut off for the last week of school, it was a fun project. Paul made the poster and Darren made a fun Dutch food called Oliebollen for him to take to class.  Oliebollen is kinda like a doughnut.  They were delicious!! I brought in some fun things from Holland.  It was fun to walk around the classrooms and see all the kids and their posters.  I love different people and different cultures.  

Here was his board.  He did it all himself!  I was so happy all the kids made their own.  It drives me crazy when kids have a project like this and the parents do it all for them.

Holland Coat of Arms

My Reflection!
What a family!  I can't believe I'm Dutch!  I love Holland and my Dutch accent.  I am doing a project on my family's past, and I have finished the story, so let us begin.
In the beginning, about 60-70 years ago, my great grandfather and grandmother had my grandpa, Paul Debry.  He grew into a strong fine boy, and became the kind, loveing grandpa I knew he was.
How did they come to live in America, you may ask?  Here is the whole story.  About ten years after my grandfather was born, they became a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  A year later, they moved to America to be closer to the capital of the Church.
How did I get here? Here is the full story.  In America, my grandfather married a good women, Rita Debry.  After they got married, they had my mother, Emily Debry, who after marring Darren Ernst, became Emily Ernst.  A few years later, they had me, Darren Paul Ernst.

So now you know the story.  As my life goes on, we might even move to Holland ourselves.  It may be hard, but we would make it through, just like my grandfather and great-grandfather did about 55 years ago.

Here is Paul's interview of my dad.  

 Opa,
Hi this is Paul. I am doing a project in school where I need to interveiw someone that knows about my family history. I am also talking about Holland in my project. Make sure the awnsers are not very long, about 2 sentences each please. Thank you and I love you.

1)      What is your full name? (My name is Paul DeBry) Why did your parents select this name for you? (My mother told me that I just looked like I should have that name) Did you have a nickname? (Not that I can remember).

2)      How did your family come to live in America? (they joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Holland and moved to America to be closer to the church headquarters).

3)      What was your favorite thing to do for fun when you were a kid? (I loved to ride my bike to the Salt Lake City Zoo and watch Princes Alice the huge, 2 ton elephant. I also liked to watch the monkeys. The zoo was free then and I would go many times during the summer. I also like to play tennis. I played every day but Saturday and Sunday. I won a lot of tournaments.)

4)      Who were your friends when you were growing up? (my best friends were Johnny West and Craig Mecham and Billy Latimer). What is a fun thing about them? (We made up a special name for Johnny. We got it from a lot of places. We called him "Jonathan Swaka Senior Junior Adameriah Page the 3rd West". We thought it was a cool name. That's still what I call him. Billy got hit by a "soap box" at the annual kids "soap box derby race" and it broke his leg. The ambulance hauled him off and we thought we would never see him again. We had no idea where he went. A soap-box was a little cart that kids would make and we would race them.)

5)      How did you celebrate holidays? (On my first Halloween I was rabbit. My mother made my costume and I thought I was really cool with those long ears. For Christmas we were told that if we were not good we would get a lump of coal in our stocking, so we were as good as possible-for a few days. We got lots of presents. My favorites were a cowboy had, vest, and a cap gun in a holster with a horse painted on it).  Did your family have any special traditions? (Every birthday was special. We had a lot of Dutch traditions that we followed on Christmas. On New Year's Eve we would eat "Oliebollen". They were Dutch donuts.  They were bread dough with raisins. They were fried in oil. We then put sugar on them. They were delicious.)

6)      What is the full name of your spouse? (Rita Rae Leckie DeBry - she is wonderful) Does she have any siblings? (she has one sister and five brothers. The boys were all champion wrestlers in high school).

7)      When and how did you meet your spouse? (I met her at a square dance in the Wilkinson Center at BYU. I liked her a lot, right from the first. She had other boys she was interested in, but I bought her a BLT sandwich and a chocolate malt every day for lunch and she finally got to like me. We have been married many years and are still in love).

8)      Where and when did you get married? (We got married for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake City Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is neat to get married that way, so that we will still be married in the next life after we die).

Here is Paul eating Oliebolen- which was a hit.  The kids loved it!

A lot of the kids had family heritage from here

 And here

                                                                             And here
I love that my kids get the opportunity to go to a school with diversity.  It's good for them.