Nancy Owen Nelson’s grandmother, Nannie B. Russell Chandler, was always a mystery to Nelson, who at age 13 found the woman she knew to be her grandmother was in fact her step-grandmother.
In 1905, Nelson’s mother, Nannie B. Chandler (Nelson) was born in a small community near New Hope.
However, Nelson’s grandmother died during childbirth. Originally from Alabama, Nelson lives in Dearborn, Michigan, near Detroit.
Nelson completed graduate school at Auburn University in 1979, receiving her Ph.D. in English and taught as a graduate teaching assistant from 1970-74 and from 1976-79.
Nelson’s mother passed in 2001.
Nelson said her mother thought of her mother dying in childbirth her entire life.
“I will say that many of us don’t, we wish that we had ask our parents things after they’re gone, and she basically just, it was a shadow over her life, people in her family would not talk about her biological mother,” Nelson said.
Nelson began looking into her family history November 2011, 10 years after her mother died.
Three years later her book, “Searching for Nannie B.,” was published as a memoir.
Nelson said she had been working with memoirs for a long time, teaching workshops with Springfed Arts in Michigan once per week for six weeks to “hone my craft.”
Nelson said she wrote progressive chapters during the three year time span writing her memoir.
“So I decided I wanted to figure out what it had to do with me, which is really no more obviously, most often comes back to the impact on the writer,” Nelson said. “Sometimes you have to go to bad and dark places, and sometimes you find out really valuable information.”
Priscilla Scott, 25-year “professional volunteer” for the Elizabeth Carpenter Public Library in New Hope, met with Nelson to help find her grandmother’s grave.
According to Scott, Nelson called the library asking for the resident genealogist.
“And that’s kind of a standing joke at the library, but it’s just be- cause I am so interested in people’s local history, and so, that part is true, I pretty much drop everything if I can help some- body find their people,” Scott said.
Scott said she also volunteers with FindAGrave.com, taking photos of gravestones and recording the information on the website.
When Nelson saw the gravestone she realized her grandmother’s name was misspelled – it read “Nanie B. wife of R. B. Chandler.”
“And I thought, you know, this is such an injustice here, somebody needs to know more about her, so that was my goal,” Nelson said.
Nelson said she replaced the gravestone to correct the spelling mistakes and spell out her grandmother’s full name.
“I found out a lot about myself and about my mother,” Nelson said.
“Searching for Nannie B.” launched Sunday, June 21.
Nelson will be at The Gnu’s room in Opelika at 4 p.m. Saturday, June 27, for a book signing.
She will also be at The Auburn Unitarian-Universalist Fellowship on Sunday, June 28, at 10 a.m.
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