Who are We?

Getting to know the Mileys…

The Family of Durward C. Miley, Sr.

My Dad was known as Durward, but his birth certificate shows it as “Duwald”. He called my mother’s father Pare, like French, with an accent on the “e” (Paa-reh). I learned later in life that this actually meant that my mother’s father was his Godfather. Doing a search just now, I found that the French spelling is actually: Parain. I never actually heard the “n” sounded, perhaps it is because I do not know how to speak French.

His mother was Gladys Morales. I knew her as Grandma Pontas, as she was married (common law most likely) to the person who I knew as grandpa Pontas, whose name was Pontapolis, as I remember it.

My mother was born in White Castle, Louisiana to her parents: Jeanne Clouatre (born October 20, 1986 in McCall, Ascension Parish, Louisiana), and married April 15, 1903 in St. Francis of Assisi Church, Smoke Bend, Louisiana to Antoine (Sonny) Gonzales (son of Oscr Gonzales and Josephine Gomez, born December 5, 1879 in Ascension Parish, Louisiana. This is where my son, Anthony gets his nick name of “Sonny” which he changed to “Sunny”

I have more information on my father than I do on my mother, but, eventually, I will include here as much as I can from time to time.

I was born on January 24, 1942, in San Francisco, California. I married Patricia Ann Schmidt in June of 1967 (we had four children who are: Alisia Ann, Amy Jeanne, Nancy Cecile, and Anthony Francis); Christina Ann Boyer in August of 1986 (who mothered Robin Christina); Tico Jean Flores (No children); and my beautiful wife today, Rachel Ann “Clay” Miley).

Patricia had already birthed Alicia, who we now call Lisa, prior to our marriage, so I had the honor of adopting her early on while we were living in San Francisco. Unfortunately for me, she carries none of my blood, but is as much a child of mine as any other. I only wish my bloodline would mean something to Lisa. We used to love to go shop for candy, when her mother was working at San Francisco State University.

It is my hope that the information forthcoming in this blog will help my children, grandchildren et al to further the study of heraldry should they ever have a notion to do so.

If any of you have some comments of special interest that you would like me to cover, please let me know. I have no particular order that I plan to follow, but my thoughts are to begin with short biographical listings of my parents grandparents as I knew them.

I should include here that I had one brother who died in 1988 of lung cancer. He was D. C. Miley, Jr.

For now, I believe that will be all, a simple introduction.

Blessings, AJM 12-21-2021