My maternal grandmother had an older sister who was 14 years older than her and an "older" mother. Turns out that my grandmother's older sister was actually her biological mum and got pregnant when 13 years old and "in service". The birth certificate has no father listed and we've imagined all sorts of stories i.e. she got pregnant by the "master of the house" or had a fumble in the house stables with the master's son!!! We will never know though I'm afraid as it was the best kept secret and they took it to their graves with them. Mitzi Allen <lew977 To: PACE-L@rootsweb.com @yahoo.com> cc: Subject: [PACE-L] Older "mothers"? 13/12/2005 21:11 My mother-in-law had children her last three children at the age of 42, 44, and 47, and two of the daughters were old enough to have borne children, but this was not the case. She also had the last child at a specialty maternity hospital in NY that dealt with difficult pregnancies. And I myself was born when my mother was 42 and my oldest sister, who was 16, was shocked, embarrassed and indignent! A long time family joke. On the other hand, my g-grandmother had her last child at the age of 48 and had an unmarried daughter of 19 (who never married). In this case, though there were 10 children born very close together, there was then a gap of 8 1/2 years until this last child, which does make this birth very suspect. Before coming to a quick conclusion, check to see when the next to last child was born, and what the usual gap of years was between births. There's an old Irish conviction that it's best not to delve too deeply into your family history for fear of what you'll find. I heard that often researching my husband's family in Ireland. Mitzi in Seattle ==== PACE Mailing List ==== To subscribe or unsubscribe send email to PACE-L-request@rootsweb.com with the one word message: subscribe OR unsubscribe For digest mode, use PACE-D-request@rootsweb.com