Let the Good Times Roll

Pete and John McCarthy (left and center respectively) were brothers, two of nine known children born to Peter and Ellen Donahoue McCarthy.  The family lived in Frampton, Quebec, Canada.  As far as Jim Fitzmaurice or Fitzmorrise, although this surname may sound unusual to some, it definitely is not.  I found too many men with this name to be able to make a positive identification.  Maybe this is a mystery meant to be solved at a later time.

Pete and John’s brother, Hugh, the oldest of the McCarthy siblings, immigrated to the United States about 1882 and was married in Lancaster, New Hampshire in 1889.  Another McCarthy brother, William, was also living in Lancaster when he was married in 1890.  I mention the marriages because I can imagine these three sitters stumbling into a photographer’s studio after a wild bachelor party.

On a more practical note, following Hugh’s and William’s movements help fill in the story of how these brothers from Frampton, Canada came to be in New Hampshire, as  I wasn’t able to find a record of Pete and John crossing into the US.

Unfortunately, Pete died in Lancaster in 1893, at the age of 21.  The cause of death was gangrene of the lungs, which can be a complication of aspiration pneumonia.  In other words, Pete may have breathed something (food, liquid, vomit) into his lungs which caused an infection.

According to an unsourced family tree on ancestry, John, who was 25 at the time of his brother’s death in 1893, returned to Canada where he married Lea Bissonette in 1915, had several children, and died in 1942.

I’m ending with a couple song lyric snippets that seem fitting.  Click on the titles if you’d like to give them a listen.

Let the Good Times Roll, by B.B. King

Hey, everybody, let’s have some fun
You only live but once
And when you’re dead you’re done

So let the good times roll
Let the good times roll
I don’t care if you’re young or old
Get together, let the good times roll

Good Times Roll, by The Cars

let the good times roll
let them knock you around
let the good times roll
let them make you a clown

let them leave you up in the air
let them brush your rock and roll hair
let the good times roll
let the good times roll
let the good times roll

let the stories be told
they can say what they want
let the photos be old
let them show what they want

Sources:

US census records
Canada census records
New Hampshire death records