The Wheeler sisters gathered in my grandmother’s home in Pittsfield, Illinois during the spring of 2007. Seated at a dining room table before a camera on a tripod, the three sisters huddled together to look at and scroll through images from the past contained on a laptop. At first, they were a little self-conscience, but they soon forgot that the camera was there. Later I inserted the images into the video. All three would pass by November 2013.
The Wheeler sisters are Bernice O’Leary née Wheeler, Naomi Jean Farrington-Helky née Wheeler and Helen Nevius née Wheeler. They grew up in Pearl, Illinois, descended from European settler stock; the Wheeler family laying roots in the area in the 1820’s.
Cousin Douglas O’Leary provided the scanned images and identified the individuals in the photos used in the video.
