The Spur Question

[L Verge]

Thanks for that link, Roger. Although it does not solve our problem, I did find part of the correspondence about Mr. Ream and his descendants historically interesting also:

«2. Uncle Sam Ream, as he was known to his relatives, was
born at the Reem homestead at Rheems, Pennsylvania, in I8I4.5.
At nineteen he enlisted in the U. S. Cavalry for the duration
of the Civil War. After the war he went to Kansas where he
lived the rest of his days. He taught school at Holton,
Kansas where Buffalo Bill (Bill Cody) also taught at the same
time. Ream and Cody became very intimate friends. He followed
the great scout in the circus business for several years but
later returned to Holton and entered into business. He never
married but spent much of his earnings assisting poor boys,
bearing the expense of rearing and educating four boys, all of
whom are living but one. The latter was only seventeen years
old when Mr. Ream died. The young man mourned his death and
is said to have died of a broken heart two weeks later.

3. The above mentioned spur was repaired by Uncle Sam Ream
by welding, and was in his possession until 1927 when he died
suddenly while attending a convention of the Grand Army of the
Republic.

I4.. Shortly after his death the spur came into the possession
of Mr. D. L. Reem (spelling now changed from Ream to Reem), of
107 N. Market Street, Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, who on 6
May 1951 presented the spur to the U. S. Naval Academy Museum
in memory of his grandnephew, 2nd Lieutenant Robert Dale Reem,
USMC, who graduated from the U. S. Naval Academy in the Class
of 19I8. Lieutenant Reem heroically sacrificed his life on
November 6, 1950, in the Chosen Reservoir sector of Korea by
dropping on a hand grenade hurled into a group of his command
by a unit of the Chinese Red Army. Lieutenant Reem was
instantly killed but saved the lives of his men.

5. S. B. Ream, who picked up the spur in Ford's Theatre, was
the great -great -uncle of Lieutenant Reem.

One thing I noted was that Uncle Sam Ream was born in 1814, enlisted in 1833, and would have been in the cavalry at age 46 when the CW began. If his birth date is correct, the death date given as 1927 would have him at 113 when he died. Possible, but... Steve, can your marvelous research sources determine if his birth and death dates are correct as given?

I also questioned if the black paint would have been original to Booth's spur? Was painting spurs at all common in those days - or did a later generation paint it thinking they were preserving it from what appeared to be deterioration?

I would also encourage all to read other portions of that link, especially correspondence related to the possibility that the boot's maker's mark has been damaged over the years. The gentleman who was writing the gov't. was the late-John C. Brennan, a veritable walking encyclopedia on the Lincoln assassination, a side-kick to James O. Hall, and a mentor to me as well as Betty O, Joan Chaconas, and Mike Kauffman, to name just a few. He was also the one we turned to whenever we needed a lesson in the English language and the use thereof.

We talk about the Greatest Generation, and that included historians like Brennan, Hall, Tidwell, Hanchett, Keesler and others. Even those like Eisenschiml, who screwed up parts of history, were of that generation - but their suppositions kept the story alive and open for discussion and further research.