Special Features

Gathering a short biography of each child and grandchild of Bom and Justus in now in progress. So far, one biography has been completed. To see a short biography of Helen (Doyle) Moultrie, daughter of Vernon and Lydia Doyle, and granddaughter of Bom and Justus, click on the link "Children and Grandchildren of Balm and Justus" to access a complete list of all of their children and grandchildren. Select Helen's name to view a picture of Helen and her family and to read a short paragraph of her life.

The goal is to post a similar page for all of the children and grandchildren of Bom and Justus, but we need help from nearest kin, or from anyone who is willing to supply similar information to this website as in Helen's case. In order to submit, please submit a picture of choice, and other relevant information, such as birth and death date, names of children, count of grandchildren/great grandchildren, and so on. Also, please send a short paragraph of how they spent their life as well. Please send to the email address: stevemoultrie@comcast.net or call (559) 434-7512 to make other arrangements.

Connect with our family's history, values, and activities and other Special Features from here. Presently, this page is still very much in development, but the overall vision is to feature stories that are value based or historical or related to our common interests and activities. Access the links above and check out our projects to date. Presently, a project is underway to complete a short biography of all the children and grandchildren of Bom and Justus as described in the article below. Also, two other webpages have been added. Our Spiritual webpage will feature information regarding our family's rich spiritual heritage, and serve as a place to share our wonderful spiritual experiences. Also, added to the Website is a Recipe webpage, where we hope to gather in one place all the secret ingredients to preparing all of those yummy, cultural dishes we all love so much!

Most of the family probably has seen the Doyle Family logo, but many aren't aware of its origin. Our family logo in now almost 20 years old, designed by a fellow family member, Derrick Doyle (son of John and Mossie Doyle, grandson of Vernon and Lydia Doyle). Derrick, who dabbles as a sketch artist, sketched our family logo at the request of Marion "Boady" Crowder Turner (daughter of Zelma Crowder, Vernon Doyle lineage). At that time, Marion was looking for something visual to stencil on t-shirts that would appropriately represent each branch within our family, so she called upon the lay artist Derrick to come up with an idea. Derrick said that he went into Marion's kitchen and completed a few different rough drafts, and the logo we have today was preferred.

On the logo, each branch of the descendants of Mary Ada and Justus Doyle are represented. However, to distinguish between each branch within the family at family reunions, the black and white logo was stenciled on colored t-shirts to represent each family member's particular branch within the family. Representative family colors are: Mattie (red), Ruby (yellow), Vernon (green), Spencer (blue), Norvelle (lavender), Otis and Blanche (purple).

Over time, color was added to the black and white logo itself. At our 2003 Doyle Family Reunion in Austin, Texas, Andrew "Mac" Smith (son of Vivian Smith, grandson of Ruby and George Prosser) introduced a version where each family representative color was added to a branch on the logo. Also, Mac went one step further and added embroidery to our logo, and presented this updated version at the 2003 Doyle Family Reunion in Austin, Texas.

Incidentally, Derrick also is a twin. He and his twin brother Dennis are the oldest of 17 sets of twins in the Doyle family. Both live in the Sacramento, California area.

You may have notice the spelling of our matriarch Mary Ada's nickname has been change from "Balm" to "Bom." throughout all pages on this website. While the official spelling of her nickname has never been officially proclaimed, "Bom" seems to be the best spelling due to the origin of this nickname. As we are told, Mary Ada's nickname "Bom" came about through one of her grandbabies who called her "Bom" because she could not pronounce Mary Ada's name. Quite possibly the grandbaby was merely trying to call her "Mom," but who knows. However, the nickname "Bom" stuck, and Mary Ada has been fondly nicknamed as such to this very day. In fact, one of her grandsons (Edward Doyle) wrote a poem, called "Bom's House" where he affectionately recall memories of living with and around Bom.