Events

Family reunions are the lifeblood event of genealogical activity. It is on these occasions that one comes face to face with the living flesh and blood of one's family tree. The young and the old, those familiar and those unknown, including both male and female, some famous and a few infamous, the rich and the poor, the charming and the odd bore, the academic and less frequently it seems the artisan etc etc etc. An infinitely more interesting experience than scanning through a dusty BD&M and shipping index! Moreover there is the opportunity to catch up with cousins one may not have seen for decades let alone the excitement of meeting descendants from remote branches one may have never previously encountered or even been aware of. Often through such chance encounters one is able to share rare and interesting memorabilia including photographic records. A not infrequent benefit is the identification of strangers in handed down family photos. Reflecting back on my reunion experience I am still amazed at the strength of the emotional rush experienced when first participating in a significant big production family reunion. A short time later I was lucky enough to watch on TV the film "Perfect Strangers". There on the silver screen albeit in a much grander and textually richer mode and without the boy girl interaction appeared large aspects of the process and emotions I experienced preparing for and attending my first significant family reunion. If you have not seen this film I can recommend it without hesitation. A simply wonderful fantastical and highly believable family story from this viewers perspective. While my family experience and history is most definitely not at the level portrayed my research suggests there could well be a few Gribble lines with a rich enough life tapestry to give it a credible challenge!

To my knowledge there has been until the early 1990s few if any family reunions for the descendants of Simon and Sophia Gribble. Research has revealed that there was intermittent contact throughout their lives between the offspring and some of their descendants. No significant descendant family reunion however prior to 1992. Premature death of key family members along with the tyranny of distance probably explains in large part this fact. That is not to deny however the relatively frequent contact between individual descendants located on opposite sides of Australia. Over the past fifteen years however the internet has served to reduce the communication and cost barriers raised by distance. Simultaneously here in Australia interest in family history has increased since out bicentennial celebrations and travel has become incredibly affordable by comparison with earlier decades. One should not be surprised therefore that the interest of Gribble descendants in their family history and ultimately family reunions has increased markedly. Some of the reunions specifically targeting the descendants of Simon and Sophia Gribble are summarised in this section for those who might be interested.

While my investigations have turned up references to a number of earlier Gribble reunions (E.G. descendants of the Reverend John Brown Gribble have held a number of events over the years; descendants of various Gribble families of Ballarat and Daylesford also it appears have held a number of Gribble descendant reunions) I have not included details of these in this website as that is essentially their story.

The Nedlands reunion of 1992.
The Ballarat reunion of 1998.
The Northcote reunion of 2004.