This is Roald Tweet on Rock Island.
"What's in a name?" Juliet asks. Jane Marie Tiedge of Rock Island can finally answer that one.
Jane grew up in Rock Island, hating her name. In school there were those dull kids, Dick and Jane who never did anything that required more than one syllable. Then there was Jane Doe, who was always getting into trouble with the law. And "plain Jane," and "Me Tarzan, you Jane." And so on. It seemed clear that anyone named Jane was doomed to a life of mediocrity.
Why was she named Jane? Her parents had never given a reason, and her grandfather, who had worked on the Rock Island Lines Railroad, had died two years before Jane was born. But perhaps in some family history, in some Bible, there was a namesake. A great grandmother, perhaps. Perhaps even royalty. What about Lady Jane?
Jane Tiedge began to research her family roots. The past came alive. She met all sorts of interesting ancestors she might never have met. Admirable women there were, but never a Jane among them.
Then came the computers, the network. Jane left Bibles behind and began to cruise the communication highway, searching for some lost Jane Marie. Out she went, past chat rooms and home pages.
Last week she found her Jane Marie, a Jane Marie with her own home page. And a photograph. There could be no doubt that this was the long-lost namesake. The connection was her grandfather. Jane Marie had been a passenger car on the Rock Island Lines "Twin Star Rocket" on the Minneapolis to Houston run, and was still in operation when the Rock Island Lines folded in 1980.
Although being named after a train was not exactly what Jane Tiedge was hoping to find, her Jane Marie royalty of a kind. She was saved from the scrap heap and restored to a family private car, with a lounge, two master bedrooms, and a dining room seating eight. She's shiny and new, inside and out, and travels a great deal.
So, if you see Jane Marie Tiedge with a new outfit these days, or a new hairdo or silver earrings, holding her head a bit higher than before, there's a reason. She's trying to live up to her namesake.
Rock Island Lines with Roald Tweet is underwritten by Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois.
