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Let's stop the car and stretch our legs while I tell you a little bit of our family ancestry:
The Reno's are Huguenots and natives of Angoumois in the Bordeaux region of France. Our actual forefather is Louis Reynaud and our name has several different spellings such as Reno/Reneau/Reynaud/Renno/Rennoe/Renoe/Rhyno and others.Our spelling is Reno due to the fact that I believe we are decendants of John Reno and Susannah Thorn.After researching the user pages of Steven Fancy and Sue Reneau Damewood, I feel our direct line is from William Thomas "Hatter Bill" Reneau who was born about 1763 and died before 1826 in Blount County, Alabama. According to the records of Steven and Sue there are several versions of William's birth and death but the the fact remains that he is probably our gr-gr-gr-gr grandfather , add or take a few greats.According to different records, William was married to a Margaret who married a John G. Callison and on February 15, 1830, he was the administrator of William's estate.Court records in December of 1831 list Margaret Callison and 6 children but records of October 1832 list her as a widow of William and 7 children.There children were; William L.,Samuel T. Katherine B., Rachel F., Elijah B., John L., and James L. William Thomas owned several acres of land in Blount County, Alabama on July 8th, 1819. Marcus A. Reno was a Major who served with General Custer at the battle of Little Big Horn and is buried in the Little Big Horn Cemetary.You can see a picture of his grave on Findagrave.com.Other famous ancestors are Jessi Reno who invented the escalator and of course the FAMOUS "RENO GANG" TRAIN ROBBERS who are in the Guinness World book of records as being the first train robbers in America.Our gr-grandfather was Abe Reno. Abe's son is Henry Kye Reno, our mother's father and Mom told me a story that I would like to pass on about Henry and his brother Johnny. Henry's parents died when is was a young boy so he and Johnny became homeless and they lived in the woods on Sand Mountain in Alabama and one night had a fire going and a black lady noticed it up on the hill and sent her sons to investigate it. Her sons got Henry and Johnny to go home with them and Henry told our Mom that it was the best supper he ever ate and he didn't want to sleep on her sheets because they were so white, he was sure he would soil them even though he had taken a good bath and changed into some clothes she gave him.So kids, if you are reading this, count your blessings, that you never had to go through some of the things our ancestors did. If you would like to read more on your Reno family go to http://familytreemaker.com/users/f/a/n/Steven-G-Fancy/index.htm. He has 276 pages on line on the Reno family from 1600 to 1920. There are also several books you can buy about our family history.