I’ll be at the following seminars and trips this spring: We’ll have Genealogy Tip of the Day and More Genealogy Tip of the Day books for sale at the Ohio and Kansas presentations. Email me if you’d like to pre-order a copy for distribution the at the conference/seminar.
Just because seemingly different sources agree does not mean that they have to be correct–it just means that they agree. Consider whether or not the sources are truly independent. Sometimes different “sources” have the same actual person directly or indirectly providing the information. My grandmother’s 1935 marriage record, 1994 death certificate, and 1994 obituary all provide the same place of birth for her. Grandma was essentially the informant on all three because her children provided what they were told for the death certificate and the obituary. And all three gave places different from Grandma was actually born. Just because Grandma was consistent does not necessarily mean that she was correct.
The 1900 census entry for Gardner and Mary Ramsey finds the couple living in Santa Monica, California. Their entry is at the very bottom of the census page and it would seem reasonable that after being married fifty years, the seventy-five year old Gardner and seventy year old Mary would find themselves without children in the household. But a quick look at the following page indicated that there were two grandchildren living with them. Something that could have been missed had I neglected to see what was on the top of the next page. When viewing any record, always make certain you’ve looked at the whole thing. With census records, it means viewing the entries until you have seen the start of the next household. With deeds books […]
Issue 5-13 of Casefile Clues has been sent to subscribers. As a reminder, it’s more detailed and more in-depth than Genealogy Tip of the Day. Learn more about Casefile Clues on our website.
The local radio station’s website referred to the Hollywood actor as a “native” (their exact word) of a town near where I live. His biography on another website (supposedly vetted by the actor himself) indicated he was born in a different town forty miles away. Of course it’s possible the actor doesn’t know where he was born, but in this day and age with a birth certificate required for many things it would seem that he would know where he was born. I’m suspecting (sans evidence) that the actor was born in the more distant town and grew up in the nearer one. That’s a rabbit hole that I do not need to go down as he’s not even a distant relative. But it reminded me that people […]
We can’t really cover analyzing “old published genealogies” in one tip, but there are some suggested ways for using information printed in genealogies published in the early twentieth century and earlier. There’s more to the analysis than this, but keeping these points in mind is an excellent start. Genealogy Tip of the Day book is here. Learn more about it.
When reviewing records on an ancestor it’s an integral part of the genealogical analysis to consider how old the ancestor was when they are appearing in various records, going through personal life events, experiencing national events, and the like. It’s important because age is one way we can determine whether or not we are likely to have the right person in a genealogical record. Whenever you find an ancestor named in a document, do you ask yourself how old they were at that point in time? Is their age atypical for someone who usually appears on that type of document (a sixty year old woman having a child, an eight year old getting married, a ninety year old signing a mortgage, a sixty year old man enlisting in […]
A relative is married in 1843 in St. Louis, Missouri. He is married again in Illinois in 1848. The most likely scenario is that she died. It is possible that the couple actually divorced or separated and never bothered to divorce. The divorce would have generated a court record. A separation that never resulted in divorce may not have generated any records at all. But I should not assume the first wife died unless there is some additional evidence other than simply the subsequent marriage.
Sometimes we have to conjecture about a relative in order to move our research forward or at least get ideas of what other records could help us. Be careful with whom you share that conjecture as sometimes speculation suddenly becomes a “fact” for which you become the source. Sometimes it just becomes a fact with nary an indication of the origins of said fact. If you include speculation in your research notes, clearly label that speculation as speculation. Otherwise you may inadvertently convert your own speculation to fact.
The address listed my parents as “Mr. and Mrs.,” but the salutation on the postcard addressed them as “Nephew & Niece & Boys.” The “Nephew & Niece” was an obvious reference to my parents and the “Boys” referred to my brother and I. My Dad had an Uncle Herschel (who was often referred to as “Hersch” or “Neill”). My Mom had an Uncle Herb. I knew immediately when reading it which uncle had signed the card, but a maternal relative thought that it was written by Herb. It wasn’t. Even if we put aside the fact that the signature looks (at least to me) more like Uncle Hersch than Uncle Herb, there’s a few clues that make it clear which uncle wrote the card. The note says “Please […]
Some items that have genealogical or historical relevance to your family are too large to preserve, have left family ownership, or have already passed from ownership or ceased to exist. I’m talking about family businesses, family farms, automobiles, farm equipment, homes, neighborhoods, and the like. There are still some things you can do to preserve the memory of these things to which your family has a connection, including: Preservation of large items may require some creativity and can be a good activity when we are stuck on locating information on long-deceased humans.
How many studio portraits of your Grandmother do you need? Some genealogists have to ask that question–or a very similar one. It’s not easy to decide and it’s not easy to cull things from a collection of family artifacts and memorabilia. But sometimes it needs to happen. Collections need to be curated. I have numerous prints of studio portraits of my maternal grandparents. Some I have a half a dozen copies of. They have been digitized and identified. The question is: how many physical copies do I keep? I cannot keep them all. I have decided to keep no more than two copies of any one pose or setting. That is it (and that may be too much). The others will have to be recycled. If I only […]
When sorting family history items, consider taking a picture of each of them with your phone or a digital camera as you are sorting. That way you at least have an image of the item should something happen to it. It also saves you from having to go through the items again to take pictures. Storing digital images also takes significantly less physical space than the actual item. There may also be items that are difficult to preserve long-term due the material from which they were made, the process used to create them, or how they were stored before they came into your possession. The illustration for this post is a Mother’s Day card I made for my Mom in the 1970s.
“It’s wrong,” “It’s wrong!” “It’s WRONG!” It’s not sufficient to simply say something is wrong or to scream it. You’ve got to have a reason. The last name of one of the heirs to whom a notice was mailed in a 1913 probate case is wrong. It’s not wrong just because I say so. It’s wrong because there was no heir to the estate named William Samuel Ewing. In other probate documents, the names of the heirs are all the same as in this affidavit–except the last heir is William Samuel Neill (not Ewing as shown here). William J. Ewing was William Samuel Neill’s guardian and was not an heir in his own right–he was being notified in his capacity as guardian of William Samuel Neill (incorrectly listed […]
From a while back…still stand by this advice. An online tree indicates that an aunt of mine was married in Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio, in 1869. The only source that tree has for this date are two other online trees. There is no additional information to indicate how the information was obtained–no minister or justice of the peace name is listed, no church, address, etc. A search of extant Hamilton County marriage records did not locate the marriage. The only way I know that my aunt married is because her husband’s full name is listed when she inherits from her brother’s estate in the 1870s. That estate record is my evidence for the marriage and I’m using the date they are mentioned in the court record as a […]
Recent Comments