In July of 1945 an heir searcher was in Adams County, Illinois, looking for heirs of a Harm Jelden. This does not appear to be one of those estate scams that were popular in the late 19th and early 20th century. There really was a man named Harm Jelden who had the parents and brother listed. I’m working on finding the estate records. There’s a number of genealogy reminders in this item though. Newspaper articles may leave out key details. This article does not mention where Harm Jelden died and one may think he died in Missouri because the searcher was from there. That would be an incorrect assumption. This article has the maiden name of Harm’s mother wrong–it was Behrens, not Burns. People can appear in newspaper […]
Fortunately I only have one set of negatives where some of the images have been cut into individual pieces. I’m not certain why, but at least they were all in the same envelope. The cut apart negatives served to remind me not to jump to conclusions. There could have been a picture that someone didn’t want anyone else to see. There could have been a negative or two that someone wanted to give to someone else. Maybe the photos that didn’t turn out were removed. Maybe one or two strips of photos were cut apart for some reason but all the photos were retained. Note: I’m still digitizing negatives and am using this Kodak scanner for making digital scans of my negatives.
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There were actually three registrations for the World War I draft in the United States. The cards were different. The cards for the first and second registrations had a corner that was to be cut off if the registrant was of African descent. The second card asked for the place of birth of the registrant’s father. The third did not ask for marital status. There are other differences between them as well. World War I First Draft Registration Card World War I Second Draft Registration Card World War I 3rd Draft Registration Card
“You’re still looking for that?” Those who are not involved in genealogy don’t understand the urge to keep looking. However there does come a time when one has to realize that you might not find that for which you are looking. The question is when do you realize that you need to stop looking? The key to a reasonably exhaustive genealogy search is to look through materials that might reasonably contain information that addresses the issue you are trying to resolve. In the case of finding an original picture of the stuffed toy Curious George I have from my childhood, that required me going through all the print photos and the negatives I have from my parents. Both need to be searched because I don’t have every print […]
I’m going through another set of photographic negatives I found in my parents’ things. There’s no date on any of the strips of negatives. Sometimes I know approximately when pictures were taken by being able to date one photo on the negative strip. Other times I am not so lucky. Occasionally there is a receipt tucked in with the negatives. There’s always the chance the receipt was accidentally tucked in the wrong envelope. Despite the potential for error, I still need to keep an image of the receipt as it can help to age the negatives. Of course, the date shipped is more closely tied to the development date and may not even be close to the date the pictures were taken. But it is better than nothing. […]
You can’t just grab any George and assume he’s your George. I almost did that for a quick minute with the George in the picture on the left. The Curious George I had as a kid my Mom kept and it was among her things when we cleaned out the house. I have quite a few things from my parents and when I’m going through pictures I’m always on the look out for something I still have in a picture from years ago. It was not to be with George. There’s a genealogy reminder here about jumping to conclusions. A little reminder about what can change over time. The eyes on the George on the right fell off decades ago and Mom replaced them with buttons. The eyes […]
Some married couples never see their former spouse after a divorce. Many times that is because one partner leaves and never returns. There are other possibilities. Some former spouses may continue to reside in the same area and interact with each other, especially if they have children. One divorced couple in my family appear on a mortgage with a son-in-law after their divorce. Other times couples eventually remarry, even after they’ve had subsequent spouses. Or they may even later live together, even if they don’t remarry. Those aren’t made up examples—just situations from my own family where I’ve removed the names.
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Many databases will be titled something like “Blah Blah Records of Blah Blah: 1800-1900.” Always try and determine just years are really included in the database. It could be that the “Blah Blah Records of Blah Blah: 1800-1900” actually only contains entries for: Read the “more about,” “FAQ,” or whatever they call it to determine just how complete the database is. It may include records between 1800 and 1900, but there also may be gaps. The records a person needs always seem to be in the gaps of time not included.
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Don’t let the fact that your genealogy isn’t “done” and isn’t “perfect” prevent you from publishing your compilation. Cite every source you have used, transcribe the documents accurately, report what they say (not what you wish they’d say), omit conjecture that has no basis, and summarize what you have found. No genealogy will ever be complete and there’s always the chance you miss something. Make certain you have used all sources that are available, not just the ones that are easy to access and not just the ones that are the easiest to understand. Realizing that it won’t be done and that it won’t be perfect doesn’t mean that you skim the surface of what is available and that you do a sloppy job. It’s just that perfection […]
All of us sometimes need to be reminded of things. For me–it’s spelling a last name consistently when writing about one specific person or couple. In writing a narrative about two members of my Behrens family, I alternated between Behrends and Behrens. I need to choose one spelling. My normal approach is to use the spelling that most members of the family used–when that is known. Virtually all members of my Rampley family use that spelling today, so that’s the one that I use. It certainly gets spelled a variety of ways in documents, but I use “Rampley” when writing about them and entering names into databases. The last name Trautvetter gets written a variety of ways, but generally speaking that is the spelling most members of my […]
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From a while back… After your ancestor’s deed is recorded in the local records office, the original is returned. Sometimes there may be a notation in the record book indicating to whom the deed was returned after being recorded. It may not be your ancestor. That’s a clue.
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