Preserving the history of your family heirlooms, particularly those things in addition to pictures and paper items, is important. One way to start this task is to photograph those items individually. You may wish to use a basic graphics program to crop and slightly rotate the image if necessary. Information about the item could be added to the image as well. Then import those pictures into a word processor and include textual information about the item. Using a word processor gives you flexibility in terms of what text is added and how much text is included. That file can be printed, saved in a variety of formats, etc.
Couples who didn’t want to divorce because “we just don’t do that, but we can’t live together” may have lived separately for much of their married life. In some cases, there may have been a lawsuit to separate their property or allocate the amount that one spouse was to pay the other. These court cases would not be filings for divorce, but rather filings for separate maintenance. In many jurisdictions, these legal actions would be brought forward in the same court where divorce cases were heard, but there may be exceptions. The information contained in the records would be similar to what divorce records contained during the same era–except for the divorce decree and termination of marriage. Date and place of marriage may be given, information on minor […]
The declaration of intention of Michael Trautvetter to become a citizen is contained in the order books of Campbell County, Kentucky. The order book contains a variety of other court actions, not just naturalizations. Fortunately most, but not all of the order books were indexed by the clerk at the time the orders were recorded–only the “main names” are included in the index. I was careful to include the page number for the order on the image and to download the volume cover from which the order was taken. The declaration was undated and it was necessary to browse a few pages earlier to see that Trautvetter’s declaration and the other orders recorded on page 199 and a few pages before were done on 28 April 1851 at […]
My aunt’s husband died in 1846 in Germany when their oldest child had not yet turned fifteen. He was survived by my aunt and five children. The family appears to all have immigrated to the United States, but they did not all make the trip at the same time. Based on passenger lists, it appears that the children emigrated with siblings of their mother one or two at a time before the mother immigrated sometime around 1855. Passenger manifests do not state the relationship between passengers during this time period. Fortunately I knew the family connections before searching for those records and did not overlook those “nearby young passengers” who were actually related to my adult immigrant relatives. Not everyone migrates as a family at one point in […]
Many members of one of my ancestral families came to the United States in the mid-1840s. They all initially settled in Kentucky, later heading to Illinois. Except for my third great-grandparents and their children. They waited until 1853. Of course I wondered why. The parents of the couple had been deceased for some time. That was not the reason. Then I discovered that the mill the father operated in Germany was one that he leased–not one that he owned. Was it possible he stayed until his lease ran out? I’m not certain. I may never be certain. But it is a possibility. I will not put this down as a fact in my genealogical database. I will not put it in my notes as a known fact. I’ll […]
I jumped the gun recently in making an Ebay purchase. I read the description of the item a little too quickly and fixated on “north of Carthage, Illinois” and “Long Creek Bridge.” I grew up north of Long Creek and have crossed it many times. In fact, it ran along what we called the “bottom” where my father pastured cattle. I saw the postcard and the bridge and purchased it. I jumped the gun just a little bit. When I looked more closely, there were clues this was not the bridge in which I had an interest: The description said “Northeast of Carthage.” The bridge I was thinking of was directly north of Carthage. While the picture was taken 60 years before my first memories, the approach on […]
They were always members of the same denomination. But were they? And if they were, were they members of the same congregation? A church attendance chronology for your ancestor may get you thinking in a different way about some details of your ancestor’s life. My great-grandmother was always a member of a Lutheran Church, but attended four throughout her life. 1881 (birth) -1888: Christ Lutheran Church, Gothenburg, Nebraska 1888-1907: probably Immanuel Lutheran Church (Basco, Hancock County, Illinois) or Zion Lutheran Church (Carthage, Hancock County, Illinois). Likely attended Immanuel in the earlier part of this time frame and may have attended Zion once she started working as a hired girl in Carthage. 1907 (marriage)-1922: Zion Lutheran Church (German Lutheran Church), Carthage (her in-laws church)–disbanded at merged with Trinity. 1922-1954 […]
The search conducted was for references to “Neill” that were close to “Rampley.” The results page highlighted the references to the names where two words appeared between them. There’s actually another reference where the names are separated by one word. The reason for the highlighting is buried in the search code used to locate items and pull up the references. The key in this case, as in all newspaper searches where computerized “reading” and “searching” is conducted, is to read the entire page for additional references that may have been overlooked. Figuring out precisely why the specific item was highlighted is left to those with knowledge of the algorithms used to return the search results. This serves as a reminder that things may (or may not) work exactly […]
This record of marriages from Bedford County, Virginia, is apparently a transcription to the actual records. That fact is suggested by the use of the phrase “General Index to Marriage…” at the top of the page. An even stronger bit of evidence indicating that this record was not created contemporary to the events that were taking place is the fact that marriages from the late 18th century are typed into the book. Just because this record is an extraction from the actual record does not mean that it is incorrect or wrong. However, there is always the potential that a name or date has been transcribed incorrectly. When citing this record, I need to indicate that it was not the original record. This record is not a transcription […]
I looked at a postcard that had a postmark from one of the small towns in the county where I grew up. The picture on the card was of a church with a red brick exterior. The seller of the item had assumed that the church was located in the town where the postcard was postmarked It wasn’t. That town had no churches on that street. The red brick exterior was one I thought I recognized as the church I attended as a child. Other features in the photograph were consistent with that identification as well. Don’t jump to immediate conclusions based upon one clue. Look at every clue in a record or document. Think about what those clues tell you and what they do not. The clue […]
Avoid jumping to conclusions based only on one document or record no matter how tempting. Ask yourself: What other “reality” could explain the information I have found in the record? What other records may help provide more information? Is there a simpler explanation? Is there someone else I could ask for their opinion of what I have found? Do I need an answer to the problem “right now” or can it wait? Have I transcribed the records, summarized the information they contained, and written out my conclusions? I used to tell my students “SPR” when they would shout out answers. It stood for “Stop. Pause. Reflect.” That’s good advice for genealogists as well.
Ebay can be a great place to make genealogy purchases or even just to find images of items and materials if the prices are beyond your budget or your genealogy space at home is already limited. I located a picture of an uncle, a fan from a funeral home owned by a cousin, and a postcard containing a picture of the church my 3rd great-grandmother attended in Warsaw, Illinois. It does take some trial and error to get your searches right and sufficiently narrowed. I have better luck searching for locations, last names, historical features, and similar items. Narrowing your searches may be necessary if the locations are heavily populated or the last names are common. Instead of searching for full names, try a last name and a […]
Genealogists rely on obituaries, but remember that they can be incomplete or unclear, especially when the deceased (or their parents or children) have been married more than once. We’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating as many of us utilize obituaries in an attempt to get the “tree” down to as recent a time as possible and to analyze our DNA matches. The obituary for a recently deceased relative indicated they had four siblings. They actually had ten. The only ones listed in the obituary were three full siblings of the deceased and a half-sibling from their mother’s second marriage. That distinction wasn’t made (as it is often not in obituaries). The deceased had six other half siblings through their father. When the obituary is for someone […]
Those large genealogy projects tend to never get done. Instead of thinking about all the family members you want to document or all the family items you have to preserve, start small. I’ve decided to work on documenting the descendants of one set of 4th great-grandparents through their great-grandchildren. It’s a small enough task that it will be easier to manage that tracing down all the descendants through the current time. And it is better than doing nothing. Instead of thinking about all those pictures and other items I have to digitize and organize, I am working on one box and will go from there. One is better than nothing. Getting something done can also be motivation to continue on with other projects. What large tasks on your […]
I’m looking for a man named Johann Michael Senf who was born in Wohlmuthausen, Germany in 1835. He probably immigrated to the United States as his mother and some of his siblings are known to have immigrated after his father’s death. His “call name” (the name he was known by) was likely Michael Senf based on the practice of others from the area where he was from. It is possible though that he used the first name Johann or John upon immigration to the United States. The last name of Senf occasionally gets spelled Zenf and gets read as Serf. I need to conduct searches so that I search for those variants (in addition to other ones): Michael Senf Michael Serf Michael Zenf Johann/John Senf Johann/John Serf Johann/John […]
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