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. Documents and records should be transcribed as they are written. But when writing expository paragraphs about an individual, I should use a consistent spelling.
Never be so stuck on an initial conclusion that you avoid other reasonable scenarios or avoid looking for records because the person you need to find “simply cannot be in that location.” A relative concluded a family member returned to Germany for a visit and returned to the United States simply because the ancestor could not be located in the 1870 census. The story of the trip was repeated enough that it became an accepted fact. It’s easy to jump to conclusions when we are first starting out. We can sometimes “break brick walls” by going back and reviewing those initial conclusions. A big thanks to GenealogyBank for being our sponsor!
Today’s tip comes after a discussion we had on Facebook regarding a chart I made a few months back. The term “farm wife” covers a lot of ground–figuratively as well as literally. If you know details of what your “stay at home ancestor” did, include that in your research notes. Make certain to include how you came to know this information–don’t include what you don’t have some sort of source for. It was not unusual to find my Grandma Neill doing a variety of barn and other farm chores. My other Grandma didn’t do barn chores. If you know some of the details of what your “farm wife” ancestor did, have you included that in your research notes? And even if your ancestor wasn’t a farm wife, there’s […]
Tell your ancestor’s story as accurately and as completely as you can, citing your sources along the way. It really doesn’t matter if your citation punctuation is incorrect–as long as your citation is complete. That’s still no guarantee you’ll get it all or that you’ll get it completely “right,” but it’s an excellent way to start. If you want to get your citations correct, you can use Evidence Explained your guide, but the world will not end if your punctuation is incorrect. Seriously.
Years ago, I discovered my ancestors on an 1853 passenger list. I didn’t read any other names. Later I did. It turned out that there were other relatives on the manifest. The family immediately after the ancestral family was the niece of the father and her family. Twenty entries before the ancestral family was the married daughter and her small child. Read the entire passenger manifest. Think about the names. There may be more there than you think. People like to travel with others they know when they can.
Do you have any heirloom plants and have you documented their story along with your other genealogical information? This tiger lily originally belonged to my great-grandmother, Tjode (Goldenstein) Habben (1882-1954) who gave bulbs to her daughter, Dorothy (Habben) Ufkes (1924-2008), my maternal grandmother. Take pictures of your plant and write down as much of the story as you know, including various locations where the plant grew and who owned it.
Pre-1850 United States census records, which frequently only list a county of residence, can be a challenge when the names are spelled wrong and the writing is difficult to read. If you can’t find you person in 1830, try searching for his 1820 and 1830 neighbors in 1840 and then looking closely in the vicinity of that name (at least a few pages befor and after). You may find the person of interest.
Join us for the following classes this July-August(registration is limited): US land records class US probate records class Organizing Genealogical Information–
The biggest mistakes are when you “think you know everything” or when you’ve researched a family for so long that you forget things you located years ago. This overlooked 1860 census entry raised more questions than it answered–was there a relationship with either of the two farmers the young couple was living with? Was the teenager related to young husband? Always check and review–especially when you’ve been researching a family for a while.
Make certain you have looked at every side of a stone for additional inscriptions, significant markings, etc. There could be something of value on the reverse side of stone and some families did the best they could to get the most possible out of the stone.
In addition to the regular blog content on my blogs, I put out a weekly summary of blog content–this is perfect for those who may overlook the daily emails or who do not want to receive the daily emails–the weekly update is weekly, not daily (grin!). My weekly blog update is separate from daily emails received from the individual blogs. The weekly update includes a summary of postings to: Genealogy Tip of the Day Genealogy Search Tip of the Day Rootdig In addition, the weekly blog update includes the following premium content not published on my blogs: Tombstone of the week Citation of the week Letter of the week Picture of the week and the occasional extra item of interest There are no press releases, memes, or similar material in […]
Your ancestor’s final neighbors may hold the key to more information on her. Determine who is buried near to your ancestor. Those adjacent burials could be other relatives, by birth or by marriage, or they could be totally unrelated. But you will never know unless you locate more about them than a name on a stone.
A “friendly suit” is a lawsuit where the parties are not at each other’s throats, but need a legal remedy to a problem they can’t solve themselves. In the 1924 partition suit mentioned in the illustration several of the heirs were minors and unable to legally act on their own and the farm could not equitably be divided amongst the heirs. A “friendly partition” suit was the result. Not all partitions are friendly, but both types should generate court records. A big thanks to GenealogyBank for being our sponsor!
At a recent family reunion, a relative (technically a second cousin of my father) told me how in the 1930s her mother had lived with my great-grandparents when she attended high school because my great-grandparents lived in town. It never hurts to talk to the more distant relatives. Sometimes chatting will bring up more stories than specific questions. This was also a reminder that times and transportation were different. The cousin lived several miles from “town,” a village of maybe two hundred people, and could not afford a car. Even though town was more of a tiny village and the distance was small by modern standards, it would have been difficult to walk daily in the Depression era–especially in winter.
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