genealogy

Ancestry.com doesn't seem to have many associated apps, but I just got a promo in the mail for this free one, and I LOVE it. It's called shoebox, and you use it to link to your ancestry.com account with your phone, and then you take a picture of a picture, enter in which person in your tree it goes with, and you're done! It's perfect for cataloging family pictures your Mom won't let you take with you, or in my case, are too fragile to be taken out of their frames for scanning.

Here's the app:
http://shoebox.ancestry.com/?o_xid=56206&o_lid=56206&o_sch=Email

The internet is just amazing. My grandmother was the one interested in genealogy, until I came along, and she worked for years to prove a connection between her Washburns and Francis Cooke, of the Mayflower. When she finally found the proof, and got a letter of congratulations from someone at the Mayflower society, she xeroxed the letter and sent it in triumph to the whole family. *g* It was a big deal because she'd been working on it for so long by snail mail. She cared a lot about connecting to the Mayflower. She could have connected to the Daughters of the American Revolution, she told me once, but she didn't give a hoot about them. I don't know why. I guess she admired settlers more than soldiers?

At any rate, my mother, when she was engaged to my dad, had a conversation with her future father-in-law (whom she always saw as rather pompous) where he informed her loftily that she was marrying a man descended from a Mayflower passenger. "Oh, that's interesting," she was able to say, because of her mother's research, "I'm descended from two." Hee. Not that Mom cared; but any ancestry has always been of interest to me, so I was grateful for my now deceased grandmother's work.

Decades ago, still before the internet (largely), I paid a visit to Plimouth Plantation or whatever they call that historical reinactment site. While there I bought an extrememly expensive book about the descendants of Francis Cooke, knowing I'd care about it when I had time to do genealogy research. I opened it for the first time last night, planning to check the info I had gotten at ancestry.com against what was in the book. In passing, the writer of the book mentioned that a woman one of the Washburns married was a descendant of another Mayflower passenger, William Brewster. What, what? How cool. So I settled in with the internet and ancestry.com last night, and within two hours I had her connection to William Brewster documented.

Two hours.

It took my grandma seven years.

So today, I have a feeling of accomplishment, but it's probably not quite like the jubilation she felt. *g* I wish she could have lived to do genealogy research on the internet.

I have just started using wikitree, which is just what it sounds like. A family tree that can be added to by anyone. http://www.wikitree.com/

Well, they have instituted some policies and hoops to jump through, apparently to weed out some troll-like behavior they've had in the past. But it's not too hard to figure out, and it's a free way to be able to link in to other people's trees and knowledge.

http://www.wikitree.com/

Sometimes there are ancestors of mine who don't show up in the census or other records. My great-great grandmother had only one child, who had only one child who had only one child. I am one of the few people who know her name or story. She didn't live long and doesn't show up in the census, for whatever reason. No burial record, no marriage license. I have the odd feeling like if it wasn't for me no one would ever know she lived.

Agnes Eger 1838-1860, died in childbirth with her first child.

When I asked my grandfather about the origins of our German-ish surname, he said we were Scots-Irish and came from West Virginia. I was 13, and just made a note for future research.

I'm now a genealogy researcher, and have long since dismissed my grandfather's version of our family origins. It's a German name, so how is it Scots-Irish? The earliest (known, so far) progenitor of the name came from Pennsylvania and the family ended up in Illinois with a stop in Ohio. So how does West Virginia even get in there?

I figured some other line--female line--probably married in, and THEY were Scots-Irish and from West Virginia, but it never has shown up in my research. So, Grandpa had just heard something that was wrong, that's all.

Until I found where in Ohio the "stopover" was. I had assumed northern Ohio, since that's what's between Pennsylvania and Illinois. Uh, no. Apparently my family was working its way down the Ohio River. There's a whole nest of my ancestors in Gallia County, Ohio, and they were from Clay Township, which, as far as I can tell from a map, might be literally a stone's throw (across the river) from West Virginia.

Grandpa wasn't very wrong. (I still haven't found any Scots-Irish, though.)

I'm amused to see the name Monroe show up in two of my TV shows--Revolution and Grimm. The name Monroe has been like a trail of crumbs sprinkled through my family line for me to follow. It's not a surname, but it was my father's middle name, and his father's. Then the path forks in two directions--to a cousin with it as his middle name, and to an uncle with it as his middle name. When I follow the male line of the cousin, I find three James Monroe [surname] in a row and eventually I hit the first James Monroe [surname]. (He had brothers named Thomas Jefferson [surname] and Andrew Jackson [surname]) He was born during James Monroe's presidency. Along the path of all these men with Monroe for a middle name, I find a man who went by "Roe" and a man who went by "Roy." It was never a family name but it has persisted down to my dad's generation from the time of President Monroe.

And now it seems a fashionable name on TV. *g*

Today I saw a list of famous descendants of Richard Warren, the Mayflower passenger, and it included Laura Ingalls Wilder, the author of the "Little House" books. Since Warren is an ancestor of mine, I decided to work on the connection to Wilder, and can now say I am Wilder's fourth cousin five times removed. *g*

I am a new member. I've been having fun with my ancestry since getting a subscription to ancestry.com a year and a half ago as a birthday present. I post about it fairly frequently in my journal under the tag ancestry. I know a few other people who read me are interested in ancestry, too, so I wondered if there was a comm, and there is! *waves*

I've been looking through the California Digital Newspaper Collection (http://cdnc.ucr.edu/cdnc) lately and have found some fun finds.

Turns out my great-grandparents did the same thing my husband and I did and eloped, then had a wedding for family six months later. And neither my great-grandmother (who lived to be 103) nor any other family member ever mentioned it to either my uncle or I! Neither he nor I have any idea whether my grandfather (their only child) ever knew. ( scan of cliping )

And a lovely lady who prefers to remain anonymous first took photos of the cemetery in Grey Co, Ontario, where my great-grandfather's father came from, including a picture of his father's and oldest sister's gravestone, and after I contacted her, she went back, took better pics, and dug around and FOUND MY GGG GRANDMOTHER'S MISSING GRAVESTONE! \o/ ( photos )

Hi there! Just wondering if anyone was still watching or thinking of using this community. :)

I was out of work for nearly a year, and at some point (to keep my brain from utterly rotting) I started more seriously pursuing mine and my spouse's family trees. And some of the stuff I'm finding strikes me as So Very Cool, I feel the need to share with others who are also into this stuff.

I was directed to the Canadian Genealogy Survey at http://www.cusurveycentre.ca/gensurvey/ today; if you have roots there (or live there) you might enjoy taking it.

...or maybe a ginormous hole *g*

My ggg grandmother is Mary Ann Jordan from Leighlinbridge, Co Carlow. Her marriage record to my ggggfather Patrick Brennan is in the St. Lazarian RC records.

Sadly the baptismal records for her and for the person I suspect is her brother are part of missing books.

Happily her family seems to have been close enough to move to Canada to be near each other, so there's a bit of circumstantial evidence...

In 1841/42, Martin Jordan is sharing the same lot in Lanark Co as Patrick and Mary Ann Jordan Brennan.

In 1851 the Brennans are in Grey Co; next door are Michael and Elizabeth Jordan Mara/O'Mara and her mother mother, widowed Mary Jordan.

Elizabeth is younger and she (along with a John Jordan) *do* have baptismal records: parents Moses Jordan and Mary Hayes.

There was another Mary Ann Jordan living next door as a servant to the Martin Jordans in '51; no was to tell if she was Martin's, though. One of Martin's sons was named Moses.

But there I sat til this last week.

I heard from 2 people who are related to Martin's line, which I had little info on aside from children's names.

2/3s of the children moved to the area around Williamstown and Utica, NY -- and there are newspaper scans of published obits at fultonhistory.com.

Obits tha include all the daughters' married names and the info that the stray Mary Ann was Martin and Catherine's eldest daughter (and the last survivor of the kids).

Still nothing mentioned of the O'Mara or Brennan connection, but I'll keep looking for a reference to aunts, and in the meantime?

WHEEEEEEEE!

I realize I may ruffle some feathers with this entry, but I cannot imagine I am the only one who asks this question, even if not aloud.

Admittedly, I probably do not have as much experience with historical/genealogical societies and associations as others may.

In the past three years, I've had contact with eleven such organizations - one as a member for one year. That one was a very local group who gathered once monthly for a two hour meeting at various restaurants in a small town one county away from me.

To talk. The talk was about doing things.

And for the nine months I attended, they continued to talk. As far as I can tell, they had been talking for two years before I joined.

One of the ideas for "doing things" that was presented was creating a bound book of 19th century census records for that county.

I asked why they would spend precious volunteer time creating something in print that can be so easily found in digital form.

To raise money. To one day do things.

When they changed the meeting time from evening to mid-day because autumn was approaching and some of the older members did not like driving after dark, I made my regrets and quit.

I do not have time in the middle of my workday to spend two hours once per month listening to people talk about doing stuff.

My other contacts with historical/genealogical societies and associations has been in the form of finding their website, seeing that they have a publication I need, and trying to access the publication.

Six of those organizations have been in my own state, and the others out of state.

In each case, the website has listed the publications it has for sale, included a form for ordering them that has to be printed and mailed in, and in three cases (two in Arkansas) no prices on the form, so I had to call and "catch" a volunteer to find out how much the publication cost.

None of them had the capability to take and process an order over the phone.

All of them had a hierarchy from which they *could not* deviate. The shortest amount of time from which my check was cashed to delivery of the publication was six weeks.

In each case where I inquired, I was informed that things had to be done per the hierarchy - meaning the lady with the PO box key (because you never send a check to a street address, even if the organization has a physical location) had to go to the Post Office to retrieve the check. Then she had to give the check to the treasurer, who in turn had to contact the volunteer who was responsible for actually addressing an envelope and putting the publication into it for mailing.

So if a couple of those people go on vacation or become otherwise engaged, well...

You just wait.

One of the in-state organizations is run by a (many times removed) cousin of mine. I talked to her about bringing the association into the 21st century. I offered to digitize their cemetery transcription books for them, so they could be placed on their website in a "members only" section. In order to access them, you would have to pay dues and become a member.

They are not interested in that, but would love for me to join the association and drive an hour and a half once a month to have lunch with them and listen to a guest speaker - for a fee. Then drive an hour and a half back home.

We finally worked out a better arrangement. Since it takes no less than two months for me to purchase and actually get my hands on their publications using the surface mail method - they have quite a few - when I want one, I drive down there during hours when the museum is open, and buy them there.

But I call first to make sure the volunteer will be opening the museum that day.

I know there are more cutting edge historical societies out there. I read about them on other people's blogs every day. I yearn for the day when I have need of what they offer.

In the meantime, what can I do to at least persuade the ones close to me that one of the reasons they are having a hard time raising money is because they make it hard for people to access their services and products, and that technology is not a bad thing?

I just moved both of my blogs over to Dreamwidth from LJ.

One of them is my genealogy blog.

If there are other members of the community with genealogy blogs, I'd love to add yours to my reading list.

And if you want to meet a bunch of other geneabloggers, I highly recommend adding your blog to Geneabloggers under the Suggest a Blog link.

anyone want to take over this community?

[cross-posted from

history]

I live in Halifax, so my twitter today has been full of stuff about the Titanic and what's available at the Nova Scotia Archives & Records Management site.
( Cut for those who aren't interested in the Titanic )

I love this scanner app

collecting Mayflower ancestors

Wikitree Let's build one human family tree

It's weird when I'm the only one who knows someone lived.

My Grandfather was not so wrong

The name "Monroe"

Laura Ingalls Wilder

Hello!

Some recent finds

(no subject)

(no subject)

a crack in a wall

Are historical societies becoming irrelevant?

Doesn't seem to be a lot of action lately...

(no subject)

Titanic Exhibit at NS Archvies

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