Fifth Annual iGene Awards

The Carnival of Genealogy's Annual iGene Awards have returned - where Geneabloggers choose the Best of their Best posts from the past year in five categories: Best Comedy, Best Biography, Best Documentary, Best Screenplay, and Best Picture.

The TransylvanianDutch chapter of the Academy of Genealogy and Family History has participated in all prior years, and will do so again. For those who are nostalgic, here were our selections in 2011, 2010, 2009, and 2008 from the prior year's posts.

With no further ado, we will open the envelopes for 2012


Best Picture

For Best Picture, the winner is:  March 22nd, 2011 (which was posted on the 23rd)

The rules define this as a photograph, but a video is made up of a series of stills. And some videos this is more true of than others. We know the winning video has very little to do (directly) with our family history, past or future, however, other aspects of this post swayed us in our selection.

Runner Up:

Wordless Wednesday - Tel Aviv hotels, and postage stamps - 1944 was also nominated.   This post contained scanned images of several Tel Aviv business cards and postage stamps from the 1940s.  The war-time souvenirs were from my maternal grandfather's collection.

Best Screen Play (story you would make into a movie including the cast)

For Best Screen Play, the winner is: Dawes Commission Testimony

Readers may point out that some of these posts were prior to 2011, however, it seems appropriate that the series of posts win an award for the year of completion.  I've indicated the year of each post below, and five of them were in 2011.

Dawes Commission Testimony - Samuel T Hartley - Nov 21, 1900 (2009)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Robert Hartley - Nov 21, 1900 (2011)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Virginia Hartley Shultz - Nov 21, 1900 (2011)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Sophronia Hartley Cagle - Nov 21, 1900 (2011)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Melvin Elijah Van Every – Nov 21, 1900 (2009)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Samuel W Denyer - Nov 21, 1900   (2011)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Caroline Hartley Taylor - Nov 26, 1900 (2011)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Eliza Caroline Foster Reeves – Nov 26, 1900 (2009)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Georgia Hartley Phillips – June 17, 1902 (2009)
Dawes Commission Testimony - Samuel T Hartley – June 17, 1902 (2009)
The Dawes Commission Decision - July 11, 1902 (2010)

Casting: The Dawes Commission judges made a point that none of those testifying 'looked Choctaw."  However, I have no photographs of any of them, except my great grandfather, Melvin Elijah Van Every.

My first choice for casting Samuel T Hartley will be Morgan Freeman.  My second choice will be Leonard Nimoy.  My third choice will be Kirk Douglas.  None of them appear Choctaw, so they fit the requirements. (How Samuel T Hartley, who fought for the Confederacy, would feel about some of those casting suggestions doesn't matter to me.  He's not my ancestor.)

For Samuel's four daughters: Sophronia, Virginia, Georgia, and Caroline, I'd like to cast Drew Barrymore, Natalie Portman, Mayim Bialik, and Soleil Moon Frye.  Don't ask me why, but I think they'd make excellent sisters.

Perhaps Leo DiCaprio could play the role of my great grandfather, and Macaulay Culkin could be Robert Hartley.  Jewel Staite can complete the main cast members as Eliza Foster Reeves.

Best Documentary (investigative research)

For Best Documentary, the winner is: Civilian Occupation Codes: What's Going On?

This series of posts began with the discovery that Ancestry had changed the occupation for my great uncle on his Army Enlistment record, sometime after 2007 when I first obtained the record.  I conducted some research, and realized several other members of my family had had their occupations changed.  I identified the cause: Two different lists of Occupation Codes.  In my final post, I linked to the report from the National Archives indicating that the original Occupation Codes were in error.  It was dated in 2005, two years prior to when I initially obtained the records from Ancestry.  I still don't know when Ancestry updated their records.

Runner-up

Also receiving a nomination is: 1942 Tax Returns - a post where I looked at my grandparents' tax returns and calculated how salaries, and deductions compared to today.

Best Biography

The winner for Best Biography goes to: 

Judson Van Every - Manchester Journal - 1902 - 1910 and Judson Van Every - Manchester Journal - 1915-1917.

These two posts contained newspaper clippings from the Manchester Journal (OK) concerning my great grandfather's brother, Judson Van Every.  The clippings reveal a lot about the 15 years of his life. 

Best Comedy

The winner for Best Comedy is: Missouri Sheriff has a Mule Problem - the St. Louis Post Dispatch had a little fun at the expense of Sheriff Louis P. Gober of Scott County, Missouri (my fiancee's second great grandfather)

Runner-Up:

Also receiving a nomination was a poem I wrote: Genealogy Research

This ends the awards for the five main categories.  However, in 2010 and 2011 I added a category where  I present awards to show my gratitude to other Genea-Bloggers who commented upon, or in some other way responded to an entry, providing me with more information on my family.

Geneabloggers in a Supporting Role

This year this award goes to a blogger whose post spurred me to conduct some research for which I am grateful.

Philip of Blood and Frogs back in April posted a primer on finding and ordering US Naturalization Records.  While I already had the Declarations of Intent for most of my immigrant ancestors who arrived recently enough, I realized there were several other documents of which the National Archives might have copies.  The process led to the Naturalization Petition for Salomon Deutsch - my great grandfather - and the first name of his first daughter who remained in Transylvania, and likely died in the Holocaust.  The process also led to the Naturalization Petition for Barnet Newmark - another great grandfather - and a date for his arrival in St. Louis.

Thus concludes the Fifth Annual iGene Awards - TransylvanianDutch Chapter