Last Friday I was unable to post a Follow Friday, so I thought I would suggest two sites today. Both sites are maintained by the same person, and have similar missions, so it seems appropriate to mention them together.
For obvious reasons, Newspapers and City Directories are two extremely useful resources for genealogists. Many are being digitized and put online, but if the researcher doesn't know they're there, they may spend the time to research them manually via microfilm, if the microfilm is available nearby, or not utilize the resource at all.
Miriam Robbins Midkiff of Ancestories decided there needed to be an online index for both resources, and has taken it upon herself to create them. Online Historical Directories and Online Historical Newspapers. They are both, by their vary nature, a work-in-progress. Alone, either one of these would be worthy of commendation.
Currently, the Online Historical Directories index has listings in the US for all 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as listings for Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, and Thailand.
Online Historical Newspapers, which is a newer project, has listings in the US for 20 states and the District of Columbia.
Both sites have blogs which can be followed for updates on new additions: Online Historical Newspapers and Online Historical Directories.
***
The work done on these two sites impresses me, as I am familiar with the work a project of this nature involves. Back in 2000, I decided to create Victor Hugo Central - an index of online translations of material written by and about the French author (along with some public domain translations I've hand-entered.) It became a time consuming project - one I enjoyed. Then three years ago my time started being consumed by genealogy, which I also enjoy, but updates have dropped significantly. Unfortunately, unlike my computer, it seems I have difficulty opening more than one Obsession Window at a time.
Showing posts with label City Directories. Show all posts
Showing posts with label City Directories. Show all posts
Friday, June 18, 2010
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Where in the World was Clifford Cruvant
I mentioned a few weeks ago my issue with the birth record of Clifford Cruvant in Cook County (Chicago) Illinois. The name in the index differed from the report. Cynthia at ChicagoGenealogy looked up the Certificate of Correction on the Family History Library microfilm, and posted a copy for me. It reappears below.
As is so often the case, the mystery deepens. The Family History Library microfilm didn’t capture the date on the correction so I decided to look up the name of the County Clerk at the top of the form. Michael J Flynn was Cook County Clerk from 1934-1950. Some say he was the origin of the phrase “in like Flynn.” Others suggest other politicians named Flynn, and still others suggest the actor Errol Flynn. Regardless, Michael J Flynn wasn’t a County Clerk who time forgot, and his dates in office are pretty well established.
Clifford was born in 1904, so he was at least thirty when his birth certificate was corrected. More importantly, since his mother signed the correction, both his mother and he were somewhere in 1920 and 1930. And his mother signed the correction with the surname Cruvant, suggesting she may not have remarried. My prior assumption had been the reason we couldn't find them was that she likely remarried and Clifford’s surname got changed, though that now appears not to be the case.
The Cruvant surname has many legitimate and illegitimate spellings. Since the English spelling is basically a transliteration of the Hebrew transliteration of the Lithuanian town Kruvandai, anything phonetically close is ‘accurate’ and several different family branches adopted different spellings. Cruvant, Cruvand, Kruvant, Kruvand, and Kroovand are the five most common spellings. And then there are the creative ways it has been written by clerks and census takers, or misinterpreted by indexers, for example, Crouvant, Cruivant, and even once Casavant. (Can't blame the indexer, either, as the handwriting was that bad.)
But Ancestry allows you to search by first name only, and I've gone through every person in the Illinois Census for 1920 and 1930 whose first name began with 'Clif' and who was born in 1904+- 2 years. Without any likely matches. I could drop the age from the search, or expand the range a bit, but the list was already getting pretty long. The list for 'Paul' is longer. Though I have tried to find Goldie in the same fashion. It's possible they were no longer in Illinois.
The next step was City Directories. I found a few Chicago City Directories on Footnote. They were definitely there in 1911, though they don't appear in the 1916 or 1923 directory. I found a Chicago Tribune news story mentioning Goldie, and providing her address, from 1912.
The St. Louis County Library has Chicago Directories from 1913-1917, 1923, and 1928. I already knew 1923 would be a bust, so that left 6 years for me to research. I dropped by the library, and the research added an address for 1914, but that was the last sight of them in Chicago.
I returned to Ancestry and did a search in the entire 1920 census for anyone born in 1904+-10 years with a first name beginning with 'Clif', and who had a mother whose name began with 'Gold'. And then I changed the mother field for names starting with 'Lil' for her middle name, Lillian. There were only 1000 names for me to page through with the latter. I was looking for a particular misspelled surname which helped. Unfortunately, I didn't find them.
My most recent effort was based on a suspicion Clifford may have been in the process of changing his name when the correction to his birth certificate was filed. I had a birthdate, and anyone born in 1904 who lived past the 1950s is likely to be in the SSDI. Rootsweb's database allows you to search by first name and birthdate, which I did. There are only 6 Cliffords in the database who share Clifford Cruvant's birthday. I asked myself, how many of these six can I find in the 1910 census? Because if they're there, they're not Clifford Cruvant. Unfortunately, all of them have matches in the 1910 census of approximately the correct age. The matches may not be them, but they could be.
So I am no further, and as of this moment I am unsure what happened to Goldie and Clifford after 1914. Ancestry is working on a 1940 census substitute, which could end up being helpful in solving the mystery, but isn't yet.
As is so often the case, the mystery deepens. The Family History Library microfilm didn’t capture the date on the correction so I decided to look up the name of the County Clerk at the top of the form. Michael J Flynn was Cook County Clerk from 1934-1950. Some say he was the origin of the phrase “in like Flynn.” Others suggest other politicians named Flynn, and still others suggest the actor Errol Flynn. Regardless, Michael J Flynn wasn’t a County Clerk who time forgot, and his dates in office are pretty well established.Clifford was born in 1904, so he was at least thirty when his birth certificate was corrected. More importantly, since his mother signed the correction, both his mother and he were somewhere in 1920 and 1930. And his mother signed the correction with the surname Cruvant, suggesting she may not have remarried. My prior assumption had been the reason we couldn't find them was that she likely remarried and Clifford’s surname got changed, though that now appears not to be the case.
The Cruvant surname has many legitimate and illegitimate spellings. Since the English spelling is basically a transliteration of the Hebrew transliteration of the Lithuanian town Kruvandai, anything phonetically close is ‘accurate’ and several different family branches adopted different spellings. Cruvant, Cruvand, Kruvant, Kruvand, and Kroovand are the five most common spellings. And then there are the creative ways it has been written by clerks and census takers, or misinterpreted by indexers, for example, Crouvant, Cruivant, and even once Casavant. (Can't blame the indexer, either, as the handwriting was that bad.)
But Ancestry allows you to search by first name only, and I've gone through every person in the Illinois Census for 1920 and 1930 whose first name began with 'Clif' and who was born in 1904+- 2 years. Without any likely matches. I could drop the age from the search, or expand the range a bit, but the list was already getting pretty long. The list for 'Paul' is longer. Though I have tried to find Goldie in the same fashion. It's possible they were no longer in Illinois.
The next step was City Directories. I found a few Chicago City Directories on Footnote. They were definitely there in 1911, though they don't appear in the 1916 or 1923 directory. I found a Chicago Tribune news story mentioning Goldie, and providing her address, from 1912.
The St. Louis County Library has Chicago Directories from 1913-1917, 1923, and 1928. I already knew 1923 would be a bust, so that left 6 years for me to research. I dropped by the library, and the research added an address for 1914, but that was the last sight of them in Chicago.
I returned to Ancestry and did a search in the entire 1920 census for anyone born in 1904+-10 years with a first name beginning with 'Clif', and who had a mother whose name began with 'Gold'. And then I changed the mother field for names starting with 'Lil' for her middle name, Lillian. There were only 1000 names for me to page through with the latter. I was looking for a particular misspelled surname which helped. Unfortunately, I didn't find them.
My most recent effort was based on a suspicion Clifford may have been in the process of changing his name when the correction to his birth certificate was filed. I had a birthdate, and anyone born in 1904 who lived past the 1950s is likely to be in the SSDI. Rootsweb's database allows you to search by first name and birthdate, which I did. There are only 6 Cliffords in the database who share Clifford Cruvant's birthday. I asked myself, how many of these six can I find in the 1910 census? Because if they're there, they're not Clifford Cruvant. Unfortunately, all of them have matches in the 1910 census of approximately the correct age. The matches may not be them, but they could be.
So I am no further, and as of this moment I am unsure what happened to Goldie and Clifford after 1914. Ancestry is working on a 1940 census substitute, which could end up being helpful in solving the mystery, but isn't yet.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
American Bottom and Illinois Harvest
In March I mentioned the American Bottom Riverweb site, which
The site has moved to a new location on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's servers, and while they still have an interesting archive, it appears they have removed the East St. Louis City Directories.
Never fear, Illinois Harvest, a product of the UIUC library, has them.
Illinois Harvest has a large digital book collection for download, including over 400 entries under the subject header of County and Local Histories, another 400 under Church and Congregational History in Illinois, and 125 under Genealogy Resources.
The latter includes the 1813 and 1818 Pension lists, listing everyone in the US receiving a military pension in the given year. As well as a couple dozen Chicago "Blue Books" and social registers.
contains a large digital archive of artifacts related to the American Bottom region, defined as the area south of the confluence of the Missouri, Mississippi and Illinois rivers. This includes portions of St. Clair, Randolph, Madison, and Monroe Counties in Illinois. Most of the information on the site appears to be centered on the Cahokia Mounds, and East St. Louis.
The site has moved to a new location on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's servers, and while they still have an interesting archive, it appears they have removed the East St. Louis City Directories.
Never fear, Illinois Harvest, a product of the UIUC library, has them.
Illinois Harvest has a large digital book collection for download, including over 400 entries under the subject header of County and Local Histories, another 400 under Church and Congregational History in Illinois, and 125 under Genealogy Resources.
The latter includes the 1813 and 1818 Pension lists, listing everyone in the US receiving a military pension in the given year. As well as a couple dozen Chicago "Blue Books" and social registers.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Jacksonville, Florida City Directories
The Jacksonville, Florida Public Library website has a nice set of local city directories. Most of the years between 1891 and 1925 are either scanned in and browsable, or 'under construction'. When a year is selected, thumbnails are loaded for every page, which can take a couple minutes, but then it is very easy to browse through the directory.
There were no Van Everys in the 1916-1920 directories, neither my great-uncle Samuel, nor his alleged wife (see previous entry). Of course, her letter in his FBI file only said they were married there, not that either of them lived there.
There were no Van Everys in the 1916-1920 directories, neither my great-uncle Samuel, nor his alleged wife (see previous entry). Of course, her letter in his FBI file only said they were married there, not that either of them lived there.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
American Bottom
The RiverWeb:American Bottom Landing Site contains a large digital archive of artifacts related to the American Bottom region, defined as the area south of the confluence of the Missouri, Mississippi and Illinois rivers. This includes portions of St. Clair, Randolph, Madison, and Monroe Counties in Illinois. Most of the information on the site appears to be centered on the Cahokia Mounds, and East St. Louis.
I discovered the site looking for East St. Louis City Directories. They have several completely scanned, downloadable as PDFs, but also searchable online, with the usual OCR limitations. 1893, 1900, 1905-1908, 1912. The 1908, and perhaps some of the other directories, are bi-directional, in that they also organize the directory by street address, letting you learn who the neighbors were, or what store a family lived above.
The best way to search is to search the entire site, since there are other historical documents such as Bits and Pieces of East St. Louis History 1890-Present (c.2004) and the East St. Louis Blue Book for 1936.
I downloaded all the City Directories from 1905 on since several of my Cruvant kin are in those directories.
I discovered the site looking for East St. Louis City Directories. They have several completely scanned, downloadable as PDFs, but also searchable online, with the usual OCR limitations. 1893, 1900, 1905-1908, 1912. The 1908, and perhaps some of the other directories, are bi-directional, in that they also organize the directory by street address, letting you learn who the neighbors were, or what store a family lived above.
The best way to search is to search the entire site, since there are other historical documents such as Bits and Pieces of East St. Louis History 1890-Present (c.2004) and the East St. Louis Blue Book for 1936.
I downloaded all the City Directories from 1905 on since several of my Cruvant kin are in those directories.
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