Squirrel Genealogy

On some days, I feel like a squirrel!

The Privilege of Ladies

Because leap years are seen as unusual events that disturb the otherwise orderly progression of days/months/years, certain beliefs have been attached to them. (One constant in the realm of folklore and superstition is that out-of-the-ordinary events are deemed to have out-of-the-ordinary consequences or properties.) Leap years, according to folk tradition, were the only times when women could propose marriage to men, with this belief often termed "The Ladies' Privilege." Yet even within this hypothesis there was disagreement as to how far it went -- a great many of those who encountered this custom did not see it as applicable throughout the length of a leap year, but only to the extra day itself; that is, only to February 29.

Another school of thought held that a man so entreated either had to accept the proposal or pay the refused woman a substantial forfeit for turning her down, such as a silk gown or £100…

I have two sets of grandparents who were married during a leap year -- though neither on LeapDay. The same leap year even - 1936. 18 leap years ago. My maternal grandparents managed it by the skin of their teeth on December 31. It's not clear who proposed to whom, or whether Leap Year figured into their plans at all.

Coincidentally, both marriages were conducted by a Justice of the Peace, with only the required witnesses. While all four participants lived in St. Louis, MO at the time, both marriages occurred in Illinois. No family members were in attendance at either one; primarily because family hadn't been informed. Both sets of my grandparents were married on a spur of the moment. A leap of love.

Wordless Wednesday: Proper Treatment of Source Material

Artist: Emile Bayard;
Illustration for novel, Ninety-Three, by Victor Hugo

Wordless Wednesday

Tuesday Tech †ip

þßƵë¿

I was planning on starting this series next week, but a quick post idea occurred to me.

Many genea-bloggers have ancestors from foreign countries which often use foreign characters in their character sets. You may know how to draw those characters in your own handwritten notes, and may even be able to get your word processor to reproduce them. However, you may not know how to blog them.

Here's a cheat-sheet.

In the first column you will see what the character looks like. The last column is a description of the character. The middle three columns provide three different codes you can use: "Friendly", Numerical, and Hex. Not every character has a 'friendly' code, which are easier to remember, but they all have the other two. [Note: link above updated from original link to a source with a more complete list]

For example

á is a "lowercase a acute". It is reproduced by typing: á (where that first character is an ampersand.) or á or á

My First ScanFest

Participated in my first ScanFest today. It was productive, and fun. I scanned 46 photos in total. The conversation among the scanners varied from lingerie to applying for SAR/DAR membership. Reminded me of my college days chatting on Relay. Things are a little different twenty years later, but not much.

Here's one photo I scanned. It's a personalized autographed photo of Chevy Chase. The picture is from his 1985 movie, Spies Like Us. The photo was obtained for me by a cousin in 1986 while I was in the hospital.

This is one of only two autographed photos I scanned today. I have a large collection of those, but most of them don't have special meaning beyond being autographed photos of mostly actors. The other I scanned was a photograph of US Representative William L Clay, for whom I interned during the Summer of 1990. He gave each of his interns an autographed photo at the end of the internship.

Unlike Chevy, he wasn't wearing a hat in his photo.




Here's another photo I scanned in - of myself. An uncle of mine was married in New Orleans, and a trip was made to a local store for everyone to buy a Mardi Gras mask - even though it wasn't Mardi Gras at the time. The photo on the left is clipped from a larger group photo, since I don't like posting photographs of living people without their permission. (Famous actors are an exception.) I wasn't surprised by it, but I could easily identify everyone in the entire family group shot - even though I couldn't see anyone's face. Clothes and body shape are sufficient if you know people well enough. But I also know that's one photo that has to be labeled, or it will be completely useless to future generations.

Technology

As a long time fan of SF/Fantasy novels and movies, I have learned from experience that genre movies don't win Best Picture, Best Actor, or Best Director awards. Fans must settle for Best Special F/X, Best Makeup, or possibly Best Soundtrack. There are the exceptions (2001: A Space Odyssey; Lord of the Rings) but the exceptions are rare.

Tonight is The Academy's night, and so it somehow seems appropriate that the theme for the 43rd Carnival of Genealogy is on technology, since the last Carnival focused on our Best of Awards. (It also seems just like yesterday that the 42nd Carnival concluded, but February is a short month.)

What technology do you most rely on for your genealogy and family history research?

Select one piece of hardware (besides your computer)

This isn’t difficult. Besides my computer, the piece of hardware I currently use the most is a microfilm reader. There are a lot of records that haven’t been scanned in, haven’t been indexed. They know me by now when I enter the Special Collections department.

One web site/blog (besides your own) that is indispensable to you.

Ancestry.

If I had to recommend one database subscription site to someone, this would be it. Others have been useful, but it’s hard for me to imagine where I would be without Ancestry – from what I have learned through their databases and forums.

One piece of software (besides your internet browser)

This is where I am most likely to deviate from a lot of answers.

MediaWiki.

I have set up two family wikis – both password protected – one for my mother’s family, and another for my father’s.

Here’s a view of the the homepage of my mother’s, as well as one entry on the site.



The images should look familiar to anyone who has experience with Wikipedia or any of its cousins. It uses the exact same software. The original theory behind installing the software was to facilitate other family members helping me in recording the information.

Theory and practice aren’t always the same. I think only one edit has been made so far by anyone except me. However, even when a cousin sends me an email with text for me to put onto a page, that’s helpful. And it’s easier for me to update a wiki than it is to update other types of family websites.

I've uploaded images of almost every document I have found. Most of the more recent entries have several photographs on them.

One might argue this hasn’t helped my ‘research’. However, I think one genealogy-obsessed cousin was impressed enough by it, and pleased with the password-protection, to send me her entire register. (And I have respected her wishes and not blogged any information for which I am indebted to her.)

I’ve been meaning to do a series of posts on my knowledge of and ideas for websites, including a few more snapshots of our wikis. Hopefully I will get a round tuit soon.

Another President!

Too many of these posts and people will be paraphrasing line 230 from Act III Scene II of Hamlet.

However, while this isn't the reason I am researching my family history, I believe I have found support for at least one more, and I'm close to another of the 'famous people' Ancestry's One World Tree claims my grandmother, Myrtle Van Every, was related to. I've had fun laughing at some of the impossible family trees the OneWorldTree software draws, but the lousiest ball player will occasionally hit the ball.

(And researching both hits and misses can result in extending lines further back)

Alas, the hits are not necessarily the hits I'd have chosen.

According to this Genforum post, the book "Ancestors of American Presidents" claims the Eddye family is related to three Presidents: Ford, Benjamin Harrison, and Fillmore. I already knew about Harrison since the Van Every's intersect slightly more recently than the Eddyes. There are a couple unproven generations on my grandmothers side still for Fillmore. But if the book is accurate, Ford was 'definitely' my mother's 8th cousin. (I bet she wishes she knew this when he was alive.)

The book was researched by Gary Boyd Roberts, who seems to have some credentials. Senior Research Scholar for the New England Historic Genealogical Society sounds impressive. Since he seems to be known as a scholar, I expect the book to cite sources. It's out of print, though. I can buy it at Amazon for $300. Or I can browse through it at either the St. Louis County or St. Louis City library next time I go there. I think I'll do that. It's supposed to contain the ancestries of all the Presidents (Since it was published in 1995, it might include Clinton, I'm not sure.)

Find a library near you that has it

Ancestry Facts

Several of the charts and tables that can be found in the Name in History books that Ancestry publishes can be found on Ancestry for free. Even for many surnames that aren't popular enough to have books. (Link to extensive review of the contents of one such book.)

On the main index page of their Learning Center, if you scroll down you will see "Facts About Your Surname", and an input box to enter your surname.

You don't need to have a paid Ancestry account - though if you do, there are links to the databases for the actual records, which of course the books don't have.

ScanFest - Feb 2008

AnceStories has announced the upcoming ScanFest. This will be the first one I participate in. If I do my time zone math correctly, it will be from 1 pm to 4 pm Central Daylight Time.

I have reread Sally Jacobs' "8 Blunders People Make" and cleared some albums of photographs I wish to scan. There are probably more than I can scan in 3 hours, but whatever I accomplish will be more than I would have probably done anyway.

I don't believe it's too late to sign up now, and you don't have to be a blogger to do so - Miriam includes instructions in her post.

The answer is 42

The 42nd Carnival of Genealogy has been posted. 23 Geneabloggers have chosen their five best posts from 2007, creating a Best of the Best carnival. Since I started blogging midway through the year, and there are several bloggers in the group I have only been reading recently, a lot of it is new to me. Which is good.

The theme for the 43rd Carnival has also been announced:

Technology. What technology do you most rely on for your genealogy and family history research? Select one piece of hardware (besides your computer), one piece of software (besides your internet browser), and one web site/blog (besides your own) that are indispensable to you...The deadline for submissions is March 1st.

Read the post for full instructions.

Houston, We May Have A Problem...

The 24/7 Family History Circle posted, as it usually does, What's New at Ancestry

On the list was: Missouri Birth Records, 1805-1980 (Updated)

1980?!

I quickly went and typed in my own surname.
The results turned up 1 person born in 1889, and 3 appearances of another born in 1909.

I knew about the latter, as I discovered her on the Missouri State Archives awhile back. She's a daughter of Sol Newmark and Sarah Nathan (the couple married in the Great Synagogue of London in 1901.) She didn't live long enough to appear on the 1910 census. The 1889 individual wasn't in the State of Missouri database, though I don't know why not. I was aware of Newmarks in St. Louis prior to our family, and they either died or moved before we showed up. I haven't yet figured out whether or not they were related.

However, no other Newmarks appared in the results, and this was supposed to be 1805-1980. That suggested some serious gaps. My great grandfather, Barney, his brother Sol, and other brothers Max and Israel, all reproduced some more, and there were many grandkids. And great grandkids, too.

Since Ancestry allows you to search on just one field, and allows a +-20 year search, I made that the field, and discovered there was a grand total of 4 records between 1940 and 1980. (One of which was a birth certificate from California!)

A little more research revealed there was 1 entry for 1934, another for 1933, and 5 for 1932. I think more than 7 people were born in Missouri from 1932-1934.

In 1931 there's a sudden explosion of results: 50.
In 1930: 509
1929: 1609
1928: 3536

I'm not quite sure what's going on, as in 1912, the year my grandfather Melvin Newmark was born, there is only one entry. Not him.

I suspect some counties in Missouri may have released some more recent records. The big question in my mind, since there is a significant, if not completely sufficient, privacy window between 1934 and now, is those four *certificates* from 1951, 1966, 1973 and 1980.

I sent Juliana at Ancestry an email notifying her of this issue.

Please, no more, we're done!

The compilers of Confucius' descendants have been working for ten years, and have finally decided they're finished.

"We have received more than 1.3 million new entries and already stopped soliciting new ones."

The database is closed, for now, and since this is only the fifth time they have ever updated the list, if you didn't get on it, maybe your great great grandchildren will.

Texas Vital Records on Footnote

Since I have a 3-day free trial, my goal was to find everything I could possibly find on Footnote, and then cancel my subscription before they start charging. They are adding databases constantly, though at the moment I don't see enough hits for my surnames to warrant continuing my subscription. They also offer individual image download, though if there are more than four images, it's worth buying a month's subscription.

The two databases that show the most promise for me are in the process of being entered.

1) Texas Birth Certificates (1903-1910, 1926-1929)

I'm not sure why the years between 1910 and 1926 aren't part of the database. They are 47% finished. However, I have already found a few certificates for relatives of Myrtle Van Every, my maternal grandmother, who was born in Texas in 1900.

Her oldest sister, Minnie Van Every Benold, had two children between 1903-1910 (Shirley and Margaret). I found Shirley's certificate, as well as the certificate for Corinne Griffith, Shirley's daughter, born in 1927. I also found the certificate for Melvin Edwin Denyer Jr, who would have been Ebenezer's great-grandson. His father was Myrtle's first cousin.

2) Texas Death Certificates (1890-1976)

This is only 4% entered, but there are going to be a lot of certificates from this database that I know I will download. At least five of my grandmother's siblings, and both of her parents, for starters. And then there are nieces and nephews. I'll just wait until they're all there, and then buy a month. Though if there's a delay, there is one or two I might spend $2 to download individually.

I already have Myrtle's mother's death certificate. I ordered it because I knew she died in her fifties, and I wanted to know what from. I don't have her father's though.

There's also a very good chance that Margaret's mother, Ebenezer Denyer's wife, Sarah Hartley Denyer Foster will be in this database. It is she who I mentioned in November that declared she was 1/8 Native American. After Ebenezer died in 1872, she remarried in 1874, but alas, chose a husband with a very common surname. I was able to find Sarah and George Foster in the 1880 census, but not conclusively in the 1900 census. (There's a Sarah Ann Foster listed as a widow who might possibly be her, but there's no way to know for certain from the census alone.)

Myrtle's oldest sister, Minnie, was born in 1884, and she wrote a brief description of Sarah, and her recollection of the home Sarah and George lived in. She didn't write down years, or her own age, but I suspect she was older than 6 when Sarah died.

Of course, how much information is on the certificate, and whether it will be identifiable as my great-great-grandmother will depend upon the informant.

Ebenezer Denyer (1828-1872)

I signed up for a 3-day free trial of Footnote this weekend. There was a 28-page dossier on my Civil War ancestor, Ebenezer Denyer, which I wished to download.

Turns out he was a regimental teamster, and a "Regimental Return" form was filled out for him on an almost monthly basis, so a lot of the pages are repetitive.

However, there was one "Descriptive List and Account of Pay and Clothing" (see left) It contains a physical description of Ebenezer. Blue eyes, dark hair, dark complexion. He appears to have been a mutant, as he had five feet, and was only 10 inches tall. (There may be another way to read that.)

The form also mentions that he was captured at the Battle of Vicksburg, and paroled on July 7th. Another form says he was captured on July 4th, and the Wikipedia article confirms that was when the surrender occurred. So he was a PoW for 3 days. (I am not a Civil War buff, so while I vaguely recalled that the Battle of Vicksburg was one of the important battles I had to memorize in high school, I had to look it up to find the details.)

So how well does the documentation match up with the brief bio that appears in: A Brief History of John and Christian Fretz and a Complete Genealogical Family Register With Biographies of their Descendants from the Earliest Available Records to the Present Time – by Rev A.J. Fretz of Milton N.J. copyright 1890. Mennonite Publishing Co. Elkhart, Indiana. pp. 326-333.

This is the Civil War info:

he joined the 2nd, Texas Company Volunteers, mustered at Marcos, Hays County, in the summer of 1861, and served throughout the war in the Confederate service. He was taken prisoner at Vicksburgh, Mississippi, was exchanged, and laid in the hospital at Galveston until the close of the war.

Company is correct. He actually enlisted on June 12, 1862. The "Second Company" itself wasn't formed until September of 1861. There's a Regimental Return form filled out for every month from March 1864 until April 1865 identifying him as a teamster, so I don't think he was in the hospital until the close of war, unless there were teams of horses for him to drive through the corridors of the hospital. However, the 'Descriptive List' says he was paroled by 'the medical authorities', so maybe from July 1863-March 1864, which is a significant amount of time. On the other hand, there are no hospital forms in the dossier -- I'm not sure if those would have been kept separate or not.

One thing I am curious about the Fretz history is who submitted the information for Ebenezer's family. Rev Fretz supposedly began researching for the book in 1872, which is when Ebenezer died. His brother Samuel, and sister-in-law were both deceased too. He had one sister, Elizabeth, and one brother, William, who may have submitted the information. His wife Sarah is another possibility. That's the biggest problem with the book - there are very few citations.

I can do it!

Terry's inspired me.

As I mention on my new blog, I've done this before, seven years ago, before I knew about blogging.

My Happy Valentine

The past few days I've been going through my own photo albums removing photographs I wish to scan. This morning, February 14th, before work I turned a page and found this photo I decided I had to share.

1) It illustrates that back in 1995, when I first began growing my beard, I actually started off going for the 'Honest Abe' look. I finally caved into pressure, and laughter, and grew a mustache. Lincoln's Birthday, of course, was Feb 12th, 199 years ago. I had both friends and family tell me the style was 'a little out-of-date.'

2) Seeing this photograph of my grandmother, Sissie (Feinstein) Newmark, and me -- on the morning of Valentine's Day - makes me question the randomness of events.

Now that the writer's strike is over...

It's time for awards!

In particular, it's time for the First Annual Academy of Genealogy and Family History iGene Awards. These are awards given out by genea-bloggers for their best posts in the previous year. According to the stated rules posts between Jan 1 and Feb 15th are permitted to receive awards.

Here are the categories:

Best Picture

Sphinx Chinning on some sandbags

Even though for sentimental reasons I like looking at the photo of myself at age 13 with my grandparents, I think my favorite photo is of my grandfather in Egypt during WWII. The combination of history with family is appealing. The sandbags make the photograph unique.

Best Screen Play

It was difficult choosing a family story I shared which I thought would make a good movie, because I haven't shared many family stories. One story I considered briefly I decided deserved a different award. I then realized that the best movie could probably be made, not from something I wrote, but from something a collateral ancestor of mine wrote.

Mother – a poem by Ida Green

This poem covers a lifetime of struggles and hardships. It would be a depressing movie, with few special FX. Not the typical movie I like to see. Which probably means it would be a critical success. I don’t know who I would like to cast as I don’t know what any of the key players looked like.

Best Documentary

It wasn't difficult choosing the most informational article about my family's history

August 31, 1902

Here I took the marriage certificate of my great-grandfather’s brother, and researched what I could from the names, and places I was given. As a sidenote: the second-great-granddaughter-in-law of the Cantor found the article and left a comment, and I found a few more links for her which can be found in the comment thread.

Best Biography

The winner of this category is the one I briefly considered for Best Screenplay.

The Vicious Chiffonier

The post is mostly a partial transcript of an audio tape. It narrates a tragic event in Transylvania as told by my grandfather and his brother seventy years afterwards.

Best Comedy

The final category was the one with the stiffest competition. I like humor. My choice:

Olo Chubb Baggins of Pincups

GeneaBloggers were challenged by CowHampshire to post something funny, and this was one of my contributions. I went to a Hobbit Name Generator and converted the names of all my ancestors through four generations and then created a tree-chart using my genealogy software.


Excuse me!
What's the matter?
This is your grandma!
I recognized your voice, Grandma.
You have four grandparents, and you had five categories, and still, you forgot me!
I didn't forget you.
With everything you've written about the Dudelsacks, you think you could have found an award for one of those posts!
I did Grandma.
Which one?
The last one. Selig is the only ancestor whose Hobbit-name I mentioned in the commentary that went along with the post.
Oh. Well, I guess...
And you're going to be in my next post.
I am? Well, alright then.

I can do it!

I have hope!

I finally believe that I will one day be able to extend my family lines back 800 years, perhaps 1000!

Scientists declare we might someday live to be 800-1000 years old

That would make my task easier. Just a matter of waiting long enough, and keeping track of descendants.

Of course, this assumes the world's politicians don't destroy the Earth in that time period due to Malthusian Principles.

Time to Colonize!

(I suspect someone might tell me that The Independent isn't a primary source. Or even a very good secondary one.)

Mea Culpa

If The Genealogue is correct and WorldConnect isn’t a Primary Source…-- and I am inclined to agree --OneWorldTree definitely isn’t.

However, under the philosophy of visiting the sins of the parents unto the children…if you aren’t a fan of the holiday that is today…you can either blame me, Patrick Swayze, some of our kin, or perhaps a few other individuals. (Of course, if you like the holiday, we get the credit too, right?)

There is a theory that the only reason today is associated with Cupid is due to a poem Geoffrey Chaucer wrote.

In 1381, Chaucer was busy composing a poem in honor of the arranged marriage between England's Richard II and Anne of Bohemia. This was a very big deal indeed, and Chaucer was looking for just the right saint to honor on May 3, the day Richard II signed the papers of engagement to his Bohemia beauty.

His search ended, Kelly surmises, when Chaucer learned that a Saint Valentine of Genoa had an honorary feast day on May 3. Perfect! So he wrote the poem "The Parliament of Fowls" in the couple's honor.

"The Parliament of Fowls" literally means "the meeting of birds," says Kelly. "Chaucer dreamed up the idea that all birds chose their mates on May 3rd," he says.

After Chaucer's death in 1400, Valentine's Day celebrations got pushed back to February.

Why exactly is unclear, however, if you forgot about today, and someone is upset, perhaps you can use this information to give yourself a few extra months.

First Annual Blogger Poet Roundup Submission

Terry is sponsoring the First Annual Blogger Poet Roundup. Since I enjoy both reading and writing poetry, I couldn't not participate.

He asked for six line poems about one's own blog

• the first three lines must end in rhyming words
  
• the fourth and fifth line must rhyme
  
• and the sixth line must rhyme with the first three.
  
• Here is the general rhyming scheme to follow: AAABBA
  

Originally he called it a limerick, and said limerick meter was optional.
Then he revised the post to indicate it was a sestet - like the last six lines of a sonnet.
He said nothing new about meter, so I decided to write my sestet in pentameter (five feet).
Though I'm certain there are several feet that aren't iambic.

He said I could submit three, so this is my first submission. If I compose any more, I will tack them on to this post.

TransylvanianDutch - by John Newmark

In his jammies, he finds some distant kin –
Or in the library microfilm bin
He’ll uncover where ancestors have been.
Then he’ll post what he has found on TransDutch
Along with jokes, funny names, and much much
More he hopes others find interest in.

Poem #2

Poetry my ancestors wrote
and Friday Fives add a coat
of humor. Maybe I will post a phot
ograph or two to entertain a rube
or explain how to download videos from youtube.
I don’t believe I’ve mentioned my goat.


Other posts with my poetry:
Genealogy Limericks
Genealogy Haiku/Senryu
Genealogy Jenny