RootsWeb Review: RootsWeb's Weekly E-zine 7 September 2005, Vol. 8, No. 36, Circulation: 804,154+ (c) 1998-2005 RootsWeb.com, Inc. http://www.rootsweb.com/ * * * Editor: Myra Vanderpool Gormley, Certified Genealogist Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com Certification: http://www.bcgcertification.org/certification/ * * * RootsWeb HelpDesk http://helpdesk.rootsweb.com/ * * * =============================================================== IN THIS ISSUE: 1. NEWS, NOTES, AND SITES WORTH SEEING 1a. Editor's Desk: "Hurricane Katrina Message Board" "RootsWeb Meeting at FGS" "Lessons Online" 1b. Tips from Readers: "Outmaneuvering Index Problems" "Thinking Outside the Name Box" "Packing Right and Tight" "Checking Your Citations" 1c. Using RootsWeb: "Sorting Out the Jones Boys" Part I 2. Connecting Through RootsWeb: "Bringing 'em Home to Bristol" 3. New RootsWeb Mailing Lists 4. New Webpages at RootsWeb 5. New/Updated FreePages and HomePages 6. New User-contributed Databases 7. RootsWeb Review's Bottomless Mailbag: "Learning Lessons; Cherishing Places" "'Take Me Home, Country Roads'" "Putting Spin on Family Stories" "Naming the Children" 8. Humor/Humour: "Revealing Census Notes" 9. Subscriptions, Submissions, Advertising, Reprints =============================================================== IN THIS ISSUE: 1. NEWS, NOTES, AND SITES WORTH SEEING 1a. EDITOR'S DESK: Hurricane Katrina Message Board The aftereffects of Hurricane Katrina, which hit several U.S. states recently, will be felt for some time. A message board was created to enable you to post inquiries about your loved ones, friends, neighbors, and "genie friends" who may have been in harm's way. Hopefully, when they are able to get online, they will post here to let us know they are OK and to share their stories of survival. Queries and news about archives, libraries, repositories, cemeteries, and other items of genealogical interest are also appropriate for this board. Offers to help the victims of the hurricane should be directed the appropriate agencies, such as the Red Cross, Salvation Army, etc. http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec?htx=board&r=rw&p=hurricanekatrina2005 * * * RootsWeb Meeting at FGS on September 9 You are invited to attend a RootsWeb discussion meeting that is being held in conjunction with the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) annual national conference in Salt Lake City, Utah at 2 p.m. on Friday, 9 September in room 250A at the exhibitor's hall. Attending the RootsWeb meeting at FGS does not require conference registration. The exhibitor's hall and the Ancestry.com booth are open to the public, free of charge. Since seating is limited, please help us plan for the right number by sending an e-mail to: trees@myfamilyinc.com with "RootsWeb meeting" in the subject line. Even if you can't attend the meeting we'd still like to hear from you. Send a message to trees@myfamilyinc.com with "RootsWeb" in the subject line, and share with us what you like about RootsWeb, anything you don't like, and any ideas that you have to make it better. * * * Lessons Online: Immigration and Naturalization Research Class ($29.95). Starts September 15. Learn about your ancestors' migration patterns from various places in Europe to the United States, Canada, and Australia since the mid-1500s. Learn about immigration and naturalization records from various time periods and about research using both traditional reference resources and detailed Internet search techniques. http://ancestry.myfamily.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=3598&sourceid=481 1b. TIPS FROM READERS: Outmaneuvering Index Problems By Pat Bowmaster In Sue Moran's letter, she stated, "It was common at one time to write the 'n' with a sag in the middle instead of the two humps used today." She had found misindexed names where the 'n' in Andy was mistaken for a 'u.' I have found the reverse to also be true. In search for the SIAU family, I hit many a dead end until I tried looking for SIAN. After finding SIAN in the census indexes, I looked at the original documents and found that some of them were, in fact, the SIAU families that I had been searching for. * * * Thinking Outside the Name Box By Vince Summers I received a tip that led me to think my cousin's relation was buried as: Ada M. One Star so I went to the SSDI (http://ssdi.rootsweb.com/) since the dates were 1897-1977. Surely she would be there. Alas, no Ada STAR. So I got to thinking about it, and this fool notion popped into my head: Try One Star as one name -- ONESTAR. Bingo! ADA ONESTAR, born 16 March 1897, died May 1977. * * * Packing Right and Tight By Susan Biedron I have made several genealogical trips to Europe and my additional advice is to pack genealogy files in your carry-on luggage. I have copied essential information needed for the research and printed it in a condensed version on both sides of the paper to save space if necessary. I make copies of any old photos, leaving the originals at home. I also make a list of questions I need to ask and particular locations, houses, etc. that I need to see, arranged chronologically by the itinerary. Even with a "to do" list, it is easy to get distracted and neglect to look back at the list. If you are meeting with a long lost cousin, for example, there is often so much conversation going on, that it is easy to get sidetracked. Make it a point when you are back in your hotel or room at night to review your plans. * * * Checking Your Citations By Sue McElhaney I recently came across a GEDCOM file with a small bit of information on my 2nd-great-granfather, THOMAS J. GREENWOOD, where the submitter cited the book, "Brushmen and Vigilantes; Civil War Dissent in Texas," by David Pickering and Judy Falls. It was very plain to any of the other family members who had read the well-researched book, that this submitter had not. My word of advice: If you are going to cite a document, book, or any other record, please read it first. 1c. USING ROOTSWEB: Sorting Out the Jones Boys. Part I [Editor's note: The names are fictitious, but circumstances in the story are based on actual events and real family stories.] Jack JONES retired in June after 40 years working at his chosen career as a research scientist. He hadn't done badly for someone who had been the first person ever in his family to attend college. This first summer of retirement was devoted to traveling with wife, Judy, and then seeing youngest son, James, off for his senior year at the university. On the long drive to deposit James and his belongings at college, the conversation turned again to the old subject of how lucky they were to not have suffered the hardships of the generations of JONESes that had preceded them. Jack had never known his grandfather who had been the last of many generations of coal miners. His paternal great-grandfather JONES had emigrated from Glamorgan, Wales, ending up in Harlan County, Kentucky, USA in search of a better life. But lacking education, he found himself bound to the treacherous job of working in the mines. Grandfather JONES was killed in a mining accident when Jack's father, the youngest of 10 children, was a small boy. It was the urging and hard work of Jack's grandmother that led her youngest son on the path that took him out of the mines. Two of Jack's uncles were killed in mining accidents and one was lost in World War II. Jack's grandmother was determined that no similar disastrous fate was going to befall the baby of the family. Jack had heard all of these stories and more over the years and he told himself that after he retired he'd devote time to learning more about his family history. Now that summer was over, his son was at college, and the house was quiet, he decided to follow through with his plans. As a scientist, Jack approached everything in a methodical manner. He began by gathering all of the items of possible significance that he could find around the house. He'd inherited a family Bible that included a lot of papers giving information about his JONES ancestry, but he wasn't sure how accurate it all was. The story was that three brothers -- John, William "Willie," and Hugh -- immigrated to America in the 1860s. John and Willie had fought on the Union side during the Civil War and Hugh ended up fighting for the Confederacy. Jack wasn't sure why the brothers separated like this and fought for different sides in the war. This truly pitted brother against brother, if the information was accurate. After the war, John settled into life as a coal miner in Kentucky, Willie moved out West in search of adventure and fortune where he married the daughter of an Indian chief -- an actual Indian princess. Hugh became disenchanted after the war and went Australia where the family lost touch with him. At least this was the story according to handwritten notes Jack found inside the yellowed pages of the family Bible. The handwriting was his mother's and he didn't know how much of this information she had known first-hand. Also, the family Bible, although old and crumbling in places, wasn't old enough for the entries inside to have been made at the time the events they recorded occurred. The Bible was published in Philadelphia in 1901 and the events on the family pages began with births in Wales in the 1840s. So Jack felt it important to find other means of verifying all of this information. Jack's father once gave him a family Coat of Arms for Christmas that he said he purchased at the local shopping mall. Jack had always been curious about heraldry and wondered how his JONES family had come to have family crest. That was yet another subject he planned to look into while doing his family history. The Internet was the first place Jack looked for information on how to begin searching one's family history. He located the RootsWeb Guide: (http://rwguide.rootsweb.com/) and Ancestry.com's Learning Center: (http://www.ancestry.com/learn/) where he began studying the information provided on and linked from those sites. From the RootsWeb homepage ( http://www.rootsweb.com), he located Cyndi's List and clicked on a link to the page for beginners (http://www.cyndislist.com/beginner.htm). Jack was now on his way to learning about his family history. First, he decided to find the ship that brought his JONES ancestor to America from Wales. Next Week: Part II: Awash in JONESes 2. Connecting Through RootsWeb. Thanks for sharing your stories. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Bringing 'em Home to Bristol Dawn Gallagher in Bristol, England In response to Richard May's family coincidence, I thought I might share my own experience with coincidence. I was born in Liverpool, North West England, I moved to Yate, near Bristol, South West England when I was seven, my dad had a job in nearby Keynsham. As I grew up I worked in central Bristol, everyday walking past The Priory Church of St. James and promising myself more time one day to wander into it. I also daily visited the shopping centre which was on a street called "The Haymarket." Anyway, years passed, when I met my second husband who is from Scunthorpe, the North East of England, he moved down to the south west to be with me. So, this is when I started researching our family history. I started with a photograph of his great-great-grandparents and their six children. Olivia being my husband's great-grandmother. My husband's mother informed me her family was originally from Manchester, the North West of England, so I dug and dug and couldn't find any documents to prove they were in Manchester, apart from Olivia's marriage certificate. So, I started to look a bit closer to the great-great-grandparents, I knew their names were George BATTEN and Rhoda Elizabeth WILCOX, so I used the Births/Deaths and Marriage Index on Ancestry.com to see if I could come up with a match -- which I did! -- to my amazement the district they married in was Bristol, so I sent off for the marriage certificate and to my utter shock found they had married in The Priory Church of St. James's, the same one I passed year by year and didn't find the time to visit. Also, they lived on "The Haymarket." So, this started my search for all of their siblings, I found out that George and Rhoda had two brothers and two sisters respectively who also married each other. My husband is seriously into motorbike trials, and when he first moved down here he used to travel through a village called Pensford. I finally tracked down the family of George and Rhoda's brother and sister Joseph and Louisa to this village. Not only that, but the family still live in the same house as they did in the 1800s, my husband had been driving past this house on numerous occasions to get to his trials. He goes to a place called Chew Magna to do his motorbike trials. Guess what? The other brother and sister of George and Rhoda, James and Sarah lived in Chew Magna. You might think that is the end of the coincidence? Not so, as I have mentioned before I live in Yate. I finally tracked down the birth of George BATTEN to a village called North Common, Bitton -- five miles from where I live now. Also, another BATTEN -- Joseph, the son of George and Rhoda, lived in Keynsham, he was the village policeman -- Keynsham being the reason my family moved to Bristol in the first place. So, both our families have been linked with this area, his more than 160 years ago, and now mine and his today. We have a daughter together, I like to feel we have brought back his family to Bristol. ======================== Advertisements ============================ BOOK NOTES: "New York (upstate) in 1905," by Michael Engle. The book uses old newspaper articles from all over upstate New York to tell the story of life there in 1905. At the book's website, you can find an index for every location mentioned in the book and for the more than 3,000 names mentioned. Upstate New York was considered as from Dutchess County, north and west-ward. http://www.nydiners.com/1905.html * * * GET HELP WITH YOUR BRITISH GENEALOGY British Ancestors, a British company with researchers throughout England and Scotland has helped more than 4,500 satisfied clients worldwide since 1999. Researchers will search the records of your English and Scottish ancestors stored in archives throughout England and Scotland, most of which are unavailable on the Internet. Friendly service, affordable prices and free research assessments. For a FREE! no-obligation research assessment visit http://www.britishancestors.com/consultrwr/ ====================== End Advertisements ============================== 3. New Mailing Lists at RootsWeb Request a New Mailing List: http://resources.rootsweb.com/adopt/ ----------------------------------------------------------------- MAILING LISTS. Brand-new mailing lists can be found under OTHER/MISCELLANEOUS until moved to their proper categories. For information and an index to the more than 29,400 RootsWeb-hosted genealogy Mailing Lists and for easy subscribing (joining) options go to: http://lists.rootsweb.com/ No new mailing lists this week. 4. New Webpages at RootsWeb To Request a Free Web Account: http://accounts.rootsweb.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------- Some of these webpages might not yet be accessible. They are created by volunteers, so if one that interests you isn't up yet, please check again in a few days or next week. http://www.rootsweb.com/~[accountname] Note that the ~[tilde] before the Web account name is required. For example, the URL of the Madawaska County, New Brunswick website is: http://www.rootsweb.com/~nbmadawa/ AUSTRALIA ~ausaphs -- Alstonville Plateau Historical Society ~ausalsto -- Alstonville Plateau CANADA ~nbmadawa -- Madawaska County (New Brunswick) ~nbvictor -- Victoria County (New Brunswick) JAPAN ~jpnfukuo -- Fukuoka U.S.A. ~nyrcessar -- Rochester Empire State (New York) Chapter SAR ~ncps -- Parker Society (North Carolina) ~txnsdcw -- National Society Daughters of Colonial Wars (Texas) ~txthcnscd -- Governor Thomas Hinckley (Texas) Chapter NSCD ~gamsbcdar -- Martha Stewart Bulloch (Georgia) Chapter DAR ~iltdcdar -- Toussaint Dubois (Illinois) Chapter DAR ~ncjackso -- Jackson County (North Carolina) ~mtdawson -- Dawson County (Montana) VIETNAM ~vnmisa -- Misa Key: DAR — Daughters of the American Revolution SAR — Sons of the American Revolution NSCD — National Society of the Colonial Dames of America 5. New/Updated Freepages and Homepages -------------------------------------- Can your cousins find your website at RootsWeb? Has it ever been mentioned here or do you have a new, updated, or substantially revised website at RootsWeb (it will have "freepages" or "homepages" in the URL)? Send the URL (its Web address), along with a brief description, including the major pertinent surnames and what is available on your site, to: Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com ALLISON/ELLISON DNA Project. Charts of the current participants have been updated recently. There are more than 60 participants and still growing. Finding family origins and new cousins are two benefits of participation. All ALLISON/ELLISON (or variant spellings of this surname) males are invited to join the project. The goal is to find common ancestors and establish the genetic connections among the various families through Y-Chromosome DNA test results. http://freepages.family.rootsweb.com/~allisonellisondna/ MAY. Richard May's family tree at WorldConnect has been updated. Surnames include: MAY, HOWITT, LAPWOOD (LAPPETT), BAYLISS, BARRATT, BLENCOWE, SCOTT, VINEY, LITTLE, HONOUR, LAMB, NORTON, BOOCOCK, WOODHEAD, GILBERT, COOK, ORTON, TAWLKS, THURLBY, READ, JOHNSON, CLIFTON, BRACEY, RELTON, GORNALL, WARBRICK, DICKINSON, KNOWLES, PARKINSON, BAINES, COWELL, CARTER, TAYLOR, HANDLEY, GILLIAM, POWELL, BEATY, PARRY, and JONES. Places (all in England) include: Sudbury, Suffolk; Bristol; Leicester; Preston; Bolton; Wotton-under-Edge, Glos.; Whittlesey, Cambs; Hethe, Oxfordshire; Helmdon, Northants; Maidstone; Dover; Deal, Kent; Mansfield, Notts; Nottingham; Doncaster; Fleetwood, Lancs; Manchester. http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com//cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=richjmay MYERS of INDIANA; DAVIS of MINNESOTRA. Includes JONES, WALTERS, NELSON, OWENS, ROBERTS, REED, KOWINSKI, CRANE, and ZELLMER. References included; download GEDCOMs. http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=billmyers1931 NEW ZEALAND RIVER DROWNINGS--1840-1881. Dedicated to the nearly 2,000 people who drowned in New Zealand rivers between 1 January 1840 and 30 June 1881. This is also a memorial to all those who died from the "New Zealand Disease." http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~sooty/nzriverdrownings.html SHEFFIELD, CAMPBELL, HIGHTOWER, EASTER AND MARTIN. http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=glendags 6. New User-Contributed Databases at RootsWeb http://userdb.rootsweb.com/submit/ ---------------------------------------------- The following databases have come online recently. They are searchable, but not browseable. Search: To look for specific data or occurrence of text in a file. Browse: To view the entire contents of a file or a group of files. CALIFORNIA. Napa County. Calistoga Centennial group members; 359 records. Lori Wicks http://userdb.rootsweb.com/groups/ San Joaquin County. 1881 marriages; 356 records; Karen Hendricks http://userdb.rootsweb.com/marriages/ FLORIDA. Brevard County. Cocoa. "Cocoa Tribune"; deaths 1917-1924; 318 records; deaths 1925-1929; 299 records; deaths 1930-1934; 395 records; Jim and Bonnie Garmon http://userdb.rootsweb.com/obituaries/ KANSAS. Osborne County. Portis. Portis High School juniors, 1932; 14 records. Carrie White http://userdb.rootsweb.com/alumni/ 7. FROM ROOTSWEB REVIEW'S BOTTOMLESS MAILBAG [Editor's note: The opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the editor or of RootsWeb.com]. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Learning Lessons; Cherishing Places By Mary Greene in Fairview, Texas, USA This week, as many of us, my thoughts constantly stay with the devastating news in New Orleans and on the Gulf Coast. As a relocated New Orleanian, it breaks my heart to see what's happening to my city. I've spent so many wonderful, memorable years there growing up and during the many return visits. My families' homes are probably ruined as well as those of my ancestors. They were in the 9th Ward since the 1860s. While viewing the images of shattered windows in the Hyatt Hotel downtown, the amateur genealogist in me shuddered to think about the New Orleans Public Library, whose eighth floor houses some extensive, priceless information. Is it safe? Also came to mind were the two pieces of paper laying here on my desk waiting to be handled. One is to send off for a CD of St. Paul's Lutheran church records, also in the 9th Ward, and the other to send for a copy of my mother's obituary from that very library. Perhaps neither of these may be obtainable now. Benjamin Franklin was certainly correct about not putting off things until tomorrow. * * * 'Take Me Home, Country Roads' By Amy in Central Virginia, USA In response to Richard May recent article in the RootsWeb Review, regarding unexplainable coincidences, it has happened to me, too. After years of searching for affordable property in the country, we finally found a place that just "felt right" with the proverbial 40 acres and an 1847 log cabin. A few years later I started down the genealogy path, initially knowing very little about family history. Surprisingly, research revealed we had moved to within four miles, as the crow flies, of where my great- grandparents lived in the mid- to late-1800s in a log cabin my great- grandfather had built and which old pictures showed looked amazingly like ours. Additionally, he was known to "hire out" to other farmers in the area. Our property had once been part of one of the largest farms in the area and the owner and my ancestor were the same age, so it is not much of a stretch to conclude he had worked on the very same land where we now live. Some might call it coincidence, but I believe it is the call of the bloodline. * * * Putting Spin on Family Stories By Bill Trimble in DeSoto, Kansas, USA All of us have stories of our ancestors most of which are handed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. These are anything from being hanged as a horse thief, related to a president or being a war hero. My case is the later -- I was always told that my paternal great- grandfather Allen TRIMBLE was shell-shocked during the Civil War and spent that last years of his life in a mental institution suffering from what is now known as post-traumatic stress disorder. I recently ordered his military file from the National Archives and like a boy with a new toy I gleaned the pages for information I didn't have. I copied information and entered it on my family tree program and sat back satisfied at what I had accomplished. But, the more I sat, the more I realized I had missed something, but what? I picked the papers back up and went through them again looking for a fact that had eluded me. As I scanned the records one little sentence caught my eye, "Discharged from service December 24, 1864 for medical disability (syphilis)." What this taught me was stories are great for fireside chats, but are not etched in stone. Ancestors will always try to put spin on a story so as to put as much good light on a family member as they can. Blood is thicker than water, but stories are just that -- stories. * * * Naming the Children By Dot Moritz in Florida, USA In reference to a recent Humor section of the RootsWeb Review about the long, unusual names given four children in the late 1800s, I suggest that the list reveals that the mother was a reader of all sorts of literature. For example, Melanethon (almost certainly should be Melanchthon) was the name of a friend and co-worker of Martin Luther and a mover and shaker in his own right in early Reformation history. However Fenelon was a Catholic bishop or something, not a Protestant of any sort. Agripina is a feminine form of a name from the Bible, Agrippa, one of the Herods of New Testament infamy. And there was a fairly well-known (in his time) Bishop Selwyn for whom the youngest may have been named. It appears that the parents (probably the mother, but who knows?) were well read and probably simply liked the sound of the names. It can't have been admiration for the people themselves, because their religions, histories and characters are so dissimilar. And with Shakespearean characters, poets, military leaders, etc. in the mix, it points to parents who were great readers. It does make one wonder what the children were actually called in normal conversation -- Aggie, Melly, Fenny and Selly? 8. Humor/Humour: Revealing Census Notes --------------------------------------- In an 1870 U.S. census, I found this notation for an adult daughter living at home with her parents. Her occupation was listed as "no gumption." -- Thanks to: James Cobb I found this note at the end of the New York 1825 census for Pamelia, Jefferson County: "Oldest inhabitant in town is 105 years and no prospect of her dying." -- Thanks to: Carolyn Springer in Fresno, California, USA Rebecca Crow's occupation was "living at ease" in J. R. Strong's household in the 1880 Rusk County, Texas census. He was her son-in- law. -- Thanks to: Katherine L. Short in Breckenridge, Texas, USA * * * Found a humorous sign or entry in census, parish, church, etc. records? Send to: Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com 9. Subscriptions, Submissions, Advertising, Reprints ----------------------------------------------------- SUBSCRIPTIONS. To manage your e-mail communications (i.e. to subscribe or unsubscribe to this newsletter, or to sign up for others), visit our newsletter management center any time at: http://newsletters.rootsweb.com/ If you use a spam-filtering program, in order to receive the RootsWeb Review please make sure that you're allowing e-mail from: newsletter@reply.myfamilyinc.com The RootsWeb Review is a free publication of MyFamily.com, Inc., 360 West 4800 North, Provo, UT, 84604 * * * The RootsWeb Review does not publish or answer genealogical queries, and the editor regrets that she is unable to provide any personal research assistance or advice. RootsWeb Review welcomes short (500 words or less) articles, humor, stories, or letters, and reserves the right to edit all submissions. The announcement of books and products is provided as a community service and is not an endorsement in any way. All mail sent to the RootsWeb Review editor is considered to be for publication — send in plain text (please, no attachments) to: Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com * * * ROOTSWEB REVIEW ADVERTISING CONTACTS. Ad Sales Worldwide: Shana Davis, creative@myfamilyinc.com * * * REPRINTS. Permission to reprint articles from RootsWeb Review is granted unless specifically stated otherwise, provided: (1) the reprint is used for non-commercial, educational purposes; and (2) the following notice appears at the end of the article: Previously published in RootsWeb Review: 7 September 2005, Vol. 8, No. 36. * * * *