RootsWeb Review: RootsWeb's Weekly E-zine 11 October 2006, Vol. 9, No. 41 (c) 1998-2006 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: Check here for announcements: http://helpdesk.rootsweb.com/ * * * ROOTSWEB REVIEW ARCHIVES: Current and previous editions: http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/review/2006/1011.txt http://e-zine.rootsweb.com/ ========================================================= IN THIS ISSUE: 1. 1a. EDITOR'S DESK: NEWS, NOTES, AND SOME SITES WORTH SEEING NEWS: Sprechen Sie Deutsch? BOOK NOTES: John Woodhouse Biography SITES: Georgia, Michigan and Oregon State Archives 1b. Tips from Readers: Making Irish Eyes Smile 1c. Using RootsWeb: Finding Proper Balance with WorldConnect 2. Connecting Through RootsWeb: Rounding Up Three Brothers' Families 3. New User-contributed Databases 4. New/Updated FreePages and HomePages 5. New at RootsWeb 6. RootsWeb Review's Bottomless Mailbag: Creating Global Connections Untangling the Ridings and Other English Places Don't Believe Everything You Read 7. Humor/Humour: Citrus Genealogy 8. Subscriptions, Submissions, Advertising, Reprints ======================================================= IN THIS ISSUE: 1a. EDITOR'S DESK: NEWS, NOTES; SOME SITES WORTH SEEING NEWS: SPRECHEN SIE DEUTSCH? Do you speak German? If so, would you like to volunteer to become a board administrator for the upcoming brand-new German-language Ancestry message boards? Please send an e-mail (in English, please!) to boardfeedback@ancestry.com for more information. Note: These boards will not be part of the current RootsWeb/Ancestry.com board setup. Stay tuned for more news. * * * BOOK NOTES: WOODHOUSE. A biography, "John Woodhouse, a Remarkable Mormon Pioneer" is a story by Ron Woodhouse about his Woodhouse ancestor who was from Adwick le Street, Doncaster, England. John Woodhouse was baptised at 20 years of age in Sheffield and immediately became a priest, converted a number of members to the church including his parents and siblings. The family sailed to America in 1851 and the book traces their difficult journey to Utah, then records John's life and times in the early days of the development of Utah. He left his large family after 25 years to return to England as a senior missionary and became president of the Latter-day Saints Church in Leeds and later in Bristol. After his return to Lehi, Utah, he continued as a farmer, trader, justice, church elder and family man with more than 160 members of his family alive at the time of his death. The book costs $14.50 (£8.95 in England) plus postage. To order, contact the author at: ron@woodhouse-online.co.uk * * * SOME SITES WORTH SEEING: Georgia State Archives http://www.georgiaarchives.org/ http://www.georgiaarchives.org/what_do_we_have/online_indexes/ Michigan: History, Arts and Libraries: Naturalization Records Indexes http://www.michigan.gov/hal/0,1607,7-160-17449_18635_20684---,00.html Oregon State Archives. http://arcweb.sos.state.or.us/banners/genealogy.htm * * * 1b. TIPS FROM READERS: Making Irish Eyes Smile By Marian Crowley Chamberlain My great-great-grandparents, James CROWLEY and Ellen BURKE, came to the United States in 1845 from Ireland. Trying to find where in Ireland is a little like finding that needle in the haystack. The surname CROWLEY made west Cork County a likely possibility, but there are CROWLEYs almost everywhere in west Cork. In Ellen BURKE's obituary it states she was born "near Queenstown," but I've researched the church records in Queenstown and she wasn't baptized there. For years I put these ancestors on the back burner. Then, in re-reading a genealogy that a second cousin did in the 1970s, I noted that Ellen BURKE's two siblings, Daniel BURKE and Susan Driscoll BURKE, didn't come to the States until the 1880s. Civil birth registration in Ireland began in 1865. So I began searching the Family History Library films of birth registration. And, lo and behold, found Susan's family in Cork County, Tullagh Parish, Glannafeen Townland! And Daniel's family nearby in Myross Parish, Cooldurragh Townland. Of special interest on the registration of one of Daniel's children is the listing of "present at birth," which I'm guessing is midwife. On this child's registration the person present at birth was Susan BURKE. It took me awhile to see the obvious. I knew from the genealogy that Ellen, Daniel, and Susan's mother was Susan WHOLLEY. And I tend to think of her by her family [maiden] name. But, of course, her married name was BURKE! In essence I have discovered that my great-great-great-grand- mother was still alive in 1868 and delivered her grandchild -- and namesake, Susan BURKE. If your primary ancestor's trail is a dead end, try researching their relatives. It may yield surprising results. * * * 1c. USING ROOTSWEB: Finding Proper Balance with WorldConnect We all reach the point when recording our family history data where we'd like to share our findings with others and make it possible for others researching the same ancestors to find us and possibly add new branches to our family trees. We probably all would agree that an excellent way to accomplish these goals is to post our tree online at RootsWeb's WorldConnect (http://wc.rootsweb.com/). However, at this point, we may begin to have concerns over what data we want to make public on the Internet for all to see and what data we wish to preserve privately for only our close family members to access. We may have extensive notes, including the fact that Uncle Harry tippled a little and that cousin Joe liked to play high stakes poker and lost his shirt, not to mention in his house, in a card game. We might have included a note about a Black Sheep family member who landed in prison, or perhaps we listed dates indicating that Aunt Sue's oldest son was born only two months after she married Uncle Jim. While facts carry no judgment, sometimes other family members might and they may find it difficult or embarrassing to read these things plastered across a public Web page. While facts are facts and we'd like to preserve them no matter what, to pass down to our descendants; there are occasions where we don't want to share everything with the entire world. This may entail excluding our notes or sources for some or all individuals and events when we are uploading our GEDCOM to WorldConnect or elsewhere on the Internet. But then, most of us also would like to use an online family tree as a secure backup of all our data and would like to have the capability of downloading our complete GEDCOM should we ever need to do so to replace lost data on our computer. We probably all maintain some type of complete backup on a disk, second hard drive, or elsewhere that we house separately from our computer, but backups fail even with meticulous care -- and disasters occur that could result in the loss of the backup file along with the primary database on our computer. Having a backup housed on the Internet, far removed from our computer and even our house, and maintained by a reliable system such as that found at RootsWeb, is the ideal situation, but the dilemma remains how to accomplish all of the above goals using WorldConnect. Many genealogy programs give us the option of "pre-cleaning" our GEDCOMs by removing our notes, sources and/or living individuals. By removing individuals from our file and by eliminating the sources or notes we can most likely avoid any awkward situations of publicly airing our family's dirty linen, but it leaves us with a problem. The information we remove when creating our GEDCOM and never upload to WorldConnect won't be there for us should we ever need to use the GEDCOM as a backup to restore lost data on our computer. Additionally, privatizing a GEDCOM before it is uploaded to WorldConnect, and before it is subjected to WorldConnect's own filters, can actually have the opposite affect of what we hope to achieve. By removing dates from some individuals included in the file we could be removing the very information WorldConnect's living filters need to assess the data in establishing who it will consider "living" and who it will not. The perfect solution is to create a complete all-inclusive GEDCOM and upload it to WorldConnect but to make use of WorldConnect's Advanced Set-up page with its vast array of customized display options. Using the Advanced Set-up page enables us to remove notes, sources, set our own preferred cut-off for having individuals in our file considered as "living." There is even the option to remove specific individuals from our displayed tree completely. All of the above can be accomplished while housing our complete GEDCOM at WorldConnect, hidden from public view, because WorldConnect "stores" our original GEDCOM, complete with all of the notes, sources, and other data we choose not to display publicly as long as we include that data in the GEDCOM we upload. We can also adjust our online display options whenever we want to without uploading a new GEDCOM. Return to the Advanced Set-up page using the original password and usercode and, while leaving the existing path to the GEDCOM intact and merely adjust the various display options and reprocess our existing GEDCOM. We may also choose to retrieve our complete GEDCOM in this same manner using the retrieve GEDCOM button. We can have the best of both worlds and maintain the perfect balance between privacy of delicate facts and publicly displaying the information we wish to share with the world. We also can provide ourselves with a safe backup for our complete GEDCOM at WorldConnect. * * * * * * * * * * Advertisement * * * * * * * * * * REQUEST A SEARCH FOR YOUR ANCESTORS AT THE FAMILY HISTORY LIBRARY ANCESTOR SEEKERS researchers at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City will search this vast collection for your ancestors from the USA, Canada, Australia, Ireland, Germany, Poland, Russia , Holland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Italy. If you commission the work (there's no obligation to do that!) prices start from $55 (US). For a FREE! initial e-mail consultation visit http://www.ancestorseekers.com/research/rwr/ For help in finding ancestors from England or Scotland request a FREE e-mail assessment from http://www.britishancestors.com/ or join us FEBRUARY 18-23 for our Seventh Salt Lake City Research Trip -- the ideal genealogy vacation! * * * * * * * * * * End of Advertisement * * * * * * * * * * 2. CONNECTING THROUGH ROOTSWEB: Rounding Up Three Brothers' Families By Rhoda C. I have been so excited this week, I received an e-mail from a descendant of Harry Lee MARRINER, my grandmother's brother (one of three). She sent me data on all his descendants! She found me via a Website. She lives in New York state and is about the same age as my oldest child. I sent her my snail mail address and she sent me hers. I did a printout of the MARRINER family back to Gilbert MARRINER, an American Revolutionary War soldier, and some copies of cartoons done by Billy MARRINER, brother to Harry Lee, a poet and newspaperman in Texas. She was delighted. This Harry MARRINER was my brick wall, I found Billy MARRINER online, and his date of death and how he died. Several years ago I got a phone call from a descendant of the other brother, Albert, asking what I had on Lucie MARRINER. We corresponded and sent family pictures, so I sent her an e-mail too, then another with the data on Harry Lee MARRINER. I have several scrapbooks my grandmother made, which included some of Billy MARRINER's cartoons so I sent this newfound cousin a copy of those. I am hoping this new line will lead me to more correspondence with the Texas cousins. * * * Did you leap over some brick walls or cleverly figure out where your grandmother was hiding in a census? Do tell! Dazzle us with your brilliant sleuthing or uncanny luck. We're all ears. Send your tales of genealogical adventure to: Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com 3. New User-Contributed Databases at RootsWeb http://userdb.rootsweb.com/submit/ ---------------------------------------------- The following database has come online recently. It is 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. FLORIDA. Brevard County. Florida Today newspaper obituaries, 1971; 1,148 records; Jim and Bonnie Garmon http://userdb.rootsweb.com/obituaries/ * * * SHARING OPPORTUNITY. Does your alma mater, old military unit, newspapers, church, parish, province, county or state have material available that you think would be of interest to genealogists? Do you have any compiled lists of names or databases (other than your personal genealogy) that you would like to share and that you think would be of value and interest to others? In most cases, RootsWeb would be proud to host such material. http://userdb.rootsweb.com/submit/ 4. 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 * * * AYER. Pertains to descendants of John Ayer, the immigrant ancestor, of Haverhill, Massachusetts. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~ayergenealogy/ BAKER. Images of Myla BAKER's 1928 U.S. passport. She was born 17 September 1879 in Washington, Iowa; was 5-foot-4-inches tall, brown hair and brown eyes, resided in the Gunter Hotel in San Antonio, Texas. She traveled for several months in 1929 returning to the United States before that crash of the stock market and the start of the Depression. She traveled to Galveston, Texas; New York, England, Austria, Czech- oslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Switzerland, Italy, and France. http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~rajordan/passport.html ENGLAND. Directory of the stonemasons, quarrymen, builders, carpenters, plasterers of the West Country with more than 56,000 names and bios. Example: ROBERTS, Oliver, b. abt. 1759 St..Austell-Con, Carpenter, address 1782: Plymouth-Dev. Began service with H.M. Dockyard on April 23, 1782 and was said to be a good workman. Mr. Roberts was 5'5" tall with a fair complexion and brown hair. He served his apprenticeship in St. Austell-Con. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~stonemen/ MY KITH AND KIN. Many surnames from Alabama; each surname has a family history with photos from a 25-year research collection. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~kithandkin2000/ OUR MATERNAL AND PATERNAL ANCESTORS: 300 YEARS OF HISTORY IN AMERICA. New surname pages for: DICKSON; JOHNSON, DISBURY; SHEPERD; Also contains Revolutionary War pension application of William BISHOP and death notice of James DOUGLASS. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~tqpeiffer/ * * * 5. New 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/~xxxxxx[accountname] U.S.A. azcsdiw -- Continental Society Daughters of Indian Wars (Arizona) cajtcdar -- Joshua Tree (California) Chapter DAR casacdar -- Sierra Amador (California) Chapter DAR inccgs -- Cass County Genealogical Society (Indiana) macsaugu -- Saugus (city, Massachusetts) macwakef -- Wakefield (city, Massachusetts) mohhs -- Huntsville Historical Society (Missouri) nybcdar -- Beaverkill (New York) Chapter DAR ortscar -- Takelma Society (Oregon) Chapter CAR tnanders -- Anderson County (Tennessee) tnclaib5 -- Claiborne County (Tennessee) KEY: CAR -- Children of the American Revolution DAR -- Daughters of the American Revolution * * * New Mailing Lists at RootsWeb Request a New Mailing List: http://resources.rootsweb.com/adopt/ ----------------------------------------------------------------- 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 29,800 RootsWeb-hosted genealogy Mailing Lists and for easy subscribing (joining) options go to: http://lists.rootsweb.com/ No new mailing lists this week. 6. 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]. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Creating Global Connections By Phyllis Reed It was wonderful to get the perspective from across the pond and Peter Rutherford had some good points. Recording dates as "19 Aug. 1908" seems backwards to my American ears. While I completely comprehend what day that is, possibly writing it as Aug. 19, 1908 would be equally acceptable to our cousins. Having had friends (and family born there, too) from overseas, I am mindful that when I get a date, say 19/08/1908, this looks obvious but I always check to make sure (example --- "You did mean to say August 19, 1908 -- right?"). While I may appear dense to the person who sent the information, I hope they understand that I have had problems in the past with dates like 06/05/04 that were sent to me, not June 5, 1904, as I thought they meant, but May 6, 1804! We do sometimes get lazy, think the sender probably meant what we thought they meant, but it's important to get it right. We never know when we might lose contact with our source. I haven't run into many problems with changing country borders but hope I will have that challenge as I go back further in time. My challenges now are more often the changes in the U.S. My Dutch relatives hopped on the first available ship across the ocean and then a generation or two later, I find I have lost my Jan VAN HOORNE and John HORN suddenly and magically appears in his place. Relatives appear to move from state to state when in reality they are where they have always been -- political powers chopped one state in two and created a new state. I beg to differ with Peter Rutherford on the lack of repeating place names in the U.K. Our family has been stopped cold for generations trying to find the family origins in Northrop where the family came from ca 1860, almost yesterday by genealogical standards. A search by my cousin turned up two Northrops at the same time in close proximity, although one had since been abandoned. Had the town been moved, the newer one started by residents of the other? The search was then complicated by finding a Northorpe and then discovering my ancestor's journal that confirmed what an incredibly bad speller he was. Not knowing that Northorp literally means "north hamlet" we Americans wonder at the prevalence of all the thorps and thorpes, as baffling to us as the abundance of streets named "Peachtree" something around Atlanta, Georgia, USA and just as frustrating to pin down. I think I may have finally found my Northorpe, though, after locating a period map and noting the close proximity of the church where his daughter was married and other landmarks in his journal. Now if I can find a trace of the family there I will be all set! On the subject of major cities in the U.K., I think we Yanks are all fine with that. We are happy to do the extra work and find out where the places are and note with excitement that it is "on the water!" or "close to London!" or "on the border with Scotland!". Our cousins that we left behind need to remember that the U.S. is a huge country in terms of geographical area . . . Just to make things a little more confusing, not all states have counties that are divided into townships and others have different legal divisions. "Parish" in Louisiana, a more familiar designation to us now after Hurricane Katrina, comes to mind. My suggestion is to "Google" the new term, learn a little bit about it and consider it some bonus information and education on the local area's history. It has taken the U.S. Postal Service half a century to get us trained to use the designated abbreviations for states, MA instead of Mass. (Massachusetts), so we are very understanding for the most part if others have a tough time with this; Americans still have a tough time! If you don't believe me, ask a random sampling of Americans what the abbreviations are for Alaska, Arkansas and Arizona? The USPS website can help: http://www.USPS.com/ We all need to be mindful of those regional accents too. My grandmother had a peculiar way of saying some words that some people said was an "Old New York" accent, but I believe the Boston (Bahston) accent along with the old New York accent are remnants of colonial times. It was said that until the 1930s when radio became popular, most Americans did not know what a British accent sounded like. This is an interesting thought because our collective roots were so predominantly from the British Isles and even the newcomers to our country learned how to speak their English from the people already here, who had presumably learned it from their forebears back to the English settlers! My grandmother said that "If you berl your ersters in erl, they'll sperl." Translation: "If you boil your oysters in oil, they'll spoil." For years I searched for her relatives in WARPON, Wisconsin, believing that I was taking into account her accent, looking for some British- sounding town that probably no longer existed. It occurred to me one day as I perused the genealogy online that another city name was quite close and sure enough, when I checked the records, there they were, under WAUPUN, Wisconsin. As a note to our cousins across the water too, Native American (Indian) names have meanings that you might find helpful and informative. For example, "oga" means some kind of water in Iroquois languages, as in the place names Ticonderoga, Canistoga and Saratoga (bitter waters). I try to include all of the spellings in my queries. I ask for information on my Jan VAN HOORNE, later known as John HORN, my GREENLEAFs sometimes spelled GREENLIEF, and try to keep an open mind as I am searching for where my ROBLEEs might have come from, RAPALJE, RABLAIS, ROBILYRD or ROBLE. We should probably do this with place names as well, for example, "originally this country, for a time that country, now this country". Sometimes we Americans take it for granted that others are familiar with the peculiarities here, just as we assume that we know all there is to know about finding towns and information in the U.K. Please feel free to give me a friendly reminder or make certain that I understand some things that might be unique about your system. Aliens from another planet wouldn't know all the details and many of your long-lost cousins might not know either. I promise I won't take offense if I already know what you are explaining to me. Thanks cousins -- we'll work together and find all those family members we share! [Editor's Note. Actually Americans are out of step with the world on the order of dates and we are not even consistent. The order of month, day, year is used by Americans, but its federal government and military often use day, month, year. England originally used day, month, year, then for a short while used month, day, year, and finally reverted to the original form (day, month, year), which was revived around 1900. The U.S. chose to stick with month, day, year. Most genealogy programs can be adjusted on numerical date entries so they know that 5/10/1859 means 10 May 1859 and not 5 October 1859, but the problem always is what date order did someone else use? Spelling out the month and using four-digit numbers for the year helps make it clear what you mean.] * * * Untangling the Ridings and Other English Places By Mark Andrew in Halifax, Yorkshire England UK In last week's RootsWeb Review Peter Rutherford in the UK writes "In Search of Standards: Recording Differences, about UK County names." I specialise on Yorkshire-American family links and often notice that U.S. researchers name Yorkshire as York County. This is, of course, incorrect as the county is YORKSHIRE, simple as that. I realise that many researchers, even in England, do not understand that Yorkshire is divided into three Ridings, East, North, and West. The word Riding deriving from the Norse "Thridings" -- Three Parts. With changes in administration over recent years it has become a habit for some to include South Yorkshire or even South Riding (this was only the name of a novel). Ancestry listings of Births, Deaths and Marriages now put entries in the form of "West Riding -- West Yorkshire." There is no need for this as most of the data is well before 1974 when West Yorkshire was created as an Admin "county" and it only now exists for a number of joint services such as police forces. Peter also asks "Does any problem arise with some large cities in UK where we never use the county name with them" and "as well as those towns that have the same name as the county, e.g. Derby and Warwick? Some cities, of course, are (or were before 1974) counties in their own right,)" Here in Yorkshire we do have a problem with the City of York, in historic terms it is part of the "Ainstey of York" but more associated with the East Riding, except for those parts of the Ainstey to the west, which are also in the West Riding. Our other cities are: Bradford Leeds, Sheffield (West Riding), Kingston upon Hull, (East Riding, it was a County of Hullshire for a period) and Middlesbrough (North Riding) and we should keep those Riding names in our research. Postal (Zip) Codes have now largely replaced county names in these areas except by us traditionalists. I write addresses as Yorkshire, except for the East Riding where, sadly, it is now established as a name of the area, and yet includes places, like Goole, which to me are in the West Riding. Many of my correspondents also ask questions about older area names like "Wapentakes" -- making for interesting historic discussions. * * * Don't Believe Everything You Read By DW in USA I have found so many mistakes in census records, newspapers, etc., that I often wonder how anything accurate survived over the years. For example, one census has my uncle, whose name is Lewis, listed as a female named Lois. Another census lists my grandfather, whose name is Reub E., as a female named Ruby. A different census has my grandfather listed as being 60 years old. That in of itself doesn't sound odd, unless you look at his death certificate and see that he died at age 48 -- even though the newspaper obituary says he was 50. 7. Humor/Humour: Citrus Genealogy ------------------------------------------- Thanks to: Dennis Pease in Auckland, New Zealand The following baptism was found in the parish records of Great Melton, Norfolk, England: Lemon and Orange, twins, son and daughter of Lemon PITCHER and Susan, 14 June 1736. * * * Found a "proper name for the job" or humorous sign, amusing entries in census, parish, church, etc. records? Send them to: Editor-RWR@rootsweb.com 8. 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 and please include your full name and e-mail address in the text. * * * 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: 11 October 2006, Vol. 9, No. 41. * * * *