From roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com Sun Apr 2 18:16:53 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k330Grjb011098; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 18:16:53 -0600 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l.rootsweb.com [66.43.16.22]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k330GxtN006564 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 18:16:59 -0600 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l [127.0.0.1]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id k32LkLFI027862 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 17:46:21 -0400 Received: (from roots-in@localhost) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.8/Submit) id k32LkL7L027861 for roots-approved@rootsweb.com; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 17:46:21 -0400 Received: from lists5.rootsweb.com (lists5.rootsweb.com [66.43.27.41]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with SMTP id k32CMaFI026683 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 08:22:36 -0400 Received: (from slist@localhost) by lists5.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) id k32Er0A4031374 for roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 08:53:00 -0600 X-Envelope-From: altaf@world-net.net Sun Apr 2 08:53:00 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k32Er0jb031363 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 08:53:00 -0600 Received: from blackbird.world-net.net (root@blackbird.world-net.net [204.57.72.6]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k32Er4at008313 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 08:53:04 -0600 Received: from world-net.net (s2p2-108.world-net.net [207.71.22.108]) (authenticated bits=0) by blackbird.world-net.net (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id k32EsGcU086940 for ; Sun, 2 Apr 2006 09:54:17 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from altaf@world-net.net) Message-ID: <442FE75A.9090509@world-net.net> Date: Sun, 02 Apr 2006 10:01:46 -0500 From: Alta Flynt User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030624 Netscape/7.1 (ax) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en, th, ko-kr, ko, ko-kp, ja, in, zh-cn, zh-hk, zh-sg, zh-tw, zh, ar-dz, ar, ar-bh, ar-eg, ar-iq, ar-jo, ar-kw, ar-lb, ar-ly MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ROOTS-M@rootsweb.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Virus-Scanned: ClamAV 0.88/1367/Sun Apr 2 05:40:41 2006 on blackbird.world-net.net X-Virus-Status: Clean X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 Subject: [ROOTS-L] My back door/work around approach Sender: roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com When I asked for the message about the back door approach to finding an ancestor, I had a request to put my story on the list. Here it is, Carl. And, thanks Colleen for sending me the original message. I'm not sure that what I did will work for everyone - how many libraries have an on-line archive of old obituaries - but maybe someone will be inspired to do something similar. If so, I'd love to hear about it. I have been searching on and off for the parents and the correct name of the wife of one of my husband's cousins. The mutual cousin who sent me her family group sheets nearly 10 years ago said that Elwin Macomber married Percie L. Then I found "Macomber Genealogy" by Everett Stackpole and he said Elwin married Persis Chandler. I couldn't find anything else about Persis Chandler - no parents, no birth place or death record. Percie was in the 1880, 1900 and 1910 census as Elwin's wife. Then in 1920, Elwin's wife was Priscilla, but the right age for Percie. No sign of either of them in 1930. Elwin had died in 1929, but where was Percie/Persis? Then two or three days ago, I remembered that the Abbot Memorial Library in Dexter, Maine where Elwin lived most of his life has an online archive of old obituaries. I looked at all the Chandler obits prior to 1930. I found four that said Mrs. E. L. Macomber was a surviving sister. Two of those said the men were born in Ripley, Maine - Thomas A. in 1838 and Benjamin H. in1846. I started with the 1850 census and the first Chandler I looked at was Harvey with a son Thomas A. born in 1838 and another son, Harvey B., born in 1846. I've seen several other people who went from using their first name to using their middle name and sometimes back again, so I was pretty sure that Harvey was Benjamin. Percie was born in April 1862 according to the 1900 census. When I checked the 1870 census for Harvey Chandler, he had a new wife and a daughter, Priscilla, born about 1862. When I went looking for Priscilla Macomber in 1930, I found her under the name Luella, but when I looked at the actual census page, because I knew what it should be I could see that it was really Priscilla. When I knew the right name to look for, I also found her in the Old Town, Maine city directory for 1932. I still haven't found Priscilla/Percie's mother's maiden name, but I do know now that her parents were Harvey Chandler and Dorothy (?) and that Priscilla/Percie died after 1931. Since she was the wife of a distant cousin, that's all I'm really interested in finding - but I will gladly accept any other info about her. That may be my back door approach to smashing another brick wall. Alta