Heartland Genealogy

Last week, I watched the " Watch Geoff Live: DNA " webinar on Legacy Family TreeWebinars. While watching, I followed along by looking at my autosomal DNA results on Ancestry. I had my DNA tested last summer and had studied some of the results but hadn't found the help with 'brick walls' that I had hoped for. One of the brick walls I've been working on is my James Crawford line. My James Crawford died in Preble County Ohio in 1854. He married Sally Duggins in Garrard County Kentucky in 1799. Sally had previously been married to Alexander Duggins by whom she had two sons: William and Henry. Henry Duggins was married to Jane Sellers, daughter of Nathan Sellers. Nathan A. Sellers was a neighbor of my James Crawford and died in Preble County Ohio in 1824. In early Preble County Ohio, there was a second James Crawford who owned land adjoining my James Crawford. This James Crawford married Martha Knight in 1793 in Lincoln County Kentucky. It is believed that two of...

One of my genealogical challenges is identifying the parents and siblings of my ancestor, James Crawford. James marries Sally Duggins in Garrard County, Kentucky in 1799. By 1810, the couple is living in Preble County Ohio. I've already done some cluster research to try and make headway on this line. In the process, I've identified quite a few potential members of a cluster. In trying to figure out how to track my research, I created a spreadsheet to show where these people were at various times. The above spreadsheet provides a visual of what I currently know. Now the struggle is to create a research plan and figure out how best to track this research. Cluster Surnames Crawford, Duggins, Smith, Knight, Neal, Finley Time Period 1770 to 1850   Locations Preble County Ohio pre-1800 Kentucky  

Michele Simmons Lewis' post, My Latest Excel Spreadsheet , explained what should be a fairly easy spreadsheet to visualize which census data is needed for individuals in the tree. In order to quickly create this spreadsheet, I had to review some skills I've yet to master in RootsMagic, one of those being the creation of a named group . Once I had a named group created for my ancestors, I was able to create a custom report to pull the following fields: Surname, Given Name, Birth Date, Death Date. By saving the report as a text file, I could then open it in Excel. In the comments section of Michele's blog post, JJT (John J Tierney)stated that he had created a similar spreadsheet that would automatically calculate the age of the person for each census year. His post, Simple Census Age Table , discusses this spreadsheet, which he freely shares. So, I downloaded the spreadsheet. (Thanks JJT!) After manipulating my data to pull the year out of the birth and death dates, I...

I first became aware of the term 'Cousin Bait' by viewing the ' Mondays with Myrt ' hangouts. Even though I've been sharing my genealogy for years, I had not heard the term before. The purpose of 'cousin bait' is to locate 'cousins' so you can share research. I've had the good fortune to work with several 'cousins' who were truly willing to critique my research and provide hints and even share documentation. In one case, a cousin in Washington (state) and I were working on her CURREY line and trying to document a death place. She had an obituary indicating that her ancestor, James Barnes Currey (Curry) died in Oregon. Neither one of us could find the family in Oregon and were about to decide the obituary was wrong when we realized that he did die in Oregon -- Oregon, Holt County Missouri. Unfortunately, I often find my research incorporated into someone else's tree without ever contacting me. Many would question how I know it is m...

I'm in the process of filling in holes in my research by looking up census records. One of those holes was the 1940 census for my great-grandfather, Hiram Currey. It didn't really surprise me that I didn't have that record since he moved had moved quite a bit. However, I was surprised when I found the index record for him in the census on Ancestry. Not only was he listed, but he is identified as 'father-in-law'. How did I miss that? Was he living with Aunt Myrtle? Since I already had my grandparent's record for the 1940 census, he couldn't be living with them. Or, could he?  When I checked the page, he was the top entry on the page and there was a note that it was continued from the previous page. Guess who I found on the previous page? My grandparents and family. I had previously found them in the 1940 census. I obviously did not click to check the next page! Lesson learned -- CLICK TO SEE THE NEXT PAGE (and the previous one)

As I devote more time to genealogy, I'm also wanting to rescue the work I did for the Nemaha County Genealogical Society and add it to the re-created web site . A lot of that work was done with Microsoft Works in the database portion of the software. Even though I had a current version of MS Works installed on my computer, I was not able to load these old files. Thus, I was on a search for a way to get them open and export the data so it could be opened with today's software, namely Excel. I tried Zamzar and other cloud file conversion options. None of those I tried would convert the *.wdb files. Thankfully, we haven't done a good job of discarding software because I found a copy of MS Works 7. I had to uninstall my current software in order to install version 7. I cringed a little when it said it required Internet Explorer 6 but, fortunately, the software installed without also installing IE6. Armed with MS Works 7, I am now able to open those old *.wdb files. ...

One of this week's 'Finally Get Organized' tasks involved sources, information and evidence. Ever since making the transition from PAF to The Master Genealogist, I've been working with sources. Although many of my source citations pre-date Evidence Explained by Elizabeth Shown Mills, I have tried to document each piece of information tied to the individuals in my database. I may also have written a ' genealogical proof argument ' during the early days of my research when I wrote the post, ' Untangling the James Crawfords '. Even though I believe what I wrote about the various James Crawford families is accurate, I doubt it would stand up to today's standards. Thus, when challenged to look at sources, information and evidence this week, I took that as a challenge to improve my skills in hopes of bringing them up to the levels of today's genealogical standards. With that in mind, I elected to investigate a place instead of a person. The pla...

One of this week's Finally Get Organized tasks was to celebrate women's history month by entering data for the female ancestors in the first four generations of my tree. I'm very fortunate in that I know who all of these women are. Since family was important to both of my grandmothers, they kept almost anything related to the family. I was fortunate to be able to discuss these things with them -- even though I wish I had asked even more questions during their lifetimes. Josie & Nellie Hammond These women left a legacy that is hard to live up to. My mother left college when she got married but went back after I graduated from college to finish her degree. My mother's mother left the family farm and boarded in Yates Center so she could finish high school. My father's mother lost her mother at the age of 10 and was placed in a children's home for several years. She managed to keep track of her younger siblings who were placed in homes and made sure...

I've tried several scanning apps with my phone. Lately, I've been working with Photomyne . This app allowed me to quickly scan photos from an old photo album of my grandmothers. The app did a good job capturing both the older black and white photos and 'newer' color photos. I also used the Photo Transfer App to quickly move the photos off of my phone and into dropbox for use on my computer. Even though this is a quick easy way to convert these photos to a digital format, there is a downside: all of my images are in jpeg format and not .tiff format.

Spring break just started and it is gorgeous out! Since it was too nice to be stuck inside scanning, I decided to try and fulfill some photo requests at the Seneca City Cemetery. Armed with a list of 16 requests from Find a Grave, I stopped by the City of Seneca office to pick up a cemetery map. From there, I went to the Seneca Free Public Library to check for lot numbers since some of the memorials were missing the lot number. [Nemaha County is very lucky since a native living in Ohio has indexed all of the cemeteries and placed copies of those indexes in the library.] My quest for pictures started in the older part of the cemetery, looking for Ridgway stones in lot 180. Unfortunately, no stones remain in the area of this lot. From there, I ventured to the Wells plot (lot 147) in search of Adolphus Wells (1832-1903). Several Wells family members are buried in this plot, but there isn't a stone for Adolphus. While in the older part of the cemetery, I also looked for Sally...

The tasks for Feb.28th thru March 5th centered around sharing -- sharing daily. I confess, I didn't meet the standard of daily sharing. However, I did get several family stories published on my blog . My blog is the newest way in which I'm trying to share my research with my family. Over the years, I have shared my work in a variety of ways, including my Heartland Genealogy web site with my sourced genealogy. Other ways in which I have shared with my immediate family: Photo album of family pictures CD containing copies of pictures Scrapbook pages covering key events Shared pictures in a Google folder This past summer, I started using Facebook groups to share photos. As I've been scanning the photo albums from both sides of my family, I've been able to make the digital copies of those photos available to distant cousins quickly and inexpensively. I recently created a group for the alumni of the local high school. Since the yearbooks were recently sca...

July 17, 2015 #Wk3GenealogyDoOver This is the end of week 2 and I don't feel like I've made much progress, so let's review: Cleaned off desk - my husband even noticed (now to keep it fairly clean) Wrote (at least started) interview of self Selected 'questions' for relatives and sent off to 'cousins' - Even received two back already! Switched focus of scanning - pulled out my scrapbook and started working from me back thru the family notebooks Discovered my baptism certificate - I hadn't had this info in my genealogy data before Investigated TNG software / configured site at www.heartlandgenealogy.com Want to be able to let cousin(s) have access to full research - this will meet that goal Still need to upload the media Need to check permissions - not sure they are set correctly Tried to create a wiki-tree - gedcom didn't go up Focused on using Roots Magic for genealogy software Began going thru documentation for myself and updating...

This week I've been transcribing the audio from one of the interviews I did with my father who passed away almost ten years ago. As I was marveling at the family stories contained in one recording I realized that I owed a BIG THANK YOU to two people: Thomas MacEntee and Pat Richley-Erickson ( Dear Myrtle ). Without them I would be doing sometimes genealogy and never going back thru what I already had. Genealogy Do-Over on Facebook . I 'officially' started the do-over in July claiming I was doing a go-over. However, I spent most of my time taking advantage of all of the prompts, resources and tools to re-connect with the genealogy world and bring my skills up to current standards. Unfortunately, I'm still not consistent about using a research log -- even though that was a skill I learned in the early days of my research and I have my original log to prove it. That changed last spring when I discovered the The Genealogy Do-Over provided a chance to rediscover...

It’s week two of Genealogy Do-Over (cycle 3) and time to get specific on some goals. Focus scanning project on family notebooks Check source citations for events appearing on a family group sheet to make sure they follow current standards (using Evidence Explained) Continue learning by reading blogs and participating in webinars Figure out tagging of files so that I don’t end up with multiple copies of the same file. #Wk2GenealogyDoOver

For about the past ten years, my genealogy research has pretty much stalemated. This summer, I decided to pursue a project that I had started over Christmas vacation – the digitizing of my genealogy files. This long, slow project is also giving me screen time to explore. During that exploration time, I stumbled across the concept of a ‘genealogy do-over’. Intrigued but not really wanting to start over, I signed up for cycle 3 of ‘Genealogy Do-Over’ on Facebook. One of the rationales behind a ‘do-over’ is that many genealogies contain data that was imported from other researchers without documentation to support the lineage. I have to admit that unfortunately, I did import another researchers tree in my early years. I learned from that mistake and have been careful about importing data since. This argument along with the valid point that some data may be in a genealogy file that doesn’t have sufficient documentation have caused me to seriously consider an actual do-over. However, the fo...

Another Master Genealogist user recently asked for URLs of genealogy websites generated with Roots Magic or Legacy software. Curious about the differences, I decided to do my own comparison. For this project, I created a gedcom with a limited number of people from my Master Genealogy data. I then imported that gedcom into a new file in both RootsMagic 7 and Legacy 8. In RootsMagic, I used the default configurations and generated a web site using RootsMagic 6 style website. In Legacy, I used the default configurations to generate an individual style website.  Please note that images do not transfer via Gedcom from Master Genealogist to RootsMagic or Legacy. I also did not take the time to reconnect the images to the individuals. Thus, the lack of images in the test site is my fault and not the fault of the software. Both RootsMagic and Legacy put the events into a list. RootsMagic Legacy Second Site generates a narrative report for the individual. Legacy only shows the documentation...

Tonight I participated in the webinar, Pinning Your Family Tree , by Thomas MacEntee. This was MUCH MORE than I expected! The first part of the webinar was on how to use Pinterest -- particularly for sharing of family pictures and heirlooms. One suggestion was to scan the fabric memorabilia that has been passed down. I would have never thought of that, but it would be a way to document those heirlooms. Besides using a scanner to get a picture of the heirloom, a cell-phone or tablet could be used with scanner apps such as Shoebox. By using a phone or tablet, it would be possible to obtain an image of a quilt or other large heirloom. The second part focused on a lot of other tools similar Pinterest - many of which were new to me. Google Collections allows one to add scanned images to create a visual storyboard for a family member. Based on the presentation, it might not be possible to make them public. Google My Maps -- This tool allows you to add pins at various lo...

Thinking thru the process — I like Drusilla Pair’s visual (as posted on the Genealogy Do-Over Facebook page) of the research process but I’m not getting very far with figuring out the nuts and bolts of my process. Since I’m trying to digitize my source files, this do-over process is an excellent opportunity to establish a procedure for moving away from paper research. My current genealogy software (Master Genealogist) allows for the attachment of images and files to an individual. Images are viewable but the PDF files are not. The software that I may transition to also allows me to ‘attach’ images and pdf files. Both also have the ability to do research logs and task lists. I already have a lot of source templates configured in Master Genealogist. After reading many of the posts and blogs, it appears that most participants are not going to use their genealogy software to track the research process. Instead they are going to use other resources such as Evernote, OneNote, Evidentia or Go...

Do-over? Am I crazy? With over 35 years of research on all of my lines I think I might be – especially where I’ve already done a ‘do-over’ once. When I converted my data from PAF to Master Genealogist I reviewed my data. During that process, what was a NOTE in PAF became an event in TMG and citations were added. I used Elizabeth Shown Mill’s book, Evidence! Citation and Analysis for the Family Historian , to create the templates for my citations. During the early stages of my research, I also ran into the ‘how do I organize’ this stuff problem. About that time, I had the privilege of attending a workshop where William Dollarhide spoke. After hearing about his organization method, I decided to adopt it. Thus, my files of research are in folders by Surname.State.numbe r. This has proven a very workable filing system – especially where I have had to research several lines to begin to identify my own line. I plan to continue using my version of the Dollarhide system as I digitize my files....

In trying to document an elusive collateral line, I discovered that the St. Louis Public Library has an online index to the obituaries published in the St. Louis Post Dispatch. St. Louis Public Library Obituary Search  — http://www.slpl.org/slpl/gateways/article240117800.asp    — Not only do they have the obituaries indexed online but their staff will supply photocopies of those obituaries at a very reasonable cost via snail mail! Below is a copy of the obituary I recently received from them. St. Louis Post Dispatch Tuesday 11/8/1994 page 4B This wonderful service is much appreciated.

In trying to help a fellow researcher with their Wells family, I’ve been going back thru my Wells line to make sure that I have the census records on the descendants of Ozias Wells from 1850 to about 1900. In the process, I have finally found Thurston Kennedy Wells in 1860 — AND — he is in Kansas! This supports family legend but I hadn’t been able to prove it before. Tonight, I did a search for William Wells born in 1857 and lo and behold there is a William Wells born in 1857 and a Franklin Wells born in 1854 and a K T Wells born about 1830 living in KANSAS TERRITORY! They are living in a household with James Londers age 60 who was born in Pennsylvania and his daughters, Martha age 15 and Sarah age 17. Also in the household is Benj. M. White age 42 who was born in Indiana. My initial reaction is that James Londers and Benj White are not relatives but I will have to do more digging to verify that. The census verifies that William Wells, age 3, was born in Kansas. It also indicates that ...

A fellow researcher is looking for proof of residency for Nathaniel Wells who was married to Alinda Swain to complete an application to DAR.  The son of   Nathaniel and Mary Thurston Wells , the family was living in Saratoga County, New York in 1790. George, a brother to Nathaniel, married Eunice White in 1784 in Hadley Massachusetts. Reference to military service from American Ancestors DAR Patriot Index Information for Nathaniel and Polly (Thurston) Wells

A fellow researcher is looking for proof of residency for Nathaniel Wells who was married to Alinda Swain to complete an application to DAR.  The son of  Nathaniel and Mary Thurston Wells , the family was living in Saratoga County, New York in 1790. George, a brother to Nathaniel, married Eunice White in 1784 in Hadley Massachusetts. Reference to military service from American Ancestors DAR Patriot Index Information for Nathaniel and Polly (Thurston) Wells