My Trails into the Past

We took a family vacation to Southern California, with plans to visit the Huntington Library in Pasadena, Disneyland, the Getty Villa, and Chinatown. While there, I wanted to visit Calvary Cemetery and photograph some of the grave markers of my family buried there. I had already written to the cemetery and received the burial locations. Section N, L76. These are siblings. Elizabeth Gleeson, 1865-1942 Frank T. Gleeson, 1877-1942 Helena M. Gleeson, 1867-1950 Section G, L1009. This is a family. Warren E. Gilbert, 1857-1930 Mary M. Gilbert, 1863-1962 Muriel M. Gilbert, 1895-1956 Section R, L634. This is a couple. Effa L. Sullivan, 1892-1951 John C. Sullivan, 1887-1978 Section E, L2970. This is the infant who lived only one day. Annabell Hork, 1927-1927 Once at the cemetery, we checked in at the office and received a map of the cemetery. Find a Grave has over 80,000 memorials for the cemetery. Luckily, the office marked the map with the general area where we’d find the b...

My outside activities this week included a trip to the History Center, doing phenology, and hiking with my walking group. Outside, I started cleaning up some leaves before we go on our vacation. It is still fire season here, and we want to make the area around the house safe. Genealogy Genealogy Volunteer/Work: Tuesday, I volunteered at the History Center, where I entered accessions into PastPerfect and descriptions into the library database. Thursday, our writing group discussed Nancy’s article in the New Mexico Genealogist and Jacqueline’s experiment using AI to assist with her blog writing. Genealogy Meetings:  Jen and I were the only accountability members to meet on Monday. The Roundtable group met, and most discussed what they were working on. Jacqueline and I met briefly and got caught up with our activities since our last meeting. At RootsMagic SIG, Keith discussed new features of RootsMagic 11, as well as the report functions. Genealogy Writing/Research :  ...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: It's Saturday Night again - Time for some more Genealogy Fun!! Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings is to: 1)  Genealogy can be really fun.  Please create, or have Artificial Intelligence create, a genealogy-related joke or funny story. Here's mine: Since I don’t want a made-up story about my ancestors on my blog, I decided to look for some genealogy jokes. The website Joke & Pun has lots of jokes arranged by categories, and the genealogy category can be found here: https://jokeandpun.com/jokes/genealogy-jokes/ . Some are groaners, but I have collected a few of my favorites here. I hope you enjoy them. 8. Why did the skeleton skip the family reunion? He had no body to go with. 9. How do genealogists stay in shape? They climb family trees. 19. Why are genealogists great leaders? They understand deeply-rooted issues. 20. Why did the genealogist never write fictional stories? She only dealt in factual ma...

Sunset from Pixabay My 3x-great-grandparents, Robert Hutson and Amanda Davis, were last known to be living in Cherokee County, Georgia, in 1860. Also living with them were assumed children: Thomas, Asberry, Peter, and Margarett. These children were 13 years old and younger. My 2x-great-grandfather, Peter, was seven. [1] The 1860 census was the last enumeration I have found for Robert, his wife, and any of his children. They may be in the 1870 and 1880 censuses under completely misspelled or garbled names. So, I have no death date for Robert or for Amanda. I have another child for them: Victoria S., who was born in 1863. She married J. B. Williams in Hunt County, Texas, in 1881. [2] Her daughter, Della, named her parents Bob Huston and Amanda Davis. [3] Della was born in 1885 and likely did not know her grandparents, which may explain the misspelling of her grandfather’s surname. [4] Research Ideas What might be the next steps to locate what became of Robert Hutson? Below are som...

My outside activities this week were numerous. Some will be mentioned below. I spent the weekend at the Walnut Creek Model Railroad Society, where we had an open house. I was a trackwalker from the setup area, which meant I spent a lot of time crawling under the layout and climbing ladders to reach the track in the mountains. Genealogy Genealogy Volunteer/Work: I volunteered at the History Center on Tuesday and the Oakland FamilySearch Center on Wednesday. I took minutes for the historical societies board meeting. Genealogy Meetings:  Jacqueline and I met briefly and got caught up with our activities since our last meeting. We attended the Kinseekers Military SIG, and the discussion was about the morning reports located at the NARA website. I also attended the OFSC staff meeting on Friday and met with the certification peer group, although only Josh popped in. Genealogy Writing/Research : I continued working on the Colman family in Alaska and California, using the full-te...

We have had only Australian Shepherds as pets, as they are my husband’s favorite dogs. Our youngest daughter loves dogs of all kinds. Sidney. He was our last dog. He came to us when he was about 9 months old. He had been living his entire life alone in a backyard, so he was not well-socialized. He would bark at anything, especially things with wheels, though not at cars. Whether it was a bicycle, skateboard, stroller, or motorcycle, he would go wild with barking. He was also very hard to control when going for a walk. My husband was careful to keep away from other people and not let anyone pet him. One day, he was not well, and the vet told us he had a larger tumor in his abdomen. It was a sad day for all of us, especially our daughter, with whom we facetimed, so she could say goodbye to him. The photo is Sidney’s last visit at the vet. Toby. He was a red-merle and very beautiful. Many people commented on him. He and I took walks every morning before I went to work. He liked to ru...

My outside activities this week were numerous. I volunteered at the History Center on Tuesday, had eye surgery on Wednesday, and had a follow-up eye appointment on Thursday. On Sunday, I attended a presentation by the Martinez Historical Society. Genealogy Genealogy Volunteer/Work: I sent out the press release for the upcoming BCG-sponsored webinar. At the History Center, I worked on new accessions, and then, with the intern, we added descriptions of books in the library to the Excel database. Genealogy Meetings:  I attended the renewal accountability meeting and submitted the first proof summary about the first person in my KDP I’m working on. I got good feedback. Later, I attended the Kinseeker’s Military SIG, where we discussed the WWII morning reports. Jacqueline and I also met to discuss ways to use AI. Genealogy Writing/Research : This week, I worked on Ida (Hork) Colmann, my grandfather’s sister, and her husband, Martin J. Colmann. I found deed records in Los Angel...