My Trails into the Past

I am taking the virtual GRIP class “Marching Toward Change: Reformers, Crises, and Movements that Transformed 19th and 20th Century America,” coordinated by Katherine R. Willson. One session yesterday (Tuesday) was about women’s rights and suffrage taught by Gena Philibert-Ortega. I started thinking if I had checked out that database for my female family members. California gave the vote to women in 1911. My grandmother’s aunt, Mary Martha (Gleeson) Gilbert, was living in California at that time. She was the daughter of John Gleeson and Margaret Tierney, and my great-grandaunt. Warren, Mary, Anna (her sister), Lorene (Anna's daughter), Muriel, John Sullivan (Anna's father) c. 1923 Did she register to vote? Ancestry has a California Voter Registration collection, so let's check it out. I did not find her in 1912, but did in 1914. She and her husband, Warren E. Gilbert, were listed living at 2343 Scarff Street in Los Angeles. He registered as a Democrat and she registe...

Father Albert Hork, my great-grandfather’s brother, was a Roman Catholic priest. He was assigned to many parishes in Nebraska, Arkansas, and Oregon. He served in Nebraska between 1888 and 1904, when the communities were small and the areas just being settled. He tended to serve those communities with German immigrant settlers. Learning about his service from diocese records only gave the facts of locations where he served and dates of those services. Newspaper articles tended to fill in the rest of what I know. Sometimes he served as the parish priest of one church and the roving priest for neighboring church whose parish were not large enough to support a full-time priest. He was assigned as the first full-time priest at Frances Church in Randolph, Nebraska. Before his arrival, visiting priest served the parish on an irregular basis. They might say a mass once a month, baptize any children born since the last visit, and then come back again in a month. The first priest who did tha...

Outside activities included a trip on the weekend to Santa Rosa to babysit the granddog and give a genealogy presentation. Otherwise, I was sick the early part of the week and stayed home.   Genealogy Genealogy Volunteer/Work: The only work I did was to give a presentation about research plans to the Sonoma County Genealogical Society, an in-person seminar. This was my last event with the group. I turned my secretary binders over to the new secretary. The seminar went well and many people came up to me at the break thanking me for the talk. I think they enjoyed how I involved the audience during the presentation. They all seemed to enjoy the second presentation on railroad records, too, which was very good. Genealogy Meetings:  I attended the Kinseekers NARA SIG on Monday but didn’t participate much as I was not feeling well. I shared that I am getting a bankruptcy file from NARA Kansas City soon. Genealogy Writing/Research : I attended two session of Level Up writin...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans:  It's Saturday Night again -  Time for some more Genealogy Fun!! Our assignment from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings , is to: 1)  Sunday is Father's Day in the USA, and usually a time for memories and gratitude to our paternal birth person. 2)  For this week's SNGF, tell us three things about your father that are special and memorable to you. Here's mine: We did this this topic last year, https://mytrailsintothepast.blogspot.com/2024/06/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-three.html . Now to think of 3 other things about him. 1. My dad was the youngest with three older sisters who likely spoiled him. They called him Billy. Napa 1940 - Virginia, June, Lorene, Billy & a young Nappy 2. He liked sports and playing football. When he played quarterback, he could throw with either arm. 3. He was a Boy Scout and had a dog named “Nappy” when living in Napa. Copyright © 2011-2026 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Right...

This month, I am working with my Tierney family, who are of Carleton County, Ontario, specifically Nepean, which is now part of the Municipality of Ottawa. John Tierney and Ann Murray had a large family of eleven known children. The youngest, Mary Martha (1857-1950) entered the Sisters of Charity (Grey Nuns of Ottawa) at the young age of 16 years, 5 months on 24 December 1874. Three years later, she made her profession on 13 December 1877. [1] She was known as Sister St. Melanie. I have written about her before: Spirit – Mary Martha Tierney & her Spiritual Connection to God as Sister St. Melanie . After reading Sunny Jane Morton’s book, Searching for Sisters: A Guide to Researching Catholic Nuns in the United States (Genealogical Publishing, 2026), I have not been able to put her out of my mind. My cousin was named after her, and I took Melanie as my confirmation name. So, I feel a connection to her. I have a photograph of her as well as a couple of obituaries, which can he...

The last three 12 for '26 posts have been about John Gleeson, the husband of Margaret Tierney (1835-1920). These next posts will focus on Margaret and her parents John Tierney and Ann Murray. Introduction Margaret was born on 20 April 1835, likely in Goulbourn Township, the daughter of John Tierney and Ann Murray. [1] She was baptized on 18 May 1835 at Notre Dame of Ottawa, with William Hanrahan and Eleonore Murray as sponsors. [2] John Tierney and Ann Murray married on 27 November 1832 also at Notre Dame of Ottawa. They were both of Goulbourn. [3] She was the second child. Her older sister, Elizabeth was baptized on 15 December at Nepean. [4] John and Ann lived in Nepean until their deaths. John died on 14 December 1891. [5] Ann died on 8 October 1899. [6] Census Records John and Ann were enumerated in each of the census records from 1891 down to 1841. I will list them below beginning with the most recent one first. At the end will be a table showing all the census records...