My Trails into the Past

It's good to revisit the past year, to reflect on what worked well and what to improve on. This past year on writing posts for this blog, I kept a spreadsheet of the posts and in total, I wrote 155 posts across two blogs: this one and Mam-ma's Southern Family . In order to do some statistical analysis, I learned I need to create a couple more columns with some codes to better help with sorting and counting. Hand counting across 150 plus entries in a spreadsheet is difficult. In all, I wrote 138 posts in this blog, which fell into four categories: 52 Ancestors in 52 weeks: 38 Genea-pourri: 51 Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: 40 Family Stories: 10 The top-viewed posts by theme this past year were: From 52 Ancestors meme: Air: George J. Gorrell Served in the Army Air Corps During WWII Scary Stuff: Building the Bridge Over the Vesle (France) Winter: Freak Snowstorm in Southern California on Virginia’s 5 th Birthday Different Language: Swedish & German Spoken at Home Quite the...

This is my third year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow. I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails into the Past. I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. Before setting goals for this coming year, let’s look to see how well I had accomplished of my goals for 2020. I had six goals for the year. I completed three of them. Goal #1: Write the story of my parents.  Not even started . Goal #2: Create Presentation Flyer and distribute to local societies.  Completed . Goal #3: Create Genealogy Program for Adult School. Completed, as well as ongoing . Goal #4: Finish processing paper and digital files. I have continued to process current files, but nothing has been done with older paper files . Goal #5: Finish processing and cataloguing the Hork Photo Collection. Not started . Goal #6: Keep the record keeping spreadsheets up to date.  Current . 202...

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme. I have completed forty-one (41) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. I went out only this week on Tuesday to pick up books at the library, Thursday for phenology, and two walks to the mailbox with my husband and one around the marina. Genealogy Blog Writing : Blogs posted this past week: Haven’t written the 52 Ancestor’s yet. Last week’s 52 Ancestors made the weekly highlight this week. Online Study Groups Attended:   The only study groups that met this week due to the holiday. Monday Morning . 15 of us attended this week. Wednesday, the three of us Amigos met. Webinars Attended : “FamilySearch’s Secret Weapon: Court Order Books,” by Barbara Vines Little (NGS On Demand) Client Work/Presentations : Received signed authorization for some ...

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme. I have completed forty (40) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. I went out only once this week on Wednesday to have a Covid-19 test at Kaiser in Antioch. I stayed home, quarantining until I heard back from the test. On Friday the results were negative. I guess I just had a small bout of the flu on Sunday. On Saturday, I did take a walk with my husband. Genealogy Blog Writing : Blogs posted this past week: Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Blog Caroling! I wrote about one of my favorite Christmas songs, “Christmas Canon.” 52 Ancestors-Week 51: Winter – Freak Snowstorm in Southern California on Virginia’s 5 th Birthday . I had a photo of the snowman that the Hork girls, Virginia, Lorene, and June built on Virginia’s birthday. They were living in Onta...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans:   It's Saturday Night again -  time for some more Genealogy Fun!! Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings has our assignment for tonight: Are you in the Christmas spirit yet? I love this time of year - and hearing and singing Christmas carols and songs is my favorite holiday pastime. Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to: 1) Identify your absolute favorite Christmas Carol or Holiday song. 2) Share your favorite Christmas carol or holiday song in a blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook post. Please leave a comment and link here to your post. 3) For extra credit, post an audio or video of the carol or song (almost all are on www.YouTube.com) and the words to the song. Add the background of the song, and the artists if you can find them. 4) Enjoy the memories and feelings that the carol or song brings to your heart and mind, and share them too! Here's mine: One of my absolute favorite Christmas carol is "Christ...

This is my third year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow. I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails into the Past. I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. My mother’s ancestors lived in the south. My father’s lived in Joliet, Illinois and in Hamilton and Anaconda, Montana. My immediate family has lived in California the past 75-100 years. Photos I have of family in Montana portray them in nice weather, probably in the summer. Of course, all of the photos of family in Texas and California also show nice weather, except this one.  This photo shows my father’s older sister, Virginia Hork, on her fifth birthday, January 11, 1930. The family was living in Ontario, California. The three girls, Virginia’s older sister, Lorene, and younger sister, June, are building a snowman from the snow that had fallen in the area.  They managed to get quite a bit of snow togeth...

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme. I have completed thirty-nine (39) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. I did phenology with Shirley at the meadow as usual. I went to an MRI appointment at the hospital in Walnut Creek and stopped in quickly for marzipan at Cost Plus. Sunday, I woke with aches, developed a fever a little over a 100 and a headache. So far, I can smell and taste stuff. No sore throat and I’m breathing fine. Let’s hope it’s not worse on Monday. If so, I’ll call for a COVID test.   Genealogy Blog Writing : Blogs posted this past week: I did not blog writing this week. I recycled a blog about my father-in-law’s photo he took on VE-Day for the 52 Ancestors and skipped Saturday Night Genealogy Fun altogether. Online Study Groups Attended:   The study groups I attend...

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme. I have completed thirty-eight (38) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. I did phenology with Shirley at the meadow as usual. I went on only one walk to the mailbox. Otherwise, I stayed home. Starting Monday, our area is under lock-down—essential errands only. Genealogy Blog Writing : Blogs posted this past week: 52 Ancestors: Week 49: Oops—Conflicting Dates for Jeremiah Sullivan’s Death . I wrote this week about the different dates for Jerry Sullivan’s death.    A Marriage Find & a Tip When Searching Newspapers . I found the marriage date of my great-aunt, Ethel’s marriage to John Vir Quigley. I also gave a tip when searching in online newspaper databases. Online Study Groups Attended:   Study groups were back on again this week: ...

This is my third year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow. I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails into the Past. I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. Sometimes information in records just do not agree. One of the items might be correct and the other pieces of information wrong. Or all of it is wrong and research is still needed to find the right answer. It might even be possible to not discover the right answer. My example is my 2x-great-grandfather, Jeremiah Sullivan. Not a lot is known about him. He came with his family to the United States sometime in the early 1860s but no ship list has been found yet. It is believed they were from County Cork. One of their children was baptized in the Eyeries Parish in 1860. Their next child was born 11 Aug 1869 in Houghton County, Michigan. So, I have no idea when he married Mary Sheehan. I have no idea of their arrival...

After many years of looking, I have found the marriage date for my grandmother’s sister, Ethel Elizabeth Quigley’s marriage to John Vir Quigley. I wasn’t looking at the time for her marriage, but instead was working on World War I draft cards. I made a spreadsheet with the names of all of the men in my database who were found in these draft cards. I double-checked these names against the images on my computer and sometimes I needed to return to Ancestry to see the actual images. When looking at John Vir Quigley’s card, one of the hints that Ancestry showed was to the “Newspapers.com Marriage Index, 1800s-1999” database.  His name was right so I clicked on it. It was a link to The Butte Miner newspaper in Montana about the marriage of Ethel Elizabeth Sullivan to John Vir Quigley in Burlingame, California, on 20 October 1925! [1] According to the article, Ethel, a former Anaconda girl and daughter of John H. Sullivan, was married to John V. Quigley of San Francisco at St. Cath...

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme. I have completed thirty-seven (37) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. I did phenology with Shirley at the meadow as usual. I went to the bird store for bird food. We went to our daughter’s for Thanksgiving. We went on two walks to the mailbox. Genealogy Blog Writing : Blogs posted this past week: Putting Names to the Enslaved from Jemima (Porter) Coor’s Estate in Copiah Co, Mississippi . I wrote about the inventory and sale of the enslaved people listed in her estate in 1839. 52 Ancestors: Week 48: Gratitude—Thankful For My Grandmother’s Interest in My Family Research. I wrote this week about deeds that are full of family genealogy.    Online Study Groups Attended:   I attended Monday Morning on Monday, as well as meeting with...