My Trails into the Past

It's Saturday Night - time for more Genealogy Fun! Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing with our assignment for us: Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music here) is to: 1)  Have you gone to Rootstech? If so which years?  2)  Describe your experience. 3)  Who was your favorite speaker?  4)  Did you talk with any genealogy "rock stars"? 5)  What was something you learned that you use over and over? 6)  Describe something you enjoyed in the vendor area. 7)  Do you watch the streamed classes live? 8)  Did you visit the Family History Library?  Describe your experience. 9)  What was your favorite Salt Lake City experience not genealogical related? (A restaurant, a landmark etc.) 10)  What was a pleasant surprise about your visit that you did not expect? My thanks to reader Jacquie Schattner for creating this list of questions!! My r...

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. Over five days, three family members of the Horoch family in Oberhundem, Kreis Olpe, Westfalen, died. The first was eleven-year-old Johan Joseph Carl, who died on 1 October 1857, just ten days short of his twelfth birthday. He died from dysentery. [1] The next day on 2 October, the youngest child, Maria Elisabeth Horoch, died from dysentery. She was about a year and a half old. [2]                                                  Lastly, on the 5 October, their f...

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. Genealogy Blog Writing : 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 8– Prosperity I wrote about the prosperity Dempsey Welch had because he was a large plantation and slave owner. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – A Bucket List Meme . It was a meme we’d done before and I updated a few new activities I had done. Webinars/Study Groups Attended:     The only online study group I attended this week was the Thursday evening one. We heard about Kim’s trip to NY and CT, and there was discussion about KDP and case study rules. I attended these webinars this week: “A Convincing Argument or A Convoluted Mess?” by Barbara Vines Little, CG, a BCG webinar at Legacy Family Tree Webinars. I found her handout useful but got confused during the presentation. ...

It's Saturday Night -   time for more  Genealogy Fun! Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing has given us our assignment for today: Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music here) is to: 1)   A "Bucket List" meme went around Facebook several years ago where you put an "X" in the box if you have done it!  2)  Copy and paste it into your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or on Facebook and fill it out (erase my entries and insert your own). 3)  Put a comment on this blog post to tell me where I can read all about you! We did this meme on March 5, 2016 . I shall update where I can below by marking the X in blue. Here's the list and my updated responses: (X) Shot a gun (  ) Gone on a blind date (X) Skipped school (X) Watched someone die (X) Visited Canada (X) Visited Hawaii (  ) Visited Cuba (X) Visited Europe (X) Visited Las Vegas (X) Visited Central A...

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. Genealogy Blog Writing : 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 7–Favorite Discovery I wrote about finding newspaper articles indicating my great-grandmother did see her mother again after her move to Montana. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Top 20 Surnames . We were to write about our special Valentine’s Day and I wrote about what fun we had at school Valentine’s Day parties. Webinars/Study Groups Attended:   The only online study group I attended this week was the Friday afternoon one. Everyone spoke of their progress on their portfolios and we got to see Annette after her absence of several weeks. I lamented that I hadn’t worked on the Hork family project and they urged me to start right then. I attended the Monday Morning group at Susan’s for a...

It's Saturday Night - time for more Genealogy Fun! Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing has our assignment for tonight: Valentine's Day was yesterday, 14 February...   Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music here) is to: 1) Recall a memory of a Valentine's Day in your life. Is it the first love of your life? A special day with your lover, spouse or significant other? Do you have a picture of a Valentine's Day event, or a special Valentine that you received, to share. 2 ) Describe your Valentine's Day memory, activity and/or image in a blog post of your own, a comment to this blog post, or in a comment/post on Facebook. 3) Have fun remembering a special day. I have no real memories of love interests that concern Valentine’s Day. My best memories of Valentine’s Day were during elementary school when we would buy small cards, sign our name, and drop them off in the decorated box in the classroom. Everyone gave cards...

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. This post is about a small discovery but it made me very happy. My great-grandmother, Julia Sievert Hork, was born in Joliet, Will County, Illinois on 31 October 1854 to Vincent Sievert and Susanna Raduntz. [1] When she was born, her father was a farmer. [2] Julia was the oldest surviving child and on 6 June 1872, she married Johan Anton Hork, a tailor, at St. John’s German Catholic Church in Joliet. [3] She stated she was eighteen years old, though her eighteen birthday would not be for a few more months. Anton was twenty-eight. For the next eight or so years, she and Anton lived in the area near her parents, either in Joliet or Aurora in Kane County, not that far certainly by train at twenty-thr...

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. Genealogy Blog Writing : 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 6–Same Name .  I wrote a proof argument about separating two Ellis Lancasters in Kentucky.  Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Top 20 Surnames . We were to find our top 20 surnames in our genealogy database program. We had done this in 2017, so I compared my current numbers to 2017. I had only added a couple hundred names, mostly by finding spouses and children of cousins. Webinars/Study Groups Attended:     I attended the Thursday night study group and we Kim talk about her NYC trip and all the research she has planned. We gave her tips on places to visit in her free time. I attended only part of the Friday group because I was at the Walnut Creek Library with Jacqueline. We...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans:  It's Saturday Night again - time for some more Genealogy Fun!! Our assignment from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing this week is: 1) Go into your Genealogy Management Program (GMP; either software on your computer, or an online family tree) and figure out how to Count how many surnames you have in your family tree database. 2)  Tell us which GMP you're using and how you did this task. 3)  Tell us what the top 20  surnames are in your database and, if possible, how many entries.  How many different surnames are in your family tree? 4)  Write about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, in a status or comment on a Facebook post. I use RootsMagic and Randy was so kind to explain in his blog post how to do this in RootsMagic. It is a report called "Surname Statistics." We had done this previously on 21 October 2017. So I will do some comparisons to update the post.* The pre...

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. Genealogy Blog Writing : 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 5–So Far Away.  I wrote about Johan Anton Hork coming to the US from Germany and traveling over time to Montana. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – A Day in the Life . We were to choose the front page of a newspaper from the date of our grandmother’s birthday. I chose my husband’s mother’s birthday, 29 January 1926 and used a Modesto newspaper. There were articles about bandits and a bad cop breaking prohibition. Webinars/Study Groups Attended:     I attended both the Thursday night study group and the Friday study group. We checked in and had good discussions about our past week. I attended two webinars this week: “More Than Just Names: Advanced U.S. Census Research,” by ...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: It's  Saturday Night  again - time for some more  Genealogy Fun!! Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing ’s assignment for us this weekend: Here is your assignment, should you decide to accept it (you ARE reading this, so I assume that you really want to play along - cue the Mission Impossible music!): 1)  What were the newspaper headlines the day one of your grandparents or great-grandparents were born?   2)  Use any newspaper provider (Chronicling America ( https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov ) is FREE) to find the headlines.   3)  Tell us who your subject was, when and where they were born, and tell us three or four headlines on the front page of the newspaper for that date.   4)  Share your finds on your own blog post, in a comment on this post, or on your Facebook page.  Please provide a link to your work as a comment to this post. My mother-in-law, Thelma Marie (Nilsen) Gorr...