My Trails into the Past

I have completed fifty-eight (58) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. This past week, I taught at the Adult School, volunteered at the History Center, went to the meadow for phenology, and picked up tea lattes at Starbucks twice. Other than that, I stayed home and worked on the computer, writing lessons and Zoom practicing for our model railroad convention on Saturday. Genealogy Blog Writing : Week 16: DNA—What I’ve Done and Not Yet Done I have not solved any genealogical problems using DNA but have tested several people. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Tell Us About One of Your Elusive Ancestors . I wrote about Benjamin W. Jones of Rankin Co, Mississippi. I know nothing of his origins except he was born about 1822 in Virginia. My goal is to research the other Jones men in the county and see if I find a connection. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended:  Jacqueline & I met on Tuesday and talked about citations and three of the Amigos met on Wednesday a...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: It's  Saturday Night  again - Time for some more  Genealogy Fun!! Here is our assignment from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing : 1)  We all have "elusive ancestors" that we cannot find a name for, or one that absolutely eludes us, but we know some details about their spouse and/or children. 2)  Tell us about one of them - how are you related?  What do you know about them? Where did they live? etc. 3)  Tell us about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook Status post.  Please leave a link in a comment to this post. Here’s mine: I do not know the parents of my 3x-great-grandfather, Benjamin W. Jones, who married Amanda A. Haley 26 Jun 1845 in Rankin County, Mississippi. [1] Census records in Rankin County show Benjamin was born in Virginia about 1822. [2] He first appeared in Rankin County in the 1845 state census and 1845 tax list. These show Benjamin as a sing...

I have not solved any genealogical mysteries with DNA (yet). I do have burning questions that I would love to answer, but haven’t found the right people to test. Who Has Tested I have tested at Ancestry, 23andMe, and Living DNA. I have uploaded my Ancestry DNA to FamilyTree DNA and MyHeritage. So, I feel I’m doing the right thing and are prepared to solved problems. I have asked some family members to test. My maternal grandmother first tested mitochondria DNA at FamilyTree DNA when that was the only test available for women. Later, when autosomal was available, we upgraded to that test. Here is the projected ancestry for my grandmother, which agrees with what I have researched so far. Her ancestry is deep in the South and I haven't yet found an immigrant except on the Lancaster line. I also asked my paternal aunt to test the mitochondria DNA at Family Tree DNA and, when available, we upgraded with the autosomal test. Having both my maternal grandmother and paternal aunt teste...

I have completed fifty-seven (57) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. This past week, I taught at the Adult School, volunteered at the History Center, went to the meadow for phenology, and picked up tea lattes at Starbucks twice. I also got a haircut—wasn’t so bad, just the one stylist there. I also rode my bike downtown with my husband. I went to my bank to deposit some checks and he went to both the post office and our bank. Genealogy Blog Writing : Week 15: Brick Wall—Tools to Help Solve Tough Problems I gave a few tips with examples that have helped me with research brick walls. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – My Best Genealogy Vacation . I wrote about the trip I took with my daughters to Idaho, Wyoming and Montana with side trips to conduct some genealogy research. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended:  I met with Jacqueline on Tuesday, Cert Discussion Group and Amigos on Wednesday, and Cert Peer group on Friday. I attended the CCCHS board meeting on...

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans It's  Saturday Night  again – Time for some more  Genealogy Fun!! Our assignment this week from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing : 1) Think about your genealogy career - have you taken a "genealogy or family history vacation?" 2) Tell us about one (or more) of them - where did you go, what research did you do, did you meet family members, etc. 3) Tell us about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook Status post. Please leave a link in a comment to this post. Here's Mine: I think my best genealogy vacation was when my daughters and I took a road trip to Idaho and Montana, with a stop through Wyoming to visit Yellowstone National Park. We had just purchased a new 1999 Ford Explorer and it had no plates yet, so everywhere we went, no one knew we were tourists (at least no one knew we were from California). Sightseeing The first few days were spent sightseeing. We had no real plans—just drove and...

We all have brick walls. Many are tough to solve because there are no records directly giving us the answer. Some we create ourselves because we don’t recognize clues of indirect evidence in documents that might help us. I present on this topic to local genealogical societies and have two tips that might jumpstart a researcher who is stuck. Review Your Previous Work If we have been researching a long time, we may have research notes or documents we have collected a long time ago when we were just starting out that we have not looked at again. At the early stage, we tend collect every document with our family names on them and then put them aside when they don’t name our direct ancestor. Review also all of your previous documents. We tend to get excited about a document that answers a particular question but do not pay as much attention to the other information listed on the document. Perhaps now, some of that information will make more sense. An example of this: I had the date...

I have completed fifty-six (56) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. This past week, I volunteered at the History Center, taught at the Adult School (on Zoom in an empty classroom), and went to the meadow for phenology.   Genealogy Blog Writing : Week 14: Great—How Many Great-grandchildren Did Warren Lancaster Really Have? I discovered a discrepancy in the number of great-grandchildren in the Warren’s obituary and tried to analyze why that could have happened. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – The Games Your Family Played . This was a repeat from the year before so I didn’t write a new post but posted this one instead. We played Scattergories before the Parker Brothers games was invented. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended:  I met with Jacqueline on Tuesday and Amigos on Wednesday. I had other tasks to do during the other group meetings. I also attended the California Genealogical Society’s board meeting on Saturday, and Book club on Sunday. Webina...

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 fifty-five (55) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. This past week, I went out to shop for greeting cards at CVS, the History Center three times, and to the meadow for phenology. Genealogy Blog Writing : Week 13: Music—Music in Our House Growing Up . I wrote about the different ways we celebrated music in our home from listening to the radio to playing musical instruments. Updated Website . I chose a new template for the "My Trails into the Past" blog so it appears better when using a phone or tablet. I also chose a new template for the "Mam-ma’s Southern Family" blog, here . In both cases, I uploaded my own photo to use as the header and I really like how both blogs look. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Google M...

It's a quiet day in our home this year, however we can hear the Easter Egg hunts in the neighboring houses where young children still live. I thought today I'd share some family photos of Easters past. 1955 at Lisa & Lea at Nana's on Easter 1968 Ready for Church Margaret & Elizabeth at the Mall 1998 Easter at Dad's with extended family Copyright © 2021 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: It's  Saturday Night  again - Time for some more  Genealogy Fun!! Here is our assignment from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing :  1) Identify an ancestral home address ( preferably one with a street address...) for one of your ancestral families (You do know where they lived, don't you? If not, consult the 1900 to 1940 US Census records, or City Directories). 2) Go to Google Maps ( http://maps.google.com ) and enter the street address (and city/town if necessary - usually you can pick from a list) for your selected ancestral home. 3) Look at the street map, the satellite map, and the street view. Zoom in or out, or manipulate the image as you wish. 4) Tell us or show us your map images in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook Status post. Please leave a link in a comment to this post. 5) Do you have maps and street view pictures for all of your known ancestral homes? Here’s mine: I d...

You may notice a change to the look of the blog. I have done this so my content can be viewed better on tablets and smart phones.  I was hesitant, but discovered that I really like this new template. It has a very clean and modern look. Plus, I was able to upload my own photo that really looks like a trail! Let me know what you think! Copyright © 2021 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.