Monday Genea-pourri, Week of May 3-9, 2021

I have completed sixty (60) weeks of semi- “lock down” due to Covid-19. This past week, I stayed home more. I picked up my second internet order from JC Penney, volunteered at the History Center, and went to the meadow for phenology. I got a lot done on the computer.

 Genealogy

Blog Writing:

Week 18: Crime and Punishment—Ludwig Wollenweber Goes to Court I wrote about my husband’s 2x-great-grandfather, who was a saloonkeeper. Newspaper articles mentioned his court appearances for failure to pay fees and taxes.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun – Three Things About Your Mother I wrote about how creative my mother was with all she did from cooking to crafts.

Online Study Groups & Meetings Attended: I met with Jacqueline on Tuesday and Amigos on Wednesday, where we talked about our current projects. Friday’s Peer group discussed chapter 4 of the DNA workbook after sharing about our various projects.

Webinars & Classes Attended: I attended a class on best practices in using Microsoft Word for our writing, given by Tom Jones. It was great seeing how he uses styles to create footnotes and child lists. He also demonstrated how to create tables and include footnotes. He uses a lot of short-cut keys to make his work faster.

Client Work/Presentations:
I completed the first round of client work, researching primarily in Brooklyn records. I sent in an article for consideration to Der Blumenbaum.   

Volunteer & Own Work:
I got more books in the History Center library inventoried this week and completed a query for a  naturalization record. I thought I found a city directory I hadn’t known about for my great-grandfather in St. Louis on FamilySearch, but I actually had it already—just hadn’t entered it in my genealogy program. I should take each person and make sure that I have entered all of my saved digital documents into their profile in RootsMagic, as well as check that I have scanned and entered everything that is in their paper file.

Looking at my 2021 goals, I have completed half of them: 

• Teach two courses at the adult school. I actually did 4, two each quarter. ✅
• Create three new talks. I actually created 8, four at the adult school & four on land.  ✅
• Write and submit two articles to publications. I submitted one to Der Blumenbaum. ✅  

The rest of the goals are: 

• write a KDP of a southern family 
• finish processing family photos 
• create an heirloom book 

Maybe after rearranging the bedroom furniture so I have room for a portable table, I can get to work on these last two goals.

Other: I managed one walk with my husband—he always seems to do his walk to the mailbox on days I have German class. In German Conversation class, I shared about the history of the Empire State Building which turned 90 this month and showed photos of our family at the top. On Mother’s Day, I received calls from both daughters. It was nice hearing from them, but wished we could have been together. 

I’m reading the following books:

• 1919, The Year of Racial Violence by David F. Krugler
• The Family Tree by Karen Branan
• Schooled by Gordon Korman

Photos taken this week:
Flowers from our native plant trail in Martinez, the first from the John Muir NHP and the second from the creek garden on Castro Street in downtown.

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.

Copyright © 2021 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.