Saturday Night Genealogy Fun -- What Search/Research Did You Do Last Week?

It's Saturday Night -

time for more Genealogy Fun!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music here) is to:

1)  What genealogy search/research did you do last week?  Did you have a research goal or plan?  Tell us about one or more search/research session.

Here’s mine:

I have done a lot of genealogy research and writing these past two weeks. My download folder has several Word documents of beginning writeups. I am searching for possible case studies, research reports, or family narratives to use for my BCG renewal which is due in late 2023. It’s never too soon to start on the renewal portfolio.

The first project is locating all of the newspaper articles that I can find of the Gleeson/Gleason family in Le Mars, which is located in Plymouth County, Iowa. The University of Northern Iowa, Rod Library has digital newspapers from many Iowan cities on their website. The website is searchable and the pages or clipped images are downloadable.[1]  

Eliza Gleeson and her sons moved from Clinton County, Iowa to Le Mars sometime before 1880. She died in 1904. Obituaries in this time period were often informative. Several newspapers carried an obituary, such as this one from the Akron Register Tribune:

“Mrs. Eliza Gleason died at her home in LeMars Sunday night, from general wearing out of the system. She was born in Canada in 1829, and was married in 1847 to Michael Gleason thirty-eight years ago. In 1876, with her sons, she settled on a farm in Johnson township, this county, but removed to LeMars later and has been making her home since then with her sons. Seven children were born, four sons surviving, Martin, Thomas and John, of LeMars, and Michael, north of Akron. The funeral was held at LeMars, yesterday.”[2]

I already had this obituary, but nothing collected about sons, Martin, Thomas, John, and Michael. I have spent most of the week researching the sons. I started with the eldest, Martin. I reviewed the obituary that I have for him that gave a full life history.[3] From there, I transcribed the obituary and then located sources that supported each statement made. I located the death certificate that showed the death in Kansas City, Missouri in 1913. They lived in Oklahoma previously and I found them in Jefferson County, Oklahoma in 1910. Twelve years previous, he married Mrs. Hollihan in Le Mars and I found a newspaper article about that. Other newspaper articles reported on him buying and selling land, elected as constable, appointed later as a Fish & Game warden, and being a delegate to the Democratic caucus.

I found many articles about his brother, Michael, too. I will very likely write up a family narrative about this family. I also have a big list of FHL films to search the next time I go to the FamilySearch library in Oakland, as most films in Iowa are locked.

Another project I worked on was Ebonezer Loveless, my 2x-great-grandfather, who was a Baptist preacher, farmer, and later worked as a local postmaster in Faulkner County, Arkansas. I did some newspaper searching in the Conway newspaper, Log Cabin Democrat on GenealogyBank.[4] I located quite a few articles and him in his communities of Greenbrier and Linder. I learned his wife, Eliza, was ill before she died, he sold his property after moving to Stephenville, Texas. He visited the area twice, preached locally, and even married one of his nieces. This information can be added to his biography. There are many more articles I could find for his children who remained in Arkansas.  

I am always on the lookout for new issues of newspapers. Where I find newspapers, the write-ups of my family are richer with additional historical content.

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[1] “Iowa Historical Newspapers,” University of Northern Iowa (https://guides.lib.uni.edu/c.php?g=668054&p=4696290#s-lg-box-wrapper-28403950).

[2] "Deaths," Akron Register Tribune, 11 February 1904, p1.

[3] "A Well Known Pioneer: Martin Gleeson is Suddenly Called Away," LeMars Sentinel (LeMars, Iowa), 1 August 1913, p. 1.

[4] Due to the terms of use of GenealogyBank, I cannot show any images that I have found without permission. See https://www.genealogybank.com/information/terms-of-use. 

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