My Trails into the Past

I have completed one hundred twenty-nine (129) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. I had a much quieter week with little outside activity besides having lunch with Peter and visiting the History Center, doing phenology, and going to Train Club for our last of the month show.   Genealogy Blog Writing : Timelines – A Great Way to Jumpstart Your Writing . I wrote about how I use timelines in my writing. This post was highlighted on Friday's Family History Finds . Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: What is Next on Your ‘To-Do’ List . I wrote about some of the items on my immediate to-do list. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended: Monday was a busy day for meetings and study groups. Monday Morning Zoom met with eight or nine people and we had a good conversation about what we have been doing. I met with Jacqueline and talked about our Fitbits and how they can map out our walks. I also attended the AppGen founders meeting where we discussed which courses we were inte...

It's  Saturday Night  - time for more  Genealogy Fun! Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing is to: 1) What is next on your genealogy "To Do" list? [Thank you to Linda Stufflebean for suggesting topics!] 2)  Write your own blog post, or add your response as a comment to this blog post, in a Facebook Status post or note. Here's mine: One item on my genealogy to-do list is finishing up the lesson plans, handout, and in-class exercises for my upcoming AppGen course called Foundations 2. My goal is to finish everything by September 1. So, I have four more days. I’m working on the last week, so I am close to my goal. This week, I listened to the Genealogy Guys podcast while walking and heard mentioned a new database at My Heritage called “Germany, North Rhine Westphalia (Arnsberg, Detmold, and Münster), Deaths 1874-1938.” I did a preliminary search and found some promising returns, but I don’t have a subscription. I need to take ...

This issue never got published, so it is late. I have completed one hundred twenty-seven (127) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. Did anyone expect the pandemic to last this long? We may have Covid forever. Because a research trip to Turlock took up three of my days, I did less volunteering and more getting out in the public. The details are below. Genealogy Blog Writing : My 52 Ancestors post about Rootsweb Message Boards was highlighted by Friday’s Family History Finds .     Library – Research Trip in Turlock, California . I wrote about my trip to Turlock to research in two libraries and at the historical society. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: A “New to You” Resource Helping Your Genealogy Researc h I don’t have a new resource online, but wrote about the joys of researching in archives and libraries to find “new to me” resources. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended: Jacqueline and I met on Monday and we hosted the CGS Roundtable on Wednesday n...

Creating a timeline is a great tool for a variety of genealogy research tasks. Timelines can help see holes in the research, can be used to analyze and correlate data, and can help distinguish between two same-named people. The best way I use timelines is to assist in my writing. My timelines include all the events of a person’s life and each is fully cited. I like to create my timelines in a word processing program to utilize the footnote feature. However, timelines can be created in a spreadsheet program or by using tables in a word processing program. Just be sure to have a column for your citations. When I’m ready to write about one of my ancestors or collateral lines, I take out the timeline. I have all the events in their life from birth to death recorded on the timeline, and the events I include come from census, directories, newspaper articles, military records, deeds, court records, and vital records. Any source that references them would be included. Writing becomes eas...

I have completed one hundred twenty-eight (128) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. I had a much quieter week with little outside activity besides the History Center, Oakland FamilySearch Library, phenology, and shopping at Penney’s. Genealogy Blog Writing : Service – Fountain Service at Quig’s Fountain . I wrote about the restaurant my great-uncle ran using ads I found on newspaper websites. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: What Are You Reading This Summer? We were to list books we were reading and state how they help our genealogy research. None of the books I’ve read were useful for research. I read mysteries for enjoyment, but I also had some non-fiction books I read for book club. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended: On Monday, I attended three meetings: CGS hosts where we discussed Zoom issues, the AppGen founders meeting where we placed students into the classes after registration, and a Zoom meeting with Jacqueline. I sat in on the NGSQ study group on T...

It's  Saturday Night  - time for more  Genealogy Fun! Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings is to: 1) What are you reading this summer?  Does it help your genealogy research? [Thank you to Linda Stufflebean for suggesting topics!] 2)  Write your own blog post, or add your response as a comment to this blog post, in a Facebook Status post or note. Here's mine: I read a lot, both fiction and since the pandemic started and I joined a book club, nonfiction. I have been making note of the books I have read in my weekly Genea-pourri blog posts. Currently, I’m reading The Birth Certificate: An American Histor y by Susan J. Pearson for a book club. We’ll discuss the book over three Zoom meetings. I also started Singin’ in the Rain: The Making of an American Masterpiece by Earl J Hess & Pratibha A. Dabholkar . “Singin’ in the Rain” is one of my favorite movies and it’s interesting how they came up with the idea and make...

To come up with a person to write about each week, I do an “everywhere” search in RootsMagic for the themed word. This week, service came up in hundreds of events for funeral services, military service, and even social services as written on state vital records. However, I did find this ad for John V. “Vir” Quigley’s restaurant Quig’s. [1] What makes this ad meet the theme is the fact there was fountain service, where milkshakes, sodas, and floats were sold, and drive-in curb service with a large parking lot. Other ads found include these two: At left: Napa Journal, 17 July 1949; at right: The Mid-Week Shopping News, 3 Sep 1947 His fountain café was located on Main Street at Lincoln in Napa, California. It’s gone today and newer buildings are in its place. In fact, I found two notices in the newspaper where he tried to sell the business in 1954 and 1956. [2] He moved to Redding sometime between those years as his obituary in 1959 stated he had lived in Shasta County for five years. [3...

It's  Saturday Night  - time for more  Genealogy Fun! Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings is to: 1) What is a "new to you" resource that is helping your genealogy research? [Thank you to Linda Stufflebean for suggesting topics!] 2)  Write your own blog post, or add your response as a comment to this blog post, in a Facebook Status post or note. Here’s mine: Like Randy, I have not used a “new to me” resource recently. I use Ancestry , FamilySearch , Fold3 , newspaper databases, and digital book sites such as Google Books , Internet Archive , and HathiTrust often. I would say what is new to me would be making a visit to a local archive to see one-of-a-kind resources. I did that this past week when my friend and I visited Turlock, California for two days. We visited the archives in the library at California State University Stanislaus, the Turlock Historical Society, and the Turlock Public Library, as well as two local ceme...

I had been planning a research trip to Turlock, California with a friend since the pandemic started. We both have family who lived in the area, though my husband’s family lived here early in the 20 th century and hers lived there in the mid-to-late part of the century. We used Trello to make our plans. It’s a great place to put details of each research facility and what specific things we hope to see there. We had three main places for research: the archives at the California State University Stanislaus (CSUS) library, the Turlock Historical Society, and the Turlock Public Library. We also planned trips to the cemetery and funeral home. We spent two nights and three days in Turlock. CSUS The first stop was the library at CSUS. The archivist had all the items we requested laid out on the tables.  It was very helpful to contact her ahead of time. One of the items I wanted to see was a master’s dissertation but it was not available for me because the microfilm machine at the lib...

I have completed one hundred twenty-six (126) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. I volunteered at the history center and Oakland FamilySearch library. I attended a Lumineers concert in Sacramento and had dinner with my German class at Brotzeit. Genealogy Blog Writing : Help – RootsWeb Message Boards Helped with Networking & is Still Useful for Hints . I wrote about how I found cousins, who were descendants of the four Sievert children who immigrated to Joliet, Illinois in the 1860s on RootsWeb Message Boards . Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing highlighted my post. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Who is A Mysterious Person in Your Family Tree ? I wrote about my 3x-great-grandparents who are holes in my tree on my father’s side of the family. One was born in a German settlement in Poland and the other two were likely in County Cork in Ireland. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended: I attended the SLIG Writer’s group on Monday where my piece of research report wri...

It's  Saturday Night  - time for more  Genealogy Fun! Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing is to: 1) Who is a mysterious person in the family tree you'd like to learn more about? [Thank you to Linda Stufflebean for suggesting topics!] 2)  Write your own blog post, or add your response as a comment to this blog post, in a Facebook Status post or note. Here’s mine: When I look at my RootsMagic software under the pedigree view, I have six blank spots at the 3x-great-parents on my father’s side. The parents of Susanna Raduntz, who were likely from Schneidemuhl, Posen, a former German village in present-day Poland. Susana was born about 1832 and married Winzent Siewert on 10 February 1850. I do not have the original church record that the information came from—only the data. So, I don’t know if Susanna’s parents’ names were mentioned in the record. Winzent and Susanna came to the U.S. aboard the ship Johanna Elise on 23 June 1852 w...

Back in the day before Ancestry and FamilySearch got so big with images of records and many family trees, we used sites on the internet such as USGENWEB and RootsWeb.  Whenever I located a new residence for my ancestor’s families, I would check out the county page at USGENWEB for user-contributed content. The hosts for the sites would upload indexes, photos, maps, and other useful information about their county. Some counties had more information than others and often you’d see they needed a host for the county. RootsWeb was another site with database indexes, family trees, and message boards. The message boards are still available, as  Ancestry now hosts the site at https://www.ancestry.com/boards/. You can search on surname, place, or topic. In the past, it was a way to communicate with others who were researching the same families or places.  It is where I met three other researchers of the Sievert/Freitag families. Four siblings arrived from Schneidemüh...

I have completed one hundred twenty-five (125) weeks of semi-lock down due to Covid-19. I volunteered at the history center, did phenology, and went to Train Club for a public show. Genealogy Blog Writing : Teams – Elda Wayne “Teensy” Lancaster Played Football . I wrote about my grandmother’s youngest brother who was an athlete at Stephenville High School and Tarleton College. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Who is Your Current Favorite Ancestor to Research and Why I wrote about my great-grandfather’s brother, Albert Hork, who was a Roman Catholic priest in Nebraska, Arkansas, and Oregon. O nline Study Groups & Meetings Attended: I hosted the CCCGS Roundtable meeting with Zoom on Monday. Later, Jacqueline and I continued discussing our upcoming trip to Turlock for research. Three members of Amigos met. I also attended the RootsMagic SIG. Client Work/Presentations : I continued working on my lessons and handout for the upcoming course for AppGen. I’m continuing the Fo...