My Trails into the Past

Whenever I come across a new website where I can do some searching, I use a couple of surnames to test out the site. I try my unusual surnames first, like Coor, Hork, Gleeson, or Hutson. Of course, it depends on the database’s subject. I certainly would not search in a northern state for a family with southern roots. Sometimes, I get nothing from a database. It’s frustrating, but before I give up, I test out the database with more common names such as Smith, Johnson, or Jones. If I cannot get any returns with those names, it means I need to dig deeper to see what the database does cover. My husband’s friend has me conduct research, and one of his family names is Hulaniski. Now, that name is pretty rare, and I can almost use it globally in a database search without using place filters. It is one of the first names I used when FamilySearch released its full-text search capability. What names do you test a database with?   #52Ancestors-Week 26: Favorite Name This is my eight...

Agnes Hilma Carolina Lundquist was born on 16 July 1894 in Stanton, Montgomery County, Iowa, to immigrant parents from Sweden, Pehr Alfred Lundquist and Mathilda Lovisa Erikson-Holm. [1] Her parents were married on 15 March 1892 in Red Oak, the county seat of Montgomery. [2] Agnes was their second child. When I began researching my husband’s family, I looked for her father in ship passenger lists and found no record of Pehr Alfred Lundquist, nor his parents Anders Lundquist and Cajsa Lundquist. Two more siblings of Pehr Alfred, Johan Gustav and Ana Sophia, were also not found. I continued researching the family in US records but at the back of my mind, I really wanted to locate that passenger list. It’s the first connection to the old country. Then I remembered the Swedish naming pattern. Pehr’s name would be Pehr Alfred Andersson, being the son of Anders. Anders’ surname would Eliasson, as the son of Elias Pehrsson. Perhaps they did not come to America using the Lundquist name...

This is my second 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. I am not named for any ancestor. I did not name my children for any ancestors. Yet, they have many namesake ancestors. I named both of my daughters before I had done any genealogy research. I have captured those ancestors here. My daughter, Elizabeth Ann has nine ancestors with her name: On her paternal side, Elizabeth Hocking is her fourth great-grandmother, who married James Davey in 1806. They are the parents of Thomas Davey, who immigrated to the US in 1852. Also Marie Elisabetha Welsch, who married Philippe Ludwig Emerich, and were the parents of Dorothea Carolina Emerich Wollenweber. Marie is her fifth great-grandmother and lived in Kusel in the Pfalz.  On her maternal side, Eliz...

I am 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’m looking forward to writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. My name is Lisa. I was not named after anyone. From name books, Lisa is derived from Elizabeth. Elizabeth is a Greek name, meaning either “oath of God” or “God is satisfaction.” Elizabeth was the mother of John the Baptist. After doing a lot of family research, I have found many ancestors on both my father’s and mother’s sides, as well on my husband's side. I also named my first born, Elizabeth. So checking in my RootsMagic database, which contains ancestors of my children, I found: 10 Elizabeths with no surname 86 people with Elizabeth as their first name 46 people with Elizabeth as their middle name There may have been more Elizabeths with the women whose middle names were listed as E....