My Trails into the Past

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. There is so much that can be written about school. I could write about all of my ancestors who were school teachers , starting with my grandmother, Anna M. (Sullivan) Hork. Her aunts, Helena and Margaret Gleeson were also teachers in Anaconda, Montana, and in Portland, Oregon. I could find all of the yearbook and school photos of pupils in my family (which would be mostly the people who attended school in the 20th century). Mt. Diablo HS Yearbook, 1950 Lela Johnston, Mt. Diablo HS, 1952 Me in 1st grade Me in 5th grade Newspapers covered school activities and I have a few of those items to share. The first is the school lunch menu for the week. I loved western styled beans and often trad...

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 grandfather, William Cyril Hork, was the youngest of ten children born to Johan Anton Hork and Julia Ann Sievert. [1] His eldest sister, Mary, died before he was born in 1895 of blood poisoning. [2] By 1900, two of his oldest siblings, Ida and Susan, were out of the house. Susan had married Andrew E. Hart on 20 May 1900. [3] Ida was living in Spokane, Washington. [4] His father was a tailor [5]  He also had a drinking problem and lived at home on and off.  Finally he left the family. [6]   In 1906, he died in Sheridan, Wyoming, destitute. [7] Cyril was just seven years old and never really had a father. He did have four older brothers, three of whom never married. The oldest, Albert, w...

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. Genealogy Volunteered at the Contra Costa County Historical Society on Tuesday, working again on the Finding Aid. Probably about half way through the Special Collections. The two biggest collections will be the most challenging. Also spent five hours at the Oakland Family Search Library . We almost have more volunteers than patrons and most of the patrons are very self-motivated and need no assistance. So I brought a big box of slides to be scanned. In this way, I became familiar with one of the scanners so I can help a patron in the future. I spent a couple of hours scanning slides I had taken in my first trip to England and Scotland in 1975. The scanning part was simple, though time-consuming, but the biggest work was renaming each image and sorting the...

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. The first child born to Johan Adam Voehringer and Maria Agnes Reiff was named Philippine Margaretha Voehringer. She was born 18 February 1832 in Unterhausen, Schwarzwald, Württemberg. She lived just over one year, dying on 14 April 1833. [1] Their second child was also named Philippine Margaretha, born 28 May 1834. [2] She was the 3rd great-grandmother of my children and the oldest child who lived to adulthood. She was confirmed when the family was living in Bronnweiler. She then left for America, arriving on the SS Gebhard in New York on 1 September 1857. [3] It is not clear she traveled alone or with other known people. A year later she married Ludwig Wilhelm Wollenweber on 5 September 1858 in Louisvil...

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. Genealogy Presented at the Sacramento German Genealogical Society on the topic of Focused Research: Using Research Plans. I was a little nervous at first but then got right into it. The recording is available at their website for thirty days. Presenters also come in early for their study group and a couple of people sat at my table. When we have big name speakers, the table is usually over-flowing. Participated in the Certification Peer Group on our way down to L.A. using my phone. I like meeting better on the computer. We continued talking about case studies, using the tips from the BCG Action Group mailing list. Participated in the DearMyrtle study group, AmericanGen on Wednesday. These are now twice a month and we finished up chapter 7. I also we...

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. Genealogy I helped a researcher who came into the History Center this week to do some research in court records on men from China. She actually found quite a bit of information in our loose files. We had a very nice conversation with Tom Jones at our Writers SIG meeting. He gave us some great tips about writing and editing. What I took away from the talk: write about the person, not the research. Find the theme and weave that into the story: introduce it, draw it out in the narrative, and then end with theme. Watched a webinar about numbering genealogies, given by Alice Vogt Veen and then made more changes to my numbering in my KDP.  I have decided that I’m done making changes. It still matches the examples in Numbering Your Genealogy but I lea...

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 Pas t . I’m looking forward to writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. Who is or was musical in our family? My daughter, Margaret, plays the piano, sings, and dances, as well as acts. Her favorite music is show tunes. In junior high and high school, she played percussion instruments. Her grandmother, Thelma, sang in the St. Stephen's Church choir for over fifty years. She also loved classical and opera music. She had such a strong diaphragm from singing that she could blow up air mattress in no time at all. My father-in-law’s uncle, Fred J. Davey, was a music teacher who played trombone and led the church orchestra and the Odd Fellows band in Springfield, Missouri. My paternal grandmother, Anna Sullivan, was in her college Glee Club. She later was ...