A Deadly Inside Scoop

Collette, Abby. A Deadly Inside Scoop. New York: Berkley Prime Crime, 2020.

Bronwyn "Win" Crewse begins managing her family's ice cream parlor after a cousin's changes to its mission nearly causes its demise. Win wants it to do one thing well--ice cream--and avoid all the other things which did not separate it from other Chagrin Falls businesses. While playing in the snow, she falls over a dead body. When she realizes the detective suspects her own father of the dastardly deed, she and a friend investigate. The novel's pluses include an African-American sleuth, the ice cream parlor that tries to stick to locally sourced ingredients, and the character of Pop-Pop. The novel's minuses include marginalization and depiction of the police as incompetent, a sleuth who spends too little time in her new business, and the sheer stupidity of the sleuth and her friends when it comes to investigation. While I might pick up the second installment to see if it improves, I'm not in a rush to pick it up. I hope she spends more time in the ice cream parlor and less time exhibiting her stupidity in the next installment. I received an advance electronic copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Happy Anniversary, Levi & Barbara

Levi Lance } to } Barbara Yoder }

I solemnized the marriage of Levi Lance and Barbara Yoder I vow the 9th day of Nov 1837. Jacob Bowman J.P.

Wayne County, Ohio marriage records, volume 4A, p. 167, Levi Lance-Barbara Yoder marriage, 9 Nov 1837; Wayne County, Ohio courthouse, photocopy in possession of Lori Thornton.

The above marriage record and transcription belongs to my great-great grandparents, Levi Lantz and Barbara Yoder. They were married on this day 178 years ago.

It's My Blog's 7th Anniversary

Thanks to Thomas for letting me know it was today! I'd almost forgotten that I started this on the 8th of June. I did, however, remember it was in the month of June. I actually created my first post in a blogging workshop at the library conference I'll be attending next week.

I haven't been keeping on top of blogging as much as I should lately. It's what you call having too many irons in the fire. You see, the library conference I'll be attending next week is being held in Ohio. I actually have Ohio ancestry. I've done most of the Ohio research for my Amish line, but I really need to get some additional records on some of my New England lines that made their way to Ohio. I won't have a lot of spare time on either side of the conference -- part of a day on the front end and one full day and two partial ones on the tail end -- to do research so I've been busy making lists of what is held by 3 repositories so that I can compare their holdings, get the things unique to a repository while at it, and prioritize the items I need based on research goals. If I have a little extra time after meeting my goals, I will explore other resources. I haven't had an opportunity to work on these lines in quite some time, so I'm really looking forward to getting to work on my own research for a change.

National Library Week Tribute #2: An Amish Library in Holmes County

Many of you know that I have Amish lines that lived in Holmes and Wayne Counties in Ohio in the 19th century. On one of my trips to that area, I spent quite a bit of time in the courthouses and in the cemeteries of the area. I had gone to visit with an "English cousin" who lives in the area and has quite a bit of interaction with the Amish. She told me about an Amish library that was in Berlin in Holmes County. She made the necessary arrangements so that we could visit it. It is in the basement of a barn beside the Keim lumber yard there. Most of the books and periodicals related to the history of the Amish. It was a quite extensive collection although I'd already utilized many of the resources at other libraries. I was so surprised to find the library. I was even more surprised that they had a photocopier. It was, of course, powered by a generator rather than electricity. My cousin and I made copies of several articles. This library was a pleasant surprise on my research trip!

Nathan Dearborn Household in 1820

Betsey Dearborn's father was Deacon Nathan Dearborn. He was one of the early members of the Windsor Baptist Church in Windsor Township, Morgan County, Ohio. In 1820, he can be found right there in Windsor Township with his family. There is one male 26-45 (Nathan); one female 26-45 (wife, Lucy Perkins); one male under 10 (son, Henry Perkins); and two females under 10 (daughters Betsey and Elsina). The Dearborns have one son Samuel Ward Dearborn who was born and died in 1817 according to family members.

Sources: 1820 U.S. census, Windsor Twp., Morgan County, Ohio, p. 74, line 6, Nathan Derborn; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 18 September 2007); citing National Archives and Records Administration microfilm M33, roll 92.

Robertson, Charles. History of the Windsor Baptist Church. Published online at Morgan County OHGenWeb <http://www.rootsweb.com/~ohmorgan/brick.htm>, accessed 27 Jul 2002. Originally published in History of Morgan County, Ohio (1886), p. 412.

Stearns, Ezra S. Plymouth New Hampshire Families. Baltimore, Md.: Clearfield Company, 2001. Orig. pub. as vol. 2 of The History of Plymouth, New Hampshire (Cambridge, Mass., 1906), p. 199.

Filling in the Missing Gaps

Tonight I decided to begin the process of reviewing some of my data on lines going to New England to fill in any missing holes. I discovered that while I had most of the censuses for Stephen Taylor (1814-1881) and his wife Betsey Dearborn (1818-1899) that I was missing the 1840 one, at least out of my database. It is probably sitting in a file in a drawer that I haven't sorted through yet! However, I decided to make a quick check and discovered that while the couple had wed in Morgan County, Ohio on 8 Mar 1837 that they had already moved to McLean County, Illinois by the time of the 1840 census. Stephen is head of a household of three. One male, age 20-30 (obviously Stephen); one female, age 20-30 (obviously Betsey); and one male under 5 (Isaac, their son who was born in 1839 and who died in Memphis during the Civil War). It is interesting to note that Stephen's brothers Daniel and Sylvanus are both on this page as is Elisha Dixon who married a sister of Betsey. I also noted some of the Carlocks for whom the town of Carlock was later named on the page as well as the Denmans, namesakes of the Denman Cemetery where some of the Taylor family is buried.

UPDATE (9/21): I realize that I should specify that Elisha was not married to Betsey's sister in this census. She was married to her first husband Otis Lawrence at the time of the 1850 census. The marriage to Dixon took place in 1864.

Sources: Marriages in Morgan County, Ohio. Vol. A. April 1, 1819-February 4, 1841. s.l.: Morgan County Historical Society, 1983.

1840 U.S. census, McLean County, Illinois, p. 282, line 25, Stephen Taylor; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com/; accessed 18 September 2007); citing National Archives and Records Administration microfilm M704, roll 65.

Related to President Zachary Taylor or Not?

There are a lot of family legends that have been handed down over the years through many of our lines. When I was growing up, I'd always heard that we were related to President Zachary Taylor through my great grandmother Laura Lucy Taylor Lantz. I must confess that when I first began to try to research the family history that I didn't quite know what I did now so my methodology was quite poor. "I knew" we were related to the President because I'd always heard it was so. [There was no concrete evidence--just the family tradition. I never for a moment doubted that we were related.] I was absolutely delighted to discover that Zachary's genealogy had been done so I began looking at the various compiled genealogies of the president. I never could figure out how Laura could possibly fit in. I decided someone must have left off a line on the tree or something. I filed it away to explore some other day.

I had developed more genealogy prowess and discrimination by the time I revisited this line. My first break on the line came through a query I placed online. I don't remember at this point if I had already discovered that Laura's father was Stephen Taylor of McLean County, Illinois at that point or not, but the gentleman who answered my query was able to tell me about Stephen and his brothers. As I began to explore Laura's immediate family, I discovered that one of Laura's brothers was named Zachary Taylor. So - we were related to Zachary Taylor, but it wasn't President Zachary Taylor.

Now . . . there is also a mystery regarding Stephen Taylor's father Stephen Taylor. This southeastern Ohio resident is said to have died in Detroit in 1814 during the War of 1812. I've found nothing to support this claim YET. (I haven't even found him on a list of troups.) There is a letter that was written by a lady in a historical society in that area to a relative from an earlier generation who was researching this. She claims that there was also a creek named after him in southeastern Ohio. I really need to take the time to work on that part of the legend because I'd certainly love to locate the creek. It's just been lower priority for me. I need to do further research on this line, but I need to make a trip to a repository with better southeastern Ohio records to do so. The counties of Washington, Athens, and Morgan are the ones that seem to bear the most significance for the family. They were in Ohio County, Virginia (now West Virginia) prior to this.

One Hot Summer Day

Several years ago, I was in Holmes County, Ohio during a very hot week in the summer. I believe it may have been near the 4th of July. As we were driving through the countryside, we stopped at the Ashery Country Store near Mt. Eaton which is a very nice little store that sells bulk goods, baked goods, cheeses, deli meats, etc. On that day, they were making homemade ice cream outside the store. The thing that I remember most is the dog that was standing nearby to lick up all the ice cream that was sliding off the cones. One little boy held his cone out for the dog to lap up. The dog apparently knew he wasn't supposed to partake because he looked at it longingly and didn't indulge. However, when a little slid to the ground later, the dog lapped it right up!