The Girls Were Shipped Off . . .

via Parcel Post to their aunt in 1918. Read all about it.

Spring Break . . . Almost Here

Spring break is almost here for the college where I work. I plan to take advantage of my time off to do a little genealogical research! First stop . . . the North Carolina State Library and Archives in Raleigh. I've got a long list of things to copy there as well as more work on a project that I'm hoping to turn into an article for publication.

Next stop . . . New Bern, North Carolina. The North Carolina Genealogical Society has a regional workshop there. Craig Scott is the featured speaker.

After heading back to Raleigh, I'll be off to Monroe County, Mississippi to do some digging in the courthouses. (The chancery is in the old post office building.) If I have time, I want to head over to Lowndes County to do a little digging as well, but I may have to save that for another trip. This is for a project in which another researcher and I are collaborating.

I do want to find a little time for R & R in the midst of all this so I'll probably try to give myself a little break once in awhile from the research!

A Productive Saturday

There were two things that were on today's agenda, and I accomplished both tasks. The first thing was laundry. I noticed from Facebook status updates that I was not the only person with this on today's "to-do" list. I'm happy to report that all my clothes with the exception of those that I'm presently wearing are clean! The second thing on my agenda was the more genealogical driven task. I wanted to complete three of the four syllabi for FGS 2009 before my spring break begins on Thursday. I managed to get those three in final format today. (I will confess that I've been working on them off and on for awhile.) I've got a good start on the fourth syllabus, but I want to take a little more time with it. There's so much information I could include, but I've got to limit it to just four pages. I want to make sure that I include the things that will be most useful to those attending the presentation for future reference.

I've been introduced to the Bejeweled Blitz application on Facebook. It's a game with a one minute time limit. I honestly think that I'm at a distinct disadvantage over most folks because I usually use my laptop keyboard and trackpad rather than a real mouse. I haven't got the hang of it with that time limit yet, but I'm sure that practice will improve my results.

Now it is time to get organized for research on spring break! I've already got a list of documents I need to get at the North Carolina State Archives. I've also got a to-do list on a Mississippi project for the courthouses in a couple of counties (if I have time to check out both).

Old Records Unavailable to Researchers

Researchers expecting to find historic materials at UNC's Wilson Library may be in for a surprise. Apparently much of the building is inaccessible due to fire laws. With the current economic crisis and cuts in funding, the outlook for getting the building reopened in the near future appears grim.

Odds & Ends

I had intended to post something to the blog yesterday, but I just ran out of time. Yesterday would have been my maternal grandmother's 112th birthday if she had lived that long. I had intended to post some sort of tribute to her. I'll save that for another time when I have the time to do a good post.

Yesterday I received a friend request from deceased genealogical fraudster Gustave Anjou on Facebook. It amazes me that anyone would want to be the friend of someone who fabricated so many genealogies, but alas, 44 of my friends were friends of his the last time I checked. I do wonder who would even want to pretend to be him on Facebook.

Tonight I've been chasing down the history of a family that lived in this area. One of my colleagues had received some information from another researcher that indicates that the family moved to this area from Scott County, Virginia. However, there is a rather odd migration pattern in that the person who sent her the information claims the Scott County family descend from someone who was in Charleston, South Carolina. In my experience, most of the people settling the Scott County area would have been of Scots-Irish descent and have most likely entered the country through Philadelphia. I've been tracing the family backwards out of Hamblen County into Grainger, Hancock, and Hawkins County. I have not quite made the connection to Scott County, Virginia as there is a problem which needs to be resolved first. (It's really a fairly significant problem in attaching the known person with his alleged parents.) I (or my colleague) will probably have to travel to resolve the issue although I'll try two LDS films that might give me at least part of the information I need to resolve the problem. I've also been studying the neighbors to see what clues they might yield.

Sevier County Marriage Books

There's a new 4 volume set of marriages available for Sevier County, Tennessee. Each volume costs $29.95 plus $5.00 for shipping/handling. Each volume is approximately 400 pages in length.

Volume 1: 1856-1923
Volume 2: 1914-1944
Volume 3: 1945-1971
Volume 4: 1972-1981

Those wishing to order the volumes should send payment to:

Smoky Mountain Historical Society
PO Box 5078
Sevierville, TN 37864

Remembering Phyllis Harper

I grew up in Northeast Mississippi. The major daily newspaper in our area was the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal (Tupelo). There was one column that I never wanted to miss. That was the column by Phyllis Harper who shared about her beloved Fawn Grove, a small Itawamba County community in which she lived. While I have long since forgotten the specific content of most of her columns, there is a fondness in my heart for the community of Fawn Grove because of Phyllis' writings. It was a sad day when her last column was published. Phyllis had a gift for evoking a real sense of place in her writing. Those of us who read her felt that we knew Fawn Grove almost as well as the towns in which we lived.

Her obituary can be found here. Readers of the paper are sharing their memories of Phyllis here.

New History of Smyrna, Tennessee Available

It's often difficult for people to become aware of new items that are published locally, so I want to give a "heads-up" on a newly available history of the town of Smyrna, Tennessee.

Friends of Smyrna Public Library has re-released Walter King Hoover's History of the Town of Smyrna, Tenn. Copies are available for $40 plus $5.00 shipping for each copy. For libraries interested in ordering a copy, send a check made out to Friends of Smyrna Public Library to the address below.

Smyrna Public Library
Attn: History of the Town of Smyrna
400 Enon Springs Rd. W.
Smyrna TN 37167

More information about the book can be seen at the library's website: http://www.linebaugh.org/smyrna/smyrnahistory.htm

The Joys of (Re)-Filing

I spent most of the day reorganizing some of my files. I've recently begun trying a new system of filing that really seems to be helping me put my fingers on those documents that pertain to more than one family by filing them geographically and then by record type. I've got a few other twists on other types of documents that I'm using. As I've been going through my file folders, 3-prong notebooks, etc., I've run across several things that I had been unable to locate via my old system. I've also looked at some correspondence from early in my research that has yielded clues that may actually be useful in my current research on one of my families.

When I have been looking over my Taylor research, I knew that I had researched Cora Potter who had been taken in by my great-great grandfather Stephen Taylor in 19th century McLean County, Illinois. I had been unable to locate her information in my Taylor surname file, and I could not find a Potter file. I'd failed to record the research in my database although I could remember that her married name was Shoemake(r). When I found my research in an unmarked folder that contained mostly the research on Cora but had a few other miscellaneous items, I decided to at least make some notes in my database that would help me locate what I had found on her along with another family that was also headed by a Frank and Kora. (My Cora's husband was Louis or Lewis Francis "Frank" Sho(e)maker.) I made a note about the similarly named family along with my observations on why this was not "my" Frank and Cora in the 1920 census. All the documents are now filed in places where I should be able to locate them.

Another discovery was made by glancing over some correspondence on my Aldridge line that I had actually forgotten over the years. I had corresponded with a lady in Indiana who was descended from Francis Aldridge, a brother of Prince William and Isham Aldridge who ended up settling in northwestern Alabama. As I glanced through the correspondence, I noted that Francis had served in the Revolutionary War. I don't know why I had not paid attention to that fact years ago. I can only say that it was early in my research and that I either planned to get around to it one day or that I didn't realize the value of checking the pension files of siblings back then. I logged onto Footnote.com and had soon saved and printed off Francis' pension file. I haven't reviewed it all yet because I knew I needed to focus on my filing project, but I'm very hopeful that it will yield further clues about my Aldridge family that have been unknown by me up to this point. By the way, Francis was living in Pulaski County, Kentucky at the time his pension was granted. He served for North Carolina.

I'm excited to see what other "finds" or "rediscoveries" that I will make as I continue this filing project. It's hard to make yourself keep filing and leave the new leads alone until the filing for the day is done. However, the end result should be better organization of my documentation.

Thanks

. . . for the publicity.

Genealogy & Vacations

First of all, let me say that I rarely take a true vacation. I did manage to take one last year, but it's the last time I've just "gotten away" in a long time. Almost all of my "vacations" involve some planned research. Whenever I go to Mississippi to visit my parents, I'm almost always working on some projects of my own and often take on a few clients.

One of my favorite vacation destinations is a genealogy conference. I almost always do some research in or around a conference. The year that NGS was in Chicago, I stopped along the way to do some research in McLean County, Illinois. I didn't have a lot of time, but I went to the courthouse, to the historical society, to a cemetery, and to the town where my ancestors lived so I could see where they had actually resided. After that conference, I was heading to the Association of Christian Librarians' Conference which was being held at Indiana Wesleyan University. I stopped along the way to try to locate the Amish Family Cemetery northeast of Kokomo where my great great grandmother and other family members were buried. I'm sad to say that despite repeated trips there and the section, township, and range, I never located those few markers. A friend of mine who had relatives in the area who were friends with some of those owning the farms in the area went back later with her relatives. They were also unable to locate it. The cemetery was included in a published compilation of cemeteries. I really do wish I had photos of the markers or could locate them, but it doesn't appear that will happen unless there is a miracle! That trip was a lot of fun because I was able to do research in two locations.

When NGS was in Richmond, I did research on some of my Virginia ancestors at the Library of Virginia. In fact, I was registered for the librarian's day. I got bored with the program and snuck out to do some additional research. I kind of felt guilty, but I sure enjoyed things a lot more.

Last summer the Association of Christian Librarians Conference was in the Boston area. I went an entire week early so that I could spend some time researching at NEHGS. I also visited some of my ancestral home towns such as Ipswich, Massachusetts and Hampton, New Hampshire. I visited many cemeteries, but not all of them contained the remains of my ancestors. (Of course, I was able to do some research at NEHGS when FGS was there in 2006 also.)

I've been working on some North Carolina projects lately so I've spent some time visiting Raleigh and the State Library and Archives there on some short breaks such as our fall break and right before I had to go back to work in January.

My next two vacations will also involve genealogy. During our spring break, I'm going to both North Carolina and Mississippi. I'm going to begin by heading to Raleigh where I'll do a little research. Then I'm heading to North Carolina Genealogical Society's Spring Regional Workshop. [Note: The link takes you to a PDF file.] It is being held in New Bern. The speaker is Craig Roberts Scott, and the theme is "Overcoming Brickwalls." In Mississippi, I will be gathering materials at a courthouse on a research project.

The next "vacation" after that will be for the National Genealogical Society Conference in Raleigh. There's a great conference blog for that also.

Of course, I'll be going to FGS in Little Rock later in the year as well. They have a blog as well. I'm not sure that I can count FGS as a vacation as I'll be working very hard that week!

So, as you can see, I really don't have "vacation" any more. I just find a little "down time" while I'm doing some genealogical research in these other locations. I do enjoy true vacations, but when you are work and have the genealogy bug, you find ways to do both.

FGS Blog

Paula has been writing about events and workshops for the Little Rock FGS. She was kind enough to promote one of my workshops.

A Hungry Deer

She just wanted the buffet! For some reason, this story just amused me.

6th Picture Meme

I found this over on Musings of a Bookish Kitty.

Here are the rules if you wish to play along:

Rules to the 6th Picture Meme:

1. Go to your Picture Folder on your computer or wherever you store your pictures.
2. Go to the 6th Folder, then pick the 6th picture in that folder.
3. Post that picture on your blog and the story that goes along with the picture.

This is a restaurant located in a strip mall near the Wal-Mart in Amory, Mississippi. I took it because a distant cousin of mine on my New England Colcord line often goes by the nickname of "MamaT." I wanted to let her know that she had a restaurant named in her honor.

E-Mail Privacy

Have you ever been angered when you've discovered that someone has forwarded a private e-mail that you went to them without your permission? I think most of us have experienced that feeling. The e-mail was intended for the eyes of only the person to whom it was sent. While I don't think that I've ever had someone forward something that was intensely private and personal, I've often experienced a violation of my privacy, particularly when I've replied to some library mailing lists. For example, a person asks a question and offers to summarize the responses. Instead of summarizing the responses, that person copies and pastes all e-mails received including personally identifiable information to the list. In my book, that is not summarizing responses. It is plagiarizing. Such a practice of distributing an e-mail without the sender's permission is frowned upon by the National Genealogical Society's Standards for Sharing Information With Others. I often forget that my library colleagues don't have such a standards, and I'm quite shocked and appalled when I see an entire e-mail copied and pasted into something that is supposed to be a summary. I've gotten to the point that I often will not respond to queries from fellow librarians. If I had wanted my name to be attached, I would have replied to the list itself. I wonder how often genealogists forget and do the same thing. I've heard of many cases where entire e-mails have been forwarded to others -- sometimes with disastrous consequences. I think the NGS standards are good advice to all persons -- not just genealogists. When a person's privacy has been compromised, they often become distrustful of sharing information with anyone else. They fear that the same thing will happen again. While it has been at least a couple of weeks since I've last had this happen to me on a library mailing list and my response was nothing that I would not have shared with the entire list had the person requesting not offered to summarize the response, I felt violated when I saw my entire e-mail copied and pasted for all to read when an offer to summarize responses had been made. Summary involves analysis of the information to group similar responses. Copying and pasting is not summarization. It is plagiarism. If we as educators expect our students to avoid it, shouldn't we be practicing that as well?

Mars, Venus, & Genealogy

At a friend's suggestion, I read John Gray's now classic work Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus: A Practical Guide for Improving Communication and Getting What You Want in Your Relationships (New York: HarperCollins, 1992). First of all, I want to admit that I am not a fan of self-help books, but this friend who recommended it was also not a fan of that genre of books. It took quite a bit of convincing to get me to locate our library's copy and check it out. I will have to admit that it was a very insightful look at the differences in the ways men and women communicate and why they so often misunderstand each other. For those who may not be familiar with the book, the author's premise is that men go into their "caves" to solve problems whereas women tend to talk them out. As I began to read the book, I wondered if that is the way that men and women approach genealogical problem solving as well. Do men tend to go off by themselves, find a quiet place, and put the pieces of the puzzle together? Do women tend to talk out the problem by sharing with other friends who are researchers or perhaps just talking through it to the dog or cat if there isn't a human nearby to listen? In my own experience, more of my female genealogical friends have shared the stories of their finds with me. Some have asked what I think; others just want me to listen to the find as they are puzzling it out for themselves. I have rarely had a man do this, although I have had it happen on occasion, but it's usually a much more specific question when a man asks. I really do think men tend to work more "alone" in the genealogical research process just from what I've observed in libraries. Far more women will strike up a conversation about what they are researching in a research room than will men. I see some of both sides of the equation in my own research methodology, but I'm not sure which is the dominant one. Maybe I should ask my cat! So, what do you think? Do men and women approach genealogical problems as Martians and Venusians respectively? I still haven't decided for sure, but I certainly see some evidence that it could be true.

Why Did This Have to Be Fictional?

I am in the midst of reading Karen MacInerney's Murder Most Maine which was published at the end of 2008. There is a most interesting historical mystery in the story line. It involves a lighthouse keeper who disappeared in the 1840s, a slave bounty hunter, and some "parcels" arriving from South Carolina bound for a Canadian province. There are places in the story where I'm just "itching" to do some genealogical research on the persons in the story. The only thing is that I can't do it, because they are fictitious. I have enjoyed it as the amateur sleuth and the island historian have done the research for me in the available records (such as they are for fictitious people), but it's just not the same as doing it oneself. I love sleuthing out those details! I'm not quite done with this book, but I am enjoying it.

As I began to puzzle through the sleuthing aspect of mysteries and genealogical research problems, I began to wonder, "Do all genealogists love mysteries?"

Sears Doesn't Want My Business

When I came home yesterday in these frigid temperatures that we've been experiencing, I was unable to get my garage door to close. After numerous attempts, I finally had to climb atop my car and reach for the emergency drawstring which would allow me to close it manually. The garage door opener is a Sears Craftsman model and had an 800 number on the drawstring. I called that number this morning where I had one of those fun experiences with an automated call answering system. (I hate those things. Just give me a live person who really understands what I want!) When I tried to tell them I needed the garage door fixed, it didn't recognize that term so it finally put me through to an operator. I'm guessing their call center was in India because the person who eventually answered had an Indian accent and was difficult to understand. When I explained what I needed, he was going to set me up with an appointment. They couldn't repair it until February 10--almost a month away. I told him that was unacceptable and that if he couldn't find a date in the next few days that I would just find someone else to fix it. He offered no other dates so I cancelled the service request. I went to the yellow pages and discovered at least 5 companies in the area who service garage doors of all makes and models. I decided to put off the call until I can talk to some folks at church tomorrow to see who services their door openers. One of the companies (according to their ad) even offers same day emergency service -- a far cry from the nearly month-long wait that Sears offered. I know that I won't have to pull that string much longer! I just find it difficult to believe that in these tough economic times that Sears can stay afloat with the kind of service that I received today. I know that if I need service on any of my Kenmore appliances after this that I will not be calling Sears. I also know that I will not be going to Sears to purchase additional appliances. If this is the kind of service that they offer, I simply don't want their product.

"Graveyard Sirens" by Guy de Maupassant

I recently was cataloging a book of short stories by Guy de Maupassant. I remember reading a couple of his short stories in high school--"The Necklace" and "A Piece of String." One of the stories I encountered was entitled "Graveyard Sirens." In this story, the storyteller is relating a visit to Montmartre. I just want to share a few of the author's words.

. . . Now, I have always liked cemeteries because they sadden and rest me; and I need that influence at times. Besides, many of my friends are laid to rest there, and I go to see them once in a while. . . .

I like graveyards because they are such immense, densely populated cities. Just think of all the bodies buried in that small space, of the countless generations of Parisians laid there forever, eternally entombed in the little vaults of their little graves marked by a cross or a stone, while the living -- fools that they are! -- take up so much room and make such a fuss.

Cemeteries have some monuments quite as interesting as those to be seen in the museums. . . .

I walked slowly along the alleys of graves where neighbors no longer visit, no longer sleep togehter, nor read the papers. I began reading the epitaphs. There is nothing more amusing in the world. Labiche and Meilhac have never made me laugh as much as some of these tombstone inscriptions. I tell you these crosses and marble slaves on which the relatives of the dead have poured out their regrets and their wishes for the happiness of the departed, their hopes of reunion -- the hypocrites! -- make better reading than Balzac's funniest tales! But waht I love in Montmartre are the abandoned plots filled with yewtrees and cypress, the resting-place of those departed long ago. However, the green trees nourished by the bodies will soon be felled to make room for those that have recently passed away, whose graves will be there, under little marble slabs. . . .

How many of us have had similar stories in our graveyard visits? I know that I've encountered some humorous epitaphs and curious wordings on markers. Many of us have similar feelings about the restfulness of cemeteries. The full collection of short stories is available at Google Books. A Google search for the short story and author will bring up this result for you. The story begins on page 311 of the 10-volume-in-1 edition published in 1903 by Walter J. Black.

By the way, there is also an interesting story entitled "The Will" on pages 562-565.

Source: "Graveyard Sirens, in The Complete Short Stories of Guy de Maupassant. Ten volumes in one. New York: Walter J. Black, 1903, pp. 311-316.

Who Are Marie's Friends?

The female standing in this photo was my grandfather's sister Marie Lantz (who later married Grover Hosmer). I suspect this photo was taken in the mid-1910s in Monroe County, Mississippi, probably near Aberdeen. I have no idea who the others are or what the occasion was.

This was submitted for "Smile for the Camera."