Metes and Bound Boundaries or Which County is My House In?

Very interesting article on finding metes and bound boundaries in North Carolina. Is that tree they used to mark the corner of your land in 1750 still there? If not, how do you know where that corner is today?

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/10/north-carolina-lost-county-lines/409090/

Serendipity Day --- 24 October 2015

There has been lots of wuzz-wuzzing (my father’s words!!) about whether or not the Family History Library in Salt Lake City will keep the “real” books on their shelves after each one is digitized. Should they or shouldn’t they? James Tanner, who is eminently qualified to address this topic, in a post in his GenealogyStar blog on 1 October 2015, explained a new concept (at least to me):The Digital Divide.

This particular problem, called the Digital Divide, is the divide between genealogists who use the Internet and those who do not. Tanner, in his post, thought it would be a good thing to have all the FHL books free and available online. But after his post, he received some thoughtful comments. “Not all of the potential genealogists have access to the Internet or their access was so slow as to make the (book downloading process) impractical.”

Tanner gives several scenarios and summarizes:  “So, we have, hypothetically speaking, a class of people who have no Internet access. In addition… we have a class of people who have no physical access to the FHL or any of the branch libraries around the world. Guess what? It absolutely makes no difference to them as to whether or not the books are in paper or in digital format.”

He finishes his post by pointing out any and all of the problems connected with this peculiar condition termed the Digital Divide (and they can be many) have nothing to do with digitizing books at the FHL. “In law, raising the issue of the Digital Divide as a reason why there is something wrong with the Library’s digitization of paper books and then removing them from the shelves, would be called a “red herring,” that is, irrelevant to the issues.”

I urge you to click to www.GenealogyStar.blogspot.com and ready this entire post for yourself. While you’re there, sign up (via email) to receive all James Tanner’s thoughtful posts.

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Do you long for some genealogical library research? Would you love to go to Salt Lake but that’s just not on the horizon for you right now? Would you settle for second best? How about the Heritage Quest Research Library in beautiful downtown Sumner? (1007 Main, phone 253-863-1806, website www.hqrl.com) If you live near enough, you might wish to join and support the library ($30) but it’s only $5 for a non-member to use the library for a day. They have hundreds of books, hundreds of microforms, tables to work on and helpers there all day. Check their website for days and hours. Lots of neat eateries and shops also are on Main Street.

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Is there a Canadian veteran in your family tree? I have, and am happily willing to give away, some Canadian veteran genealogy materials……….. items that I cannot now find online. One is a small booklet in the Remembrance Series, Canadians in Belgium (written in both English and French). I also have three leaflets, “The Faces of Peace: Veterans of the Canadian Forces,” and “D-Day and the Battle of Normandy,” and “The Italian Campaign,” all in the Canada Remembers series. If you would like these materials, the first one to email a request gets them… Donna243@gmail.com. Would appreciate postage.

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“Genetic genealogy is the next tool in the tool kit of the prepared genealogists. You have your history written into yourselves. Only now are we starting to be able to read or decode that mystery in all of us.”  Bennett Greenspan, Founder & CEO, FamilyTree DNA, 2014

“This is still a baby science and there is still so much more to learn.” Cecily Kelly, 2015

Right now, today, the science of genetic genealogy is mushrooming. There is no one website, no one book and no one blog that will bring up up-to-speed on understanding this vast and tangled subject. But if you consider yourself a genealogist of tomorrow, you will begin a campaign of self-education. I have just purchased (on Amazon for pennies) these two books which I promise myself to study:

What about YOU? Share with me your plans to start your self-education in this area.

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Do you already subscribe to TIME magazine? Do you know about The Vault? The TIME magazine Vault is a digital archive of all the stories, photos, and ads, from the beginning of the magazine in 1923 to the present. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to read the news that your grandparents read? Even if they didn’t read TIME magazine, to read the issue after December 7, 1941, is to read the same news that they read that day. A subscription to TIME magazine costs $40 and digital access to The Vault is included. Think of the research opportunities.

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Thomas Jefferson’s Ten Rules

1.      Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.

2.      Never trouble another for what you can do yourself.

3.      Never spend your money before you have earned it.

4.      Never buy what you don’t want because it is cheap.

5.      Pride costs more than hunger, thirst and cold.

6.      We seldom repent of having eaten too little.

7.      Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly.

8.      How much pain the evils have cost us that never happened.

9.      Take things always by the smooth handle.

10.  When angry, count ten before you speak, if very angry, count a hundred.

I bought this postcard at the Historic Michie Tavern, a great eating place at the base of the mountain whereupon sits Monticello, Thomas Jefferson’s home.

Do you think these are good rules for today?

Spokane Valley Heritage Museum Heritage Program

Annual Free Hayden FHC Seminar Was A Success

You know, Coeur d'Alene is only 30 miles east of Spokane.......... a fast and short drive on I-90. And those EWGS members who attended the free seminar at the Hayden Family History Center last Saturday got their money's worth........ and a wonderful free lunch besides. Besides myself, Inez Hodge, Mary Holcomb, Ardis Storms and several others, EWGS was well represented but more could-have-should-have taken advantage of this great learning day.

Connie Godak is the director of the Hayden Family History Center, which sponsors this annual event. The Hayden FHC offers weekly (Tuesday) free genealogy-related classes. Google to their website for more information. 

These were the sessions you missed........... this reminder is shown to you only so you will mark your calendar for 22 Oct 2016 for next year's Hayden FHC Free Seminar............. 

FIRST SESSION – 10:00 to 10:50

          1.   Research Made Easy with Steve Morse – Diane Kamphaus

          2.  Touring and Using American Ancestors.org: New England Historic Genealogical Society Resources Online – Donna Potter Phillips

         3.   All About Findagrave.com – Sandy Simon

         4.   Intro to Kinpoint: Up Close & Personal webcast– Derrick Brinton

SECOND SESSION – 11:00 to 11:50

          5.   Solving the DNA Dilemma – Sharon Gibson

          6.   Treasures in (Digital) Newsprint – Connie Godak

          7.   Breathing New Life Into Damaged Family Photos: Free Online Photo Restoration and Storage – Natalie Langford

          8.   Using Kinpoint to Find Names for the Temple webcast – Derrick Brinton

THIRD SESSION – 12:00 to 12:50

        9.  Lunch Hour 1

         10. Puzzilla.org & Family Tree Q&A Session – Connie Godak

         11.  German Ancestors Research – Renate Benn Wilde

                 12.  Building a Genealogy Research Toolbox – Rootstech 2015 Video

FOURTH SESSION – 1:00 to 1:50

         13.  Lunch Hour 2

         14.  Fun & Informative Websites You Never Heard Of– Donna Potter Phillips

         15.  DAR Membership Made Easy – Sandra Doutre & Louisa Durkin

         16.  Discover New Research Possibilities with My Heritage – Rootstech 2015 Video

FIFTH SESSION – 2:00 to 3:00

      17. Colonial Dames, Are You Interested in Becoming a Dame? – Liz Jones
                 18. The Secret to Writing Your Family Story – Kimberly Morgan
                 19. US Maps & Migration Trails West & South – Sandra Doutre
                 20. Our Changing American Culture – Syd Albright

National Archives Virtual Genealogy Fair

Good morning,

I hope you will join us for our 3rd annual Virtual Genealogy Fair! 

The fair will be streamed live online through YouTube on October 21 and 22. You can find the links for each day's sessions here: http://1.usa.gov/1MNjKkW

It's free, and there no reservations or passwords. 

We'll be taking your question on Twitter during the fair. Tweet your questions to @usnatarchives and use the hashtag #genfair2015.

You can also ask questions through the chatbox on YouTube. 

We have a great line up of speakers this year! Our experts will discuss preserving your family's records, WWI veterans' records, ancestral migration routes, bankruptcy records, CCC records, and more!

See you there! 

--

Hilary Parkinson

Writer-Editor

700 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20408
202-357-5325

Serendipity Day

Mary Holcomb, soon to be vice-president of EWGS, shared a great blurb with me........ if you click to www.sos.wa.gov/legacyproject/washington-remembers you will find the stories of Washington's heroes ... including Fred Skiosaki. His story is a terrific read, as are all the stories found on this website. "Washington Remembers..... WWII....Their Sacrifice, Our Freedom."

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One pearl gleaned from Cyndi Ingle, our EWGS Fall Workshop speaker, was for a little program called Fences.  "Are your desktop icons often scrambled from the positions you put them in?" asked Cyndi. "With this little program, you put "fences" (boxes) around groups of icons on your desktop and they stay put. I did it and so far I'm quite happy with the results......... go see for yourself. Google "stardock fences." (Stardock is the company originating the program.)

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I'm a member of the St.Clair County (IL) Gen Society and so receive their Quarterly. In the latest edition they reported on a most-cool project. Under the direction of their teacher, local high school students in the German class are translating old German obituaries that were published in the German-speaking area newspaper in 1893. I think that is a terrific idea! Think of the various and many ethnic newspapers in our area.......

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Another Illinois research pearl I gleaned from the above Quarterly was that the Illinois Blue Books, 1900-2006, are digitized and now are available online. State Blue Books are "most than a directory of (state's) legislative officials, their portraits and biographies, articles about (state's) farms................. they contain departmetntal reports ...... conservation, finance, insurance, labor, mines, public health, welfare, safety, education, maps, patriotic organizations and photographs......"  These online Illinois Blue Books can be found on the Illinois Digital Archives website, www.idaillinois.org

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Do you know: How many national parks do we have in Washington?? How many have you visited? Well, there are three: Olympic, North Cascades and Mount Rainier National Parks. And there are many national monuments and state parks. (We are so lucky in that regard!!) Came upon a "List Challenge" with a list of all the national parks in the U.S. (and there are 59) and inviting us to see how many we have visited.... www.listchallenges.com/national-parks-of-the-usa  My score was 30-some, how about you? (The above photo of mine is of Rialto Beach just west of Forks, WA.)

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Do any of your non-genealogy friends bring up to you the seemingly negative Bible verses against genealogy, like Titus 3:9 and 1 Timothy 1:4:  "neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies.."  I've done some studying and have come to understand that Jews of that day strove to prove their descent from Abraham thus claiming that they were automatically saved above the Gentiles and were better than the Gentiles. That's what Paul was warning against; he stressed personal righteousness no matter what your ancestry. Whew! 

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Shall end today with a great quote from Ellen Goodman, columnist for the Boston Globe:  “This packrat has learned that what the next generation will value most is not what we owned, but the evidence of who we were and the talks of how we loved. In the end, it’s the family stories that are worth the storage.”  

FREE Seminar, October 17th, Hayden Family History Center

Free Family History Seminar

Saturday, 17 October 2015 -- Hayden Lake LDS Stake Center – 2293 W. Hanley, CdA, ID

9:45 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Check-in begins at 9:15 a.m.

A variety of soups & salads will be served from 12:00 to 2:00,

running simultaneously with several classes.

Yes! There is still such a thing as a free lunch –

Pre-registration is appreciated!

Now Five Ways to Register:

Call 208-765-0150: Monday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Tues thru Thurs 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.

(or Email haydenlakefhc@gmail.com, or Mail Connie Godak, 2203 James Crowe, Hayden, ID 83835

Or just drop in at the FHC to register……

You can also register online at our website!    https://sites.google.com/site/haydenlakefhc/

Registration Form:  Please indicate the classes and lunch hour of your choice below:

FIRST SESSION – 10:00 to 10:50

__ 1.   Research Made Easy with Steve Morse – Diane Kamphaus

__ 2.   Touring and Using American Ancestors.org: NEHGen Society Resources Online – Donna Potter Phillips

__ 3.   All About Findagrave.com – Sandy Simon

__ 4.   Intro to Kinpoint: Up Close & Personal webcast– Derrick Brinton

SECOND SESSION – 11:00 to 11:50

__ 5.   Solving the DNA Dilemma – Sharon Gibson

__ 6.   Treasures in (Digital) Newsprint – Connie Godak

__ 7.   Breathing New Life into Damaged Family Photos: Free Online Tools & Storage - Natalie Langford

__ 8.   Using Kinpoint to Find Names for the Temple webcast – Derrick Brinton

THIRD SESSION – 12:00 to 12:50

__  9.  Lunch Hour 1

__ 10. Puzzilla.org & Family Tree Q&A Session – Connie Godak

__ 11. German Ancestors Research – Renate Benn Wilde

__ 12. Building a Genealogy Research Toolbox – Rootstech 2015 Video

FOURTH SESSION – 1:00 to 1:50

__ 13.  Lunch Hour 2

__ 14.  Fun & Informative Websites You Never Thought Of – Donna Potter Phillips

__ 15.  DAR Membership Made Easy – Sandra Doutre & Louisa Durkin

__ 16.  Discover New Research Possibilities with My Heritage – Rootstech 2015 Video

 

FIFTH SESSION – 2:00 to 3:00

__ 17. Colonial Dames, Are You Interested in Becoming a Dame? – Liz Jones

__ 18. The Secret to Writing Your Family Story – Kimberly Morgan

__ 19. US Maps & Migration Trails West & South – Sandra Doutre  

__ 20. Our Changing American Culture – Syd Albright

******************************************************************************************

NAME___________________________________________   PHONE ________________________

EMAIL/CONTACT         _____________________________________________________________

Serendipity "Friday" (today is Thursday)

Reason? I'll be the least among four speakers at Heritage Quest Research Library's OctoberFest on Saturday, October 10th. As it's a 6-hour drive from Spokane, I'll be heading over on Friday.

If you live near Sumner, and are not signed up for this exciting day, I don't think it's too late. Click to www.hqrl.com for information.

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Hubby and I attended a wonderful presentation last evening from the Spokane Chapter of the American Archaeology Association. Dr. Robert Neyland told us all about the H.L. Hunley, the Confederate submarine that sank the U.S.S. Housatonic and then sank herself. 

Dr. Neyland related how Hunley had been found and recovered (in 2000) and was now undergoing restoration (which will take another 8 years!). Read all about it at www.hunley.org.  The most fascinating part was when he explained the recovery of the eight crew members...their bones and artifacts. At the above website they have posted photos of the cranial-face-feature reconstructions of all eight men. After all the forensic work was done, these veterans were buried under the Confederate flag in a Charleston, SC, cemetery and several descendants attended the event.

If you think you, or somebody you know, might be a descendant of a sailor aboard the H.S. Hunley, do some Googling and you'll find plenty of exciting information on this particular brave ancestor. 

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Did you know:  The membership of every organization is made up of four types of bones:

1.  Wish Bones  --  These "bones" sit around and wish every one else would do the work.

2.  Jaw Bones  --  These "bones" do all the tal king but little of the work.

3.  Knuckle Bones  --  These "bones" knock everything that everybody else tries to do.

4.  Back Bones  --  These "bones" are the ones who get under the load and do all the work.

Which kind of "bone" are you????

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Above the entrance to the University of Colorado Library is this carved phrase:  "He who knows only his own genealogy remains always a child."   Isn't that an interesting homile to be carved over the door of a university library?

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Just discovered a new-to-me website that will help in the finding of local or still-alive people. Give it a try at www.blackbookonline.com.  The home page describes this as "the free public records search site." 

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Another way-cool website that my brother shared with me is this..... Google this phrase:  "22 Maps and Charts that will surprise you."  Posted by Ezra Klein on 11 Mar 2015, he explains:  "A good visualization helps you see what the data is telling you. The best visualizations help you see things you never thought the data would tell you. These 22 charts and maps were, at least for me, in that category: all of them told me something I found surprising. Some of them genuinely changed the way I think about the world."  Really, now, try it you'll like it.

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Have you heard of Thomas MacEntee's The Genealogy Fairy? Thomas explains:  "Back in March 2015, I announced a new concept as part of my genealogy business: The Genealogy Fairy. I have seen a huge increase in business revenue related to affiliate marketing and I wanted a way to say thankyou to those who continue to support my business and believe in what I do to improve the way we search for our family history. 

What Thomas has done is to set aside 5% of affiliate income for some type of grant program. These Genealogy Fairy grants are open to all genealogical and historical organizations, especially non-profits, and to individual genealogists who seek to fund specific projects related to genealogy and family history. 

If this offer intrigues you, click to www.genealogybloggers.com/update-genealogy-fairy.com. Or just Google "the genealogy fairy."  What a good guy to make such a great offer.

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Been wanting to make a family book? An ONLINE family book? Like with Shutterfly?  I was just introduced to the Olive Tree blog:   Olive Tree Genealogy, created by Lorine in February 1996 was started to bring genealogists FREE genealogy records. Olive Tree Genealogy has more than 1,900 pages of free genealogy records to help you find your brick-wall ancestors and build your family tree. In a post of 1 Sep 2015, Lorine pointed to three YouTube tutorials on how to do a family book using Shutterfly. Why not take a peek?

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Unserious Thought for Today:  Broken pencils are pointless. 

Cyndi Ingle Visits "Our" Archives

Cyndi Ingle, of www.CyndisList.com fame, was the EWGS presenter at our annual Fall Workshop. And she was, of course, wonderful.

As she arrived into Spokane on Friday, and had never been to the Eastern Washington Branch of "our" Washington State Archives, I arranged tours for her. Here is Cyndi with Lee Pierce (red shirt), archivist for the "downstairs" or paper archives part of the facility out on the EWU campus in Cheney, and with Harold Stoehr (green shirt) who manages and maintains the "upstairs" or digital archives part of the building. They were both so very gracious and informative and both Cyndi and I thanked them profusely for their time.

Cyndi was especially impressed with these two wrapped sets of disks.......... Harold took us into the very innermost vault and let Cyndi hold the external backup to the entire contents of the state's digital archives.  (Don't panic; there are multiple backups.) Cyndi was big-eyed-impressed with being able to hold such a treasure in her hands.

Cyndi hails from Puyallup and we here in Washington are very proud of our own home-grown bigwig celebrity in the world of genealogy. I was happy to show her some "eastern Washington" resources in person.

EWGS Fall Workshop with Cyndi Ingle of CyndisList.com

This week was a great week for Cyndi Ingle to come to Spokane, the Chinese Lantern Festival at  Riverfront Park, nice weather and a great seminar with Cyndi Ingle.

Here is Cyndi and Margie Beldin from the Tri-Cities.

Then Dani Lee McGowan and Doug Floyd announced the winners of the writing contest.

Third Prize to Marge Mero.

Second Prize to Anna Corwine

And First prize to Jerry Heston

Cyndi talked all day and I think everyone was in a hurry to get home to try out all we learned from Cyndi today, and I hope more people will join us on Facebook, or other social media to find help with researching their ancestors.

Serendipity Friday - 2 October 2015

Did your ancestors settle in western states and were first landowners? If so, you can find the information about their land at www.historygeo.com. Arizona, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Washington, and Wyoming land records were recently added to the database. I don’t have ancestors in those states but I did find great-great-grandfather in Kansas. Doing a search on some surnames of those I know settled in these areas produced a lot of results. Check this database for your ancestors. Read the article about these 3.3 million original landowners added to historygeo.com.

Blog.historygeo.com/2015/06/08/western-states-added-to-first-landowners-project/ -

(Jeanine Barndt is the Head Librarian for the Heritage Quest Research Library in beautiful downtown Sumner, Washington; this bit is from the HQRL Newsletter for Fall 2015.)

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I learn history best from historical fiction. And to my ken, some authors of this sort are better than others. Edward Rutherfurd is one of the best, in my opinion. The following blurb from his book New York gives a brand new insight into those old Civil War soldier photos that we prize so highly…. The year is 1863 (page 413) and then 1871 (page 488):

 “His photographic  studio  was well equipped….. like the other photographers on the Bowery, his bread-and-butter business in recent years had been taking quick portraits of young men standing proudly, or sheepishly, in their unaccustomed uniforms, before they went off to fight again the South. Quicker than the old daguerreotype to take, easy to reproduce on paper, he’d  get thirty a day sometimes. It paid the rent. At first, these small “carte-de-visite”-size portraits had seemed jolly enough, like taking someone’s picture at the seaside. Gradually, however, as the terribly casualties of the Civil War had mounted, he had realized that the dull little portraits he was taking were more like tombstones, last mementoes, before some poor fellow vanished from his family forever. And if he tried to make each humble one as splendid as he could, he did not tell his customers the reason.”

 The character was explaining why he didn’t get a photo of Lincoln speaking the Gettysburg Address…… Lincoln was so brief and:  “It had been no easy business getting a picture in the Civil War. The photographs were always taken in 3-D, which meant that two plates had to be inserted simultaneously into a double camera, one to the left, one to the right. The glass plates had to be quickly cleaned, coated with collodion, then, while still wet, dipped in silver nitrate before being put into the camera. The exposure time might only be a few seconds, but then on had to rush the plates, still wet, into the mobile darkroom. Quite apart from the difficulties of having people in motion during the seconds of exposure, the whole process was so cumbersome that taking pictures of battlefield action was almost impossible. “

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Next is a great little bit from my friend, Barbara Zanzig; the Ten Commandments according to Norwegians:

Da Ten commandments
1. Der's only one God, ya know.
2. Don't be idolizing dat fish on yer mantle.
3. Cussin' ain't Minnesota nice.
4. Go to church even when yer up nort.
5. Honor yer folks.
6. Don't kill; Catch an' release.
7. Der's only one Lena fer ever Ole.  No cheatin'.
8. If it ain't yer lutefisk, don't take it.
9. Don't be braggin' 'bout how much snow ya shoveled.
10. Keep yer mind off yer neighbor's hotdish.

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If you want to Show-and-Tell your grandchildren into better behavior, take them to the Jefferson County Historical Society Museum in Port Townsend……….. this organization is housed in the old city hall and in the basement are the scariest jail cells I’ve ever seen. I visited with three teenagers and they were impressed and vowed never to have to be put in a place like this. 

This is the solitary confinement cell. Notice the leg irons in the back. Believe me it was cold and dark and awful. Notice the little “trap door” on the wall where the food was pushed in to the unfortunate person…. and then the trap door was closed, leaving the person in almost total darkness.

For more information on the Jefferson County Historical Society and Museum in Port Townsend, click to www.jchsmuseum.org

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If you do travel to the peninsula, after your visit to Port Townsend continue on to Port Angeles, the home of the Clallam County Genealogical Society.  This little-but-very-active society supports a dandy library. Here is CCGS president Ginny Majewski in front of their library:

They have several shelves full of local, one-of-a-kind material, like these binders of the several censes of the Makah Indians who live further out on the peninsula in Neah Bay.

Another thing that really impressed me was this rack of nametags……… each nametag on this rack belongs to a library volunteer. Clallam County Genealogical Society surely does support their local 

(genealogical society) library!         

Archives Month Celebtates Washington Bridges

Archives Month celebrates WA bridges

If it’s October, then our State Archives is celebrating its annual Archives Month. This year’s theme is Washington’s historic bridges, those indispensable links for moving people and goods around the state. I’m a big fan of our bridges and have my favorites, as I’m sure you do.

I want to give you a head’s up that as part of the month-long celebration, the main State Archives in Olympia and the regional branches in Bellevue, Bellingham, Cheney and Ellensburg will host open houses or Basics of Historical Research workshops on Saturday, October 24. Contact the State Archives at (360) 586-1492 or research@sos.wa.gov for more information about these events. Another research workshop will be held October 10 from 9 a.m. to noon at the Floyd Norgaard Cultural Center in Stanwood. For more info about the Stanwood workshop, contact Janette Gomes at the Northwest Regional Archives at janette.gomes@sos.wa.gov or (360) 650-2813.

A great-looking free poster helps commemorate Archives Month. The poster (shown here) is available in the State Archives headquarters in Olympia, the front desk of our Executive Office at the Capitol and at all regional Archives branches, as well as several local historical societies, universities with archives/library collections, museums and heritage centers. Get your poster while supplies last! If you want to see the digital version of the new poster, just go here. The poster was designed by Archives’ own Benjamin Helle.

If you want a larger version of the poster go here: http://www.sos.wa.gov/_assets/archives/2015ArchivesMonthFINAL_300_5x7.jpg