Genealogy Shows & Movies

 

I've discovered that there are more genealogy-related movies available to me on my iPad that I'd have guessed!  I just watched (for free on YouTube!!) Yesterday's Children, where Jane Seymour in today's time is driven to learn about a family 80 years ago in Ireland and reunite that family. It was SO good. 

And certainly Finding Your Roots is THE NUMBER ONE genealogy show on public TV. Did you realize you can watch PBS shows on your phone, Kindle or iPad for free????

And of course there are more history-museums-archaeology type videos posted on YouTube than you'd have time to enjoy. There is the History Channel, Archaeology Channel, etc. All free!

So no need to watch dreary, depressing, or silly TV shows unless that's your thing. There are genealogy shows to enjoy!!!

Roosevelt Roots in the Netherlands

 

Did you know that FDR had Dutch roots? I did not but I learned that factoid on my spring 2024 trip to Holland. 

The forefather of the Roosevelt family of New York was a man named Claes Martenszen van Rosevelt. Five of his children were baptized in the Reformed Dutch Church in Amsterdam, although the family probably lived in what we'd today call a suburb, Oud-Vossemeer.  In 1655, Claes had moved his family to Manhattan and bought a farm. 

The website for the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library & Museum lists the complete ancestral pedigree of FDR as well as listing his descendants. 

The little town of Oud-Vossemeer is very proud of its connection to the American Roosevelt presidential family. They have established a website (www.rooseveltoudvosemeer.nl) and here's what I learned: 

The Roosevelt Foundation of Oud-Vossemeer was established on September 17, 2015.

Its goal is to set up and maintain an information centre that allows visitors to discover more about the place of origin of the American presidential family Roosevelt. Exchanging and spreading information on this subject to organizations and persons is also part of our objective. Amongst other things, the foundation organizes exhibitions in order to realize this goal.

A continuing big question is were FDR and "Teddy" related? Well, distantly.

Theodore, 1858-1919, s/o            FDR, 1882-1945, s/o

Theodore, 1831-1876, s/o            James, 1828-1900, s/o

Cornelius, 1794-1817, s/o            Isaac, 1790-1863, s/o

James, 1759-1840                        James, 1760-1847

Why the discrepancy with dates for James???? Well, that's what Google found for me.............. you check it out. :-) 

Irish Potato Blight..... Caused By?

 

How did the Irish Potato Famine of the mid-1800s originate? I came upon one possible answer in an unlikely book: The Conquest of Nature: Water, Landscapes and the Making of Modern Germany, by David Blackbourn, 2006. He wrote:

 "One result of the greatly increased traffic across the world's oceans was that we would now call 'biological invasions.' It was not just people, cotton and tobacco that crossed the Atlantic but other, less desireable  species also made these journeys as stowaways in cargo holds, ballast tanks or attached to the ship. The invasive species that created the most alarm in the newly unified Germany were two arrivals from North America... the vine disease phylloxera and the Colorado Beetle, both of which attacked potatoes."

Wanting to know more, I turned to Google. Wikipedia stated: "it is assumed that winds spread the spores (of phytophthora infestans) that caused the widespread devastation of potato crops in Ireland and northern Europe beginning in 1845, leading to the Irish Potato Famine." Also, " The potato blight was found across the Eastern part of the U.S. and Canada and crossed the Atlantic in 1845, probably with a shipment of seed potatoes for Belgian farmers which ultimately spread to all the potato-growing countries in Europe.  

If you'd want to read more, Google to The History Place: Irish Potato Famine, the Blight Begins or Milestones in History: The Great Hunger, article by Eugene Finerman, 2009. 

This last article was subtitled: "Ireland's potato famine was caused as much by a government's gross negligence as by a devastation of crops."    

Kinship of the World

 This image comes from an article in a 1977 issue of The Ensign, publication of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Even asking Grandma Google :-) I could not find a better image for this post..............

QUESTION: What really is world history? Isn't it the story of cousins who could just not get along? (That made you smile, didn't it?) Yes, we living today are cousins of a sort because populations have expanded and contracted as wars, fires, floods, plagues and other disasters impacted them. 

It is estimated that the Black Death plague in England in 1348-1377 carried off 40% of the population. That same plague alone in Europe in 1720-1721 claimed 20 million people. 

Many families were completely wiped out; many surnames died out; many families were left with no descendants. You and I survived because somehow, miraculously, our ancestral line survived. Or at least one or two of them did. 

Quote from this article: "For example, in the U.S. in 1960 there was about an 80% chance that a man would have no descendants with his last name 13 generations later. The chance of a kinship line dying out depends on the death rate of the society and the number of children in each family. Even in a society were couples have many children, there is a 20-30% chance that a family line will die out after ten generations or so."

What does this mean to us as we search out our family history? It means we must realize that many of the family lines existing in the year 1700 have no male descendants bearing that family name living today. 

THOUGHT: A typical extended pedigree chart can comprise 100 or more surnames and if each person's tree was totally unique to him/her, in 30 generations (about 1000 years) every person would have two billion ancestors..... for more people than there were in the world in A.D. 1000. Could that really be so? No way.

Somewhere along the line our ancestors were already related to each other, marrying 5th, 6th or 7th cousins without realizing that. So instead of having MORE ancestors the further back we trace, eventually we will have fewer and fewer. 

And if our ancestors wee related, albeit distantly, the same must be true of all of us. Again quoting from the article, "As we research our genealogies we find our pedigrees mingling with those of hundreds of thousands of others until we are all traveling on the same broad road of ancestry back to the fathers of the human race." 

The diamond pedigree reminds us most surely of the brotherhood of all mankind. 

English Census Records

 

For what years can we access census records in England?  There are nine  censuses available: 1841, 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901, 1911 and 1921. Sadly, the 1931 census was totally destroyed by fire and no census was taken in 1941 due to World War II. (In 1939 there was taken a National Registry and ID cards issued.)

Found it interesting that the English censuses included the name for each person in the house whereas U.S. censuses didn't begin doing that until 1850. 

If you cannot read the info in that last paragraph, just Google that title. 

Tips to realize and remember:

• English counties are also known as shires (Worcestershire, Somersetshire, etc.) comparable to our U.S. states.
• Ind. independent or having own means; also may be reported as gent/gentleman.
• Pensioner usually referred to someone retired from the Army
• Scholar meant the child or person was attending school
• Ag Lab mean agricultural laborer
• F.S./ M.S. meant female/male servant

Just for fun, using www.freecen.org.uk I looked by my mother's maiden name, GURNEY, in the 1841 census. Viola! There were 104 hits!!  And I've never explored them!!! 

Green Peas: A History

 

  

"Fresh green peas were considered a delicacy by King Louis 14th of France. To his wife, the subject seemed all consuming. 'This subject of peas continues to absorb all others....a pleasure of having eaten them and the desire to et them again are among the great matters which have been discussed for the four days past.' One of Louis' wives wrote in a letter dated 1696: "It is both a fashion and a madness."

The history of peas is long and jumped quickly from country to country. Certainly by 1793 in America "peas were popular with all classes of people."

Recipe for Dressed Peas from a 1744 cookbook published in London:  Place one pound of peas in sauce pot with 6 TB of butter; simmer and dust with flour. Add any sweet herbs desired: parsley, basil, mint. Stir in 1/2 cup flour and bit of boiling water "slowly stewing the mixture." Lastly, add some diced ham. 

(Thanks to The Magazine of Colonial Williamsburg, September 2023.) 

Did you know that Washington ranks #1 in edible dry pea production, contributing 45% of the U.S. production.  Our dry eastern Washington fields are good for dry peas, lentils (all colors) and chickpeas. There are three types of peas grown here:

• Garden peas - grown from seeds
• Sugar peas - grown for the whole edible pods
• Field peas - grown for dried seeds

Isn't September a dandy time to make a pot of pea soup???

Google: Your Internet Swiss Army Knife

 

Even if you've never used a Swiss Army Knife, I'd bet that some in your family have one and use it regularly. That little pocket tool is just that useful.

That's why some compare Google to your Internet Swiss Army Knife. Certainly there is not just one all-purpose tool (think kitchen gadgets and pans) but Google for genealogy comes close to fitting that definition. 

How do I use Google? (How do YOU use Google?)

History of Labor Day..... Were Your Ancestors Involved?

 

Okay, we all mark Labor Day as an end-of-summer holiday. But do we know WHY we have a holiday labeled "Labor Day?"

In 1894, Congress voted to have a national holiday to honor the nation's workers and their contributions to the well-being of the country. The impetus for this decision was to celebrate the achievements of American workers and, specifically, the establishing of an 8-hour workday and abolishment of child labor, among other achievements.

Tidbits from Vogue magazine dated 1925: Where did the idea that you can't wear white after Labor Day originate? In a quote from the magazine we read: "It's a fashion rule that has been parroted by grandmothers, magazines and teenage girls for generations, as if it's a statue that society has always abided by." 

This crazy idea traces back to the elite of the Gilded Age. Every summer the rich would move from the crowded, sweltering cities to the cooler places by the ocean, such as Newport of Southampton, and remain for the entire season. Packed away in their travel trunks were their summer wardrobes of white. White clothing was cooler in summer, reflecting sunlight. But another factor for the elite to wear white was a subtle way of showing you were not doing any manual labor which would dirty your white clothes. 

And one certainly could not wear white back in the city where the streets were dirt or mud and were covered in horse poop and rotting garbage.