WHERE WERE THEY BORN? 5 generation color spreadsheet showing birthplaces

Thanks to J. Paul Hawthorne for creating this idea that went viral in the genealogy world the past two days.  While I’m a day behind others, I still wanted to share this great idea with all of you.

The idea is to create a spreadsheet chart showing birth places for our ancestors.  It’s been a lot of fun to see everyone’s colorful charts and see all the various locations.

Here’s the link for the Five Generation template to create your own chart.  AND, thanks to Pat Richley-Erickson (Dear Myrtle) we also have a Six Generation template to play with.

Here they are.  Both my birthplace chart and my husband’s.

You can clearly see the Michigan theme in mine, as well as Scotland and Ireland.  Those red blanks are the brick walls.



Here is my husband’s chart.  New York and Pennsylvania stand out.  But even more startling when you see it in living color is all the red on his mother’s side.  I’ve worked and worked on locating those families, but have had no luck thus far.



Thanks again to J. Paul Hawthorne for this wonderful exercise. 

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

DID MY ANCESTOR DO TIME IN SING SING PRISON?

BACKGROUND: I was recently going through some of my BOGGS ancestor’s info in my Legacy database.  I have 102 individuals who were either born with the surname Boggs or married a Boggs.

One of my 2nd great grandaunts, Lucinda Estelle Boggs has always been of particular interest, as I cannot find much information about her.  What I do have comes from my grandmother’s journal of names, dates and marriages.  Please see my posts where I have transcribed all the names and dates in that journal by clicking here.

In addition to her journal my grandmother left other miscellaneous pages of notes for her genealogy research.  NOTE:  my grandmother, Florence Bowden Milne was born in 1888 and died in 1986, so all her notes are handwritten.  No online research was available to her.  I have verified and found evidence that most of her research is incredibly correct.

Below is the page about the Boggs line.  You can see I have outlined in red the portion about  Stella Boggs.

The entry reads “Stella Boggs m. Norris Nov. 4, 1867 Cin. O. buried in Dublin.”

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)



Here is the excerpt from my grandmother’s complete handwritten tree.



It’s difficult to see the lines drawn between the generations, but they are there.
 
Transcription of that area is:

“Estelle Boggs (daughter of Nancy Delilah Lunsford and Allen Boggs) born 4 Nov 1847 married 4 Nov 1867 Lord Norris of Liverpool?  There children Lady Beatrice Norris, Lord Harold Norris and Lady Lillian Norris.”

Here is my Family View from Legacy, based on the information I have.  Note:  I have no idea where I got the “Abt 1840” birth year for Berry Norris.  This is a result of my own failure to document every entry, back when I began my research in 2003.  In fact the last note I have for Lucinda Estelle Boggs is from June 2006. So, it’s been some time since I’ve researched this family.



HERE IS WHERE IT GETS INTERESTING
I decide to do some research on the NORRIS-BOGGS family on Ancestry.  I see a couple of hints come up for Berry Norris.
 
There are only two hints for Berry Norris.  One is for 3 public member trees, which I look at and see that two are my trees and one is my brother’s.  I only look at the Ancestry Member Trees for hints and clues.  I never site them or copy from them to my tree without proof (valid sources) of the information.

The other hint is “New York, Sing Sing Prison Admission Registers, 1865-1939.”  Now this could be interesting!!

Here is what I found.

Berry Norris

in the New York, Sing Sing Prison Admission Registers, 1865-1939

Let’s take a look at the image and see what it says.



Page 242 – second entry on the page
May 4-75  Berry Norris
    “Recd from NYork born Ireland age 32 married wife Stella B Norris lives at 3 Kent Terrace Dalkey Ireland lived at time of arrest at 45 State in Brooklyn N York Statue 5-7 W 141 1/2 (Thank you to reader, Mary, for helping me figure out the wording about his height and weight).  
Complex sallow eyes blue hair d brown no mark, can read & write Protestant church (cannot clearly read the two words before Clerk)  Conf attempt Grand Larceny Sentenced May 3rd 1875 for two years by Sutherland”

Further research today revealed a newspaper article which I located on the Fulton Postcard website.  This is the first place I look when I’m trying to find newspaper articles for New York.
In the New York Herald 3 May 1875, page 9, I located an article about the Court of General Sessions held by Judge Sutherland.



I still have a lot of research to conduct for Barry & his wife and family.  Here is the evidence that, so far, leads me to conclude this may be my ancestor. 

• My grandmother’s references to Norris as being the husband of Lucinda Estelle Boggs.
• That she refers to Lucinda Estelle as “Stella” on one of her written records.
• That the wife listed in the prisoner record for Berry Norris is “Stella B. Norris.” We know many women use their maiden name as a middle name or initial.
• That my grandmother stated “buried in Dublin” on both written records. Yes, there are places named Dublin in the U.S. and that option must be considered.
• That she listed the date of marriage as 4 Nov 1867 and the record of marriage I located was 3 Nov 1868.  We all know how dates can vary.
• That the prisoner record for Berry Norris states he was born in Ireland and that his wife was living in Ireland at the time of his arrest.
• That the age of the Berry Norris arrested is within a couple of years of my record of him being born in about 1840 (even though I don’t yet know where I came up with that date).

I’ve inquired, as I so often do, on the New York Genealogy Facebook group to which I belong.  Other members of these type of groups often have historical information, links to places to find information, or live in the area and can offer assistance.  When I posted my inquiry, I got several responses.

Is this my Berry Norris?
What conclusion would you come to?

I know my research is far from finished.  I am not completely comfortable, just yet, in saying this is my ancestor.

Do you have any hints or insites to offer?  If so, please post them in comments.  I’d love to hear from you.

If you think you might be related to anyone mentioned in this blog post, please contact me.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

ON THIS DAY ~ March 4th

Sometimes it’s fun to pick a random day and write about it.  This time I’ve picked March 4th.
 
Let’s look at some family facts for that date:

WHO WAS BORN ON MARCH 4th?

CHATFIELD, Benjamin Edgar – Born in 1876 in Lawrence Co., Ohio (husband of my 2nd cousin twice removed)

EASTON, Lt. Robert Gillen – Born in 1920 in Indiana (my 2nd cousin 3 times removed)

WHO WAS MARRIED ON MARCH 4th?

STOVER, Joel and BOLIN, Martha – married in in 1841 in Lawrence Co., Ohio (Joel was later married to my 3rd great grandmother, Emily GILLEN)

HART, Harry H. and STEVENSON, Marjory Viola – married in 1924 in St. JohnS, Clinton, Michigan (Harry is my half 2nd cousin twice removed)

WHO DIED ON MARCH 4th?

HUDSON, Elijah – died in 1881 in Green Bank, Pocahontas, West Virginia (he is my maternal 4th great granduncle)

RATHBUN, Wallace Glenn – died in 1886 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California (he was my husband’s former father-in-law)

TRAYLOR, Robert Roland – died in 2012 in Huntington, Cabell, West Virginia (he was the husband of my 3rd cousin twice removed)

The oldest entry in this list is 1841 and the most current is 2012.

I did a search on the internet to find out what historical events took place on this day and found there were quite a lot, many of significant importance.

You can go to this link and see the entire list On This Day in History

Here are some highlights from the list, that stood out to me:

1681 - England's King Charles II granted a charter to William Penn for an area that later became the state of Pennsylvania.
1766 - The British Parliament repealed the Stamp Act, which had caused bitter and violent opposition in the U.S. colonies.
1789 - The first Congress of the United States met in New York and declared that the U.S. Constitution was in effect.
1826 - The first railroad in the U.S. was chartered. It was the Granite Railway in Quincy, MA
1908 - The New York board of education banned the act of whipping students in school.
1917 - Jeanette Rankin of Montana took her seat as the first woman elected to the House of Representatives.
1998 - The U.S. Supreme Court said that federal law banned on-the-job sexual harassment even when both parties are the same sex.

Was there anything special that happened in your family on March 4th?  If so, please tell me about it.
 
OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST
ON THIS DAY - In the History of our Family - September 11th
 
AN EXACT DEATH DATE IN A CITY DIRECTORY LISTING
 

If you think you might be related to anyone mentioned in this blog post, please contact me.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

INTERMENT RIGHTS for Ancestor’s burial plots ~ How to gain ownership

Aid Cemetery sign, Lawrence Co., Ohio (photo taken by me)

Me at Washington Cemetery in Keene, New Hampshire (photo taken by my husband)

Mt. Olivet Cemetery sign, Detroit, Michigan (photo taken by me)

The subject of interment rights came to me quite by accident.  One of my paternal cousins wanted to place a headstone on her grandmother’s burial site.  Her grandmother is buried with my paternal grandparents and other family members.
 
However, she was told by cemetery staff that she had to get permission from the owner of the plot.  Trouble was, the owners were all deceased.  The staff member told her that if there was a living heir/descendant to the owner, then a notarized affidavit could be filled out and ownership then transfers to the descendant.

Guess who that descendant was?  Yup, me.
 
My cousin obtained the paperwork. I completed it, had it notarized and then returned it to cemetery staff.  Once this was done I, of course, gave my cousin permission to place the headstone for her grandmother.

Prior to this, I had never thought of doing anything like this.   
Have you heard of this procedure or done it yourself?

Here is the form I filled out (with names changed to protect living descenants).



I paid $10 to have the form notarized.  I am now the documented owner of this plot in Grand Lawn Cemetery, Detroit, Michigan.

WHY WOULD THIS BE IMPORTANT?

• Should anyone want to make changes to any of the gravesites, they would have to get my permission.
• If the cemetery or the City of Detroit or anyone else should decide to use this land for something else, they would, hopefully, notify the owner of record.
• When I make requests to have headstones raised (as I often do), they may be more likely to pay attention to me if I own the plot.
• And the last reason….because it makes me feel good to know that my grandparents and other ancestors are in my care.

I am currently in the process of completing another Affidavit of Heirs for my maternal grandparents burial location at another cemetery in Detroit.  Last time I visited their gravesites, their headstones had sunk so far I could barely see them.  I asked that they be raised and a year later, they had not been. Maybe as the owner they will process my request in a more timely manner.

I called the specific cemetery and they emailed the form to me right away.  Last time I did not keep a blank copy of the form.  This time I have scanned and saved it, as I see that it’s the same form I filled out before.

I’m not sure if all states have the same form, but I’m sure with a phone call to whatever cemetery you have in mind, you can find out.   I did look online and found that using various search criteria brought up mostly information about heirship for estates.

I would love to hear from others who have gone through this process. 

• Did you have any problems?

Do you think this is something you might do in the future?

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

TOMBSTONE TUESDAY ~ Woodlawn Cemetery in Detroit, Michigan

Woodlawn Cemetery, 19975 Woodward Ave.

Woodlawn Cemetery in Detroit, Wayne, Michigan is just one of many cemeteries in Detroit, that are final resting places for my family.
 
I’ve been to the cemetery several times in recent years.  Using the “search” function in Legacy 8, I determined which of my ancestors are buried at Woodlawn Cemetery.  Please click here to see instructions on how to use the Legacy 8 search function.

This is the list created by Legacy 8.  There are 9 names on the list.



Here are the headstone pictures I have for this group.  Fortunately, I have pictures for all but two.  I have recently, via FindAGrave.com, requested headstone photos for Ralph Gillespie Forsythe and his wife, Katherine Martz.

All photos shown here were taken by me.

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)

Robert A. Milne 1909-1969	Dorothy T. Milne nee Delahoyde 1913-1965	Joseph A. Milne 1883-1957
Merritt J. Quackenbush 1885-1955	Sarah C. Quackenbush nee Roe 1884-1952	Everett P. Roe 1893-1958 and Irene M. Roe nee Milne 1893-1989

How I am related to the ancestors buried at Woodlawn Cemetery.

DELAHOYDE, Dorothy – my Aunt (she married Robert Andrew Milne)
FORSYTH, Ralph G. – my 1st cousin twice removed
MARTZ, Katherine – the wife of Ralph G. Forsyth
MILNE, Irene “Peggy” – my maternal grand aunt
MILNE, Joseph Albert – my maternal grandfather
MILNE, Robert Andrew – my maternal uncle
QUACKENBUSH, James M. – my grandaunt’s husband’s sister’s husband
ROE, Everett P. – the husband of my grandaunt, Irene Milne
ROE, Sarah “Sally” – wife of the above James Quackenbush.

If you think you might be related to anyone mentioned in this blog post, please contact me.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

HAVE LIMITED TIME FOR RESEARCH? Here's What I Did Today in Just 60 minutes

As genealogists we all want more time.  Whether we work full time, part time or are retired.  There never seems to be enough time to work on our research or our files.  And, if you have a family with children there are even more distractions.

WHAT CAN WE DO IN A LIMITED AMOUNT OF TIME?

HERE ARE SOME THINGS I DID TODAY IN 60 MINUTES

• I went to findagrave.com and searched for memorials for one branch of the family.  I located 3, entered the memorial numbers in the User ID in Legacy.  I downloaded and saved the headstone photos to the digital folder and attached it to the burial photos in my database, for that person. 
• I entered a To-Do task to source the photo.
• From those finds I found out that these family members had died in Cabell County, West Virginia.  I know that the wvculture.org site has loads of vital records. 
• I located all three death certificates and death registers on the wvculture website.  I downloaded and saved them to my computer.
• I entered the information from the death records into my Legacy database for that person and created a To-Do item to source the death certificate.

AND THE LAST THING I DID DURING MY 60 MINUTES

• I went into the digital folder where I had just saved the death records for this family.  This is my Frampton family.
• I noticed that some of the death records (including the three I added today) had not been cropped and straightened, so I took care of that today.

Here’s how they looked prior to being edited.
 


I personally, don’t enter any images into my database without first editing them.  I use the Microsoft Office Picture Manager program to perform these tasks.  It’s easy and quick.

Here’s how they look now.  I began this process at 11:29 and finished at 11:34.  
So it took me only 5 minutes and look at the difference!



Here is a post I wrote about using the Microsoft Office Picture Manager program to edit images. The methods here can be used with most photo editing software.

Easy Document Editing

I hope this post has given you a couple of ideas for making use of those small windows of time we may find for our research.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST

Family History Library - After you return home...then what?

Tuesday's Tip - Photo Repair and Restoration

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

MICHIGAN DEATH RECORD IMAGES FOR 1940 NOW ONLINE! Here’s how I found my family’s certificates

The website https://michiganology.org/vital-records/ has many wonderful records & historical information for Michigan researchers. 
Certainly the one I’ve used the most is their death index and images. The images for records from 1897-1920 have been online for a while now.

The images for 1921-1952 are being released as the 75 year restriction rolls around.  As of today, they have uploaded the images up to and including 1940.

So, today, I’m going to use my Legacy search function and see how many, if any, of my ancestors have deaths in Michigan in 1940.

To accomplish this I will go to the “Search” tab and then “Find.”
I want two criteria in my search:

• Place of death = Michigan
• Date of death = 1940

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)
 

And, here is my list



Let’s go over to seekingmichigan.org (UPDATE Oct 2019 - the seekingmichigan website if closed down - the new site is michiganology.org) and see how many of those four certificates I can locate.

NOTE:  As you know, uploading and indexing are not perfect sciences.  So, just because we hear that records are available, doesn’t mean they ALL will be.

How many of these death certificate images did I find?

FOUR OUT OF FOUR!!!

DEATH CERT FOR WILLIAM W. BUSH	DEATH CERT FOR WILLARD B. GOULD
DEATH CERT FOR MINNIE ERB	DEATH CERT FOR KATHERINE MARTZ FORSYTH

Wonderful!  I’ve downloaded each of them, cropped and corrected them and now I can add them to Legacy and source them.  That’s what I call 15 minutes well spent online.

TIP:  I do not like the look of images as they appear in our downloads.  I don’t like the black surrounding them and I don’t like them to be crooked or too grey.  I fix all of this before I ever save the digital image to my computer.  I takes about one minute to perform the task and makes your images look so much better in any report or if you upload them online.  See my “Other Posts” below for a post I wrote about this process.

Time to go work on those records.  Please let me know how many new records you find in this collection.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST

MICHIGAN DEATH RECORDS ONLINE - Where can you find them?

Legacy 8 - THE SEARCH FUNCTION - What Can You Find?

EASY DOCUMENT EDITING - How to Straighten & Correct Images

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION