You know those old pictures that you inherited from your grandparents or your parents that you keep meaning to sort or do something with? Well, Heritage Scrapbooking at MGC is the place for you to be! On the first Saturday of each month, we meet to help each other create a timeline of pictures for your family. Most people do it in scrapbook form with some embellishments and creativity. Others simply record and mount the pictures with just names and dates. Either way, it is two hours that yo
Have you looked at census records for Ireland? If so, have you noticed that only 1901 and 1911 are available? That’s right. The 1821-1851 records were largely destroyed in the fire in the Public Records Office in 1922. There are only a few surviving fragments. Those for 1861-1891 were completely destroyed by the government.
The next available census will not be released until 2027 but don’t panic. There are census substitutes; that is, other types of records that exist:
A patron and I were working on her mother’s family. She told me the story of her great-uncle, who was killed by a train when he was 12 years old. The accident happened in Jackson County, Missouri, sometime in the 1920s. His name was Francis Bishop.
Have you lost an ancestor in Maryland? We recently received a research tip from one of our book vendors, Diane, from the Prince George’s County Genealogical Society of Maryland [PGCGS]. No one knows about researching in a geographic area like someone who lives in the area.
Diane says that after the Civil War, many young men left their farms in southern Maryland to find work in Washington, DC. When they died, most of the time their bodies were not shipped home. You will find their burials in Washington, DC.
One of my favorite hobbies is genealogy. I suppose it is because it is the personal side of history. In school we learned the basics of history, from World to American. When it comes to genealogy, history becomes personal. When you are starting, of course, you begin with your closest relatives. This is fairly easy and pretty close to your own history experience. Most stories you have heard from relatives have happened recently enough that you can correlate them with the recent history that you learn in school.
When my father-in-law passed away, we inherited boxes full of family history information. While digging through one of the boxes, we found a scrapbook full of newspaper clippings. The clippings were not labeled in any way and really were not in chronological order.
Many years ago, I asked my mom to write to my great aunts in California for some information and copies of pictures of my mom’s parents. Both of my maternal grandparents died before or shortly after I was born, and since my mom is the baby of seven children, she inherited virtually nothing in the way of family photos or heirlooms. At the time, my aunts were also in their late eighties, and I thought that these stories should most definitely be collected before the last of their generation were gone.
Jessie Elizabeth Rush, also known by her first name only and her middle name only and even just Lizzie Rush on her marriage certificate. What about Shively, Shibley, or Sheobley. UGH! Those are all the same family, and it certainly looks like Shively to me when I read the handwriting. But to the person indexing those names, it was a guessing nightmare. And, it can be a nightmare for researchers as well.
