Showing posts with label family tree. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family tree. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Stevenson Genealogy

Stevenson Genealogy

This is my favorite place to order supplies. They offer a wonderful newsletter each month with helpful tips.  When I was just beginning I wanted a 15 Generation chart, and had no clue as to where I needed to look for them.  I found them here, and when I ordered, and received my package, one of the owners sent me a little note, wishing me luck on my research.  It was so nice to have that, and for all of my needs I come here.

Over the years I have collected memorabilia from various relatives, and Stevenson's Genealogy has various size page protectors, for photos, funeral notices, and paper items that need to be preserved. 

Click on the link above and you will be taken to their site, I have also added their free forms to my sidebar.  I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.  If you have questions, they are also a great source to ask. 

Friday, July 22, 2011

Humbled by my Ancestors

Everyone has a past you just have to dig for it.. I have been using my gift membership to Ancestry.com nightly and getting so many records its just unreal.  Someday I hope to chart all of this on a great big chart, but for now, I am very happy with my going green/ paperless family tree.

Last night I decided to work on my Great Grandma Hastings family, and got about to 1340 A.D., and much to my surprise, I am a niece of King Henry VI.  Everyone has someone in their family that is famous, just sometimes its not the famous type you would like to have. 


I also looked for my boyfriend who has been told since he was a teenager that he is related to Outlaw Jesse James, he too wasn't quite sure how to take that, or to be real happy about it.  But I found it, they are distant cousins, just not so distantly, only by about 125 years. 


As I was digging for my own ancestry, a lot of the deaths were at Tower of  London, that gave me a very unsettled feeling.  Mostly sadness, I am sure it was due to the King, he seemed to be a very difficult man.  My own GGGGGGrandmother was beheaded by his order, and for that, just makes me sad, I am still working on trying to find out why she was beheaded, she was only 54 years old. 

In that time era, it seemed common place to find you guilty and then behead you.  Which I find ironic, since today's society its, you are found guilty, but then can spend the rest of your life in jail at the expense of others.  Maybe the King did have a point, maybe if you were truly guilty of what he said, off with your head, and be done with you.  But a lot of the crimes people committed were stealing food because they were poor, or not affording the taxes, and lastly, religious views, some wanted to remain Catholic, and others didn't, Hence the introduction of Protestants...

As I dig more into the how's and why's of my ancient family, I will post my findings.  If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask,

Tracy

Friday, October 16, 2009

Irregular Marriage

If you find this term in your Genealogy it means this...

In Isolated frontier areas couples were not always able to travel to a church or preacher or legal recorder when they wanted to marry so they would publicly state their intentions and set up housekeeping together and then when the first itinerant minister came through, he would marry them.

This term was accepted by church elders, in Scotland and here in the U.S.A. in the earlier days. The couple was not thought of as promiscuous, it was just something that they did. The children under law were never thought as illegitimate, and thus, the church didn't either.

So in some states now, they call it common law marriage, or even the new modern term, Domestic Partner...

Friday, July 24, 2009

Find A Grave

seeing as how i dont get a chance to volunteer or help out with charities that really inspire me, I have been thinking of something to do to give back. I just happened to be working on a little research for my genealogy, and came across this little website, its nothing fancy, but it has 34million grave site photos. http://www.findagrave.com I am soon going to be walking the local cemeteries and taking photos.. Great exercise, great nature walks, and plenty of photos in the hopes of helping out my fellow genealogists. Usually when you have a person to research, you find their last known whereabouts, i.e. their grave. A photo is worth a thousand words, and in this case, a date of birth or a year, etc. If you are like me, and have just a few spare hours, or several to spare and want to get out and about, take your camera to the nearest cemetery and take photos, then upload them to the site. Also, if you need a photo, you can download it, and have it as your own, there are even celebrities listed there.

I Seek Dead People

I have been doing Genealogy for years, since I was about 14, I became very interested in our families history, when my Grandma got involved heavily into it. At 15, I went on a very long road trip with my Grandma, and it involved digging in cemeteries. It was a lot of fun, looking for people, searching thru weeds, snacks, bugs and swamps... yes swamps.. some people were buried in cemeteries that were turned into natural wildlife/flora preserves and then flooded. I basically took it is, the town, city, county or state, didnt feel the need to upkeep it, or didnt have the money to do so, so they just let nature take its course.

Finding Relatives the old school way, involved traveling and lots of microfilm, making photo copies with large bulky copiers and doing a lot of writing. Now in the days of the internet, fax machines, email it is much easier to get the info. Sometimes I still do it the old school way, getting the actual copies of the things i need, from a death certificate to a marriage licence or land deed.

If you are new to this you are not alone, I still consider myself an intermediate Genealogist, but I am very resourceful since I have a background with detective work. I love to help people get in the direction they want to get going, but for me, what is hard, is asking for help. I am still looking for my maternl grandfathers family, the trail stops actually when they leave Germany and enter the USA in the late 1800's. Rumor has it, they changed the spelling of their name, and there is a town in Germany named after them, and I'd like to know why. Someday I know that I will find out why. But for now, I have been working on getting all the research that I have collected from my Grandmother into proper order.

My title "I Seek Dead People" is as plain as it can get. I have dug in dozens of cemeteries, taking photos, rubbings and etchings, putting the last place photo with the person, and then go in reverse. It seems to work best for me this way, and when others need help, they know exactly what I do.