Genealogical Year in Review 2012

Another year past, and a few things to show for it. I haven't been writing here as much because I've been a bit scattered this year. Too many things, not nearly enough done. But I have found some fun tidbits here and there, and switched to a new software program for my genealogy.

Changes in the family

Not as many this year (that I'm aware of) as last, but two big changes. One in the immediate family, and one in the extended family.

My grandmother died this year. The last of her generation on that side. All of that generation left are only on the other side of my family now. We had a nice service for her, and many of the extended family came down, including my grandfather's cousin, whom I had not seen in some years. He enjoyed seeing the book on the Bordewicks my sister and I put together, and complemented us on it. I did up a pair of slideshows for the memorial. One for the service itself, which was only a couple minutes, and one much longer which played throughout the reception after. I enjoyed doing it so much that I ended up doing one for each of my grandparents and gave them to both sides of the family as presents. I miss them all, so it was a bit of a tearful process. You've heard it before, but I'll say it again. No matter how difficult it might feel to talk to someone and ask them questions, it's far harder when they've gone. There are some things you'll never get if you don't ask.

The other big change in the family this year was my cousin's second child was born. She's a sweet little thing, and it was quite the celebration Christmas evening with four kids in the house. My cousins and my sister and I are all so widely spaced, we generally haven't had more than three kids in the family at any family Christmas. There are six years between me and my sister, and five between her and our next cousin, so by the time his brother was born, I was in my teen years. And by the time my twin cousins were born, they'd moved up to Alaska, and just didn't come to many family Christmases. We've had the occasional Christmas where extended family have had their kids over, but they were more rare than not, so it was definitely an experience having four young kids at Christmas this year. I quite enjoyed it.

Brick Wall Progress

I considered doing this in a different post, but I'm not as well-organized this year as I was last. I've made a few discoveries.

My favorite this year, I think has to be my great-grandmother's brother, Mendel Kresch, who escaped through Belgium to Brazil when the war started in Europe. He and (I believe) his wife, their daughter (not sure if there were others, or if they escaped), her husband, and their child, managed to escape to Brazil, and therefore managed to survive the war. I only discovered that one because one of my father's cousins mentioned a cousin from South America, so when I saw the Brazillian Immigrant card collection at Family Search, I had to check it out. It's especially great because the cards have a photo attached, so I can see just what he looked like.

Other than that, I haven't made any big discoveries in my ancestral lines, though I have made a few other discoveries. I discovered that Grumpy's family was still officially in Arkansas during the 1940 census, when I'd assumed they were already in Chicago. I do know that they'd moved to Chicago no more than two years later, as that is where they are living when Alex had to go in for his draft card, which was another bit of fascinating information to find. I still haven't found Jack Seneft in the 1940 census, though I keep trying. Unfortunately, I don't believe he ever married, so all I have to go by is his name and draft card information from that same batch. 

I also found a bunch of names and addresses in the BC area during the Ancestry free period. They had the Canadian voting records posted, and so I have a lot of information on who was living where and when because of them.

I'm working on a book about Nana's mother, and sorting through letters, which makes me think it might be interesting to scan them all and create a book of them. It would be a lot of up-down, though, given where my scanner is currently placed. But because of the book, I have been trying to firm up the information I do have on the Sealand branches. I still have no better leads on where Lars Olsen ended up when he came here, but I have a bit more information on his wife. I keep trying on Oline's father's side, too, but so far all I really have there before him is Census information. As of now, I know that the family farm, Stubbegaard, passed through at least four generations: Rasmus's father, Rasmus, Rasmus's eldest son, and that son's son. I think after that it was sold, though I'm not sure why. I hope to find some information on it in the letters, because I remember my Aunt talking about it in at least one of them.

Software Upgrade

After many years of being a Family Tree Maker user, I have finally switched over almost completely to Roots Magic. I miss some of the interactive features FTM had, but RM has others that make up for quite a bit. I got the full version of the software for Christmas, so I'm still playing with some features, and haven't even gotten to others, but so far so good.

Much of my year has been spent hand-entering the family tree from the old documents I have, and actually adding in the source information, which I never did in FTM (part of why I wanted to do it this way). It's been a learning process, but I've found all sorts of fascinating stories in doing so, and reorganized things a little to help.

Articles

Still posting at the Examiner, including a series on local and online sources for international genealogical research.

I also restarted my Surname Saturday posts, though those will be slowing down now, as I'm reaching the edges of my family tree, and know less and less stories about them as I go further back.

Resolutions

I didn't do so hot on my resolutions this past year, but I think my main two focuses this year will be on finishing adding all my sources to my Roots Magic tree, and otherwise focusing on my great-grandmother's story. I'd love to at least get her life story written out, if nothing else. Maybe get all those letters scanned, too.

To everyone reading this, have a happy and productive new year.

Genealogy Year in Review 2011

This past year wasn't exciting as the year before, though I made a few minor breakthroughs, and there were a few more changes in my tree.

I've now been blogging here over two years, and it's definitely helped me get things in order in my family tree, and in my search for more.

My new filing system, started last year, has helped me greatly in my search, and in keeping track of what I have. I also got a new printer/scanner from my mother-in-law, which has meant being able to re-print my entire tree (though it will need updating again soon).

Changes in the family
We lost a few members of the extended family this year. One great-aunt that I knew fairly well growing up, and another who I might have met once or twice, but mostly know by name. This does mean that on both sides of the family, only one family member from that generation is still around any more on three sides of my family tree. On my dad's side, it's his maternal aunt, and on my mom's, it's my grandmother. The only one that still has a number of members is my paternal grandfather's. Three of his four sisters are still around.

We also gained a few new members this year, both in the close family as well as the extended family. One of my second cousins married this year (possibly more than one, I'm not entirely sure at the moment), and my sister and another second cousin had children. My nephew, who was born December the 11th, and our cousin's daughter, who was born December 29th. Again, there might be more there, but those are the two I'm certain of.

Brick Wall Progress
Hillingers: While I have not gotten any further back on this side of the family, I have confirmed that Mindel Seneft (nee Hilinger) died in London, or is at least buried there. I found a grave marker with the name "Minnie Seneft" with an inscription by one of her daughters on it, the same name as one of the two I have listed. So while I'm not 100% sure it's her, I am fairly certain it is.

I also had one picture confirmed (as the opposite of the great-great grandfathers I suspected), and another as a great-great aunt I'd guessed at.

Hansen (Sealand branch): I've confirmed Rasmus's parents' names, as I've found him in at least three Census lists, including one with both his parents and his first wife, so I know that I've got the right ones now.

On Oline's mother's side, I haven't gotten much more, but I'm working on what I do have so that I can write a book about her. I've been organizing the notes and letters I do have, and trying to learn what I do have so that I know what I still need.

Park/Curran: I've made no progress on this branch this year, but I think once I've finished Oline's story, this will be my next project, as May's (my great-grandmother) family has always held a fascination for me, ever since my grandfather died. They're the reason I started doing all this, and I hope, in time, to get much further back, and learn which of those lines, if any, hailed from Scotland.

The Welsh Lines: Still sorting through these. I've made no big progress aside from finding my Canadian relations in the early 1900s censuses. I'd love particularly to make progress on my Jones line, though at the moment, that's highly unlikely to happen any time soon.

Software Update:
After playing with The Master Genealogist, I'm going to shelve it for the moment. It seems too old-fashioned and clunky. I've stopped playing with Legacy, though I might go back to it as well. At the moment, Family Tree Maker has my most complete family tree, but I'm slowly working on creating a sourced tree in Roots Magic 5, their latest build which was released this year.

Roots Magic seems to work quite well as a replacement for Family Tree Maker, as does Legacy, but Roots Magic seems to appeal to me better. I've two branches mostly sourced in it at the moment (though I need to go back and find the Census information on the Welsh lines mentioned above), and I'm currently working on one half of a third—the Norwegian branch, which is one of the two biggest lines in my tree.

Family Tree Builder also released a new version this year—mostly website-based, but there are some interesting things in the new release that might make it worth putting my info online, if private.

Posts here at Oh, Spusch:
I finished doing my Surname Saturday posts this year, though I think at some point, I will revisit them.

I also did a series I called Where We're From, which focused on all the locations my direct ancestors lived, were born, or died over the centuries.

Both helped me understand a lot more what I knew and what I needed to know, and I'm hoping to find more of that sort of thing to post in the coming year.

The Examiner
This year, I also began posting as the Seattle Genealogy Examiner. This has meant (mostly irregular) posting of articles on Genealogy, both in Seattle and in general, and going to the Seattle Public Library and the Seattle Genealogical Society to learn more about both.

In the coming year, I hope to do much more, and I hope you will all check out my articles.

Resolutions for the coming year:
* To get in contact with one or more of my grandfather's sisters, and ask them what they remember about their parents, and anything they might remember about their great-grandparents (though that won't likely be much).

* Finish adding all my sources to the family tree in Roots Magic. And possibly make a file to store those things that have not yet been added.

* Find at least one more piece of information on each of my four branches.

* Do at least twice-monthly articles here at Oh, Spusch.

* Post at least two Examiner articles a week. Try to write at least three.

* Send out an Email at least once every three months to the family to get more information.

* Keep Facebook family groups updated—post at least once a week.

And to everyone reading, have a fabulous new year, and good luck in your own Genealogical pursuits.

My year in Genealogy 2010

I have been the family genealogist since 1991 or thereabouts. But until this year, I'd never spent more than a couple of hours here or there doing research. Most of my time was spent gathering what info I could from the family to update my tree.

My first post here at Oh, Spusch was well over a year ago, but it wasn't until this past year that I really started to post regularly. I had a few random things laying about that I wanted to blog about, and then I discovered Surname Saturday, and decided to do that as well, to work up a visual tree of the family.

Sis joined in, and the two of us (her more than me, though I helped as often as possible) scanned the family photos into her computer and did our best to identify as many people in the photos as we were able. It gave us an idea for a certain project we wanted to do, so much of everything I did on the family tree this year went towards working on that project—identifying locations, reading the letters between my great-aunt and my grandmother, who were sisters, and in the process, learning a great deal about my family tree, and how much had already gone into finding out what we already had.

I got a lot more organized because of it. I resolved to work on our family tree at least once a week, sometimes just working on posts, sometimes doing research, sometimes over at my sister's to scan and identify more photos.

I also started a new filing system for my paperwork. When I first began to work on my family's genealogy, I had a very simple system—I had folders in my file cabinet for each branch of the family—one for each grandparent, and one for my husband's family.

As I began to work on my genealogy this year, I decided to upgrade my system. I had a file-box with a handle that I could take with me if needed, and used that for putting all the folders I'd used before. It grew more complicated from there as I began to gather paperwork—both from printing stuff off the internet, and gathering papers from my family for the family tree. I'm now so overwhelmed with paperwork I may never catch up, but I'm hoping to try, at least. One of my Christmas gifts this year was a new storage box that I can put everything into and only use the carry-box for what I absolutely need to take with me.

I also started using sub-folders in each family name, and printed out a full version of each branch of the tree in two forms—as a pedigree chart in sections of four generations, and as family group sheets. Of course, with everything I've discovered in this past year, I need to update it again, but I think I'll make that a once yearly project, rather than redoing it every time I find something new. Otherwise, it will be too much work. Unfortunately, with everything that has happened, my printer is now on the fritz, so I will have to wait until I can get a new printer so that I can do that this year.

I've even started to use colour-coding to tell the branches apart visually, though mostly in the computer forms I've made for myself. Because otherwise, the long lists of names starts to blur after a point.

My actual progress for the year:
I started out my search writing out what I had on three of the biggest Brick walls in my family: My father's father's side of the family, my father's mother's mother's side, and my mother's father's mother's side. I am proud to say that I have made major progress in all three branches, though I have yet to actually get any further generations back on my grandfather's side.

The first brick wall, my paternal grandfather's side is the hardest to get further back with, because they were Ashkanazi (German) Jews from Eastern Europe. But I learned a great deal more about them, to the point where I now have the names of most of my great-grandfather's siblings, and birthplaces for both himself and his wife. I also learned a great deal more about his journey from Galicia to England, then Germany, and finally to America. And I learned about Galicia itself, which while depressing, was fascinating. I also learned that my grandfather's twin sister was named for their mother's sister, who I'd never even heard of before. I really feel like I connected to this side this year, and someday hope to learn more. Possibly even manage to get another generation back—or more.

On my paternal great-grandmother's side, I have learned so much, and then discovered that I was re-tracing the steps my grandmother and her sister had already taken. I may have managed to get a few more names, thanks to FamilySearch.org, but most of what I've found has just confirmed what they learned from their uncle, who they met again in the eighties shortly before his death, and from my great aunt's trip to Denmark around that time.

I've even learned more about their father's side, though I'd never thought to look into it until I got the paperwork about the family tree after my grandmother's death this last year. Particularly about how their father came to the US, and how he and his wife met.

And I've done so much research on that side, Denmark has sped to the top of my "genealogy places to go" list. As well as becoming one of the spots on my tree that I know a lot of tricks about how to find information. I even connected with a cousin of my grandmother's over there who has quite a bit of her paternal side mapped out on a genealogy website.

On the other side of the family, my paternal great-grandmother's side has always been of interest to me. I knew they were Irish, but I'd never been able to find my great-great grandmother's parents' names, even though I had the names for three of their daughters. As of now, I know not only their names, but both of their fathers' names, as well as several more likely children, and I know that my great-great grandfather's mother's maiden name was the same as my great-grandmother's middle name. It's so much more than what I had before, and also made me realize that that side of the family is what is known as Scotch Irish here in the states. Very cool. And a wall that I'm glad I finally managed to break through that wall, given that it was the branch I'd always been most interested in from the start.

I had so much luck with those three branches of the family that I even took a stab at sorting out the Welsh branches of my family tree, for which I unfortunately have the least documentation at this point, though it's getting better. I even managed to find one of the "missing" wives of one of my ancestors on Family Search, so I think I'll be able to manage something. I might even be able to connect one of the branches to the rumours about one of those lines being Huguenots. I think I've figured out which, but I have not conclusive evidence—yet.

I even managed to make some headway on the other branch of the tree, to the point where I found marriage records for many of them, and connections that led me even further back. Including finding out the origin of my maternal grandfather's line in Norway. Now I just have to find out who his parents were.

I've had a lot of help this year. The photos have helped me learn more about the connections between people—both from the stories we've learned from family members, and from the notes on the backs of the photos, as well as the photos themselves. It's been a revelation.

Software and websites:
Then there were the websites and programs I've been using. FamilySearch.org was of course the number one site, especially when they started to test the latest version on their beta site. So much new information there these days. And far more outside the country than ever before.

But I also decided to upgrade my software, only to find that the latest version of my current software was not something I wanted to purchase. So I began to test out other software, only to discover that there really isn't anything that will replace Family Tree Maker exactly. I ended up with two new programs, though neither is exactly a perfect replacement. The Master Genealogist is what I was hoping I could use to replace FTM, but now I'm less sure than when I first got it. I like it, but it feels like it needs a major overhaul. It's like it's stuck in the 80s, which is never a good thing. The other program is a free one called Family Tree Builder, but while it's much more modern, it's missing some of the basic things that most genealogy programs have—most specifically, a merge function. But I think if it gets one, that could well become my main genealogy software. I've also still got a free version of Legacy on my computer, which has a lot of nice functions, particularly when it comes to merging—so we'll see…I haven't made up my mind yet.

In using Family Tree Builder, I've found several connections, and several new websites. I also finally signed up for Jewish Gen, which hasn't led to any new discoveries yet, but I do keep hoping. The Ellis Island site yielded info on my paternal great-grandmother's Ellis Island record, as well as one of my great-great aunt's records for when she came to the US.

Then there were the other things the internet has helped with: Google Reader, and tips and stories from other genealogists; Google Bookmarks, which has made it so much easier to back-track all the info I've found over the last year; Google Maps, which has shown me at least one of the places my ancestors lived if I am right; and even Geni, though I'm less enamoured of that site than I was when I was first shown it. I like being able to connect to others, but it feels a bit pushy in some aspects. Possibly because only my sister and myself are on it in our family circle, though we've sent invites to several folks in the family, a few of which who even joined, though they never added anything much.

And then there was Drop Box. I dithered on that for a while, because I was worried that others would have access to my information. But having two computers at home made it rather a vital convenience. I've still not been able to get all of my software to read from that folder, but having duplicates of all my writing, and of my Family Tree Maker files definitely makes having it worth it. I highly recommend it to anyone who has more than one computer that they use regularly.

Then, of course, there was Picasa for the photos, which was both great and problematic, but definitely a wonderful resource for keeping track of the family photos, especially so that I don't have to download them onto my computer as well as having them on my sister's.

And one last site that was only set up at the end of this past year. Tapestry. I've only played with it a little, but it looks as though it could become a great asset to the genealogy community, given time. I highly recommend it to anyone trying to do research into their family tree. From kids on up.

Events in my tree this year:
As far as genealogical events, there have been quite a few for my family this year, both close and more distant. The largest, of course, was my grandmother's death in May, and the second most would have to be my cousin's son being born in March. Other highlights included a second cousin's marriage in Canada, my brother-in-law's marriage in September, and a few other things, some of which I'm not quite ready to talk about, and others I am sure I have already forgotten.

Shortly after my grandfather's death, I spent an afternoon with my grandmother, talking to her about her mother, and about her own life. I don't want to go into too much detail here, aside from saying that I'm glad I did. Because she's the one grandparent that I really got to talk to their family about before their health declined. It makes me feel a little closer to her. And I do miss her every day.

After my grandmother's death, my aunt gave me a few different stacks of papers, and from those papers I have learned so much more—not just about her and her family, but also about my grandfather's family, including many things I'd never known before. I know I have barely scratched the surface. I think, if I manage the time, this coming year could be just as fascinating. I suppose I'll see.


There's so much more I could talk about, but I've already gone on far too long, so I think what I have is enough, and I'll do my new genealogy resolutions/wish list in another post.

But beyond everything else—it really was quite a year. I can't wait to see what the coming year will bring. Hopefully more good than bad.