Working On My Personal Genealogy

While I have been trying to keep up to date on my genealogy writing at BellaOnline, I have gotten very behind here on my personal blog, Gtownma’s Genealogy. I have set a 2013 New Year’s goal to try to write more often. Today I will write my goal of brick wall’s I’d like to solve this next year, should I be so lucky.

I am first hopeful to do more personal research on my direct lines. There are a few lines that I was stuck on. But, with FamilySearch uploading so many new things since my last search on these lines, I might just be able to solve the puzzle next go round. Some of the people I would love to discover more on are:

• Green W. Smith (my step mom’s grandfather) and his wife Willie Brookins, both from the Montgomery County, Georgia area. Also MS, Fl and GA states may have information I need. (See picture below)
• Pleasant G. Alfred Cox from Alabama who may have died in Arkansas right after the Civil War. Would like to know more about this Civil War veteran, one of my direct line ancestors. 
• Elizabeth Garris who married Adam Fralick, then Jacob Ruppenthall around 1850 when Adam died. I want to know Elizabeth’s ancestry. She resided in Autuaga County and Montgomery County, Alabama.
• William & Mary Ann Roten from McNairy County, Tennessee. Anything on these two would be exciting, especially Mary’s maiden name!  
• I would love to get back to researching my husband’s Sicilian lines in Termini-Imerese, Sicily. (Did I put the FHL microfilm numbers down years ago, when doing his lines in the early stages?  NO!  So, need to go back and add those citiations!)

One thing I have been reading alot about lately is the importance of putting our ancestor’s in historical context. I would like to go back to some of the families I have documented and add more historical facts for them. “Meat on the bones” I have heard it often referred to. 

And, of course, let’s not forget to cite our sources. Seems like most of us learn the beginning steps of genealogy on our own personal families. It is not til we are deep into our families or doing it for someone else that we realize, the “lightbulb” goes off, that we need to be citing our sources. I desperately need to revisit my families that I started genealogy with and add those missing citations and hope I can refind them. 

I also have many friends I have done family histories on that I would love to revisit, especially now, as I stated earlier, so much has been added to help us in our research. I also hope to be able to do more non-internet research this next year — court houses, library, cemeteries, archives, etc. That is where the excitement truly lies!

So, join me in 2013 in working more on our personal genealogical lines. Set a goal to do it weekly or monthly. I am hopeful to spend at least one weekend a month on my personal genealogy. 

Green W. Smith & Willie Brookins

 

Family History Fair – June 16 in Bartlett, TN

The public is invited to the Family History Fair hosted by the LDS Church on Saturday, June 16, 2012.

1940 U.S. Census Discoveries

On April 2, 2012 the 1940 Census was released! It has been a very exciting time to both Index and also search out the families I research. I would like to share with you the exciting things I have discovered!

Feel Good Feeling Indexing the 1940 Census

We all like to have that “feel good feeling” for doing something worthwhile and helpful. Come learn how you can get that “feel good feeling” helping index the 1940 census!

The Microwave Oven, An Accidental Invention

The 1940’s had many technological advances, but there is one invention that most households use today that was discovered quite by accident. Percy Spencer invented the microwave oven. He was employed at Raytheon in 1941 and working with magnetron. Come read more about Percy Spencer.

Saturday Night Fun February 11, 2012

 

Randy Seaver over at GeneaMusings has come up with another great Saturday Night Fun challenge. 

It’s Saturday Night, time for more Genealogy Fun!!

The genealogy world was reminded (again) of how time flies, relatively speaking, by the news that there are two living grandchildren of President John Tyler (1790-1862).  This past week there was theRobert Krulwich blog post about persons knowing people who knew famous people long ago.

For this week’s mission (should you decide to accept it), I want you to:

1)  Using your ancestral lines, how far back in time can you go with two degrees of separation?  That means “you knew an ancestor, who knew another ancestor.”  When was that second ancestor born?

2)  Tell us in a blog post of your own, in a comment to this blog post, in a status line on Facebook or a stream post on Google Plus.

 

Here is my contribution:  

 

I was born in 1961 and I remember (and I have a picture) of spending an afternoon with my great grandparents, Joe Lee Coleman (1901-1968) and Amie Mae Sulephen (1903-1995). Amie knew her grandparents that died in the same county as she lived. They were George W. Casteel born 1854 in Tennessee and died about 1933 and Nancy Ann Seaton born 1857 in Hardin, TN or Waterloo, AL and died 1948 in Alcorn County, MS. 

 

 

The Taylor’s Civil War Review

The Taylor’s Civil War was written by Lowell F. Volk. It is a great book that has the Civil Was as its background, but there is much more to the story line than the war.