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52 Ancestors 52 Weeks: Favorite Photo

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I have many favorite family and historic photos so it was hard to choose one. This photo of the Haverstraw Baseball team was in a box of my Great Uncle Harry's belongings. I was going through the box with his son and we were happy to come across some newly discovered and some long forgotten treasures.   In this photo my Uncle is second from the left in the bottom row. Next to him on the end is my grandfather, Tuck. I never met Tuck and thrills me that they were friends as well as brothers and did things together like this.   Almost immediately,  we wanted to identify the rest of the team. My dad took some guesses and then suggested I take the photo to the local senior citizens center. The members there had a great time trying to guess who was who and it generated lots of conversations. We narrowed down who might be who and several members were certain they identified family members. One senior suggested I take the photo to the local hometown newspaper (this was ...
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52 Ancestors 52 Weeks! Week 1

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  My goal is to be a better and more consistent blogger in 2025.  I still have a lot to say about my genealogical research in 2024 and will do so soon.  I decided to participate in Amy Johnson Crow's 52 Ancestors 52 Weeks initiative. Once you sign up, she sends a prompt each week and you can interpret it and work on it any way you wish. I did post week one on her Facebook where other participants are posting. I will also post here. I hope to think of new avenues and ancestors for storytelling and to build on my writing skills.   Week One: Beginnings. I learned as a pretty young girl that I was interested in genealogy, except I didn't know there was a name for it. I was a voracious reader, I love History and I felt very rooted in place. My father and his father were all born in our small town like my brother, sister and I. I couldn't walk in town without being recognized as my father's daughter.  My mother and her father and his father and so on, were all bo...
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Newspapers!

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 It's been more than a minute since I have posted!  I wanted to share an important tool for researching your family!  Newspapers.  Here is our latest podcast discussing just that.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDfPCXrZCdo
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Happy Family History Month!

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 Hello!   I have finally found some time to get back to my research!   I was inspired by the Florida Genealogy Society- Tampa annual seminar last week. I haven't missed the seminar since I moved to FL in 2013. I don't attend the regular meeting often as the are in Tampa and I hate driving there. I have been impressed by the quality of speakers this seminar attracts and this year was not exception. I was especially pleased that the program was all virtual and featured my favorite podcast host, Diana Elder and Nicole Dyer of Research Like a Pro. It was a great day! Diana and Nicole are both great speakers and explain their methods well. I was motivated to pick up my copy of their new book and dive right in to their DNA class.  If have not yet listened to Diana and Nicole you are really missing out.  In addition to the podcast, they offer two great online classes, Research Like a Pro and Research Like a Pro with DNA. I was proud of the research and work I...
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Minnie Rose Johnson

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  On April 21, 1887 Minnie Jones was born in Sandy Fields, NY.  She was my maternal great grandmother and the desire to learn more about her and her life has led me to my life's work, genealogy and family history.   I never met Minnie, she died before I was born.  I was lucky to hear many great stories from my aunts, my cousins and my mother.  I was luckier still that the cousin who had many of her photos stored in the attic, shared them with me.   Minnie has what I imagine would be a very hard life. She was born to a single mother, widowed before age 50 and raised her family through the depression and world war. Her home town, Sandy Fields and its neighboring towns full of family and friends were washed away to make room for Harriman State Park. Yet, every photo I find of Minnie, she is smiling her wide, happy grin.   Finding documented evidence of Minnie's life has been a genealogical challenge! But what I have found has been revealing...
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Midwest Case Study

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 A new podcast is available today!  What's Your Story? A mid-western Case Study https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMwBenFNNIs For this podcast Lois and I researched our tech expert and producer, Nicole's family.  I was great to work some different records and stretch my research skills.  I have no mid-western ancestors and found Iowa records fascinating!  
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Don't stress, use common sense! Podcast #11

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Lois and I published our newest podcast this week! It's our 11th and the first of 2022.  We wanted to offer some tips and emphasize some concepts that were less methodological and more common sense based and we had a great time brainstorming our list.   Don't stress, use common sense!  Frequently check your research for reasonable leaks in logic.    Check dates- is mom old enough to have given birth to all of the children? Maybe she is their step-mother.  Names- be sure to keep everyone straight and be careful with family naming patterns.  Don't jump to conclusions! Spelling is fluid Handwriting is subjective Your ancestors name was not changed at Ellis Island, may be the biggest myth in genealogy.  DNA is not genealogy. It is only one piece of the puzzle. One tool in the genealogy toolbox.   Don't believe everything you read and not everything is online. A good researcher, like a good detective mines documents for clues a...
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