Category Archives: Research Methods

Lucky clues

Family Stories, Research Methods, , , ,
During the war_2
My maternal grandparents with my mother.

On the face of it, my mother’s immediate family was Southern: her father was born in Norfolk, Virginia, and her mother in Baltimore, Maryland. Things quickly get complicated, though, as my grandfather’s mother and my grandmother’s father were both born in Ohio; it was their spouses’ respective families who had the Virginia and Maryland connections. A generation further back, and my great-great-grandfather William Boucher Jr. (1822–1899) is my most recent immigrant forebear, arriving from Mannheim in the Grand Duchy of Baden in 1845. It will not be surprising, perhaps, that some other nineteenth-century ancestors hailed from elsewhere in the United States, or that both of my maternal grandparents had a lot of New England ancestry. Continue reading Lucky clues →

Changing town names

American History, Genealogical Writing, Research Methods, , ,
norfolk-county-map
Partial map of Norfolk County, 1888, showing Dedham, Hyde Park, and Milton still in the county, while Dorchester has already been annexed to Boston. Robinson’s Atlas of Norfolk County, Massachusetts (New York: E. Robinson, 1888)

In documenting the dates on Mabelle Clifton (Lippitt) (Bourne) Bevins in my last post, her step-mother’s data reminded me of other issues that come our way in family history with new towns being created, or annexed, and the shifting borders of counties and states.

Mabelle’s step-mother, Lillian Hannaford Blazo, was born at Hyde Park, Massachusetts on 5 December 1869, daughter of William Augustus and Mary Elizabeth (Farnum) Blazo.[1] She married at Boston 7 March 1901, Robert Lincoln Lippitt.[2] This marriage listed her birthplace as Dorchester. Lillian died at Providence, Rhode Island 7 February 1937 and her death record listed her birthplace as Milton.[3] Why was there confusion on these two records?

Hyde Park was incorporated as a new town in 1868, just one year before Lillian’s birth, from lands in Dorchester, Milton, and Dedham. From that alone, it’s difficult to say if Lillian was born in the part of Hyde Park that had been Dorchester or Milton, without looking at land records or town directories to see where Lillian’s parents lived, assuming a home birth. Continue reading Changing town names →

ICYMI: Loyalist ancestors

American History, ICYMI, Research Methods, , , ,

[Editor’s note: This blog post originally appeared in Vita Brevis on 10 September 2015.]

Encampment of the Loyalists
“Encampment of the Loyalists in Johnstown, a new settlement on the banks of the River St. Lawrence, in Canada West,” courtesy of Archives Ontario.

Mabel Winters, my great-grandmother, left Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia, when she was about eighteen or nineteen years old. She arrived in the United States about 1900, and first lived with her older brother George in Norton, Bristol County, Massachusetts. I have heard many wonderful stories about Mabel, and I wanted to learn everything that I could about her. As I began to research her life in Nova Scotia, I discovered that she was descended from several Loyalist families. Continue reading ICYMI: Loyalist ancestors →

Metadata

American History, NEHGS Collections, News, Research Methods, Technology, , , , ,

metadata-2-croppedMuch has happened with the Society’s Civil War digitization project, funded by the Cabot Family Charitable Trust, since Abbey Schultz’s last article on quality assurance. Our vendor completed all scans in June 2016, ending the imaging portion of the project. The focus then shifted to preparing the images to be uploaded into CONTENTdm software so they can be displayed  on our Digital Collections website. Continue reading Metadata →

Family associations

NEHGS Collections, Research Methods,

newsletter1I have recently been thinking about an interesting collection in the NEHGS library: our collection of family association newsletters and publications. We have more than 700 different family publications ranging in date from the late 1800s to the present. For some titles, we have just one issue; for others, we have more than 50 years’ worth.    

I was first drawn to the collection by some amusingly clever titles, like Blackburn Beginnings, Chilson Chatter, Collier Collator, Cooley Communiqué, Harlow Happenings, Harris Hunters, Jones Journeys, Kernfield Kernals, and Lay of the Land. I smile at the thought of a group of family members coming up with these names. Continue reading Family associations →

Take a guess

Family Stories, Research Methods, ,

mabelle-3In gathering records on people – especially in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries – I often find people listed with middle initials. Sometimes finding the full middle names can be challenging; sometimes it’s impossible! (In some cases, such as Harry S. Truman or J.R. “Johnny” Cash, the initials may not even actually stand for anything.) Continue reading Take a guess →

A lesson in history

American History, Genealogical Writing, Research Methods,
justin-winsor
American historian, librarian, and former AHA president Justin Winsor (1831-1897). Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

One might be surprised to learn that the profession of “historian” in America is a fairly recent creation. The American Historical Association (AHA), founded in 1884, was established partly in reaction to growing numbers of individuals who were pursuing the serious study of history.[1] America’s earliest historians were focused largely on recording the events and sequence of history: that is, political events, wars, and other nation-building activities. Only recently have America’s historians begun to ask what life was like for ordinary men, women, and minority groups – questions of significant relevance and interest to family historians and genealogists.[2] Continue reading A lesson in history →

Thankful for our volunteers

American History, NEHGS Collections, Research Methods, Technology, , ,

hampton-records-shawThis past week we held our annual Volunteer Luncheon, thanking all the volunteers at NEHGS for the prodigious amount of work they do to help our Society. Here on the database team, we have many volunteers who help scan and index the original material from which we create our databases. We want to highlight some of the databases that we have re-released lately and the volunteers who have made this possible.

Why do we “re-release” our databases? Many of our databases are fully searchable throughout seven categories: first name, last name, year, record type, parents’ names, spouses’ names, and location. However, some of our older collections are not indexed with all of that information. Continue reading Thankful for our volunteers →

Harvard graduates

American History, Family Stories, Research Methods, ,

Alicia Crane WilliamsOne of the best sources I use is Biographical sketches of graduates of Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. John Langdon Sibley compiled the first three volumes, covering the classes of 1642 through 1689 (published between 1873 and 1885). The collection is still colloquially known as “Sibley’s Harvard Graduates,” although his successor, Clifford K. Shipton, published more volumes covering classes from 1690 through 1771 (between 1933 and 1975), a total of 17 in all. The text from these books is available in the database Colonial Collegians: Biographies of Those Who Attended American Colleges before the War for Independence on americanancestors.org. Continue reading Harvard graduates →

A growing sense of community

American History, Research Methods, ,

charleston-gazetteThe Stamp Act, passed in 1765 by the British Parliament, was a levied tax on legal documents, almanacs, and newspapers – basically, any form of paper used in the American colonies. The reason Britain passed the Stamp Act was to pay for the British troops stationed in North America, there to “protect” the colonists.

The tax was to be paid in the British form of money, sterling, not the paper money the colonists used. This was the first direct tax that Parliament had used on the colonists. (The Sugar Act, passed in 1764, was a tax on trade rather than a tax on the everyday life of the colonists.) Continue reading A growing sense of community →