Tag Archives: A Genealogist’s Diary

A Beekman family cookbook

American History, Collections, Family Stories, , , ,
Recipes for Indian pudding, suet pudding, and carrot pudding from the Beekman cookbook.

A surprising find in my box of Steward family papers is a combination cookbook–book of home remedies. It is a surprise not as a document – the R. Stanton Avery Special Collections at NEHGS holds many such hybrids – but as a lone example of something from my paternal grandmother’s family in a collection of Steward, White, and Beeckman papers.

To be specific, the cookbook section’s front end paper reads The Misses Beekman. My grandmother was named for her maternal great-great-grandmother, Anne Beekman (1784–1842), who married John Finlay of Montreal in 1809, and the Misses Beekman were Mrs. Finlay’s unmarried sisters, Aletta Beekman (1787–1851) and Cornelia Beekman (1790–1826).[1] Continue reading A Beekman family cookbook →

“Her whole heart’s devotion”

American History, Family Stories, , ,

Another one of the treasures in my grandfather’s box of family papers is the surprisingly well-preserved booklet produced following my great-great-grandmother’s funeral, at Grace Church in New York, on 1 August 1867. The booklet’s sturdy midnight blue cover stock offers no hint of the contents, an admiring Address at the Funeral of Mrs. John Steward given by the Rev. Dr. Stephen H. Tyng, the long-time rector of St. George’s Church on Stuyvesant Square.[1] Continue reading “Her whole heart’s devotion” →

A serious young couple

American History, Collections, Family Stories, , , ,
Margaret Atherton (Foster) Beeckman

Among the prizes in my grandfather’s box of family papers is a small double daguerreotype case containing images of my great-great-grandparents, Gilbert Livingston Beeckman (1824–1874) and Margaret Atherton Foster (1832–1904). While I have seen several images of Mrs. Beeckman, including a Fagnani pastel of her as a young bride, I have no other representation of G. L. (or G. Livingston) Beeckman, for whom my grandfather Gilbert Livingston Steward was named. Continue reading A serious young couple →

A letter from home

American History, Collections, Family Stories, , , , , ,

Sylvester Jervis 1One of the envelopes in my box of family papers turns out to contain material on my great-grandfather Campbell Steward (1852–1936) as a boy, as well as a letter written to his married daughter in Europe shortly before his death. Another item caught my eye: a vivid yellow envelope addressed to “Mr. Campbell Steward” in New York City, with a letter inside mailed from Goshen, New York, and dated 12 January 1871. Continue reading A letter from home →

Family papers

American History, Collections, Family Stories, Research Methods, , , , ,

John Steward boxMy grandfather died almost 25 years ago, and sometime before that he gave me a box of “family papers.” The box itself is rather striking: a metal strong box, easily portable, with my great-great-grandfather John Steward’s name stenciled on top in fading paint. Inside the box are not just family papers, but intriguing (and, of course, unidentified) daguerreotypes and examples of other early photographic processes, along with materials treating the family of my great-grandmother, Margaret Atherton (Beeckman) Steward (1861–1951). Continue reading Family papers →

A great spectacle

American History, Collections, Research Methods, , , , ,
Crowd scene from BEN-HUR.

Ben-Hur:  A Tale of the Christ (1925) was one of the great spectacles of the silent period; it was also one of the first movies to be produced by the newly amalgamated Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer film corporation. The uncredited cast list reads like a Hollywood Who’s Who of the 1920s (and later): among the (future) stars said to have participated in the film are John and Lionel Barrymore, Gary Cooper, Joan Crawford, Marion Davies, Douglas Fairbanks (Sr.), Clark Gable, Janet Gaynor, John Gilbert, Dorothy and Lillian Gish, Harold Lloyd, Carole Lombard, Myrna Loy, Colleen Moore, Mary Pickford, Sally Rand, and Fay Wray.[1] Continue reading A great spectacle →

The wider circle

American History, Collections, Family Stories, NEHGS Collections, , ,
Hedwiga Gray diary1
Hedwiga Regina Shober Gray diary, entries for 5-7 February 1864. R. Stanton Avery Special Collections

A frequent refrain here at Vita Brevis is that genealogists should consider not just their direct ancestral lines, with a glance at collaterals like siblings or close cousins, but the larger community in which a forebear or collateral relative lived. I was struck by this dictum as I reviewed the Regina Shober Gray diary this winter, as Mrs. Gray lived in a time and place which Jane Austen would have recognized: even the diarist’s closest friends were generally referred to by their married names. Continue reading The wider circle →

“Daylight upon magic”

Family Stories, Genealogical Writing, , , , ,
Leopold Grand Duke of Baden
Leopold, Grand Duke of Baden (1790-1852). Courtesy of Wikipedia.org

The British constitutional historian Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) wrote that “When there is a select committee on the Queen, the charm of royalty will be gone. Its mystery is its life. We must not let in daylight upon magic.”[1] There is something uncanny about royalty, a mystique that can be hard to value according to its merits. This phrase of Bagehot’s – with its reference to “mystery” and “magic” – came to mind as I was thinking about the question of morganatic marriages in Germany. Continue reading “Daylight upon magic” →

“Mr. Loring’s play”

American History, Family Stories, Technology, , , , ,
Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Ayer’s house in Prides Crossing, 1906.

My cousin Neil recently shared some family albums with me: the oldest one belonged to his grandfather, Frederick Ayer (Jr.) (1888–1969), who kept it in 1905 and 1906. Over time, the images and the captions have faded, and the book’s middle section is held together with ancient cellophane tape, but Uncle Fred obviously cared about the record he was keeping. One of the most puzzling, and therefore interesting, images fills almost an entire leaf of the album; the identifying captions are squeezed out to the page edge: D. Sohier, D. Beal, F. Ayer Jr., etc. Continue reading “Mr. Loring’s play” →

400 posts at Vita Brevis

American History, Family Stories, Genealogical Writing, News, Research Methods, , , , , , , ,
Building_exterior_night 076
This photo of the Society’s Newbury Street exterior at night illustrated the first Vita Brevis post in January 2014.

Friday’s post, by Steven Solomon of the Society’s Development team, marked the four hundredth blog post at Vita Brevis. Since its launch in January 2014, the blog has featured posts by 64 bloggers, almost all of them NEHGS staff members, with a few outside contributors or transcribed interviews making up the remainder. What does the genealogical mosaic about which I wrote in the first post at Vita Brevis look like after eighteen months in the blog’s life? Continue reading 400 posts at Vita Brevis →