Allen, ca. 1860. Courtesy of the Maryland Historical Society, Item PP231.236
The last months of 1864 marked the beginning of the end of the Civil War, as well as the final illness of Mrs. Gray’s [1] beloved brother John Shober. An effort at economy – by giving up a..Continue reading
Gilbert Wayne Helman (1882-1945) and his wife Mazy Nelson Kelly (1883-1943).
As the New England Regional Genealogical Conference was held recently in Springfield, Massachusetts, I am reminded of my brief genealogical connection to that city and the incredible value..
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Hints for Success
I recently saw an interesting infographic about writing success. Although the focus is on writing novels, several of the hints apply to writing a family history:
- read more
- write, write, write
- read your work aloud
Let’s look at each one of these in..
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At my great-grandmother's desk with her daughter Katheryn Ogle Record's clippings.
My grandmother Katheryn Ogle Record (1914–1993) was a dead head. No, surely not that kind of dead head, but one who collected those lifetime addenda we all hope someone will afford..
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Warren Reed Buzzell, 1927-2013
When I first started working at NEHGS in November 2015 and was introduced to Gary Boyd Roberts, he shook my hand and said, “Tell me about your family.” I told him my mother was half Cape Breton Scottish and Yorkshire English, and half..
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In sorting out a DNA match recently, I uncovered a rather puzzling family story. On 23andme, my father’s closest “stranger match” was a person I will call “J.O.H.” She and my father shared 0.83% DNA along 5 DNA segments, for a total of 62 centimorgans, with a predicted..
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Proud Americans: The family of Anthony and Clara Davis Martell courtesy of the Lehman family tree on Ancestry.com.
We family historians can never get enough of a good thing, right? So in the fall of 2012 when my son and his fiancée tied the knot I was thrilled for..
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My mother's letter
I grew up in a normal home with two parents, one older brother, various dogs, cats (house and barn varieties), and a one-time parakeet. Like most people with that background, I thought I knew my parents and their individual backgrounds well,..
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Reading Alicia Crane Williams’s post on Sex in Middlesex reminded me of another great work by Roger Thompson – Cambridge Cameos – Stories of Life in Seventeenth-Century New England, which contains forty-four sketches from the period 1651 to 1686. They are fascinating..
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Courtesy of Historic Oregon Newspapers.
With the addition of so many newspapers to online databases, it’s been illuminating to page back through time to see so much of our ancestors’ everyday lives. For me, one of the more curious people encountered ‘in the news’..
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