Tips – Page 22 – GenealogyAtHeart.com

Helpful Old Technology

I recently received a cassette tape of an interview done by a distant family member with one of my husband’s aunts in 2001. Both of those ladies have passed away and the tape became the possession of the interviewer’s daughter. She doesn’t have a tape recorder any longer and has a transcription so she was not interested in keeping the tape.

My husband’s Aunt Ruby was a sweetheart and with his Aunt Marge, always made me feel as I was part of their family. We had made a quick visit with her about 8 months after the tape was made but it wasn’t a happy time as I was in the area to bury my mother’s cremains so it never occurred to me to tape what became our last visit with Aunt Ruby.

When the tape was offered to me I was happy to get it – I’d love to hear her voice again. Problem was, who has a tape recorder anymore?

Evidently, I do. When the tape arrived hubby emailed several friends and colleagues to see if anyone had one we could borrow. No one did. Then it hit me! Several years ago, pre bluetooth, we used to use a boom box in the backyard on our deck. Had to think hard what we did with it and then remembered it was outside in a pool storage bench. Thank goodness it still worked!

Hubby transferred the tape to MP3 using the instructions from this site – How to Transfer Old Cassette Tapes to MP3 Files

The quality is not great – it was made in a nursing home greeting area and a restaurant so there is a lot of background noise. I’m still glad we have it and updated it to the latest technology.

If you have tapes and would like to update it is not difficult to do. I recommend putting that on your winter to do list and with the holidays around the corner, you might want to ask to borrow from family and friends if you don’t have a tape player.

It’s going to be a constant upgrade from one technology to another but I think the time expended is well worth it. Your descendants will think it’s awesome when they will see a picture of their 5th great grandparents and hear their voices!

Save Those Emails!

At the recent genealogical seminar I attended I met up with a colleague I had not seen since the National Genealogical Society conference in May. We were catching up and he mentioned he was still trying to recover about 13,000 emails that had been lost. That’s a lot of emails! Here’s how it happened:

In our area Verizon used to be one of our internet service providers. In April, Frontier purchased Verizon’s customers. The transition was not seamless; there was much service disruption but it appeared that most of the problems had been corrected. Then, with no warning, my colleague woke up one morning a few weeks ago and discovered that he couldn’t access his Verizon email account. He contacted Frontier who told him they had nothing to do with it and he needed to call Verizon. Verizon told him he was no longer a customer so he no longer had access to his emails.

It’s always difficult changing addresses, whether it’s in the real world or virtually, but it is even more difficult when one is caught unexpectedly. He had received no warning that the account would be terminated. His contract with Verizon was for 2 years and everyone in our area had been informed that Frontier would honor and continue the Verizon contracts through their expiration. I don’t even know how breaching the contract can be legal since he’s still under contract but that’s a whole different issue!

The colleague quickly made a gmail account and then began the arduous task of updating his email address all over the internet. Been there, done that, not fun!

Although hubby and I had a Verizon email account we rarely used it and I don’t think I’ve checked it in the last few years. In fact, I had forwarded the account to our gmail account at least five years ago. I completely missed that the account disappeared.

The wasted time in having to update to the new account, though, wasn’t the most upsetting situation. The loss of all the saved emails was the most devastating. I can only imagine!

Back in the day, like most Americans, we had an AOL account. We continued to use the account well into the 2000’s even though our children loved to poke fun at us old fogies still sticking with AOL. I pointed out I was being a loyal customer. So much for loyalty! About 2010 our account got hacked. We changed passwords. It was hacked again. AOL sent us a rather IMHO nasty email that warned us that our account would be cancelled if we continued to share our passwords with others. Huh?! We hadn’t done that. I was over them so I created a gmail account. Hubby wanted to continue with AOL so he once again changed the password. I spent a weekend updating the new account info to our many online accounts. Over the next few weeks I went through the saved emails and purged. Many, though, were of genealogical significance – notification of a cousin’s marriage, the death of an aunt, graduation dates and connections with long lost relatives who had found postings I had placed on bulletin boards. I forwarded those emails to gmail and placed them in a folder titled Genealogy. A few weeks after I completed the transfers, the account was again hacked. We received the same letter and this time, hubby was through with them. That account is still open and maybe once a year I go on it to see if any long lost relative has rediscovered my original tree on Rootsweb’s World Connect or one of those old bulletin board posts that I can no longer update to provide a newer email address. It hasn’t happened yet but who knows? Mostly I find a thousand junk emails that I delete en mass.

I now save emails that are of value to my computer and to a cloud. This way, if I have to abandon gmail for another email account I haven’t lost anything important. For emails that were of special importance, such as a photo or record attachment, I also attach to my tree, copy and paste the email contents into the citation. I feel very fortunate that my transition was on my own terms. Heed the warning!

Genealogy At Heart Website Update

I’ve been writing a lot about technology lately. I do love it but it certainly is a pain when it glitches! Last year I created a free website using Sidengo called www.GenealogyAtHeart.com. I linked my blog posts to it and featured genealogical special offers, photos of recent research trips I’d taken and information for clients who were interested in contacting me. In July, I received an email from Sidengo that in less than 3 weeks my account was going to be closed unless I moved to a paid option. I was leaving town for a two week research trip the next day, had a client deadline I had to finish before I left and was returning to my teaching job three days after the research trip ended so I felt rushed into making a decision. Hubby thought I should just pay up to make my life easier but I didn’t want to do that as I thought it was poor customer service to pressure folks into paying. During my evenings while I was on my research trip I searched for alternatives. I settled on another company but wasn’t really happy with it – I was only able to get one page so the website was a long scroll AND I couldn’t link to my blog posts so I had to list them which was cumbersome for readers.

In September, the Association of Professional Genealogists had a webinar about WordPress. I had explored them in July but didn’t find the site intuitive enough for me to figure out how to quickly put together my webpages. After watching the webinar I thought I’d give it another try and in just a few hours I had my webpages almost back to where it was from the beginning. It’s officially live so I’ll continue to post my blogs on blogspot and then archive at genealogyatheart.com. So, if you want to find an older post and you remember the month – you can look on blogger. If you can’t remember when it was published but are looking for the topic – visit genealogyatheart.com where I’ve tagged and archived by area.

Tips for Attending a Family History Day and What I Learned from Attendees

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 9 Oct 2016.

October is Family History Month and if you’re a newbie planning on attending a local event to get some genealogical assistance, I’ve got some recommendations to make your experience a happy one:

Bring what you know written down. Even better – bring how you know what you know! (Was it your parents who told you or did you find a record? It’s important to record where you got the information as you build your tree because trust me, before you know it you’ll have a lot of info and won’t remember where you got most of it!)
Have a specific question you’d like answered in mind. Specific is not, “I want to know everything about my mom’s family.” Specific is, “I’d like to find out when my great grandmother Elizabeth Smithson died.”
You probably have a lot of questions but rank them in order of your interest; it’s only fair as other people have questions, too, and are patiently waiting!
Prepare yourself for not immediately finding an answer – very little is online so it might take a phone call, email, letter or a visit to discover the answer you seek. You might not ever find what your looking for, either. Today an attendee demanded of one of my colleagues that he find an obituary from 1877 in a rural area of Pennsylvania. Checked the largest town newspapers online but couldn’t find one. He had checked several databases (Chronicling America, Newspapers.com, GenealogyBank, Ancestry) so I recommended calling the local history center and asking what papers were in existence then. The woman was not happy and demanded that someone find the obituary immediately. We couldn’t give her what she wanted so she left in a huff.
Remember to thank the researcher – they are volunteering their time and could be doing their own research instead of helping you with yours.

We had a nice turn out today at our county day and I met some incredibly wonderful folks with some very good questions and a few brick walls we were able to start tearing down. My three most memorable of the day involved:

A woman in her 70’s who’s parents in their 90’s were still alive and all of them decided it was time to write the family history. They were having trouble starting because they wanted “to do it right.” HINT: There is no one way to do genealogy and that’s one of the major pluses for me! I showed several formats – Case Studies, Proof Arguments, Kinship Determinations, and several lineage forms. If you’re putting off writing because you don’t know where to begin just begin with whoever your favorite individual is. You can ascend or descend from there. I understand that footnotes/endnotes are a pain but citations are critical. How is anyone going to know where you found that document unless you write it down?! The lady today didn’t like the look of footnotes; I explained why they are often used over endnotes – people tend to not think the citation is important so they save paper by not copying them. I recommended that she use page numbers that say 1 of X so if someone does make a copy in the future they’d know they might be missing the endnotes. I think the family just needed reassurance that their work was not going to be up for a Pulitzer Prize. It’s okay if you aren’t an author; it’s not ok to let all that research go to waste by not communicating in the best way you are able to for the next generation.
A lovely lady who wanted to know why her step-grandmother who she had never met was mean. What I loved about this woman was her matter of factness; she wasn’t emotional about the situation. Instead, she just wanted an explanation for why the older lady had been reportedly so miserable. I thought this was extremely interesting as most people don’t even fully research their blood relatives and here was someone who wanted to know about a step relative. I was able to find the woman’s death date in California and showed her the familysearch.org wiki so she can get further information about the many places out west the woman had lived. I also recommended she check out GoogleBooks and Hathi Trust for more information about events that were occurring at the time the grandma was residing in an area – like the dust bowl, for instance. I think that would have made me miserable! We were unable to find a marriage record or a death date for her grandfather but we did narrow down some cemeteries that she can contact to see if he is buried there. (Not on Find-a-grave, Billion Graves, etc.)
A woman who brought in the earliest photoshopped photo I’ve ever seen! Seriously, don’t know who or when it was done but some family member took a photo taken circa 1872 of a couple seated holding a baby and cut a photo of another baby out and pasted it over the woman’s lap. It was done fairly well, too. Weirdest thing I’ve ever seen! The family was afraid to remove the glued on kid, understandably, so I recommended taking it to a professional photographic restorer. For someone who just deleted all of her photos from her phone in error, I’m clearly the wrong person for the job! But the photoshopping brings up lots of interesting questions – why did someone do this? What’s underneath? Who did that? Who’s the baby? I have a tentative hypothesis that the family will have to pursue but my theory is this: Eleven months after the immigrant couple wed in Newark, New Jersey a male unnamed baby was born. The baby died 2 weeks later; he had been named Henry in the death records. The couple had another baby the following year. I suspect they had the first picture taken holding the dead baby as they looked miserable. Not having the money to sit for another photograph they had a picture of their second child taken and then wishing they had taken a photo when she was younger, cut it out and placed it over the original photo. The couple had 5 children, one every year, and then the father died. The mother died 2 years after him. The youngest two children were raised in an orphanage. Using GenWeb I was able to find where the orphanage records are housed. There was a memorial on find-a-grave for the couple but not for the baby. I recommended calling the cemetery to see if he was buried in plot 1 as the father was buried in plot 2 and the mom in plot 3. Hmm…who else could have been in plot 1 but the baby with no stone because they couldn’t afford one? Only way to find the answer is to make a call!

Happy Hunting!

Saving Photos

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 5 Oct 2016.

I’ve been on a technology kick lately and here’s why – I did something incredibly dumb and I don’t want you to do it!

We have a nice older digital camera that we rarely use. I rely on my phone for pictures of events and when I research as I prefer the document to be digitally available instead of having to lug the book to the copy machine, pay, and come home with yet another piece of paper that I have to then scan to save.

Yes, the camera phone has made my life better but I had taken so many pictures in the past two years that it stopped uploading about 45 photos ago. Now I knew this because I kept getting a warning that I was out of space but it was one of those things I put off correcting. I decided I wasn’t going to buy more space because I really needed to get into the habit of cleaning out the photos shortly after I’d taken them.

We were going to have an event at my primary job that involved taking lots and lots of photos over a short period of time. Charged the camera and put in a new SD card but I wanted a backup in case the old camera failed. I started going through the phone photos and hitting delete one by one. I guess I got a little over enthusiastic (actually, I got distracted by a phone call on the land line) and must have hit something wrong as I deleted everything at once. Oops!

I know what I lost and most are thankfully, somewhere else. I lost a picture of my son petting an armadillo he had rescued out of our hot tub last summer. The armadillo was making eye contact with him and looked like he was eternally grateful for being saved. I texted the pic to my daughter who promptly replied son better wash his hands as to not get a disease. So I have that picture in my texts.

I lost a picture of a peregrine falcon that landed on my fence during the hurricane but that’s okay, too, as he now lives in my hood so if I want, I can retake his photo.

What I’m upset about is birthday photos of my husband for the last two years. I don’t post to Facebook and I wouldn’t have texted them because everyone who cared was here. I know I was the only one taking photos so they’re gone for good. Hubby could care less but I’m kicking myself for being a goof.

Hard way to learn my lesson but I think I won’t be repeating this mistake.

A New Way to Identify Name Variations

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 18 Sep 2016.

I was reading the article Guild of One-Name Studies Is Now Available at FamilySearch.org in The Genealogy News recently and thought I’d check out the database on Familysearch. On a few lines, I trace everyone who has that name in the US in an attempt to make a connection across the pond. Stop and read the article and then come back to my blog.

If you followed the articles link to Familysearch, (added here in case you didn’t), and you enter a surname in the search field, you probably were disappointed. I know I was! I first added HARBAUGH and got links to everything but Guild Of One-Name Studies. I know family historians, some quite renown, have traced the name back to a HARBO who was a court scribe in the 1200’s in Denmark. I expected to find that and more but all I got were records of Harbaughs.

I then typed in LEININGER and got lots of IGI records but nothing for the Guild of One-Name Studies.

Then it hit me! On the left hand side, I should have scrolled down and filtered out everything but Guild of One-Name Studies.

I still got nothing for Harbaugh and Leininger but when I entered KOS I got Cass and Coss,

Next I tried KABLE and that’s when it occurred to me – duh – this could be an innovative way to come up with surname variations! My Kables were listed as Cable, Cabel, Kabel, Cobbold and Cabot. I would have never come up with Cobbold and Cabot.

Next I tried DUER and got Dewhurst. Now that was very interesting to me as I’ve been heavy into deeds and wills of my John Duer in Trumbull/Mahoning Counties, Ohio who died in 1831 after his son, Thomas, and I keep seeing Dewhurst in the records. I pronounce Dewhurst as doo’ herst but I guess it could be pronounced doo’ ers. Hmm.

We’ve all seen creatively spelled names, likely recorded from pronunciations, in records but I’ve never been really good at coming up with more than obvious variations. I’m adding this tool to my genealogy tool box!

Researching at the National Archives

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 14 Sep 2016.

My two most favorite locations to research are the Family History Library in Salt Lake City and the National Archives (NARA) in DC. Actually, NARA is by far the archive that I hold dearest to my heart as it’s the place where I am able to hold in my hands documents that my ancestors held years before. It’s a connection like no other!

It was my final day in the Capitol and as I was headed to the airport in late afternoon, I had with my my suitcase. My sister-in-law had dropped me off at the commuter station close to her home at 9 AM and it was a straight line to the archive.

Took this pic as I came up the steps from the train:

The building isn’t crooked – I was after being on the road for several days!

This view is of the researcher’s entrance – it’s around the side of the building from where the public enter to view the exhibits. Think National Treasure’s entrance.

Going through security was not a problem and the guards pleasantly directed me to the locker room. For a quarter I could get a large locker to place my suitcase and purse. I hadn’t taken off the Kindle’s sleeve so I was sent back to place it with the rest of my belongings. The Kindle and/or a laptop is permissible but cannot have the cases with them. I also took with my my handy dandy plastic Baggie of goodies.

I was prepared and had viewed the Powerpoint presentation at home prior to my trip. The ppt had been updated the week before, however, so I was required to take a few moments to read it. You can check out Researcher Presentation here.

As with the Library of Congress, researchers must obtain a Research Card. You cannot preregister but there was no wait and within minutes I was on my way. The card you receive is free and valid for 1 year. Make sure you have a drivers license or passport with you!

I was directed to a desk where the kind ladies helped me complete the pull request paperwork. Since I had already checked out their holdings I knew exactly what I wanted to get. I highly advise you to do the legwork at home and save time while there. It’s amazing how quickly time flies when you’re into the documents!

The document pull requests must be turned in by the time deadlines or you miss that window. The pull times are 10, 11, 1, 2 and 3. I had already missed the 10 AM – when they open – as I had to get my Research Card. No worries, I was ready for the 11 AM pull. In the meantime, staff directed me to the microfilm room and I was happily viewing Postmaster Records from the late 1800s on several family members.

I was able to save what I found to my thumb drive but you have to put money on your card. A staff member helped me and I decided it was best to use my charge card to guesstimate how much I would spend. I wasn’t sure if the records I was requesting from the pulls were what I wanted and I didn’t want to put more money on the card than needed as I wasn’t planning on being back soon and you can’t get a refund once money is placed. The staff member suggested $5.00 and as it turned out, he was exactly on the money!

By noon I was on another floor asking at the desk if my items had been pulled. They hadn’t yet so I sat at a table and waited.

It was a Thursday midday in July and the place was hopping! Every table in the room was taken. The adjacent room was almost empty but those tables were reserved for Congressmen so the remaining researchers had to share space.

A kind researcher had noticed me downstairs earlier and asked me if I had found everything. I told him that my pull hadn’t come through yet. He suggested that I ask the staff member in another room as he found his request there. Sure enough, there was my goodies!

I’m not going to bore you with the process but this is government so you’ve got to sign and sign again and make sure you’re signing in the right place on the right color paper. Don’t worry – the staff is patient and kind and will help you if you forget what you learned in the ppt.

I had requested 3 pulls and all 3 had information. There are limits – from their website:

“The limit is four original files for each researcher for each pull during a business day up to 24 files in a given day.”

When I come back I plan on bringing my husband to expedite the process.

I sat in awe and read the War of 1812 pension petition of my 3 x’s great grandmother Mary “Polly” Dennis Hodge Adams Elder Search. You read that correctly – she was married four times, outliving 3 of the husbands. Her first husband, John Hodge, went off to the War of 1812 leaving her 8 months pregnant with twins in the wilds of Ohio. She survived the childrens’ births, he did not. I’m descended from her second husband, Edward Adams.

Polly couldn’t write, as evidenced from her X mark. One of her sons and daughters from her marriage to Edward accompanied her and signed the pension request.

I wanted a copy so I went back to the staff member where I had obtained the record and he helped me set up the document on the printer. They use blue paper so as to make sure that no one is walking out with an original. I had put money on the card in the microfilm room so it was quick to make the copies. I signed the document back in and then went through the process with the other two documents, one at a time.

I got teary eyed when I read the Civil War record of my husband’s 2nd great grandfather, Samuel Samuelson, who was the first of our surname. I knew he had sustained an injury but I didn’t know he had become a POW and was traded back to the Union, only to go on and fight another day. Wow.

The last document was another one of my husband’s great grandfathers, John Anderson Long, who had also had a lengthy enlistment in the Union. He had fled Tennessee in the 1830’s as his anti-slavery stance had gotten him in serious trouble. He eventually settled in northern Indiana and that’s where he enlisted when the war began. I hadn’t known he was a teamster. The documents contained his medical history – he had once had pneumonia but recovered.

Unfortunately, it was time to leave as I had a plane to catch. I was directed to the desk where the staff looked through all of the items I had copied and secured them in a locked bag:

All I was allowed to keep out was my locker key and Research Card. I then took these items to the guard desk who cleared me to leave the room. I gathered my belongings and ironically, got a call from my son. He was in the process of getting security clearance for his job and he had called to vent that the security company had not been able to verify his employment from 3 years ago at a local hardware store. I had to laugh – here I was holding documents from the 1840’s through 60’s and there’s no records from 3 years ago locally. I understand how it happened – the store was sold and the new owners didn’t have the old owner’s records. Son had a W-2 but the company wouldn’t take it because they said anyone could make one of those up. I guess they could but I don’t think like that. I suggested he track down the old owner and ask him for verification which he did.

After the phone call I proceeded to the exit, which is the same place as the entrance. The guard opened the bag and returned my items to me. They had locked my suitcase upon entering the building and asked if I wanted it unlocked. It was a carryon and I didn’t need anything in it so I opted to leave the lock on.

I did complete a comment card – I was so impressed with the staff’s professionalism, especially after the lackadaisical attitude of the Library of Congress employees, I had to let the top brass know.

I’m hoping that next summer, I can take the week long class at NARA in July and spend more time. I’m already making a list of who I want to research.

I was sad to end my research trip but thankful that I had the opportunity to do it. I hope that you have gained some tips and tricks next time you are on a GLAM (Gallery, Library, Archive or Museum) quest. The trip took me through public (county and city libraries), private (DAR), and national genealogical repositories (NARA, Library of Congress). Each have their own processes and it’s best to know before you go. Take the time to read online the hours of operation, explore the collection holdings and make notes of what you want to see while you’re there. The findings may leave you with additional questions and a run through a different bread crumb trail than you expected but I assure you, it will be fun and thought provoking. I can’t wait to do it again

Researching at the Daughters of the American Revolution Library

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 10 Sep 2016.

Recently I had the opportunity to research at the Daughter’s of the American Revolution (DAR) Library in Washington, DC. I was attending an educational conference and at its conclusion, had an afternoon free so a colleague who is a DAR and I decided to join forces on a research trip.

Since we didn’t have much time we took a cab from our hotel. There had been a wicked storm the prior evening so there were tree limbs littering the street and work crews trying to open closed roads. The taxi driver got us as close as possible due to this situation.

I had already checked out of the hotel so I had my suitcase with me when I arrived. I know the DAR has gotten a lot of flack over the years for some of their policies but I must say that these were the nicest people I had met in DC on this trip so far. The guard said to put my suitcase in a corner and he’d watch it for me. We got a visitor’s sticker and were directed to the library.

My colleague and I split up and I had two objectives; the first to find if John Duer was still open for new members and the second, what was the problem with Wilson Williams. I always planned on joining the DAR when I retired and I didn’t want to submit paperwork on John Duer if the line was closed. I was assured he was open. My concern with Wilson was due to a family member who had decided to join the DAR but was told she couldn’t because of paperwork problems for Wilson. I had helped with the research on Wilson and I wanted to know what was wrong. Did someone find out, gasp, he had aided the Loyalists? Was there another Wilson that we had mistakenly followed?

The Librarian checked and found no problem with Wilson. He believed the family member misunderstood what she was told – there are too many people who joined DAR with the short form for Wilson and if she would like to become a member, she would have to complete a long form. No worries there!

I headed for the stacks and found a few books that gave me some leads on my Thomas Duer connection. I also checked out surnames for the Kinship Determination Paper I was submitting for certification just in case there was something somewhere I had missed. Nope, had all of the derivatives and not surprisingly, no primary info to be found there.

After about an hour I texted my colleague who was wandering in the museum. I joined her and loved the displays. Reminded me of the historical museum in Morristown, New Jersey.

As we left she asked me if I had taken any photos of books with my phone. “Yes,” I replied, “a few.” I inquired as to why she asked. Evidently, that was not permitted. She had whipped out her phone to take a photo of a map and was informed by the Librarian that she owed $10.00. She didn’t have a ten so she gave them a $20. and told them the rest was a donation.

She’s a much better person than me, for sure! I would not have handled it like that. I questioned her as to where there was a sign posted that photo’s weren’t permitted. She said there hadn’t been any and that a patron overheard and also questioned the policy. The Librarian responded that it had always been the policy.

When I came home I searched the DAR website and didn’t find anything regarding a no using your camera policy but be warned if you visit – your photo might cost you a whole lot more than a copy would!

Next time I’ll write about behind the scenes at the National Archives.

Researching at the Library of Congress

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 8 Sep 2016.

I had always wanted to go on the other side – the nontourist side – of the Library of Congress to research. On a Saturday afternoon in July I parked my rental car in a great (well, not really, more about that later) spot behind the Madison Building. The library is housed in more than one building so go online to check out their holdings and where they are located before you visit.

Although the purpose of the library is to be used by Congress, adult researchers may access the holdings by obtaining a Reader Card. You can complete most of the information online ahead of your trip to save time – just follow this Pre Register link.

Be forwarned that children may not obtain entry to the holdings. A high school student might but there is a process involved so make sure you follow the directions and have secured the necessary paperwork. Gotta love the government!

After going through security I was directed to the left hallway by the guards to obtain my reader’s card. I presented my driver’s license but a passport will also work. The bored clerk at the desk checked that I had pre-registered and directed me to sit around the corner. There were three individuals ahead of me. Shortly, I was called by another bored employee who had earbuds in and was watching a video on her phone. She directed me, with no eye contact, to sit in her area so a quick photo could be taken. My card was ready quickly and I was on my way.

I originally had two goals – visit the genealogy section to just “read” the shelves and find a rare book written by a family member. My plans changed, however, after visiting Pennsylvania as I found a copy of the “rare” book just sitting on a library shelf. Funny how one repository considers something rare and unique and another does not.

The genealogy section is housed in the Jefferson Building which is across the street from the Madison Building. Researchers enter below the tourist entrance. After once again going through security and having to show my Reader’s Card I was directed to the coat room where I checked my belongings. I took only my plastic Baggie and Kindle. I was then directed down a long winding hallway and eventually reached the elevator. I was headed to the humanities area and once I arrived, I had to display my Reader’s Card to another guard and sign in. The guard displayed an attitude as if I was bothering her – I guess I had disturbed her from reading. I entered a mid sized room and asked the Librarian where I might find the genealogy section. His response, “The genealogist isn’t here today.” I told him that was fine, I didn’t need to consult with a genealogist. I just needed direction to where the materials were housed. He told me to follow him and we entered the gorgeous reading room and veered to the right.

The genealogy section was hidden behind a door and looked like nothing had been added in years. Down a rickety plywood ramp the Librarian kindly asked what particular area I was researching. I told him I had several – Florida, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and New Jersey. He wasn’t familiar with the layout and began to search the shelves. I told him I would be fine so he left.

I wasn’t expecting much so I wasn’t disappointed. It was everything I had previously read about the genealogy holdings. I confirmed that there are many more resources in my own back yard then what was housed at the LOC.

This is one of only 2 shelves of Florida books. I’m going to keep my political opinions to myself but am going to state that if this is where Congress goes to get info – well, it explains a lot about Congress.

I found absolutely nothing .

Since I had gone to all the trouble of getting a Readers Card and driving through downtown DC I figured I should at least spend a bit of time reading. I left the genealogy section and wandered through the humanities section. Found a nice book on Greek philosophy so I sat and read a chapter. I think I must be in a zillion tourist photos. It is very distracting trying to read when lights from cameras are going off constantly. It was an interesting experience. Guess I could equate it to being a fish in a fishbowl.

Maybe because it was a Saturday there weren’t many Readers in the room – I counted three besides me.

Getting out of the LOC is the same as getting in. When I left the humanities area I was directed to again go through security and sign out by the guard who had changed since I entered. This individual was much more pleasant. Back up the elevator, down the winding hallway and to the coat room to retrieve my belongings. Those folks in the coat room are busy and nice! One more check through security and the walk back to the rental car.

So, about that awesome parking space – I somehow missed the sign that said I had to have a sticker permit to park where I did. I got a parking ticket for not following directions of the sign I didn’t see. I have a long history of family members thrown out of lots of different countries (and fleeing several states) for their inability to follow directions and thus, getting into trouble. I’m thinking that maybe, like me, it’s not so much they don’t follow directions as not see the directions. Just a thought.

My husband’s several times great step uncle Leonard Harbaugh had been the builder overseeing the building of Congress and the White House. When I told my husband about the ticket he reminded me none of his family members ever drive in the city and that’s why they don’t get tickets. Even so, it was a wonderful parking place and worth the ticket fine as it was close. I would have paid more if I had found a garage. Now I’m not recommending you get a ticket if you go but all things considered, it was okay with me.

Next time I’ll discuss researching at the DAR Library.

Making the Most of Your Research Trip – Part 8 – Last of a Series

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com on 4 Sept 2016.

It was the dawning of my last day of my research trip to Pennsylvania and was hoping for a miracle to find the burial location with a date for my husband’s 3 x’s great grandfather. I also wanted to confirm church records of where another of his 3 x’s great grandfather’s was buried in a second cemetery. The cemetery had no record of that burial but it was listed in church records.

After a quick breakfast and checking out of the hotel I was on to Antietam Cemetery. I drove the rental car as close to the family plots as possible. I hadn’t mixed the bleach in the water to clean the stones as per the Reverend’s instructions as I was afraid I’d spill it in the car and wreck the carpeting. The Walmart in Waynesboro carries bleach tablets. We don’t have those in my Walmart! They were perfect as I only had to pop one in the spray bottle and then add water. No worries about spilling a bottle of bleach.

Since it wasn’t yet 8 AM the dew was still covering the ground. My sneakers were soaked quickly but I trudged on, located the graves and sprayed away. Once I had sprayed the entire family’s stones I went back to the first grave and gently rubbed the lichen off with the scrub brush. MAGIC! I resprayed bleach solution and moved down to the next stone. After the second brushing I poured clean water over the stone. I was now wet, hot and filthy but happy – I could finally read all the stones. Well, the parts that were above ground level. As the Reverend had mentioned yesterday, the area was prone to sinking and one stone in particular had really gone down quite a lot. I suspect the Revered was correct that if there were stones for my husband’s missing great grandparents they had sunk. I believe there had been stones as the family has a notorious bread crumb trail of stones going back to the 1600’s in what is now Germany. I would find it odd that this was the only couple that did not have stones, especially since the stone for their son was quite large.

I rephotographed the stones and then, on a whim, decided to look for the apple trees that the Reverend mentioned. Why? I am obsessed with apple trees, probably because my great uncle was John Chapman, aka Johnny Appleseed. Sure enough, their were apple trees on the other side of the cemetery fence amidst lots of weeds and shrubs. I walked over and picked up two apples off the ground. Who knows, maybe they were Johnny’s at one time as he was known to have had a farm not far from this location once. I couldn’t resist in taking them home:

Back in the car I drove to Green Hill Cemetery. I marched to the stone I had found the previous day and sprayed away. Even after speaking with the cemetery’s director the area still had not been cleaned. I also sprayed the stones on either side to see if maybe one did belong to the great grandfather as church records stated.

Removing the dirt layer certainly helped the readability but the stone to the right was completely worn. Interestingly, it was of the same type of marble as the family member’s stone and none others surrounding were. The stone was smaller and I am now thinking it must be the stone for the infant that had died. Perhaps both children had died at the same time and the older sibling got the bigger stone. It didn’t make sense that the grandfather would have a tiny stone and the grandson a larger one. On the smooth stone I placed typing paper that the sweet girl in the hotel had given me and rubbed with a black kindergarten crayon to see if anything would be revealed – nothing. My mind wanted to see an outline of a lamb in the middle of the stone but I wasn’t sure if this was reality or not. It was no clearer on the rubbing than in a photo.

Taking the scrub brush I decided to continue to search for the missing grandfather’s stone. I located it in the same row but on the left side of the middle. I quickly sprayed, scrubbed and washed. No doubt about it – this was the stone of the man mentioned in the church records that was not included on the cemetery’s derivative list.

I’m not sure why the stone was located where it was. Church records show that the stone was originally next to the grandson but that’s not the case. Either the stones were mixed when they were relocated from Old Union or the church records are wrong. Some mysteries just won’t be solved.

I was so glad to have returned and searched again with better tools. I could leave the area with more knowledge than I had which was a good thing!

I was headed to Virginia to spend the evening with my sister-in-law and decided to take the scenic route through Harbaugh Valley. I’ve seen the pictures online and read about the area for nearly 40 years so this was especially important to me.

The GPS directions made me laugh – I was headed back to the hotel where I had stayed. Ironically, I was staying just a short distance from the Reverend Henry Harbaugh’s old homestead. We have a copy of his poetry book that had been handed down for generations. I have also chuckled at his family history, of which we also have a copy. Written in 1856 his was the first of several family genealogies written. Now I’m not criticizing here as I think he did a wonderful job given the time it was published. He couldn’t email, phone or just fly into an area like I had just done to do his research. What I find humorous in a dark sense is that he often ended a biography with “He’s dead.” No, you think? The sermons he left weren’t so succinct so I’m not sure why he used such brevity often in his book.

I located Harbaugh Road quickly and parked in the Harbaugh church lot. The cemetery behind the church is still used but it wasn’t as well maintained as I had envisioned. Many of the older stones were totally unreadable. There was no point in using the bleach – these stones were out in the middle of a corn field and not subjected to the lichen that covered the stones in the cemeteries on the other side of town.

The church was locked so I could not go in. I was disappointed not to find the stone for the missing grandmother. A marker outside of the church reminded me of the Reverend Henry’s brevity; it mentioned that a marker for the family home was nearby but didn’t give directions. I brought up my family tree on my phone to see if I had any coordinates. Nope.

I drove down Harbaugh Road and came to it’s end. There was a subdivision now and not farmland. I turned around and went back the way I had come, passing the church and turning left at the end of the road. A sign that denoted the Maryland state line was displayed. I crossed the line and stopped at a vegetable market. None of the employees or customers had ever heard of Reverend Harbaugh but they did know there was a church up the street. Ironically, one of the employees was related to the Harbaughs but he didn’t know it until I informed him. He didn’t care much, either.

I drove back into Pennsylvania and stopped at an antique store located up the road. The owner said she had never heard of the Reverend Harbaugh, either, but she knew there was a road and church and whenever an event was held at the church she got lots of business as people stopped to use her restroom. She was somewhat interested in history so I enlightened her on the land that was across from her property. She told me that the building where the store was located was once the train station for the area. This must have been the place where the Reverend Harbaugh boarded for his trip to Ohio. He had to learn English as the family spoke German at home and he learned while traveling. His parents missed him terribly and when he returned and after he became a minister, built the church to keep him in the area. As a parent of adult children, I so relate to that!

This same station was possibly where my husband’s family had left the area when they relocated to northern Indiana. From the diary of their maternal aunt I knew the day and time the family had arrived in 1869 but I didn’t know the departure schedule. It would be interesting to research further but it was now afternoon and I had to be on my way. It was a fitting way to end the trip, leaving the area, from the same location they likely had.

Next time I’ll write about my adventures in Washington, DC.