Breaking Down The Brick Walls In Our Family Research

We all have our brick walls in our family research. You go so far and hit the brick wall. Over and over that brick wall is does not move. Then by chance some how you crack that brick wall and hit pay dirt.

I have cracked a few brick walls just by blogging about a certain ancestor right here. Next thing I know I get an email from a distant relative and I get documented information to the Mayflower on my Lockwood family. From John Lockwood who fought in the Civil War to the Mayflower because of this blog. How great is that.

Other brick walls are unmovable. But with hints from others and continual research I may get another brick wall to come down. Andrew Daly I will not give up on you.

Tonight I visited Randy Seaver to read his post about breaking down brick walls at Genea-Musings Target the FAN Club to tackle "Elusive Ancestors" problems

Briefly from the posting we are to see our family research as the bull's eye and our ancestor as the target. As we search for information on our ancestor we may find information by moving out one ring of the target. Search for family members. Next search for those who lived in the area. Search for others with the same surname. By spreading out our research we may hit our target.

After reading Randy's post I was in search for other articles on brick walls.

All I had to do was go to http://www.google/ and post the question " brick wall in genealogy research " to come up with articles, books to buy and free charts to print.

Want to read more articles just go to http://www.cyndislist.com/hitbrick.htm There is more than enough to read for many nights.

I also found from my google search a new blog for me and this is just part of her article. She keeps it simple, brief and clear, which I like.

She writes
7 Keys to Getting Over Your Genealogy Brick Wall
By Corinne Bridgewater
Here are her 7 Key steps

Post questions on forums
If you know the area where the person lived try the white pages
Check into and then subscribe to Google alerts
Join RSS feeds from good strong genealogical sites
Put an ad in a newspaper, even overseas if need be
Put up a website about your search
Put up a hubpage or Squidoo lens about your search

She also writes...
If you need to break down the genealogy brick walls try these 6 steps
Write down everything that you know
Do not assume that you wrote it all down before. Go through your notes
Know exactly what it is you are looking for. If it is maiden names, birth, death, surnames, ports of entries then go and Google it. You may get ideas from what comes up.
Try different ways of spelling their names
Come at it from a different angle. Find a small bit of information that you are missing and follow the clue.
What about the property they owned? Follow land deeds
Read the whole article at http://ezinearticles.com/?7-Keys-to-Getting-Over-Your-Genealogy-Brick-Wall&id=2413086

And for forms to help us do our research just go to http://www.cyndislist.com/supplies.htm for a start. Or you can go to family tree for more forms .. http://www.familytreemagazine.com/info/researchforms

I have always had my research on the computer and no master list on each relative to what I have and do not have. I have time lines on some and not on others. That is one of my goals to work on. Getting time lines on my relatives to see what I have and do not have on each of them.

For tonight and for a few more nights this is plenty for me to read. Hope that you enjoy some of the articles and forms. Please look around at some of my other postings before leaving and I hope you visit again. Grace

Tombstone Tuesday John H and Mary Cassell Zion

For today's Tombstone Tuesday I am remembering my great great grandparents John Henderson Zion and Mary Cassell Zion.
John was born 28th of November 1831 in Indiania and died 22 April 1920 in Foster Missouri. Mary was born the 19th October 1834 in Illinois and died 20 November 1919 in Iowa.
John and Mary were married 8th of September 1853 and had 5 children. Mary, William, Jonathan, Etta and Annie. Their son Jonathan is my great grandfather.

The pictures of John and Mary plus the picture of the tombstone were found on http://www.ancestry.com/. They were shared by Sue a distant cousin. They are buried in Decatur, Iowa.

Thanks for stopping by... Grace

This Week in the Family History - November 7 - 13

This week in my Family History and the relatives I am especially thinking of this week

Nov 7th Anna Day was born in 1742 and passed away 3rd June 1815. She is my 4th great grand aunt and her parents are Isaac and Anna (Foote) Day

Nov 10th Flavious Millsap was born in 1832 in Indiana and passed away 10th of April 1910 in Kansas. He married Anna Woodmansee and is my 2nd great grandfather. I am related through his daughter Rachel Millsap who married Jonathan Adam Zion


Nov 12th Ephrain Lockwood was born in 1814 in New York. Ephrain was married to Jane ? and then to Katherine Philo. He died 31 May 1877 and is my 3rd great uncle

Nov 12th Reuben Asher Chapin was born in 1830 in New York. Reuben was married to Lourinda Cheuvront. He passed away 07 of September 1906. He is my 5th great grandfather and I am related through his daughter Kate. Kate married John Beiler.

Nov 12th Lemuel Cheuvront was born 1812 in Virginia and also passed away Nov 12th Lemuel Cheuvront died in 1896 in Colorado . Lemuel was married to Mary Rouse. He is my 3rd great grandfather and I am related through his daughter Alta
Nov 13 Ebenezer Coleman was born in 1831 in Ohio and died 25th of July 1894. He is my 2nd great uncle and his parents are Alexander ( Elic ) Coleman and Catherine Beiler Coleman


Thanks for stopping by.. Grace

Was Great Great Great Grandpa Coleman Counted Twice In The 1860 Census?

Just this week I was on http://www.ancestry.com/ and searching for information on my Coleman line. My great great great grandfather Alexander ( Elic ) Coleman was born 10 January 1805 in Connecticut, traveled west and ended up in Nebraska where he passed away on 01 September 1873

I found him in the 1860 Iowa census on 21st of July listed as Alexander. Living with him is his wife Kate and 9 children.

I was on the hunt for Alexander in the 1870 census and could not find him. At this time I decided to add his nick name of "Elic' at http://www.ancestry.com/ and a leaf came up with a hint.

I though Yea it is the 1870 census, but no it was another 1860 census for Elic Coleman. First thought was no way but went and looked at it. It was from the area in Nebraska where he had lived but I did not recognize any names of the people in the house he was living There was another Coleman listed in the home . I left that census and keep searching for him in 1870 with still no luck.

I then decided to go back to the 1860 Nebraska census and look again to the name of a Coleman man living in this house with Elic and it was William which was one of Elic's son's name.

I looked at the others living in the area and they are all names that I recognized.

This census was taken 17th August 1860. It seems that Alexander / Elic was in Iowa when that census was taken then left and traveled to Nebraska with his son William to visit family and friends and get land to settle with his family.

So while being counted twice in the 1860 census can be confusing, I did find when he went to Nebraska to settle, bringing the rest of his family at a later time.

The Nebraska state census taken in 1877 I have found Alexander's son John Henry and his family.

Checking the 1880 census I found Catherine as head of house and living with her is daughter Jane and a Hester Paul. Hester was unknown to me but by looking at the relationship I found that she was the younger sister of the head of house and that she was widowed. I now have a sibling of Catherine that I did not know of. A new relative to search in the future.

The census's are great tools. They can tell us where our family lived and who were their neighbors.

The hunt continues another day..

Thanks for stopping by.. Grace

A Vintage Postcard of Princeton Minnesota adds mysteries to my family research

I started this post on my vintage postcard blog and after turning around found out that it was written to my Appleton Esler so decided it fit in my family blog also and even more.

Great vintage postcards are not only fun to look at but can be great additions to our genealogy family histories.

Today's posting is of an old card of Princeton Minnesota and the street scene of Eastern Ave. The post mark is hard to read, but with magnifying glass it looks like could be 1909 . At the bottom left of the post card is written copyrighted 1909. So that makes this postcard 101 years old.

The street scene has many businesses including Williams Paint on a sign on first building on the left. On the right side in the middle of the block is a sign for a bakery and restaurant plus other signs that I can not make out. I did a http://www.google.com/ search on Sherwin Williams and found they started in 1866 so this is an old sign advertising their paint

There are residents on the left and one person walking on the right hand side. Most interesting is in the middle of the postcard are two wires in the sky and something is hanging from one. My thought is that it is a person crossing the street on the wire some how.

This post card is addressed to Appleton Esler of Mora Minnesota who was my grandma's step father .
What is written in pencil is hard to understand.
Dear Appleton
? cant possibly meet ? this week and I am not able to do my work now
Please don't send her ? a few days yet as I cant get any one to help me.
signed by maybe Jane? ( who is this )

This post card is a mystery to me. I do not know a lot about my great grandpa Appleton as of now. He married my great grandmother Katherine in 1893 in LaCrosse Wisconsin. He raised my grandmother Grace as his.

I do know he was married once or twice before and brought 2 children to the marriage. He and Katherine had 2 children together so they were a true Brady Bunch of the early 1900's. They moved to Mora Minnesota and lived and died there.

So the mystery is who is this postcard from and what is the meaning of the message and why was it necessary to send to Appleton. This is on my future researches at http://www.ancestry.com/ in the future. I want to learn more about Appleton and who his relatives were.

If you have not thought of adding vintage postcards to your family history books you may want to think about that. This post card was passed down to me from my mother.

Thanks for stopping by.. Grace

Tombstone Tuesday Margaret Maston Loder at Shaffer Cemetery

Today for Tombstone Tuesday I am highlighting my

Margaret Maston Loder

born 2 March 1811 and died 23 Nov 1884

Margaret is buried in Sheffer Pioneer Cemetery in Nebraska

Margaret was married to William Loder

Margaret is not directly related to me . She is the mother in law of my 2nd Great Grand Uncle

Elic Chalker Coleman Jr who married Nancy Jane Loder

Sheffer Cemetery is a small cemetery in Nebraska with tombstones of mainly Colemans, Loders

and Shaffer's. It is one of those cemeteries that is on my wish list to visit some day.

Thanks for stopping by for Tombstone Tuesday.. Grace

I received a friendly reminder that I should source this picture which is very accurate. I found this photo on www.ancestry.com and Susan Peterson was kind enough to take it and post it.

She is also related to Margaret so some how Susan and I are related. Will be contacting her to find out how. Thanks again Susan

Amanuensis Monday Post 03 Hartford Memorial Includes My Robert Day

Genea-blogger John Newmark (who writes the TransylvanianDutch blog) started his own Monday blog theme many months ago called Amanuensis Monday.

What does "amanuensis" mean?John offers this definition:"A person employed to write what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another."

I have been working on my ancestor Robert Day born about 1604 In Ipswich, Co, Suffolk, England and died 04 September 1648 at Hartford, Connecticut. Robert first married Mary last name not known in England. Robert and Mary emigrated from Ipswich, England to Boston in April 1634 aboard the ship Elizabeth. Mary died in 1634 in Cambidge Massachusetts at the age of 29. Robert remarried Editha Stibbins in 1635. They had four children Thomas, Sarah, Mary and John. I am a descendant of John. Robert Day is my 8th Great Grandfather.

A picture of this memorial will be added to my family notebook on Robert Day for future generations to see.

For today's posting I am sharing a memorial in Hartford Connecuit in memory of the courageous Adventures who traveled with Thomas Hooker

The memorial is as is

In memory of the courageous

Adventurers

who inspired and directed by

Thomas Hooker journeyed through the

wilderness from the Newtown ( Cambridge )

in the Massachusetts Bay to

Suckiauc ( Hartford) October 1635

Mathew Allyn William Lewis

John Barnard Mathew Marvin

William Butler James Olmsted

Clement Chaplin William Pantry

Nicholas Clarke Thomas Scott

Robert Day Thomas Stanley

Edward Elmer Timothy Stanley

Nathaniel Ely Edward Stebbins

Richard Goodman John Steele

William Goodman John Stone

Stephen Hart John Talcott

William Krusly Richard Webb

William Westwood

From the Society of the Descendants

of the founders of Hartford

to the people of Hartford

October 15 1935

This was found on http://www.ancestry.com/. I am searching the sites of Hartford Connecuit memorials to find exactly where this plaque came be found. http://hartford.omaxfield.com/monuments.html has many different memorials pictured.

Thanks for stopping by.. Grace