Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Wordless Wednesday Wylie Camp Tents

Several weeks ago I posted a Wylie Coach picture taken by my Aunt Latisha Vanderpool on her trip through Yellowstone Park July 21-28, 1915. Here is pictures of the "Wylie Tents" they stayed in on that trip.

 

 
Posted by Picasa

Monday, September 28, 2009

Becoming a Better Researcher

The Washington State Library blog had an article on becoming a better researcher from Ancestry, it is an excellent article and both librarians and researchers should read it before going to your library.

Ancestry Magazine recently posted an online article, “10 Tips to Becoming an Effective Library Patron,” and in it you can learn the hallowed secrets that will allow you to get twice the benefit out of your library in half the time. Mainly a tool for those who use their libraries for genealogical research, there are nonetheless some great tips here for any library researcher, such as:

1. Come Prepared
2. Use the Online Catalog
3. Learn the Library’s Classification System
4. Ask about Materials That Aren’t Catalogued
5. Go Easy on the Library Staff
6. Gather Handouts and Brochures
7. Go Beyond the Genealogy Department
8. Respect the Material
9. Don’t Forget Interlibrary Loan
10. Use All Available Resources

Want to learn more about becoming a better library researcher? Check out the full article over at ancestrymagazine.com (don’t worry, it’s free).

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Saturdy Night Fun

SNGF - Ahnentafel Roulette

This week's edition of Saturday Night Genealogy Fun has been posted by Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings:

1) How old is your father now, or how old would he be if he had lived? Divide this number by 4 and round the number off to a whole number. This is your "roulette number."

2) Use your pedigree charts or your family tree genealogy software program to find the person with that number in your ahnentafel. Who is that person?

3) Tell us three facts about that person with the "roulette number."

4) Write about it in a blog post on your own blog, in a Facebook note or comment, or as a comment on this blog post.

5) If you do not have a person's name for your "roulette number" then spin the wheel again - pick your mother, or yourself, a favorite aunt or cousin, or even your children!

Here is my answers:
1. Well my father was born in 1906 so he would be 103 now. 103/4= 26

2. #26 is Joseph Hert.

3. Joseph was born 29 June 1830 in Indiana and died 12 May 1912 in Jackson Township, Grundy county, Missouri. His father was  James Hert. I got a copy of his Death Certificate from the Missouri Archives and the informant for the Death Certificate did not know Joseph's mothers name, and neither parents birthplace. Joseph died of La Grippe. It was not too long ago I found Joseph, because all the information I had on his daughter Vada Belle her surname was spelled Hirt, so I was looking for Hirts not Hert.

Friday, September 18, 2009

Wordless Wednesday Old & New Whitman School

This is a couple of days late and goes with the I Smile for the Camera post I did for the Carnival of Genealogy. This picture is from the South East of the old Whitman school building, showing just the trees and the pile of rubble from the old Whitman school building. The trees are still there today, but look out of place with no building close to them. The red roof in the back is the new school building.

 


This is the new Whitman school from the south west. Main entrance near middle.
 
Posted by Picasa

Sunday, September 13, 2009

World Columbian Exposition

 


This is a scan of my grandfather Anton Hansen's watch fob and chain, it is a 50 cent coin from the World Exposition of 1892 celebrating 400 years from Columbus discovering America. It is about the size of a Susan B. Anthony dollar.

 
Posted by Picasa


My dad had said his dad had worked as an interpreter at the 1892 Fair in Chicago, so I guess he bought a souvenir before he went back to the farm. The farm was probably a whole day trip in the train from Austin, Minnesota to Chicago.

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Wordless Wednesday Whitman School Demolition

 

 
Posted by Picasa


These two pictures go with my Carnival of Genealogy submission. The picture of the sixth grade students was taken in front of the Whitman School, and in 1981 they built a new Whitman school, and here is a couple of pictures from the demolition. The top picture is looking from the South east, and they have totally demolished the six class rooms on the south end of the main building. These had been added on after the original building was finished. Notice the pole on the left front of the picture, this had an air raid siren on top, and it was just outside of the third floor windows of the addition, and VERRRY loud in that class room when it went off every Wednesday.

The bottom picture is looking from the north east and shows the remains of the library and utility room. They were probably added when they added the six classrooms on the other end of the main building, the bricks looked the same, and really did not match the bricks of the old building.

I smile for the Camera, School Days

 
Posted by Picasa


This picture was taken on the front lawn of Whitman School here in Spokane, Washington. The classroom we were in faced the front lawn in the middle of the third floor.

I also wrote in my sixth grade scrawl all the names.

Front Row
Bonnie Mann
Holly Dinsmore
Veronica Kind
Joyce Wickwire
Penny Wilkerson
Annette Elison
Diana Shoots
Mary Jo Grippen
Diana Algard

Second Row
Jim Logan
Patty Dounour
Susan Voag
Linda Northington
Bernidette Jimminez
Patty Gier
Linda Titus
Carolyn Scisor
Billy Barr
Fred "Buzzy" Adams

Third Row
Billy Helms
Denny Dummaca
Don Harris
John Stwert
Dean Chatwiid
Marvin Sturey
Billy Kelly
Lary Ruby
Me
Mr. Anderson

Saturday, September 5, 2009

Saturday Night Fun


Diane Haddad, on The Genealogy Insider blog, has asked blog readers to nominate genealogy blogs for the Family Tree 40 in her post Nominate a Genealogy Blog for the Family Tree 40. There is a link to a nomination form in the post, and voting will take place between October 5 and November 5.

The assignment for this Saturday Night, should you choose to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible music again), is:

1) Identify three of your favorite genealogy blogs to nominate for the Family Tree 40 list, and fill out the nomination form for them.

2) Tell us which three you chose, and a reason why you chose it, in a blog post on your own blog.

3) For purposes of this assignment, please don't name Genea-Musings as one of your three (obviously, I would be honored to be nominated, and you can do so at your pleasure). What I'm hoping is that by writing about three of your favorite genealogy blogs, that you will introduce many blog readers to more outstanding blogs, for the
benefit of all of us.

So here is my list.

1. footnoteMaven I guess I skipped footnotes in school, I don't ever remember a class on footnotes, so her posts are a real learning experience for me.

2. Genealogy's Star This blog seems to have a lot of very good advice and writing about sources and research.

3. Jake Fletchers Genealogy Project A very good young genealogist just starting out.

Friday, September 4, 2009

Wayfinder

For about the last half hour I have been playing with Wayfinder from the Washington State Library. It is a search engine for Washington libraries. Here is a copy of most the article from the From Our Corner blog:

The folks at the State Library are offering a new and very helpful online program called Wayfinder that can let you search for something among millions and millions of items found in many libraries throughout Washington. Wayfinder is an online catalog that provides a single search for locating materials owned by the participating Washington libraries.

The catalog contains information on the collections of more than 250 public, academic, government, law, medical, corporate, special and tribal libraries throughout the state. Combined, these libraries hold more than 17.8 million items in various formats: books; newspapers, magazines and journals; movies; CDs; DVDs; digital objects such as electronic documents, subscription research databases, or historical items that have been scanned and made available on the Web; books in audio and large-print formats, and much more.

“If you’re a researcher looking for a tough-to-find item, the Wayfinder catalog will be especially useful by helping you pinpoint where you can find it,” said Will Stuivenga, the State Library’s Wayfinder manager.

Wayfinder is a subset of the larger WorldCat library catalog search site, which has 1.4 billion holdings and more than 142 million unique bibliographic records. All of WorldCat can be searched from Wayfinder by choosing “Libraries Worldwide” from the pull-down menu where it says “Washington Libraries

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Tombstone Tuesday

 
Posted by Picasa


Tombstone of Bessie (Keith) Travis, second wife of Orville Travis. She was born 26 February 1886 and died 29 January 1975.