Monday, September 26, 2011

52 Weeks to Personal Genealogy Least Favorite Foods

Week #39 – Least Favorite Foods

Week 39: Least Favorite Foods. What was your least favorite food from your childhood? Did your parents make you eat it anyway? Do you still dislike the same food today? How have your tastes changed since your youth?


Well it has to be Brussels sprouts and broccoli, both are very bitter and I do remember trying to eat some as a child. Today I still do not like them and so I do not buy them.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

WSGS 2011 Building Ancestral Bridges Days 3-6

After we left the conference we headed along the Columbia River to the coast and eventually Ocean Shores, Washington, I took this picture as I was driving along the Columbia River. Don't see any barges in Spokane.

We had checked an there were several state parks along the Columbia, but all were full due to another conference at a winery, and so we were getting pretty tired when we stopped at a Rest Stop. I was worried we would be close to the Burlington Northern Railroad tracks and so I checked with a flashlight and could not see any tracks close to us. This was the sunrise the next morning, and if you look closely you can see several fishing boats fishing for steel head and salmon.

As I was looking over the area after sunrise I found we had stopped on top of a tunnel where the railroad went right under the rest stop. Here is a picture looking east and the next one is looking west.



This one is looking west on the Columbia River.

The path at the rest stop swung around and went by this very big dead tree, says I'm about 300 years old.

When we go to Ocean Shores we alway like to go down to the jetty, and I was sitting on a rock about 3 feet high when this big wave came in and splashed me pretty good.

On the other side of the jetty the waves were even larger, this one was just about to hit the jetty and the spray would go up 15 or 20 feet in the air.

As I was watching the waves crash against the jetty a fishing boat was heading into Grays Harbor. The swells were so big it would go clear out of sight and then come up on top of the wave and look like a surfer heading for shore.

Saturday Night Fun Spokeo

Hey there, genea-philes - it's Saturday Night -- time for more Genealogy Fun!!

I'm always on the lookout for websites that can find living people. I read about Spokeo this week and thoguht that I would try it out.

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

1) Go to Spokeo - www.spokeo.com and put in your name (or any name).

2) See what Spokeo says about you. Is it accurate?


Some is some is not accurate.

Male OK
early 60s OK
Single OK
House 118K lived there 15 years wished it was that low for taxes
I grew up there and inherited it 3 years ago so many more than 15 years
White OK
Gemini OK
High School guess they missed my college WSU
Self Emp OK
Live with parents Claude 90s Margaret 90s both have died pop at 101 in 2008 mom at 80 in 1994

Tried Claude Hansen
age 90s
House 137K (same house as above) lived there 2 years they bought it in 1949
Leo OK
High School He never finished High School
Office Worker he retired in 1971 and never worked in an office

Thursday, September 22, 2011

WSGS 2011 Building Ancestral Bridges, Day 2

Morning came quickly and we had cereal and juice before heading to the Baptist Church for browsing the vendors and looking for the rooms we were going to be in later in the day. The first session was Patricia Walls Stamm in the Sanctuary. We headed for the Sanctuary and found a seat near the middle, but there was a cold breeze from the back, so we moved to the side away from the cold breeze. Patricia's first talk was Death has Many Faces on finding various ways to document a death. Patricia moves a lot during her talks and I took many pictures of the side or back of her head before I finally got this good one of her looking towards me.

Now comes the hard part of the conference the breakout sessions. Why are they so hard? Well the first section had five topics and I really wanted to go to four of them, but finally settled on Carol Buswell from NARA in Seattle on Immigration and Naturalization Records in the National Archives. She had handouts for all the census including the 1940 census. Each sheet showed all the columns on the census and what was supposed to be in that column. The class was full and several people brought chairs from the hall to have a place to sit.

Next Back to the Sanctuary for the third section with Patricia Walls Stamm, this section was Elements of a Useful Research Road Map. This was an interesting section on how to do research and what to do when you have found the documents you were looking for.
Lunch was next and it was a buffet dinner where you made your own sandwich and some condiments and side dishes to go along with it. Lunch also includes the Annual Meeting of the Washington State Genealogical Society, so the minutes of the last meeting, the treasurers report, and then some awards to genealogical society volunteers. Juanita McBride was one of two from Eastern Washington Genealogical Society (below). Dorothy Braithwait was the second but she did not attend. There was supposed to be committee Reports next, but the volunteer awards took so long there was not time, so just a quick message about next years conference September 7-8, 2012 at Port Angeles, Washington.
My committee report was to be I finished three counties this year Whitman, Walla Walla and Whatcom counties so the only county not in the WSGS Resource Guides is Snohomish county.


This is a picture of the whole group of genealogical society volunteers, congratulations everyone.

After lunch was two breakout sessions, and while each had five selections, I really was not a lot interested in the first group of five, but I picked the one by Linda Lind on finding the War of 1812 Veterans that died in Washington Territory. You would think they would be easy to find but most records do not list War of 1812 veterans. Linda did give a clue on finding a War of 1812 veteran, by using the Government Land Office Records, and searching for the person in the list of Land Patents. They do not have to be from Washington to use this database, but since it is online it is a quick way to find a War of 1812 Veteran.
The next breakout I wanted to attend two sessions, but picked Margie Beldin; Google; The Genealogist's Research Assistant. Margie is an excellent teacher and her session flew by so quickly you hardly knew you were learning so much so quickly.
The last session by Patricia Walls Stamm was Discovering Your Ancestors Neighborhood, another good session on local records.
Well hard to believe it was all over except the door prizes and while I was close a couple of times I did not win anything, but Jacque won a $25.00 gift certificate.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

WSGS 2011 Building Ancestral Bridges, Day 1

My sister Jacque & I left Spokane about 8:30 a.m. September 16, 2011 heading for Richland, Washington and the 2011 WSGS Conference Building Ancestral Bridges. This was a fitting name for the Richland, Pasco and Kennewick area has many bridges crossing the Columbia River. We arrived about noon and leveled the mini-home so the refrigerator keeps working. We warmed up some frozen home made soup and some corn from our garden for lunch and then I headed for the WSGS board meeting at 3 p.m. since I am a committee chairman. After the meeting I picked up my registration paper sack with all the goodies the Tri Cities Genealogical Society had worked so hard to collect and put in all the bags.

This first picture is the Richland Baptist Church. I always thought the church I went to here in Spokane was pretty big, but this Baptist Church was really huge, the Sanctuary where Patricia Walls Stamm talked was bigger than my whole church.


When we arrived the vendors were busy setting up, and as these pictures show, were busy during the two days of the conference.


This was the opening Flag Ceremony by the SAR group from Spangle, Washington.

After the good buffet dinner, Patricia Walls Stamm gave the first of four talks; Social Networking for Genealogists where she briefly pointed out the major social working websites, Facebook, Linkedin, My Space, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr. While many of the WSGS board sat together I wanted to meet others so sat at a table away from the board and met Lee Smith one of the TCGS member volunteers that helped put on this conference. He also took many pictures of bridges around the area and they were used as centerpieces, and in the syllabus.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Wordless Wednesday Four Generations


Anton Hansen was my grandfather, Ralph Hansen was my uncle, and Clara Watson is Ralph's oldest daughter and my first cousin. David Watson is Clara's son.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Saturday Night Fun Genealogy Luck

It's Saturday Night - time for our weekly Genealogy Fun!

1) When have you had a dose of good genealogy luck? What document or resource did you find just by happenstance or chance? By being in the right place at the right time? By finding a family history treasure in your family's attic or basement? By finding a helpful document or reference without even looking for it?


As the research person for Eastern Washington Genealogical Society I spend a lot of time in the newspaper microfilm at the library looking up obits, and while most of the time I have to stop the microfilm several times to see how close to the date I am looking for. So one day when I stopped to check to see how close to the date I was looking for at the top of that page was a headline "Ella Murphy to Wed". Ella Murphy was a neighbor of my mom during high school and my moms Maid of Honor at mom and pops wedding. She married Pete Peterson and he was pops best man at mom and pops wedding.
Just below the wedding announcement was a small article "Casey's has Employees to Liberty Lake Cabin". My mom worked for Casey's department store for a while and in the list of employees that had went to the luncheon was my mom Margaret Kelly and her mom Cleo Kelly and a huge surprise to me my dad Claude Hansen. My mom had died before I found this article, but my pop was still alive so I showed it to him and he said he did not even remember going there. This was several years before they got married. Casey's was close to where my dad worked in Hillyard so I guess they met in Hillyard somewhere, I asked both of them how they met and they would just smile and change the subject.

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Saturday Night Fun Ahnentafel Roulette

Hey there, genea-lovers, it's Saturday Night - time for more Genealogy Fun!!
Your mission, if you decide to accept it, is to (cue the Mission Impossible music, please!):

1) How old is your great-grandfather 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 (ancestor name list). Who is that person?

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


Well I tried all four of my great-grandfathers and only one generated a person in my file, the other three are all blank so far.

Hans Mikkelsen age 174/4=43.5
Stanislaus Dillingham age 176/4=44
Robert Forsyth Kelly age 156/4=39
#44 in my ahnentafel chart is the father of Richard Hellenbolt one of my brick walls.
#39 in my ahnentafel chart is the mother of Johanes Margaret Jensdatter and I think those records are on microfilm at Salt Lake, I have not checked for her parents.
Orville Travis age 147/4=37

Karen Jorgensdatter is #37 she was born in Tullebolle parish on the island of Laangeland in Denmark about 1766 and she married Peder Nielsen also born at Tullebolle about 1763

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