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Bilirubin posted:So my Swedish cousin has sent me to her MyHeritage site (seems to have decent functionality), which takes my great grandmother's family back 7 generations. Its very cool to see, but what a zoo once the patronym becomes a thing. Reminds me of a fellow I work with who is Icelandic, and still uses the patronym. He's named for his grandfather, similar to his own father (think John Carlsson and Carl Johnsson), and they get each other's email all the time (both working in the same university) by mistake. It boggles the mind anyone was ever able to keep track of it all My family's all German (Prussian?) on one side and it's Freidrich Wilhelms and Wilhelm Freidrichs for GENERATIONS. Even after they immigrated to the US, they still kept it up. Makes genealogical work a nightmare. Evidently, they were a cantankerous bunch because they were constantly getting into fights with the local church and only one or two of each generation would get baptized before priest kicked them out or they'd leave. If it weren't for the family bible, it would be impossible to trace that side more than three generations. The other side is hard-core Catholic, so literally every woman has Marie as her first name. Heaven help you if they name the first daughter after the mother or worse, had a daughter who died and reused the name. Why did people do that?!!
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May 27, 2016 16:20
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Oracle posted:Good point, Powaqoatse. Germany is similar with the 'farm name' being inherited by the male via marriage to a female heir, because it was the more important name IIRC. (edit: check out the link, its even more complicated than that. Ugh Germany why can't you be simple!) Saints names  . These are currently the bane of my existence. I'm having to comb through parish records trying to figure out who belongs with who. Every man is either Jean or Joseph and every woman is Marie. Of course, it's a Catholic village, so everyone has like eleven kids. And the village was kind of remote, so everyone just intermarried for generations. Not just cousins, but uncle/niece, aunt/nephew, and my personal favorite, two brothers marrying each other's kids.It's not a family tree, it's a Gordian knot.
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Jun 5, 2017 05:42
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Oracle posted:Lemme guess: French-Canadian. Hey, there could be incestuous Catholic Francophones other places! Yeah, French-Canadian
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Jun 6, 2017 05:59
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I recently found an article where one cousin shot another cousin in front of his own house over a bag (with something in it, presumably). Jury acquitted for murder, which tells me either the dead cousin was a thief or the town rear end in a top hat. There was another sister who moved to a big city and married an Irish detective. He in turn was gunned down in broad daylight at a pay phone in a town notorious for its corruption, so I assume there's a story there.
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Aug 20, 2017 05:02
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I disagree, the "B" and "u" are very clear in butcher, and the first letter in the mystery profession is definitely a P. Polentier or even peltier if the clerk is a lousy speller. I can't even begin to explain some of the misspellings I've seen. Semi-literate census takers who speak a language different from the people they are recording is a terrible thing. I suspect Oracle feels my pain on this. On an unrelated note, does anyone know what German church records are available online or (shudder) on microfilm? I've been given a family tree that starts in 1815 and goes all the way back to c.1600, with specific dates and last names for all of the women and everything, but I have no idea if it's accurate or where the information came from.
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Aug 30, 2017 04:57
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Ooo, lots of German stuff, I bet that will be usef...ComradeCosmobot posted:Note that Archion doesn't have everything. In particular, it specifically covers the Evangelical Lutheran church, so if your ancestors were Catholic Bavarians, you probably aren't going to have any luck with the site. drat that Martin Luther! Protestants are why we can't have nice things.  I am looking for Catholics in Baden. Oracle posted:And as always, familysearch has tons of microfilmed and digitized records of german churches, and some aren't indexed so you have to page through by hand and read them all (whee! Sutterlin and Fraktur SO MUCH FUN AND SO EASY ON THE EYES. When you get some calligraphy lovin' priest with beautiful handwriting it makes you want to weep in gratitude by comparison) archion.de is a pay site, I know there's a free one out there with some familienbuchs lemme see if I can find it. quote:Oh! This site proved invaluable to me when finding my great-great-grandfather's death record. His son had recorded his street address on his Ellis Island entry form and using that and these address books I was able to find where my gggf lived in Berlin and use that info to request his death cert from the proper area and confirm it was indeed him (as he had the equivalent german name of John Smith). It goes back to 1799! Great if your family lived in Berlin and you have an address from some old document. Can give you occupations and who else was living at that address as well. This however might be helpful for a different line that my mom is working on. Thanks!
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Aug 31, 2017 02:54
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Hey Oracle or anyone else who might know, is there an easy way to see what years have been digitized in the archives departementales in France? Everything online just stops after 1792 and I don't know if that's because it hasn't been digitized or if boundaries were redrawn with the dawn of the Republic or overzealous revolutionaries murdered the priest, who was the only one who knew where the records were kept or what.
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Oct 7, 2017 05:56
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As it turns out, after digging through all the stuff in your post, I discovered all the records from four areas were combined under the name of just one of them beginning in 1793, even though the areas didn't officially merge until 1851 (and then under a different name). Hence my inability to find any records after 1792 in the little village my people are supposed to be from. We should start a "boundaries are bullshit" club. Those Baden folks from the beginning of the page were literally on the opposite bank of the Rhine. I'm trying to link the guys in the new world to the old world. They appear to have left after the revolution, for obvious reasons. My wanderings through databases did turn up a dude in the neighboring town with the same surname who got guillotined during the revolution, so that was cool.
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Oct 8, 2017 20:25
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Yeah, the Bas-Rhine archives are all up. The records range from super useful to super useless, depending on the priest keeping the records. One of the village priests kept immaculate records, recopied old records from Latin to French, and was generally awesome. One of the village priests was more laissez-faire about the whole affair and so old (or ill with Parkinson's) that by the end the records he wrote are nigh illegible. Unfortunately, I need both, so a slogging I go. I did find the baptismal record for my ancestor that move to the new world. Either he was lying mightily about his age or no one could accurately tell the priest how old he was when he died, because somewhere nine years got shaved off.
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Oct 9, 2017 01:48
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Oracle posted:Yeah, Prussians had something similar only with the added bonus of a 'saint's name' that every kid of the same gender had as their first name. So it would appear every boy had the first name Johann and every girl was Maria. Then they'd do the mom's mom/dad's dad thing, throw in a few more names for good measure, and then let the kids pick which names they went by, which would of course never be what the priest wrote down or what was used legally, unless one wasn't paying attention and just wrote down whatever they were told, which is how one guy was Michael Weiss in one record and Joshua Weiss in another and Adam Weiss in a third. You could tell it was the same dude because his wife had FIVE GIVEN NAMES and by god, you wrote down every single one of those fuckers whenever you referred to her. It was something like Ulrike Annika Maria Sophia Laura Ahrens. Even on her death certificate. She must've been some kind of terror. I saw a dispute on an ancestry tree that said "Jean couldn't possibly be the father since he was born in 1811." I almost fell out of my chair laughing. Literally every male in the family had Jean as their saint's name. Have you seen where they move the saint's name to the end? Like, the baptismal record reads "Marie Anne Catherine" but they're buried under "Anne Catherine Marie." It seems to show up with increased contact with the English.
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Dec 3, 2017 06:21
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Has anyone had any luck ordering death certificates? My mom wants me to use it as a launching pad for getting my grandmother's hospital and mortuary records. Edit: Oracle, your post is a lot funnier now that I've tracked a woman whose name is never the same on any document. Baptismal name was Marie Aimee Scholastique and she's Scholastique on her marriage record, Marie on the first census, Widow Husband's Name on the next one, then Mrs. Second Husband's Name, Solastie First Husband's Surname, and finally Aimee Second Husband's Surname. No wonder we can't figure out where she's buried. Brennanite fucked around with this message at 21:08 on Dec 16, 2017 |
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Dec 16, 2017 20:59
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ComradeCosmobot posted:I’ve ordered them from New York City and literally just mailed off a request for a pair from California. It’s usually pretty straightforward if you know where/when they died. Especially if you have an index to cross-reference against (as both NYC and California do) I do have an index to cross-reference against; I was just wondering if anyone had run into problems with anti-identify theft statutes or whatnot. It's been 60 yrs, but I think some states have a 100 yr waiting period if not the person, their spouse or child. Maybe that's for birth certificates though?
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Dec 17, 2017 06:34
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Oracle posted:What state? And I don't know that you'll be able to get hospital records. I don't even know if they keep those past a certain period of time. Also keep in mind when ordering them that you don't necessarily need a notarized copy unless you're trying to do something legal with them like get an inheritance or whatever, as those tend to cost more and take longer. Some states like Michigan (https://www.seekingmichigan.org) have all of them from around 1898-1952 that they currently have online for free, though their search engine could use some work. Utah. I found the index, but I'd like the actual record. She died in route to Phoenix, which was apparently pitched as a restorative place with clean air, warm breezes, and sunshine. Feel bad she never made it. And yeah, I already contacted the hospital listed in the index (the only one in town) and they don't keep records after 10 yrs. So that's a strike out.
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Dec 19, 2017 05:30
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Hey, Oracle, is there a reason someone wouldn't show up in the US social security death index if they were born after 1935 and died between 1998 and 2006? I am increasingly wondering if my great-uncle didn't in fact commit suicide, but this is a story to cover up him being in prison (again--he had a lengthy record going back to the 50s for mostly petty crime).
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May 28, 2018 05:01
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Oh dear me posted:No, I mean that the sources can be fine (original baptism/marriage/burial records) as far as they go but still not enough to justify people's conclusions, because names were so common. Baptism and marriage records (at the least ones from the One True Church  ) give the names of the parents (and sometimes grandparents) in addition to the name of the person(s) receiving the sacrament, which should clarify things. If you've got a particularly nice priest, you'll get ages and professions too for bonus confirmation. Of course, that assumes you're looking at the record itself and not just an index or extract. Little Miss Bossy posted:Oh that makes me soooooooooooo happy! I get absolutely infuriated by some trees I see on Ancestry... especially things that are just obviously simple mistakes, but people are too lazy to check. For example, an ancestor being listed as born in Boston, MA in 1523 even though it had not been settled yet and it's obviously Boston in Norfolk, England. I mean, take some time and care and think, people.
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Sep 30, 2018 06:38
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Krankenstyle posted:Département Haut-Rhin (Upper Rhine, Alsace) have digitized about half of their parish registers (N through Z) and are putting them online from Z down: Hey, that might actually be of use to me. Of course, that means I will have to start doing work on those lines again and not trying to find people on a census which is impossible because an American trying to spell "Guitreaux" results in me having go through sheet by sheet in between softly weeping.
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Apr 5, 2020 03:25
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Hey Oracle, do you or anyone else here have experience with Black or American Indian genealogy? That is very much outside my usual wheelhouse, but curiosity is compelling me to know more. Also, my mom has been using the COVID isolation period to prepare her application for membership in DAR and whatever the Mayflower group is, so I hope you guys have good pie recipes. She was also going to apply to the Daughters of the Confederacy, but luckily we were able to convey why that was not a good idea. 
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Aug 6, 2020 01:33
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Oracle posted:There's a whole separate thread for African-American genealogy over in the Minority Rapport sub-forum. So, yeah Holy cow, you did a LOT of work with that write-up. Turns out I got all excited over nothing--fake family lore attached by a mistranscribed census record that apparently no one ever thought to look at the original. I've never been so disappointed. Should have seen it coming, though, as that line is riddled with gaps, mistakes, and deliberately omitted information. Krispy Wafer posted:Is there any research advantage to joining those organizations if you had ancestors fighting on the wrong side of history? My great-grandmother, who did like 90% of our family research, was a member of everything. I don't think she really thought it through beyond "genealogy club for the South where they swap local history books."
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Aug 8, 2020 22:42
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Oracle posted:So if John Coffee, the baby in the first record, is the third born son OR the first born son of John Coffee Sr., who was in turn the first born son of a John Coffee, and John Coffee in the second record is the fourth born son of John Coffee who is a 1st or 2nd cousin of the John Coffee in the first record, and they both married a Catherine (a very common name in those times), then you will have two separate but similar looking entries in the book that could totally be two different people (and this without considering any of the mother's brothers names). Just last week I ran into a situation where I have no idea which set of parents a child belongs to because everyone has the same names. My gut says it's the first child of the oldest son [Jean Pierre] and his wife/maternal first cousin [Marie Emelie], but it is quite possible it's the last child of the father [also Jean Pierre] and his wife/maternal first cousin [also Marie Emelie]. I honestly can't even think of how to prove which set of parents the poor kid goes with. I have also had the distinct displeasure of trying to untangle four related gentlemen all named Jean Baptiste residing in the same place who were born and died months apart.  Bet you can't guess the name of the church they were all baptized in. It was St. Jean Baptiste
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Sep 15, 2020 05:33
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Oracle posted:Look at careers (sometimes they'll differentiate Jean Pierre the fisherman with Jean Pierre the carpenter), place of birth (Jean Pierre born on St. Agnes street vs. Jean Pierre son of Jean Pierre the voyageur and Agnes) and who the baptismal sponsors are (yes, I have actually teased out a German line by taking a few months to do the family trees of the baptismal sponsors, and figuring out which were relatives vs. friends, and then how they were related until I found the sister of my x ggm was the sponsor for her namesake 3rd born kid and then 3ggm returned the favor). Its a pain in the rear end but hey, if you really want to get back ONE MORE generation sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do. This is good advice. I've seen professions mentioned in sacramental records in France and Italy, but not on this side of the Atlantic. Side note: I don't know if it was the particular practice of that priest or region or time or what, but I was looking at marriage records that recounted not just the ages and professions of the bride and groom at the time of marriage, but also their fathers' professions and sometimes grandfathers'. Made linking things together so easy.  The record does list the baptismal sponsors, though, so maybe that will work.
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Sep 17, 2020 01:40
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FWIW, my mom learned one of her mother's cousins had a child out of wedlock thanks to Ancestry's DNA. The only real benefit to her was getting to see my grandmother's glee that her disliked cousin was neither a man of honor nor restraint. The lady got a lot of pictures of the family she never knew, which she seemed to like. Remember this? Brennanite posted:Just last week I ran into a situation where I have no idea which set of parents a child belongs to because everyone has the same names. My gut says it's the first child of the oldest son [Jean Pierre] and his wife/maternal first cousin [Marie Emelie], but it is quite possible it's the last child of the father [also Jean Pierre] and his wife/maternal first cousin [also Marie Emelie]. I honestly can't even think of how to prove which set of parents the poor kid goes with. Well, I bit the bullet and traced every stupid line of that group for a 150 yr period and I can now say decisively that 1) there were some very jumbled families in that tree and 2) the priest who diligently recorded the full names of the child being christened, their parents, each set of grandparents and where all of them were from better have made it passed St. Peter. I was able to fill in a missing generation thanks to that man. And it only took three weeks. 
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Oct 7, 2020 03:50
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Jaguars! posted:Genealogy name of the week: Honora Harrington Pfft, I see your Honora and raise you a Scholastique ("Scholastie" on census records) and a Frozine. Edit: Wait, is this going to be some European thing?
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Oct 25, 2020 01:53
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Jaguars! posted:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honorverse#Protagonist For once, I am insufficiently nerdy. 
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Oct 25, 2020 03:21
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Exactly what Jaguars! said. When the place, spouses and kids/parents and siblings, ages, etc. match, you can be reasonably sure that you're dealing with the right person, even if the name is different. Plus, you don't often know who's giving the information. I've seen people with very, very wrong names on their death certificates because their brother-in-law had no clue what their mother's name was. And then you get people who were known by nicknames their entire lives (literally one of my grandfather's brothers went by anything that resembled his given, legal name) and the people who informally changed their names due to cultural assimilation or because they just hated their given names (my grandmother's grandmother and her sisters were all named after Greek goddesses. Apparently, life was much easier on the prairie as Ella Smith than Demeter Smith).
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Oct 30, 2020 04:10
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"There's always endogamy" should be the name of the thread. Edit: Ack, new page. In that case, I'll ask if anyone's gone through the accreditation process. Brennanite fucked around with this message at 20:07 on Oct 31, 2020 |
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Oct 31, 2020 20:03
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Hey, in the pre-computer but post-church era, say, 1940s-1950s America, did the county clerks or whoever issued marriage licenses have any way of checking that one of the applicants wasn't already married? I've been beating my head against a brick wall trying to locate the divorce record for my grandfather's parents, but what if there wasn't one? What if they just split up and married other people without legally divorcing? They lied about a LOT of stuff, so it's not like they were known for their honesty or high moral character.
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Nov 8, 2020 21:48
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Oracle posted:Clerks could check local records or, if suspicious, ring up a couple’s claimed county of origin but for the most part no, you had to sign the certificate stating that you weren’t married (if you look at the certificate you have it likely has wording to this effect, asks how many times married etc) and then off you went. Yeah, this couple is a hot mess. My grandfather said they were married in 1936, divorced ?, remarried (to each other) in 1943, divorced again in 1950, and married to other people in 1951/52. Based on records, it's more likely she got pregnant, so he took her back home and said they were married, actually married in 1943 across the state line (probably because the local priest knew he had been married before), split up in the mid '40s, got briefly back together in 1947/48, and split again in 1949. Did I mention when they were together, they lived next door to his previous wife and her new husband? Or that my great-grandmother was 15 and he was 27 when they hooked up? I feel "dysfunctional" doesn't adequately describe this family dynamic.
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Nov 14, 2020 05:05
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I love the cousin chart. I get to break it out every time I try to explain any relation on my mom's side to my husband. "So, I was talking to my cousin Jane on Facebook..." "I don't know her. Which of your mother's sisters does she go with?" "Well, technically, she's not my cousin. She's my half-first cousin once removed." "What?!!" "Let me get the chart again."
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Feb 19, 2021 06:55
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Carthag Tuek posted:Interesting that the systems are all named after indiginous peoples/languages. I suppose the anthropologists or linguists who categorized them considered them more "pure" as opposed to the indo-european languages. I mean, I generally expect old linguistic stuff to be like Germanic, Latin, Slavic, etc Seems like Scandinavian is a Sudanese system. I *think* that the Sudanese system is the most common, but it's hard to tell because every article seems to use a different measure (population, societies, geographic distribution, etc.). Even though I actually think it makes a ton of sense to distinguish maternal from paternal relatives, in practice I collapse generational distinctions. Everyone's either an aunt, uncle, cousin, or grandparent in conversation. Besides, we can always break out the chart if we need to be specific. 
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Feb 20, 2021 06:49
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Oracle posted:Anyone going to Rootstech Connect? Its free and online this year and I've been going through the catalog and already have over a dozen talks picked out. There's a bunch of stuff people here might find interesting including talks on researching in the Phillipines and the Caribbean and DNA everything and reading script of various languages and man, just you name it, they have something on it. Its nuts how big this catalog is. You can find it here and browse and see if anything catches your fancy. I know one of the presenters this year and if everyone is as good as she is, those talks should be terrific.
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Feb 23, 2021 02:06
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Oracle posted:Welp, dad died and I went back home for the funeral and on our way out of the parking lot my sister gave me all kinds of stuff my aunt had saved for me from when she was cleaning out grandmas house (she died a decade ago and we are all a bunch of pack rats so it was… a lot of work). Congratulations on the motherlode. All I got was a bunch of tchotchkes and cool dresser.
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Oct 16, 2023 04:59
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