Wisdom Wednesday - So far so good

Starting on Monday I sat down at my office and dedicated my day to my job...genealogy.  It felt good to not be running around doing PTA and Cub Scout stuff.  Why didn't I do this sooner!

As I lay in bed on Sunday night mentally preparing myself for what I had plans of conquering first on Monday I realized that I wasn't happy with how my sources were cited.  Furthermore, I'm sure that they weren't 100% perfect.  What I mean is that I was sure there were some elements to some citations that were missing.  That's not how I want to start out.  So I decided to go through all of my sources and ensure that they were properly cited.  Sounds like an incredibly daunting task, but it really isn't too bad and this is why...

About 4 years ago I took an online course on genealogy.  "Family History Studies: Genealogy I" through Monterey Peninsula College and Karen Clifford was the instructor.  Even though I had been doing genealogy for about 6 years, after talking with a friend who had taken Karen's course I had decided to start with the basics.  Jenn (my friend) told me that there was plenty to learn about organizing your materials and that it was worth starting at the beginning.  It was great advice.  I loved Karen's course.  I would have loved to have taken the remaining courses, but my infant turned into a toddler and it just wasn't in the cards at the time.

When I took the course I began using the Personal Ancestral File (PAF) genealogy program that you can download from FamilySearch.org for free.  I was planning on using it just for ease in the course, but I actually found that I rather liked it and have been using it ever since.  For a free program it's incredibly good.  But I digress...back to fixing my sourcing/citations.  When I was in the course a suggestion was made (please forgive me if I get this one wrong, Karen) that in the "Notes" section for each person to include the following areas:

-Sources
-History (could be of the region, family, any background information)
-Notes
-Facts
-Traditions (family legend that has not been verified with facts yet)
-To Do

I thought this was brilliant.  Still do actually.  The problem I noticed was that it takes a lot of paper printing reports out if you have those headings complete with ALL the sources in each person's notes!  Plus, if you go to print out a Family Group Record and have cited a census for several of the family members, it prints out under every person in that FGR (because it's been transcribed into the notes!).  Not necessary.  I was killing trees like crazy.  I love sources.  I don't just stop at a birth certificate.  I want everything I can find regarding the event.  Mistakes can be made and you want to be accurate!

In addition to taking up space when you print, it's potentially problematic when you have to go back and make a correction to the citation.  You have to figure out which people have, say, the "1920 US Federal Census for the Thomas Brown household" and fix each one.  Talk about a headache!  So what I decided to do was to take the source/citation information and transcription (yes I transcribed each source...I'm a bit anal that way) and transferred it to the area meant for citations.

In the citation area it had fields for:
-Source Title
-Author
-Publication information
-Repository
-Call number
-The actual text (great for my transcriptions)
-Comments

It would then show you a sample footnote at the bottom AND you could attach the image of the source to the citation itself.  Drawback - if your source had 2 pages to it (say your family continued onto the next page in a census) you can only attach one picture.  If you had to change the citation, however, you change it in that one place and it's fixed for everyone linked to the citation.  Awesome.

What was less awesome is the 36 pages of people that I have to adjust citations on.  I will persevere though.  In the past 2 days working 3 to 4 hours each day, I've gotten through 8 pages.  It'll be well worth it knowing that it's done properly.  It needs to be done properly.

The bright side is that I'm catching that glitch and fixing it now.  I had started reentering my entire tree into the PAF program when I took Karen's course.  I didn't transfer the gedcom file from my old program because I knew there were flaws in my old tree and after learning the right way to do things, I realized that the best way to make sure my conclusions were sound was to start over...no matter how huge a task it seemed, I knew it was the right thing to do.  I hadn't finished reentering even half of the tree when Danny became a toddler so the task could have been greater.  I prefer looking at that bright side!

So I figure in another week to week and a half I'll be back at the actual research and data entry for my family tree.  I've got a busy couple of weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, but won't be deterred from my job.  All in all, so far so good!

(Please allow me to beg forgiveness that this "Wisdom Wednesday" and the series I will be including on Wisdom Wednesday isn't based in the past. It's any wisdom and experience I'm gaining as I travel down the road to accreditation. There are certainly tidbits of wisdom to be gleaned by anyone else that may choose to take the same path!)

Tombstone Tuesday - Neil Brown and Nancy McCoy

I looked for the tombstone of Neil and Nancy Brown for at least five years...probably more. They all start blurring together after awhile. Tombstones I'm trying to find, that is. Not ancestors. I'm pretty good at keeping them straight. Now ask me in 30 or 40 more years and it may be another story!

I had frequently written to Saint Gabriel's Roman Catholic Church in Hazleton for information since I began doing genealogy back in 2000. They were always extremely helpful in getting me copies of baptism and marriage records and I always ensured that I enclosed a donation to the church when requesting information! After all, Saint Gabriel's is my family's church. My ancestors have been parishioners since it opened and I was the last person in my family baptized there...until my littlest was born, but that's another story.

I know I had asked about Neil and Nancy (nee McCoy) Brown's tombstones before, but never got any information back. That's most likely my fault because when I would send in a request for information I made sure that I asked for several things so I wasn't constantly inundating them. It may have gotten over-looked. My worst fear was that there were no records.

Each year I try to make pilgrimage home to Pennsylvania with the kids. Time for Grandma and Papa to see the boys. Time for me to see them and two of my three sisters. I certainly can't pass up that time to do some research too! I just try not to overwhelm my little guys with traipsing around cemeteries. They don't appreciate it...yet!

So with a bit of perseverance, this summer was THE summer. Saint Gabriel's website finally had an email address! Score! I could start spamming, er, requesting information from them with greater ease and speed! I had a lovely conversation in several emails with the sweet lady that is the secretary for the parish. She not only found my ancestors' grave, but gave me directions and hooked me up with the caretaker to take me straight to it!

It was the genealogical highlight of my trip! I finally had a birth and death year for both Neil and Nancy! Strangely enough I had walked passed their tombstone before and never noticed it. It's sunken almost completely into the ground. It's only a matter of time before it's completely gone.

A bonus to my research...the wonderful lady helping me also helped me find his son's tombstone...and I never asked for it! His son's tombstone only had "The Neil Brown Family" written on it. I prefer tombstones that give me a bit more, but you know, I was actually happy to know who was there! I already knew when Neil Jr and his wife Bridget died but now I know where to lay flowers on those annual pilgrimages!

Military Monday - Lester Kuehl

Lester Kuehl was the son of John Kuehl and Dora Hermann. He was killed in action in France in 1944 and was originally interred in the military cemetery at LeChene-Guerin, France. Lester was finally brought home to Kewaskum, WI more than 4 years after his death in 1948. He is my mother-in-law's uncle. She vividly remembers being at the funeral in 1948 and the honor guard at the funeral firing their volleys in honor of her Uncle Lester. It was a sad day and the gun shots frightened her. She was 9 years old at the time of the funeral.

Rest in peace and thank you for serving our country, Uncle Lester. You should have been with us much longer than you were. All gave some, some gave all.

Sunday Supper - Patrick Cayemberg's Beef Tenderloin

I really do have the most thoughtful in-laws in the world! Dad always loved cooking and baking and was never hesitant in sharing a recipe. So for my first Sunday Supper (and for many more) I will share the recipes that Dad loved to make and we all loved to eat! Love and miss you, Dad!

We looked forward to Dad making this when we'd go to visit in Green Bay, or when Mom and Dad would come to visit us. Whenever tenderloin would go on sale in Green Bay, Dad would grab some for us, trim it and Mom would zip-pack it and freeze it. They'd bring it down with them when they'd visit...enough to make and enough to leave behind for us to make later on.

Beef Tenderloin

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp salt
1 tbsp dried thyme
2 tbsp butter, melted
1/2 tbsp fresh cracked black pepper
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 beef tenderloin
1 head garlic, peeled and sliced into chips

Mix together the olive oil, salt, thyme, melted butter, pepper, and soy sauce. Set aside.

Place in a roasting pan 1 whole beef tenderloin, cleaned and trimmed of excess fat and silver skin. Tuck the tail under the meat to ensure even temperature throughout. Cut small slits into the tenderloin all over and insert a chip of garlic. Pour the rub over the tenderloin and rub all over meat with hands for about 5 minutes to evenly coat. Let rest for 20 minutes, then repeat the process of rubbing the meat.

Place in the oven with a meat thermometer inserted. Cook at 425 degrees (F) until thermometer reads 120 degrees for rare, 125-130 degrees for medium rare or 135-140 degrees for medium. Remember that once you take the tenderloin out of the oven the internal temperature will continue to rise about 5 degrees.

It is important to let the meat rest for 15 minutes before slicing; this allows the temperature to rise those 5 degrees and lets the juices settle inside the meat instead of on the cutting board. Serve with a simple au jus made from the juices, a bit of water, beef stock and your favorite seasonings.

(I know that Dad clipped this recipe from somewhere, but I don't know where exactly, so sorry, but I can't give proper credit to the source.)

The Royal Charter Passenger List

I've been looking for the passenger list for the Royal Charter for almost a decade. I'm bad. I didn't want to hire someone to search for it in Australia (or Britain) for me. This was personal. This was the shipwreck that took my 3rd great grandfather Manus Maurice Boyle. I wanted to find it.

Time restrictions and other research always seemed to keep me from doing a proper search. One afternoon I just entered " 'Royal Charter' shipwreck" into a search on Google News Archive Search (http://news.google.com/archivesearch) and I got results!

I narrowed it down to articles close to the 1859 date and one of them had a list of the passengers! Maurice Boyle was listed under Steerage & 3rd Class just a few lines in. The article is from The Daily Southern Cross, Volume XVII, Issue 1284, 20 January 1860, Page 3.

If you click on the image it will take you to the news article (it's pretty long, but very interesting). You can save the article to as a .pdf or .png file by clicking on "view computer-generated text" above the article and then "entire article" in the green box to the right. You'll then see the entire page of the newspaper it was published in and there will be save options right above it.

I thought I'd share this, because while it took me awhile to find a list of the passengers, I discovered during my search that others were having the same difficulty as well. Perhaps we suffered from the same problem...all looking for a ship's manifest...a "typical" passenger list. Not realizing that perhaps a list could be found within other sources.

Treasure Chest Thursday - An Ancient Irish Rosary

This rosary has been in my family since before my ancestors swam over from Ireland. OK...they took a boat, but I'm sure it was a long, hard journey for them!  The rosary was William Quirk's, my 2nd great grandfather. Now William was born around 1842, so if the date refers to when it was carved or to commemorate an event, it most likely belonged to his father or mother.

William was Irish-born. What I don't know is if any of his family came over with him or if he made the journey alone...still looking into that one! Perhaps the rosary was a gift from a family member before he made the trip. A piece of the family to take with him on his long journey from home.

My sisters and I all have the utmost affection for this particular piece of family history. It's probably the oldest thing our family has. It was passed on to me by my mother several years ago and it spends the majority of it's time in our fire-safe.

Wisdom Wednesday - The Journey Begins

Well, sort of.

My journey towards accreditation began back in April of this year when my husband told me that if all we ever did was talk about me becoming a professional genealogist, then talk was all that was ever going to happen! I am blessed to have an extremely supportive husband...love you, Rick! So I went from stay-at-home mom (a position I had held for 4 years) to business owner.

I needed to think of a business name (so many of the cool genealogy names were taken), so I did what most people would do....I asked my Facebook friends and family for suggestions. I then compiled a list and everyone gave their 2 cents on what they thought was the best name. I had veto power the entire time, but as it turned out I agreed with their choice. It wasn't even a name I had come up with, but it worked. I really liked it. So HaveYouSeenMyRoots.com was born.

I purchased the domain name, got the blog, email, and purchased my Doing Business As license. Then things started getting a bit crazy and everything came to a screeching halt. My father-in-law passed away (we actually lost a number of family and friends this year...it's been a difficult year for our family) and summer hit. My 9 year old is pretty self-sustaining at home...my 4-year old, well, not so much. He wants my undivided attention, and my children deserve it. So I put starting everything on hold until after they returned to school in the fall.

We had a very nice summer which included a car trip from Texas to Pennsylvania and back complete with lots of state/national parks and landmarks. We believe in summer vacations being as fun and educational as they can be! But when school started things didn't get easier. They got worse.

I had been asked to accept the nomination for PTA president of my oldest son's school. I originally declined, but was persuaded to accept. As a former Drill Sergeant they were looking for my delegating skills (not my yelling and screaming skills, but they can have them if needed :) ). I figured delegating was easy in the Army, so the PTA couldn't be too bad. Um...I was wrong.

The problem is you need someone to delegate to. So with school starting it was time to reinvent the PTA wheel, unscrew everything that was (majorly) screwed up, conduct a fundraiser, etc. It seemed like every time I started climbing out of the hole I had dug myself into by volunteering, someone threw more dirt on me. It was frustrating.

Did I mention that I'm an adult leader with Cub Scouts too? Yes...we are big scouting parents so this PTA was adding on to my other volunteer responsibilities. Not cool. And I was fixing some issues in the new volunteer position I had in scouting. Not going to get into the gory details, but there was gore involved. The mess is slowly getting cleaned up in scouting and PTA-land. At least I hope it is because I'm done.

My blog was born back in April, as I mentioned, but my first post was in October. The anniversary of the Royal Charter shipwreck on October 26th spurred my post, then my friend told me about Geneabloggers, and I got into this wonderful genealogy/blogging community. It gives me the motivation to get it together and to get headed back in the right direction.

The PTA and scouts are going to have to get used to hearing the word "NO" come out of my mouth. People need to stop looking at me like I'm some stay-at-home mom that has nothing but time on my hands to solve their petty problems...heck, my job as a Drill Sergeant was easier on so many levels! :) And being a stay-at-home mom was never easy...there were never any soap operas and bonbon eating in my life!

Bottom line...I...have...a...JOB!!! My job is personal. It's going to be MY business. My job is to get prepared for my accreditation and try to figure out how the professional world of genealogy works. I want to do something I'm passionate about and help other people while I'm doing it.

And so it begins....again. We'll check on my progress next Wednesday...

(Please allow me to beg forgiveness that this "Wisdom Wednesday" and the series I will be including on Wisdom Wednesday isn't based in the past. It's any wisdom and experience I'm gaining as I travel down the road to accreditation. There are certainly tidbits of wisdom to be gleaned by anyone else that may choose to take the same path!)