Thinking of trying something new

Ok, a while back ancestry.com was running a promotion where they would allow access to a handful of World Collection databases for free. One of those databases that was open was the Drouin Collection. For those who aren't familiar with this, it's a set of Catholic church records from primarily Quebec (though I understand there is a sprinkling of records from Ontario and other denominations included on the original film though not in the ancestry collection). The records stretch as far back as the 17th century and go all the way into the 20th. It's a huge, huge collection of the births, marriages, and deaths of French Canada and this was the first time I was able to take a look at any of it since I don't have a subscription to the World Collection, and my French is a little rusty. What happened though, is that my interest turned towards my Dellibac French Canadian ancestors and now I'm thinking I might try and run with it. There are some issues though that have been and/or will prove to be a bit sticky....and I'm not just talking about the fact that it's been more years than I prefer to count since I took high school French. Here's what I know so far:

The Run-Down-

Moise Dellibac first appears in the 1855 Illinois state census living in Iroquois County. He appears to be the head of a fairly young family with himself aged 30-40, a female aged 20-30 (presumably his wife, Anastasia Mombleau), and two males under 10. In 1860, the family is found in Kankakee County (which was formed from part of Iroquois County) with "Moyse" aged 35, his wife age 27, and three boys Frs H 4, Henry 2, and Charles 3 months, all born in Illinois. Illinois took another state census in 1865 where "Moses" is shown in Kankakee County, as of 40 and under 50, a female of 30 and under 40, and three boys 10 and under. In 1870, they are again in Kankakee County; Moise 45, Anastasie 38, F Xavier 15, Henry 13, Charles 11, Moise 4, Narcisse 2, and Josephine (my Great Great Grandmother) 1 month. The last census appearance for Moise is in 1880, where the family is again in Kankakee County. Moise is now 61 years old and his wife "Nestage" is 50. They have 6 children living with them; Xavier 24, Henry 22, Moses 14, Narcisse 11, Josephine 10, Carine 7.

Where the problems begin-

Moise's death: Anastasia was living alone as a widow in 1900 and most family members show that Moise died in Illinois (probably Kankakee County) in 1896. This information is unconfirmed and unsourced. An attempt to find a death record was attempted earlier this year, but there is no record of a death for him at the county courthouse for anytime before or after 1896 and he is not listed in the pre-1916 death index for the state.

When they came over: Through the range of all of these enumerations, the children are listed as having been born in Illinois but both parents were born in Canada. No passenger list has been found for either Moise or Anastasia (with her maiden name or as Moise's wife). No marriage for Moise and Anastasia has been found either in Kankakee or in the Illinois Statewide Marriage Index. This doesn't necessarily discount their marriage however, since the marriage records of Iroquois County for the period covering the 1850s and early to mid-1860s were burned in a courthouse fire in the late 1860s. They could have come separately, perhaps with their parents or siblings and then married in IL or come together as a newly married couple from Canada and started their family once they got here. Either way, there is no marriage record found and no passenger list for either of them.

Names: Also, the names are an issue when searching for this group. Moise is often found as Moses, Dellibac can be spelled any number of ways (including Delibac, Delliback, Deliback, De Lubac, etc.). Anastasia is found with all manner of weird spellings, both for the full given name as well as for a shortened version, like Nestage, sometimes with a random "z" thrown in for no reason. When trying to search for her family, to look for relatives who may have lived nearby, Mombleau could be Monbleau, Mombleaux, Montbleau or Montbleaux, etc. Also, let's not forget that since they were French Canadian, there may be what's known as a dit name that I'm not aware of. I've heard these French call names in several of the NGSQ articles that are case studies for primarily Louisiana families but since I haven't researched anyone of French ancestry before, I've never had to figure this part out. But this may be an issue here and without knowing what that dit name might have been, I don't really know what name they could be under, especially where the passenger list search is concerned.

Possibilities-

Anastasia is found in Kankakee County in the 1900 census living alone as a widow. She is shown as the mother of 10 children, 5 then living, and her immigration year is given as 1848. She is still there in 1910, no immigration year is given, and thanks to familysearch.org I can see that she died in Minnesota in 1919 (her son, Moise/Moses was living there at the time of the 1920 census so presumably she had gone to live close to family right before her death). While this record has been indexed on that site, very little information is shown and it is undetermined whether information was included on the original and just not transcribed onto the website or if the pertinent information regarding birth was omitted by the informant. Either way, I need to order the record just for confirmation of her death, if for nothing else. But that still doesn't help me too much with figuring out when they came to the U.S. and where in Quebec Moise had come from.

For Moise's place of birth, it may be helpful to track down the marriage and death records for the children. However, several of them died between 1855 and 1900 so I will definitely need to comb the death records to find out who died when and then go into the marriage records to find out when the girls married and who they married. The marriage records might end up being the most helpful since place of father's birth was on the marriage registers in Kankakee County around this time. Though Josephine's marriage records (she married a couple of times) don't get much more specific than Canada or French Canada, she was one of the youngest children so it would be worth going after the vital records for the older kids to compare. For all of this, the fact that the family was Catholic might end up helping me pinpoint all of the vital records, if I can find out which church they attended and then whether the records are still extant.

Also, though no death record was found for Moise, he may have had a probate case opened up. When I was in Kankakee earlier in the year, just for a brief look around, I was able to take a look at Dellibac land transactions in the deed books for the years around that questionable 1896 death date for him. There was some activity in that pre-1900 time frame to suggest that something might be going on, but I would like some additional time to see if a probate file was opened. If not, more time to go into what was happening with the land to help me narrow down when he could have died.

Another big thing with this group is that they were constantly living near extended family members. A family group with an older Dellibac is shown directly below Moise on the IL census enumeration sheet of 1855. Alex and Felicite (Gaudreau) are presumed to be Moise's parents by family members, though again, no one has presented any sourced information on this. His first appearance on census enumerations also happens to be the sheet of the Iroquois County IL census of 1855, which could be an indicator that they might have come over together though, like Moise, no passenger list has been found for him. A Joseph Dellaback is also shown on that 1855 census page in close proximity to Moise and Alex as a male age 20-30 with a female the same age. He cannot be found on schedules after that.

So I think that's the full round-up of info for now. I'm not sure if I want to jump into this, it's going to be a lot of work, and I'm not sure how successful I'll be since there are a few things here that will be new to me. But I really would like to be able to at least narrow down when Moise died a little better, and find out when he might have come over, whether it was as a married man or single and he married in Illinois, where in Quebec he came from, and whether Alex and Felicite were really his parents.

...And this all snowballed from one free week of access to one of the World Collection databases on ancestry.com. Kindof hard to think that if all this happens from one database, what would happen if I had full access to the collection? Yikes!

I'm a horrible, horrible blogger...

Yes, I know. I'm a horrible blogger. How in the world did the time get so far away from me? I have a few ideas, including some family issues that had to be taken care of, and then we hit on the holidays and now we're a week and a half away from Christmas. Yikes!

I do have a couple of updates though...well, more like one big one. The genealogical writing study group that we were developing back in the summer and fall is now under way, with the first tester group into its 4th month. After the new year, one of our first writing assignments is going to be blog writing so I'll be sure to post for that. Actually, I need to start thinking about what I could write about. It may even turn out that the blog could serve as a sound board for future writing assignments with the group as well. I'm pretty excited about what could turn up from that.

For now though, I'm getting ready for Christmas and then for my first time at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy. Never heard of it? Check out the website for the Utah Genealogical Association to get the info. If you're familiar with IGHR down at Samford University in Alabama, SLIG appears to be very similar, just with a different setting. I'll be in the Advanced class with Tom Jones, Claire Bettag, and Rick Sayre. If you're familiar with any of those names, then you might get an idea of the value of the course. I can't wait!

Til then, I probably won't have too much to say but who knows. Something may get stuck in my head and I'll just have to share it here. If not though, I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday and I'll see you in the new year!

Have Indiana Ancestors?

I'm taking some time here to make a plea for submissions to the Indiana Genealogical Society's "Always a Hoosier" and "Once a Hoosier" projects. These two projects highlight individuals who either spent some part of their lives living in Indiana, or those who are buried in the Hoosier state. To make a submission, just go to the IGS website and go to the projects page here then click on either "Always a Hoosier" or "Once a Hoosier" depending upon the circumstances of your subject's life. Then download the appropriate submission form and send it off.

For more info on the "Once a Hoosier" project check here

For more info on the "Always a Hoosier" project check here

[Just as a disclaimer, I'm the editor for the "Always a Hoosier" project. We could really use your submissions so if you have an ancestor buried in Indiana, we'd love to hear from you!]

The fine print wins again

I was recently reminded of a very important tip: always read the fine print.

For those of you familiar with Illinois genealogy, you'll know the website for the Secretary of State's office, which includes a few online vital records databases (found here). One of these databases is the the Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, covering 1763-1900. Obviously, not all counties are covered for the whole of the time frame in the title. For one thing, not all of the counties were in existence at the same time. So the title is a little elastic on that front. But when I was wondering where a couple might have gotten married, sometime during the 19-teens, I thought I knew that this database wasn't going to be any help. Yeah, I broke that oh so important rule of not reading the fine print and not remembering that the titles don't always tell the whole story. Here's the page that I forgot to revisit while brainstorming on my latest marriage query:

http://www.sos.state.il.us/departments/archives/marrlst.html

What it is, is a county and time range table listing the availability of the county marriage records which are included in the online database. As you can see, some counties are not included at all, while others only include a portion of time within the titles' date range. The county in which I ended up finding the marriage record I was looking for, was Richland Co. Richland happens to have a date range between 1840 and 1915, well after the 1900 limit established by the title. And Richland county isn't the only one with records included in the online database well beyond 1900. The marriage records for Brown, Fulton, Jersey, Menard, Morgan, Pike, Pope, Stephenson, and Wayne counties all stretch into the 1920s within this database.

And you wouldn't know it unless you read the fine print...

Score!! - Finding Newspaper Bibliographies

One of the coolest things about the genealogical research process, is that success depends upon your usage of a variety of materials - pretty much, everything that is available to you should be consulted. Books that perhaps you never would have laid eyes on before become almost as important as air. Without checking out your sources, including books, you won't break through those brick walls.

One of the most helpful books I've used in the past is John Miller's 1982 work, Indiana Newspaper Bibliography. Like newspaper bibliography books you've probably seen for other states, it is a collection of listings of all known newspapers that were running within the state. It is broken down by county and then by township, and not only gives the names of the papers that ran in each county, but also the dates for each paper, a great tool since some of them didn't last very long, and who opened the press. Not only is something like this extremely useful for finding out when and where there might have been a paper running that could have information pertaining to your subject, but if you have a newspaper man in the family (like I do), these things can become like a second census for you because you can track his movements around the state. It can explain things like why his children were all born in different towns that seemingly have no familial affiliations. So these things are definitely worth having on your bookshelf.

This book has been out of print for quite some time so I've had it on every online wish list I could find (abebooks, amazon, and ebay). I've had no responses to any copies coming up for sale, I contacted the publisher and they didn't have any copies to sell and no plans to put it back in print. If I had found contact information for the author I would have gotten in touch about it. In the meantime, I was constantly ordering the book through Interlibrary Loan and it was getting old. Finally, about 2 weeks ago, I got a hit from abebooks that one had come up for sale from an Indiana bookseller and I jumped on it. It arrived last week and it's mine, all mine!! Finally, I have my very own copy and I couldn't be happier.

I know that Ohio has a similar book for newspapers in its state, by Steve Gutgesell, which you can find on amazon and I've seen others elsewhere too. You can troll around on amazon to check for your own state, or perhaps a better way to do it would be to go on to the Library of Congress website and check their catalog here . Try using search terms like the state's name and "newspapers", or if you're looking for papers within a particular county you can try searching for the county name. I know Kentucky has several localized newspaper bibliographies so for that state, the county search might work best. But try it several different ways and see what comes up. You may find your own piece of genealogical gold within the covers of a book.

Feeling like Hermione Granger tonight

For those of you who are Harry Potter fans, or have kids who like the Harry Potter movies, do you remember that part in the Sorcerer's Stone when Hermione says she was doing "a bit of light reading" and whips up this enormous book? That's kindof how I felt today. I felt like I needed a bit of a distraction and wanted to take on a little project, separate from the other stuff I've been working on. It turned out to be more than just a little distraction though.

I thought revisiting the possible birthplace of John Kleinert would fit the bill for what I was looking for. I have a copy of his 1885 marriage record, a registry entry from Kankakee County, Illinois, which includes a question about place of birth. For John, the village of Tauenzinow, Germany is shown. So I fired up ole' faithful, ancestry.com , and got to the Meyers Orts Gazetteer here . Meyers Orts is pretty much the answer to decoding all those German place names that may or may not still exist. You find a record here in the US with the name of town as it was known in the 1860s but that doesn't mean you'll just be able to find it on a map. Because of all the boundary changes and partitions of the area now covering Germany, the Czech Republic, Poland and any number of other Eastern European countries, you're going to need help finding that 19th century place name. Meyers Orts is your first step.

Now don't go thinking it'll be quite that easy though. Oh no. Meyers Orts is written in Gothic script. And it's in German. And it's full of abbreviations. So go ahead and pull up the name of your town and see what happens. Think you can do it without help on the first try? If you can, you're way better at this than I am. Luckily, I found a great guide available through familysearch.org. It gives general information about the gazetteer as well as an immensely helpful section on deciphering the Gothic alphabet which makes up the abbreviations, followed by a guide to exactly what all those letters mean. The guide and tips can be found here (you can just click on the guide and tips tabs as you go along to help find the info you need as you need it). There's also a pretty useful wiki here

Here's what the entry for Tauenzinow looks like:



I know what I got from it, namely that this place is no longer part of Germany, but Poland. Now what can you find out about your own pre-WWI German place names? If you're anything like me, you'll find that maybe those German ancestors of yours weren't quite as German as you thought.

Still alive, yes...Standing still long enough to chat, not so much

So yeah, where do I begin? In the nearly one month since my last post (ugh, I can't believe I let time run away from me!), I've been run through the ringer and really have a ton to talk about, not a whole lot of time to talk about it, and no clue where to begin. How's that for playing catch-up? Besides the usual back to school rush and any number of other things happening here, here's the genealogical run-down.

For starters, in case you haven't noticed, I'm no great writer. I decided from the start that this blog was basically going to be for me alone and if I could write things that would help other people, that's a bonus. So the voice here is extremely casual, and there's very little pressure on myself here. Which is great, usually. What's happening though is that I'm getting very used to writing for myself in that casual style, and not working enough on professional writing and that could be detrimental to achieving some of my goals. Namely, getting a case study published (hopefully in the NGSQ) and working on my certification portfolio material. I need practice and I need to start taking myself and my work more seriously. That's not to say that I'm chucking my light, casual, no-pressure blog. I like knowing that I can talk about my work and not get all stuffy about it. But to help me get on track with where I need to be professionally, I've been working on developing a new writing group based upon the ProGen model. We're having our first "intro" chat tomorrow and will be kicking off the program shortly. This group is going to be a tester to see if the format will work when applied to a writing program. If it does, we've got some plans for future groups. The goal here is to get everyone comfortable with genealogical writing in as many outlets and formats as possible and to get as much practice and experience as possible, while also receiving some helpful, constructive feedback from peers and a mentor. Those already familiar with ProGen will already have the idea. Those who aren't familiar, get familiar. ProGen should be a valuable part of your genealogical education.

So that's been the big pet project for the summer, part one. The second item that's been keeping me away from the blog for any extended time, is more personal. I've recently gotten acquainted with a couple new cousins on a family that I just rediscovered last year. They've both already done a great deal of work as far as record retrieval and tracking down collateral lines through siblings and children and have developed some leads that it would have taken me quite some time to compile. So we've been trying to get on the same page with our research so we can develop a game plan. It's been good to have another project to work with while I'm waiting for the FHL film for Clinton County, Ohio (yes, still waiting). I had been working on the Atkinson family of that area but needed to view some of the county records to help figure out what my next step might be. So in the meantime, I've got a new line of family from Parke County, Indiana, Greene County, Tennessee, and possibly Botetourt County, Virginia to brainstorm about. Once things get settled down a bit more and my thoughts get a little more clear, I have a feeling I'll be talking about them a lot. For now, we'll call them the Newbies :)