Monday, July 27, 2009

Carlsbad Library Research Trip Summary

The Chula Vista Genealogical Society Research Trip on Saturday, 25 July was to Carlsbad's Georgina Cole Library, which has one of the best genealogy book, periodical and microfiche collections in Southern California. Eight of our members went, carpooling the 42 miles each way from Chula Vista.

To prepare for this trip, I searched:

* NEHGR, TAG and NGSQ for book reviews of new books that are of interest to me.

* Updated my "Books I Want to See" to-do list, adding the items above.

* Checked the Carlsbad Library Catalog for the books on my list and for information on the Lanfear/Lanphear/etc. family, and on Jefferson County NY.

When I got to the library, I:

* Put money onto the copier card!

* Read the Family Chronicle periodical available on the shelf - I don't subscribe, but wanted to read several articles. I copied some of them for more critical review.

* Reviewed the book An Osgood and Thayer Genealogy by Franklin Baker Osgood and Virginia Anne Thayer. This is in two large volumes, and has many of my colonial New England ancestors back in the 17th century. I think that I have most of the information in this book, and probably more for some families.

* Found the 1890 Plat Book of Dane County, Wisconsin on the shelf (browsing), and copied pages showing the townships, the indexes for Severson, Leland and Natwig, and the maps for Deerfield and Cottage Grove townships. A beautiful book! All of the names on the maps are indexed!

* Checked all of the Jefferson County NY books on the shelf for Lanfear/Lanphear and didn't see anything new. Now I realize that I didn't check the Tree Talks binder for that county. Oops.

* Found the Andrew County, Missouri index of wills book that I've overlooked before; I saw it in Salt Lake City in January. I could have found my Devier Lanphear Smith adoption much earlier if I had searched for this book previously.

* Found the Andrew County, Missouri Historical Society book of cemetery inscriptions, Volume II, and found that Ranslow Smith (not my ancestor, adoptive father of my Devier Lanphear Smith) was buried in Empire Presbyterian Cemetery in the eastern part of the county. But it says he died 1873, not 1875. Wonder which is right?

* Skimmed the Diane Rapaport book on New England Court Records. Excellent book, may buy it.

* Saw two New Hampshire books on the shelf - William Copeley's New Hampshire Records and the Diane Gravel/David Krueger book on New Hampshire Families 1790, Volume 1. Looked through them for Seaver, Newton, Smith and Sawtell records but didn't see any that fit my problem children.

We took a 30 minute break at noon for lunch out on the picnic tables in front of the library and had a great discussion of online and repository resources.

Somehow all of that took up four hours. Time sure flies when you're having fun!

1 comment:

gsgenealogy said...

Randy,

I have some Thayer relatives to check in the Thayer book you mentioned. Unfortunately my gen. research is packed up but I will put it in my gen research notebook to check later. Thanks for the tip!