Monday, December 4, 2017

Monday Genea-Pourri - 4 December 2017

Here are some of my genealogy-related activities over the past two weeks:

1)  The Chula Vista Genealogical Society meeting on 29 November was an "Heirloom Show and Tell" program.  Nine CVGS members brought an heirloom to the meeting and described what it was, how they obtained it, what it means to them, etc.  Our webmaster showed photos of the heirloom on the screen while the presenter discussed it.  I took five of my mother's art pieces to share - framed paintings on copper enamel (paint powder carefully placed on copper enamel panels, then fired in a kiln, and assembled and framed) that she gifted us over the last 20 years of her life.  I talked about her art life, from her BS degree in 1940, through the "therapy" at the Spanish Village in Balboa Park as a young mother, the plates and ornaments given to her sons and grandchildren each occasion or Christmas, and her work in widowhood that she sold in local galleries.  Here is one of the pieces:



2) An email came from a distant Seaver cousin who wanted to have a report on her Seaver ancestry.  I made a 46 page, 12 generation report (from the latest known Seaver in her line) with sources but no notes or media, and sent it to her as a PDF file in email and also printed out and mailed to her (she had no printer).  This didn't take very long, and I was happy to "spread the word" about our Seaver ancestry.  This is something that online trees cannot do yet - you still need a genealogy software program to make charts and reports.  

3)  My AncestryDNA Shared Ancestors list has increased from 237 to 243, and I now have 640 4th cousins or closer.  I still have 14 DNA Circles.  I have been going through the Shared Ancestors and 4th cousins and closer lists to add a note that defines the amount of shared DNA, the relationship (if known), the common ancestors (if known), and the ancestral line, based on the Shared Matches list, if no common ancestor is known.  I have many notes that say "line unknown."  I have not started a spreadsheet yet to collect this information.  

4)  Today's Mondays With Myrt honored Pat Richley-Erickson and Russ Worthington for hosting their 800th Hangout on Air discussing the genealogy industry on a near weekly basis.  The presentations include the nearly weekly Mondays With Myrt, Wacky Wednesday, Genealogy Game Night, many Study Groups, "how-to" videos, and more - all available on YouTube and DearMYRTLE's blog.  This has happened over the past 5 years, and is a tremendous body of work.

5)  During my research time, I often find errors in the FamilySearch Family Tree and attempt to correct them.  For instance, last week I found that the ancestry of Simon Bradstreet (1603-1697) had a "ghost ancestor" as his father named Simon Bradsteeet (1580-1621).  His father was actually Simon Bradstreet (ca 1550-1621) according to published peer-reviewed works.  I fixed it.

Last night, I found that my ancestor John Kemp (1768-1861) recently had been given a second family, but the gravestone said that he was age 73 when he died.  A respected Kemp researcher had long identified a John Kemp (1788-1861) as the son of Joseph and Catherine (Bovee) Kemp who was the father for the second family.  I had to disconnect the John 1768 from the second family, then add the correct John 1788 as the father to the family, removed half of the children assigned to the second family (children born In England at the same time frame as the real family was having children in Canada), found and merged duplicate profiles, etc.  I finally got all of it right, I think, at least until someone messes it up again.  The "Watch List" on FamilySearch helps me keep track of my ancestor profiles on Family Tree.

6)  I ran the "Problem List" on RootsMagic, and had 99 errors.  I went through the list, and fixed the obvious ones (e.g., an error in a birth or marriage year), and fixed some of the other problems, such as under age 14 at marriage - some of these were because I knew a baptism date and not a birth date.  Others I left alone - especially fathers having a child after age 70.  I did find several cases where there was probably a second wife of a man with the same first name that children where the first wife's age was over age 50.  

7)  I continue to add new persons to my RootsMagic database, and then TreeSharing daily.  After TreeSharing, Ancestry provides Record Hints and I add the event data and source citations to the database, and then TreeShare the changes.  Then I match and update the data to FamilySearch Family Tree.  I only have to touch a new person twice, so that's not too bad.

8)  I bought a new laptop last week at Costco - an HP Envy 2-in-1 that might also serve as a desktop computer when the current desktop fails.  I set it up, and am transferring data to it using my flash drive.  This is my first foray into Windows 10 so I'm learning new things.  


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