Saturday Night Genealogy Fun -- Five Questions For An Ancestor

 Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: 

 It's Saturday Night again - 

Time for some more Genealogy Fun!!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible! music) is to:

1)  If you could go back in time to interview one of your ancestors, what questions would you ask him or her?  Tell us your selected ancestor's name, their birth and death years/locations, and their spouse's name and marriage date/location.  List at least five questions to ask that selected ancestor.

2)  Tell us about your selected ancestor and your questions for them in a blog post of your own, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Facebook comment.

Here's mine:

My selected ancestor is my third great-grandfather Samuel Vaux (1816 in Somerset to 1880 in Kansas), who married Mary Ann Underhill in 1837 in New York.  

My questions are (I have six...):

• What do you recall of your home and family living in South Petherton, Somerset?  Where was it located, what was the house like, who was in your family?  What were your chores, education, friends, entertainment, and fun experiences. 
• Tell me a story about migrating from England to New York in 1832 on a sailing ship with your family - discuss the trip, the quarters, the food, the landing, and ground travel to and from the ship.
• What advice and wisdom did your father (or mother) give you about selecting a wife, marriage relations, family traditions, being a husband and father, etc.
• Why did you move from Aurora, New York to Dodge County, Wisconsin in 1854, to Andrew County, Missouri in 1867, and to Kansas in 1880?
• What was the hardest work you ever performed, and what was the most satisfying and rewarding work?
• When and where were you the most happy and content, and when and where were you the most fearful and worried?  Why?

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My Interview with The Passionate Genealogist

...
One of the really fun times at the 2011 Federation of Genealogy Societies Conference in Springfield, Illinois (see The Seaver Family History Mystery Tour Compendium for daily accounts) was meeting many more genealogy bloggers in person and talking with them.

Ruth Blair, who writes The Passionate Genealogist blog, asked if she could do an audio interview with me, and we sat down in the Blogger Lounge, on the comfortable couches provided by FamilySearch, and she asked me a series of questions about my genealogy journey.  The 16 minute interview can be heard on Ruth's blog post, Interview with Randy Seaver, posted today.

The questions posed by Ruth included:

1)  When did you first start recording your Family History?

2)  What was the catalyst that got you started?

3)  What countries are your ancestors from?

4)  What is your favorite part of family history research?

5)  What was the most surprising discovery in your family history?

6)  What is your most frustrating research problem?

7)  What is the most satisfying research problem?

8)  How do you organize your family data and ephemera?

9)  What would be your best tip for someone starting out in genealogy?

Please listen to the interview to hear my answers!!  Ruth did an excellent job of keeping the ball rolling here, and I was my typical prolix self genea-babbling away.

Thank you to Ruth Blair for taking the time to sit with me, ask interesting questions and for posting the interview.  I enjoyed meeting Ruth and her colleague, Louise St. Denis at their National Institute of Genealogical Studies booth at the FGS Conference.

Thomas MacEntee's Interview with Elizabeth Shown Mills

Here's a little test:

*  is "bathroom wallpaper" a source?

*  what is a "Gee-Whiz" tree?

*  who is St. Genie?

One of the really neat "coming of age" signs for genealogy bloggers is that there are many more interviews of important people in genealogy and family history research.

Thomas MacEntee's interview with Elizabeth Shown Mills on the Geneabloggers blog is priceless - it's informational, it's humorous, it's creative.  Excellent questions and amazing answers.

Read all of it at http://www.geneabloggers.com/interview-elizabeth-shown-mills/.  Nailed. it. well!

I almsot had a genea-gasm over this one!