Saturday Night Genealogy Fun -- the Wayback Machine

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Hey genealogy connoisseurs, it's Saturday Night, time for more Genealogy Fun!!
Your mission, if you decide to accept it, is:

1. Go to the Wayback Machine at http://www.archive.org/ (it's right in the middle of the web page)

2. Enter the URL (web address) of your first genealogy blog or website into the search field. [If you don't have a blog or website, then enter your favorite blog or website.]

3. Tell us about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, or in a comment on Facebook. Show us the image of your web page if you can.

Here's mine:

My first genealogy blog was called Randy's Musings, at http://randysmusings.blogspot.com (you get to www.geneamusings.com if you put that URL in the browser address line even now).

It looked like this on 30 April 2006, about two weeks after I started writing the blog:

The description of Randy's Musings said: "Deep thoughts and shallow feelings about genealogy, family, and San Diego sports and whatever else I wonder about in a day..." Cyndi's List still uses this as my blog description, even though I changed it later in 2006.

This was my "blue period" I think. Then I read that the color blue is really boring and would not attract readers, so I changed to bright colors (reds, blues, yellows, etc.) and got more readers.

Note that The Wayback Machine has an entire web page, not just the "look" of the page.

Surname Saturday - CUTTER (England > MA > NJ)

It's Surname Saturday, and I'm "counting down" my Ahnentafel list each week. I'm up to number 59, who is Sarah Cutter (ca 1785-1878).

My ancestral line back through the seven generations of my Cutter ancestral families:

1. Randall J. Seaver

2. Frederick W. Seaver (1911-1983)
3. Betty V. Carringer (1919-2002)

6. Lyle Lawrence Carringer (1891-1976)
7. Emily Kemp Auble (1899-1977)

14. Charles Auble (1848-1916)
15. Georgianna Kemp (1868-1952)

28. David Auble (1817-1894)
29. Sarah Knapp (1818-ca 1900)

58. William Knapp, born 1775 in Dutchess County, NY, and died 16 June 1856 in Newton, Sussex County, NJ. He married about 1804 probably in Woodbridge, Middlesex, NJ.
59. Sarah Cutter, born 06 November 1785 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ; died 06 March 1878 in Newton, Sussex, NJ.

118. Stephen Cutter, born 10 February 1744/45 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ; died 21 June 1823 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ. He married about 1769 in probably Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ.
119. Tabitha Randolph, born before 06 September 1761 in Elizabeth, Union County, NJ; died 26 November 1841 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ. She was the daughter of 238. Samuel Fitz Randolph and 239. Martha Gach.

Children of Stephen Cutter and Tabitha Randolph are: Phebe Cutter (1769-1839); Nancy Cutter (1771-????); Stephen Cutter (1773-????); Mary Cutter (1775-????); Thomas Cutter (1777-????); Richard Cutter (1779-1820); William Whitmore Cutter (1781-1862); Hannah Cutter (1784-????); Sarah Cutter (1785-1878); Samuel Cutter (1787-????); Mary Cutter (1790-????).

236. William Cutter, born about 1722 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ; died 14 February 1780 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ. He married before 1744 in probably Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ.
237. Mary Kent, born about 1726 in probably Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ; died in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ.

Children of William Cutter and Mary Kent are: Stephen Cutter (1745-1823); Richard Cutter (1746-1770); Sarah Cutter (1748-????); Mary Cutter (1750-????); Hannah Cutter (1753-????); Kelsey Cutter (1756-1798); Samuel Cutter (1761-1805); Keturah Cutter (1765-1794).

472. Richard Cutter, born 13 November 1682 in Cambridge, Middlesex County, MA; died 17 December 1756 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ. He married about 1722 in probably Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ.
473. Mercy Kelsey, born About 1698 in Elizabethtown, Union County, NJ; died before 28 May 1760 in Woodbridge, Middlesex County, NJ.

Children of Richard Cutter and Mercy Kelsey are: William Cutter (1722-1780); Joseph Cutter (1725-1767); Mary Cutter (1728-????); Rebecca Cutter (1730-????); Ebenezer Cutter (1732-????); Samuel Cutter (1734-1759).

944. William Cutter, born 22 February 1648/49 in Cambridge, Middlesex, MA; died 01 April 1723 in Cambridge, Middlesex, MA. He married 04 December 1679 in Woodbridge, Middlesex, NJ.
945. Rebecca Rolfe, born 09 February 1661/62 in Newbury, Essex County, MA; died 23 November 1751 in Medford, Middlesex County, MA. She was the daughter of 1890. John Rolfe and 1891. Mary Scullard.

Children of William Cutter and Rebecca Rolfe are: Elizabeth Cutter (1681-1749); Richard Cutter (1682-1756); Mary Cutter (1685-1685); Hannah Cutter (1688-1764); John Cutter (1690-1776); Rebecca Cutter (1693-1718); William Cutter (1697-1756); Samuel Cutter (1700-1737); Sarah Cutter (1702-1788); Ammi Ruhamah Cutter (1705-1746).

1888. Richard Cutter, born 1620 in Newcastle-on-Tyne, Northumberland, ENGLAND; died 16 June 1693 in Menotomy, Middlesex, MA. He married about 1644 in Cambridge, Middlesex, MA.
1889. Elizabeth Williams, born about 1620 in ENGLAND; died 05 March 1661/62 in Cambridge, Middlesex, MA.

Children of Richard Cutter and Elizabeth Williams are: Elizabeth Cutter (1645-1664); Samuel Cutter (1647-????); Thomas Cutter (1648-1690); William Cutter (1649-1723); Ephraim Cutter (1651-1731); Gershom Cutter (1653-1738); Mary Cutter (1657-1711);

3776. Samuel Cutter, born in Northumberland, ENGLAND; died in ENGLAND. He married in ENGLAND.
3777. Elizabeth Leatherhead, born 1578 in ENGLAND; died in Cambridge, Middlesex, MA.

Children of Samuel Cutter and Elizabeth Leatherhead are: William Cutter (1603-????); Elizabeth Cutter (1605-1670); Joyce Cutter (1606-1638); Barbara Cutter (1609-1687); Joanna Cutter (1612-1679); William Cutter (1619-1663); Richard Cutter (1620-1693); Isabella Cutter (1625-1643); Elizabeth Cutter (1630-1669).

I would appreciate being contacted by anyone else who has this family in their ancestry, especially if they have more information than I do about them! With sources, of course!

Using the 1871 Canadian Census on FamilySearch

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I've been looking through the online databases available at the FamilySearch Record Search Pilot site - and came upon the 1871 Census for Canada as one of the recently added or updated databases.

I wondered how I could find the family of Alexander Sovereen in Norfolk county, Ontario in this database. When I selected the 1871 Canada Census from the list, I started filling in the search box for Alexander:




The FamilySearch Record Search site requires the user to choose a place name from a dropdown menu as you type the location into the search field. I chose "Norfolk, Ontario, Canada" for the locality, clicked on "Search" and saw:




Each record listed produces a "mouse-over" when you run your mouse over the person's name, as shown below:




You can click on the name and see essentially the same information for the person:

The record above has no image associated with it. How can I figure out who else was in this family in the 1871 Canada Census? The record data listed the place of enumeration as "Windham, North Norfolk, Ontario" and it was Home Number 174 on Page 49. I should be able to use that to find other persons in the family.

I went up to the "Refine Search" link and clicked on it, deleted the first name, kept the last name, and entered "Windham, Norfolk, Ontario, Canada" in the location field, as shown below:

After clicking "Search" I received 40 matches for those search terms. Here is the top of the first page of 20 matches:

I can find the other persons in the family by finding persons that are listed with Page 49 and Home 174 and write them down. In the screen above, the first entry for Sarah Sovereen showed that she was in Home 174 on Page 49.

I looked at the "Filters" listed, but they showed only "Date," "Gender," "First Names," "Event Type" - not Page or Home number. Drat.

I clicked on the "Advanced Search" link on the Search Box and input the Father's name" as "Alexander" and "Sovereen" as shown below:

After clicking on "Search," I got no results for my search:

So it appears that, for the 1871 Canada Census, that the Parents name box isn't "active."

By clicking through the 40 names, I managed to find that the family included:

* Alexander Sovereen, age 56, born O (line 11)

* Eliza Sovereen, age 49, born U.S. (line 12)

* Sarah Sovereen, age 18, born O (line 13)

* Nancy A. Sovereen, age 16, born O (line 14)

* Valzora Sovereen, age 14, born O (line 15)

* Hettie sovereen, age 12, born O (line 16)

* Alexander A. Sovereen, age 8, born O (line 17)

* Wilber Sovereen, age 3, born O (line 18)

This was really a frustrating exercise. This website has been online for several years now, and the Search fields and navigation links are still fairly primitive. Why aren't there links or buttons to "See all Persons in Home Number" and "See all Persons (or Neighbors) on the Page" so that the researcher doesn't have to do the process I followed above? I note that the 1880 US Census, 1881 Canada and 1881 UK Census records on the classic FamilySearch website have the "Family" and "Neighbor" capability.

If some of the "Advanced Search" box field entries don't work for a specific database, then that information should be included on the search box so that researchers don't waste their time and get frustrated.

The 1871 Canada Census is also online on www.Ancestry.com with all of the sophisticated search capabilities and links to images there. But, since I don't have a World Subscription, I cannot access it at home.

The www.AllCensus.com site has a link to the 1871 Ontario, Canada Census head of household index here, but not to every-name indexes or images.

This isn't just about this particular database - the same issues arise for many of the Record Search databases without images.

I understand that FamilySearch Record Search is a "Pilot" site - meaning that it is not fully developed yet (I think). I would love to know if, and when, the search capability for all databases will be improved or enhanced so that the records found can be accessed efficiently.

I keep having a funny feeling that I'm wrong about this - that I've missed something obvious in the search process above. Have I? If so, please tell me and I'll post how it should be done.

Follow Friday - What's Past is Prologue

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It's Friday, so time to highlight one of the genealogy blogs that I enjoy reading, and think that you will too.

Donna Pointkouski writes the What's Past is Prologue blog:

She describes her blog as:

"Adventures in genealogy."

Her "About Me" page notes:

"What’s Past is Prologue is my attempt to preserve my personal family history and memories, offer research tips and ideas to readers, and practice my writing skills."

Donna's writing skills are excellent, and this lady has a wicked sense of humor also - she is the "The Humor of it" columnist for the splendid Shades - The Magazine on footnoteMaven's Shades of the Departed blog. Earlier "The Humor Of It" columns (pre Shades - The Magazine)are here.

If you don't have What's Past is Prologue on your genealogy reading list, I encourage you to add it.

SDJGS Program on Sunday - Using Ancestry.com Effectively

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The May meeting of the San Diego Jewish Genealogical Society will be Sunday, May 16 from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center San Diego (4126 Executive Drive, near Genesee Avenue in La Jolla, second floor).

The program will be Randy Seaver presenting "Using Ancestry.com Databases and Family Trees Effectively."

The Ancestry.com subscription website has many wonderful features - it's like a lavish buffet where it is hard to choose what to do and how to use it.

* For searches: basic or advanced search; new or old search screens; exact or ranked matches; full names or wild cards; specific or all databases; restricted collection or whole collection.

* For family trees: public or private; one-editor or group editors; GEDCOM upload or enter-by-hand; upload photos and documents; attach historical documents; add stories; "collect" data from others; synchronization with software; etc.

In this presentation, Randy Seaver will discuss and demonstrate these issues and offer recommendations for effectively using Ancestry.com databases and family trees.

Randy Seaver is a native San Diegan, a graduate of San Diego State University in Aerospace Engineering, and a retired aerodynamics engineer with a 38-year career at Rohr/Goodrich in Chula Vista. His ancestry is mainly colonial New England and Upper Atlantic, with some colonial German, French and Dutch forbears, and several 19th-century English immigrants.

Randy's activities include serving the Chula Vista Genealogical Society (former President, currently Newsletter Editor and Research Chairman), speaking occasionally to Southern California societies, libraries and groups, teaching Beginning Computer Genealogy senior adult classes at OASIS, and writing the Genealogy 2.0 column for the FGS’s FORUM Magazine. He is also a member of NGS, NEHGS, SDGS, and CGSSD, and blogs daily about genealogy subjects at Genea-Musings (www.geneamusings.com), The Geneaholic (www.geneaholic.com), and the Chula Vista Genealogy Cafe (http://CVGenCafe.blogspot.com).

For more information, email SDJGS at info@sdjgs.org.

I'm looking forward to meeting with this group and sharing my knowledge about and opinions of effectively using Ancestry.com.

More about Finding and Inputting Record Sources and Citations

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My earlier post this week about Ancestry.com Source citations leave a lot to be desired highlighted the problems with some sources and citations created by Ancestry.com, and passed into online family trees, and then passed into genealogy software databases if the online tree is downloaded as a GEDCOM file.

In the post, I advised that "...all users of online family trees that want satisfactory and useful source citations, is to NOT attach any Ancestry Family Tree data or other database information to your Ancestry Member Tree. If there is data in an online family tree or online database that you want to use, then write it down and add it by hand (or copy and paste it) to your online tree, or to your Family Tree Maker database on your computer. Then create your own sources for that information in either your online tree or your software database, using the principles and models found in the book Evidence! Explained or in the Quick Sheets (both authored by Elizabeth Shown Mills)."

I want to add one more statement to that advice: "Online family trees, online databases, published books and periodicals, and indexes are all 'derivative' sources - they obtained the record information from an 'original' source. Every researcher should strive to find the original source of the information used in their genealogy database and should create a source citation for that information."

In the case of the 1754 birth record for Zachariah Hildreth in the Westford, Massachusetts, I would have created a full reference note citation like this from the printed Westford Vital Records book (using the Evidence! Explained basic format book model on page 642):

Vital Records of Westford, Massachusetts to the Year 1849 (Salem, Mass., The Essex Institute, 1915), 58.

In my genealogy software, I would add the author, book title and publication information in the Master Source field, the page number in the "Citation Page" field, and I would add the record text ("HILDRETH, Zachariah, s. Zachariah and Elizabeth, Jan 13, 1754") in the citation text field. Note: I did this in Family Tree Maker 16 - the terminology for other programs may be different.

This book is on Google Books for reference - here. I'll leave it to the reader to create a citation for this online book source - who will take the challenge?

If a researcher has not found the published book, but has found an online representation of the book, should the source be listed as the online repository (in this case, Google Books) or should the source be listed as the published book? My practice is to cite the published work IF I have photocopied pages from the book and have them in my paper or electronic files, and to cite the online version if that is the only location where I have accessed the work.

Is this Vital Records book an original source for these records? NO - the book is a derivative source (published in 1915) because the information was taken from town record books (handwritten records from about 1701 to 1849). The "Original Source" is really the actual Westford town record books, which may be located at the Westford MA town hall (I'm not sure about this) and are on microfilm through the Family History Library in Salt Lake City -- see this entry in the FHL Catalog for the microfilms of the original town record.

One more nuance - these microfilms are an "Image Copy" of the original handwritten records - should this "Image Copy" be treated as an "Original Source" record? To my mind - it depends on the source. If it is the actual record written by the town clerk (as in this case) at the time of the event, then I consider it an "Original Source" and "Primary Information." If it is a clerk's transcription, a "Record Copy," written some time after the event in an effort to preserve the information in the records (an example would be a land deed or probate record written into a court record), then I consider it a "Derivative Source" and "Primary Information." The reason for the latter practice is that this "Record Copy" may have added errors to the "Original Source" information. Often, we have access, either on actual paper or on microfilms, only to the "Record Copy" of the records.

All of the above is based on the principle that genealogy and family history researchers should seek out, use and cite the most authoritative source they can. In most cases, this should be the "Original Source" in its earliest form, because that is likely to be the most accurate and authoritative resource. Note that there are many examples of "original sources" having erroneous data, and "derivative sources" having more accurate data. Finding and evaluating a range of sources is what "Doing a Reasonably Exhaustive Search" is all about (see the Genealogical Proof Standard for more details).

There were quite a few presentations at the NGS 2010 Conference in Salt Lake City concerning this topic - I encourage readers who want more information to consult the Board for Certification of Genealogists website for more information, and to read articles on the subject on the Ancestry.com Learning Center Article Archives and other locations. I input "sources" in the Search box and received 2058 matches...you may want to refine the search by adding another term like "Mills" (114 matches).

Treasure Chest Thursday - Mary Jane Kemp's Death Record

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It's Treasure Chest Thursday - time to find and share an artifact or record that contributes to my genealogy and family history.

Mary Jane (Sovereen) Kemp died 20 May 1874 in Middleton, Norfolk County, Ontario. I found an entry in the Ontario, Canada, Deaths, 1869-1934 and Deaths Overseas, 1939-1947 database on www.Ancestry.com (accessed and image captured at the San Diego Family History Center) that contains the register entry of her death:

Mary Jane Kemp's record is on the top half of the third column from the right on the image above (no town or county shown on this page, but it is Middleton, Norfolk County) . The information included is:

* No. 13

* Name and Surname of Deceased: Mary Jane Kemp

* When Died: 20th May 1874

* Sex- Male or Female: F

* Age: 33 Years

* Rank or Profession: Wife of James Kemp, farmer, Middleton

* Where Born: Windham, County Norfolk, Canada

* Certified cause of Death, and duration of illness: Typhoid Fever, ill three weeks

* Name of Physician, if any: A.W. Sovereen M.D.

* Signature, description and residence of Informant: A.W. Sovereen M.D. Delhi

* When Registered: 29th May 1874

* Religious Denomination: Baptist

* Signature of Registrar: J.C.H. Herron

* REMARKS: 004105 [stamped]

I learned quite a bit from this record, although I did not learn her parents names from this record (I do know that her parents were Alexander and Eliza (Putman) Sovereen from other records). I did learn the date of death, place of death, husband's name, cause of death, her birthplace, her physician (probably a Sovereen cousin), and her religious denomination.

Vital Records on VitalSearch-ca.com

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Sharon Elliott's blog post How Vital Is VitalSearch? had a table on her Back Track blog in early April that provided a list of state and county vital records available on www.VitalSearch-ca.com .

I printed the table out, that Sharon generated herself. I finally found a web page with the list of databases at http://www.vitalsearch-ca.com/gen/regadvan.htm.

VitalSearch is a subscription site - it costs $57.95 per year (or $24.95 for 90 days), but it seems to have some unique vital record data sets that may contain information on 20th century birth, marriage and death records that cannot be found in other online databases.

My thanks to Sharon Elliott for providing the table of records, and the comments about using the www.VitalSearch-ca.com website. The search function is very primitive, but the site may be useful for some researchers.

CGSSD Meeting on Saturday, 15 May - Wikis for Genealogy

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The next meeting of the Computer Genealogy Society of San Diego (CGSSD) is Saturday, May 15, 2010.

The User Group for Family Tree Maker and SIGs for DNA and New Genealogy Websites meet at 9:00.

After a break and refreshments at 10:00, Randy Seaver presents the main program, “Wikis for Genealogy.”

What is a wiki, and why do I care? A wiki is a website that permits easy creation and editing of interlinked web pages using a markup language or WYSIWYG text editor. Wiki software is used to create collaborative and community websites, corporate intranets and knowledge management systems. The origin of the word: "Wiki-wiki" in Hawaii means something quick and fast. The best online example is Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org) - the online collaborative encyclopedia.

In this presentation, Randy will show and demonstrate some of the currently available wikis for genealogy that permit collaboration on genealogy information and family trees. The benefits and drawbacks of contributing to and participating in collaborative efforts will be discussed.

Randy Seaver is a native San Diegan, a graduate of San Diego State University in Aerospace Engineering, and a retired aerodynamics engineer with a 38-year career at Rohr/Goodrich in Chula Vista. His ancestry is mainly colonial New England and Upper Atlantic, with some colonial German, French and Dutch forbears, and several 19th-century English immigrants.

Randy's activities include serving the Chula Vista Genealogical Society (former President, currently Newsletter Editor and Research Chairman); speaking occasionally to Southern California societies, libraries and groups; teaching Beginning Computer Genealogy senior adult classes at OASIS; and writing the Genealogy 2.0 column for the FGS’s FORUM Magazine. He is a member of NGS, NEHGS, SDGS, and CGSSD, and blogs daily about genealogy subjects at Genea-Musings (www.geneamusings.com), The Geneaholic (www.geneaholic.com), and the Chula Vista Genealogy Cafe (http://CVGenCafe.blogspot.com).

We meet at the Robinson Auditorium complex on the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) campus in La Jolla. From North Torrey Pine Road, turn at Pangea Drive into UCSD. Free parking is available in the parking garage on the left; use any A, B, or S space. Signs will mark directions to our meeting room. Please refer to our website www.cgssd.org; or the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies website http://irps.ucsd.edu/about/how-to-find-us.htm for driving directions and a map.

I plan on being there, but probably won't publish a summary of the talk on this blog.

(Not So) Wordless Wednesday - Post 102: Lyle in Uniform

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I'm posting family photographs from my collection on Wednesdays, but they won't be wordless Wednesday posts like others do - I simply am incapable of having a wordless post.

I managed to scan about 100 family photographs in the Scanfest in January, and have converted the scanned TIF files to smaller JPGs, cropped and rotated as best I can. Many of these were "new" to my digital photograph collection.

Here is a photograph from the Carringer family collection handed down by my mother in the 1988 to 2002 time period:

This picture was taken at the United States Marines encampment in Balboa Park in San Diego during World War I, so it was likely taken in 1917 or early 1918.

My grandfather, Lyle Lawrence Carringer, is the man standing to the left of the tent opening. I don't know the names of the other men in the picture.

Lyle enlisted in the Marines Reserve, but apparently never served anywhere else but in the PX in Balboa Park.