I Can't Stop Thinking About This

Bea and her daughter, Ann, circa 1954?

 I am preparing mentally, to teach a class for the Center for Lifelong Learning (January Session 2020).  Here are some of my thoughts:

Ten Ways to Grow Your Family Tree
12/27/2019
Way #1:
 Refresh your approach to genealogy/family history and related research habits. 
    Here are some "refreshing" tips.  Can you add to this list?      Please share!
Read a book.  When was the last time you read a good book?Access Amazon.com (many of you already have an account, there, right)? In the "search box" enter something like 'genealogy books'.  You can do the same search at Google, otherwise.  Many libraries also stock "how to" books that you can check out (do you use overdrive)?.  Does your library have inter-library loans?  What is the best (most comprehensive) guide for finding a library book?  Here are some links:
    1).  World Cat: get a free account...really...FREE.  (worldcat.org).
    2).  ReadOkaloosa.org (tap into "card catalog")
    3.).  What is overdrive?  This is a site that will let you download (borrow) digital books from your locale.  Link for Okaloosa: okaloosa.overdrive.com
Join a genealogy society, attend a genealogy conference (online or in person), take a genealogy class, seek learning resources online.
Do-Over: https://genealogydoover.com/
Buy or download a new version or a different genealogy software program
Put your database to the test: Share Online
Don't become THE WOWOG.  Genealogy standards remain sacrosanct.  The guidelines have been tested.  You can re-invent the wheel, but don't break the "rules".  Agree or Disagree?  Where does your own personal style end and monotony creeps in?

CHANGE UP YOUR STYLE:  Maybe, just maybe, you do't have to do the same old things in the same old ways.  While you don't want to re-invent the wheel, maybe you do need a fresh start in less startling ways than the "Do Over" project.  This could be accomplished by simply changing (for the better) where and when you work on your genealogy.  Thoughts?





Your question may well be: What is a WoWog?

Introducing Children to FamilySearch

This photo "talks" to me about how parents can begin early in a child's life to "teach" a concept like family.  Mother holds the baby, lovingly, and invites a young child to participate.  

Words like "soft" are said quietly.  "Gentle" is a concept that is first mimicked by the mother and then, the older child is invited to do likewise.

While the picture is of children who are probably too young to use a computer, learning the idea that families contain individuals that are are of varying size, age, personalities, etc., doesn't even require using a lot of wordy language.  Sharing photos, organizing family gatherings, the writing and sending of letters or communications to family members or even just celebrating a birthday---all are steps in the child learning that there such a thing as a family unit containing father, mother, siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins!

The first introduction that any child has to any segment of the lives that we can lead is the example of the parent(s).  Seeing your busy mother dedicate a part of her day or week to record her family tree on the computer at FamilySearch.org, may seem like a small thing, but that action becomes to the child an essential lesson: Family history is important.  Perhaps unspoken, but evident is the part that they can someday participate in preserving family stories, and other related activities.

Where would you begin to introduce your children to research, recording, and/or the organization and preservation of records?  How young is too young?   You may be surprised that you are halfway there!

Harry Holding and Family in 1920 Census

So Harry Chris Holding is in Detroit, (District 3), Michigan, for the 1920 U.S. Federal Census!  The date of enumeration is 5 January, 1920.  People went where the jobs were: Harry's occupation is butcher at the meat packing complex.  

Or sometimes, maybe, folks may have followed relatives to a location or vice versa; they moved, for example, to be closer to the wife's family?  

Harry (aka "Chris") and his wife, Blanch (no "e" in this record), now have five children!  There are also a couple of boarders in the household.  They are working as teamsters at the trucking company.

Harry, here, is reported to be age 30, Blanch(e) is age 25, "Kathrine", (misspelled), Holding is age 10; Harry, Jr. is age 8, Laura is age 7, Samuel is age 2 and there is a baby, Eugene, age 3 months.

Looking at this census page, I see a couple of familiar names--there is a Blanche Clark and an entry for a Mr. Yeager from Kentucky.  Harry's mother was a Yeager.  Blanche's maiden name was Clark!  Not sure whether these are relatives, yet.  Or related.  But chances are good that they are!

My Husband's Family: The Holding's

Edgar Lawrence Harris, Sr. with wife, Louanna, and two children.

My husband, Edgar Joseph Harris, (aka Edgar Lawrence Harris, Jr.), was related to the family of Harry and Blanche Holding on his mother's side.  In fact, Harry was his maternal grandfather.  (See Harry's profile at FamilySearch, PID  

Whether the two ever met is a question that I can't answer, (research in progress), but also due to the hardships that faced the young family in which Ed was the oldest child.

When my husband was just about six years old, his mother and father separated.  The three older children of that marriage were put into the orphanage at Vincennes, Indiana.  The youngest child was dispatched to the care and keeping of Catholic Social Services and the baby was subsequently adopted out.  Little Ronald Harris was born in 1944 in Indiana.  

Here is one account I found online, by googling "Saint Vincents Orphanage":  
I lived as an orphan at St.Vincents for 11 years, from 1937 to 1948. I held the record for the longest time there. At the time, I didn't know any better about the outside world, since I was only 2 years old at the time that I arrived. I had nothing to compare it to when I was little. I worked on the farm for about 6 or 7 years and the Robert Duffy Family ran the farm for the Catholic Church. The pries that I remember were Fr. Laughtner and Fr. Victor. The Head Nun, who I thought was very mean, was Sr. Norberta. My favorite nun was Sr. Rita Jane who ran Dormitory 1, which ad the older boys. Sr. Reginald was the Cook and was really good. All my memories now are very good. I've always wanted to go back for a visit but now I am 81 and Indiana is a long ways away from California. I can now recall St. Vincents, the buildings, the barns, the orchards, everything just as if I were there now. St. Vincents was really good for me. I received a good education, a good work habit, and a good moral compass. I was there during the WWII years when things were tough in this country. We always had a lot of food to eat, good clothes, though we did not wear shoes in the summer, and the people of Vincennes were very good to the orphanage. I think that all things considered, I was very lucky to have spent my youth at St. Vincents. 

Ancestry has a message board for this orphanage/location also:  https://www.ancestry.com/boards/localities.northam.usa.states.indiana.counties.marion/7111/mb.ashx

My husband, Ed, didn't have a great deal of positive memories about his experience at the orphanage.  He was separated from his brother and his sister, probably according to age and gender.  However, at some point there was a farm couple who came to take the boys (foster parents).  Their sister was eventually adopted out and raised by a couple.  I can perhaps provide more information at a later time.

The Holding family in 1910 (my husband's mother was a Holding):  The location, here, is Indianpolis Ward 14, Marion County, Indiana, Roll T624_367; Page 12 A.  Harry Holding is the Head of Household; he is age 21.  His wife, Blanche, is age 18, and their sole child at this time, Katharine, is age 1.  [This family would grow over the years; Harry and Blanche had 14 children!]  The source for the 1910 Census  was Ancestry.com.