How I’m Spending my Summer

15 July 2011 by Libbi.

When we were in Kentucky for my husband’s grandmother’s 100th Birthday, my mother-in-law gave me her scroll of genealogy.

This is a six foot long handwritten document with  the names, dates and some of the places of the living family members and ancestors she knew about in 1973. She asked me to get it reproduced, but I have yet to find a place that can scan this 2 foot by 6 foot scroll on a flat surface, and it is too delicate to feed through a sheet feeder.

It should be noted that she does not have the documentation to go with it. It comes from some interviews with people living at the time, some information from printed genealogies, some personal knowledge (e. g. she was at some of the funerals, so she remembers those dates), and a little bit of hands-on, 1970’s style research in libraries and courthouses. I don’t know how much of this data is provable, in other words.  Maybe all, maybe some, maybe just from the people she and I know or knew personally.  It’s all right with me if she doesn’t need any more evidence, but I’d like to find some just for myself.

The solution I have come up with is to try to type all this data into Ancestry.com, and then find a way to output it. As I type, I am looking for the little leaf hint that says some form of documentation may exist  for that person, hoping to fill in the gaps with census records and so on. I am also searching the Web for the names of the 19th, 18th and 17th century people on the scroll. I hope to come up with something!

Then, Russ Worthington suggested for output I try GenealogyPrinters.co.uk . They offer a variety of styles and as much or as little details as you like, from about $50US and up. He has had one project completed by this company and was very pleased with it.

So that’s what I’m doing this summer!

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Google+ Impressions

13 July 2011 by Libbi.

So I’ve been trying Google+ ever since my son Matthew sent me the invitation July 8 and I’m ready to give a few thoughts about it on my blog.

1. The “circles” feature is much like “groups” in Facebook, but easier to use. The list of your circles (e. g. Family, Friends, Acquaintances, etc.) is always on the left, so filtering the “stream” is much easier. Creating circles is also much, much easier than creating groups in Facebook. Instead of pawing through each and every friend, you just drag and drop, or when someone adds you, you can put them in a circle with one click.

2. With the installation of StartGoogle+, a Google Chrome browser plug in specifically designed to help make the process of transitioning from Facebook to Google+ as smooth as possible, the new social network is is easy to use. You can also track Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ all at once with this plug in. The StartGoogle+ instructions also say that if you use it to log into Twitter and Facebook using the plugin,  your Google+ posts will appear on the two others.  I have not yet gotten that feature to work, but I’m sure that is operator error.

3. It can be useful for genealogy if you create a circle just for your genealogy buds, and post your genealogy  queries to that circle only.

4. I am in love with the “Hangout” feature. I just had a really fun hangout with +Russ Worthington about Google+, the video features, EfM, printing genealogies, and more! I want to use that with my kids, siblings, cousins, etc!

5. Posting your pictures, especially your profile pictures, from Picasa on your desktop to Google+ is not as easy and intuitive as it should be. I expect they will tweak that in future.

6. Like Twitter, someone can follow you but you don’t have to follow them (see their posts) back. In Facebook, it must be mutual.

7.  With all of that said, Google+ still does not feel quite so friendly as Facebook. The interface is clean and open, but not “cozy.”  Once I get more used to it, perhaps that will change.

I shall keep experimenting with this new tool and put some observations on a later blog.

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Genealogy Serendipity!

11 July 2011 by Libbi.

On my way to volunteer at the Panhandle Butterfly House this morning, I stopped for coffee at a little cafe that I have been meaning to try out for some time, Higher Ground Coffee and Tea Co.  It’s on US 98, on the north side just before the exit to SR 87.  As I walked in I saw on the white board menu for breakfast and lunch: HOT BROWN Sandwiches! Hot Browns! In Florida!!

Of course I had to ask how they knew about Hot Browns…and it turns out that though they grew up in Fort Walton and Navarre, the owner and his wife both have family in Kentucky & both went to Berea College! And the wife’s brother, who also works in the cafe, is a newly minted and highly enthusiastic genealogist!! We spent the next 30 minutes happily discussing genealogy, my book, Genealogy Online 9/E, Ancestry.com, military records, and on and on and on. Oh, and the University of Kentucky!

I just love genealogists!!

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My faovrite Derby Week Recipes!

4 May 2011 by Libbi.

It’s Derby Week and I’m having a Derby Party. The Kentucky Derby is always run the First Saturday of May, and the parties start about a week before that…..Here are my two favorite recipes for this tradition.
HOT BROWN SANDWICH

Recipe By     :
Serving Size  : 4  Preparation Time :0:00
Categories    :

Amount  Measure       Ingredient — Preparation Method
——–  ————  ——————————–
1 1/2         pounds  chicken breast — cooked
4             slices  white bread — trimmed l/2″thick slices
4             slices  bacon — crisp
1/4           cup  Parmesan cheese — grated
2              large  eggs — beaten
1           teaspoon  salt
1/4      teaspoon  pepper
2          teaspoons  lemon juice
1/4           cup  flour
1/2         stick  butter
2               cups  milk — heated
additional grated Parmesan cheese
4              whole  roma tomato — sliced

Skin and bone chicken and slice each half lengthwise. Toast bread butter lavishly and place in a 200F oven to crisp while preparing sauce.

Melt butter, remove from fire and stir in flour until there are no lumps. Return to fire and cook a minute or two. Add hot milk and stir until perfectly smooth. Cook, stirring constantly, until thickened. Add cheese. Stir about ½ cupful of mixture into eggs, then pour this back into sauce and cook a minute longer, stirring all the time. Add salt, pepper and lemon juice.

To assemble sandwiches: Place toast in an ovenproof platter and arrange  chicken slices on top, allowing ½ breast per serving. Cover each with ½ cup of sauce and sprinkle with grated Parmesan. Run under the broiler for about 1 minute or place in a 425 oven until speckled with brown.  Arrange tomato and top with bacon crosswise on top and serve at once.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

NOTES : Turkey and country ham may be substituted for chicken and bacon.

MINT JULEPS EN MASSE

Recipe By     :
Serving Size  : 0     Preparation Time :0:00
Categories    :

Amount  Measure       Ingredient — Preparation Method
——–  ————  ——————————–
1 1/2      teaspoons  Simple Sugar Syrup — See directions
2             ounces  bourbon — Makers Mark!
sprig  mint — fresh
ice

Everybody has his own idea about making a julep. Proportions vary as much as method, but most people will like these.
Make a simple syrup by boiling 2 cups of sugar and 2 cups of water for 5 minutes, without stirring. Fill a jar loosely with sprigs of fresh mint (uncrushed) and cover with the cooled syrup. Cap and refrigerate 12-24 hours. Discard mint.
Make 1 julep at a time: Fill a chilled julep cup with finely -shaved ice, pour in half a tablespoon of the mint flavored syrup and 2 ounces of the very best Kentucky Bourbon, frost, stick in a sprig of mint and serve at once. If there is room in the freezer, you can get a head start by putting the first batch, without mint, in it. The refrigerator is not cold enough.
To frost: Grasp the rim of the filled julep cup with your fingertips and rapidly twist the cup back and forth until the outside is covered with a heavy frost. Or churn with a spoon.

Source:
“The Farminton Cookbook 1979 page 157″

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From Argentina to the BVI, Family Search’s Index grows!

26 April 2011 by Libbi.

Latest Additions Reach New Milestone in Free Online Historic Record Collections    

The latest additions to FamilySearch’s online collection of free historic record collections pushes it to 600! That’s right, 600 free, original source record collections online from all over the world. The tally of insomniacs will certainly expand as the numbers of family history researchers enjoy the latest updates. This week there are new international records from Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, France, Italy, Jamaica, Mexico, Peru, Poland, and Spain. Now take a seat while the list of updates for the U.S. collections are noted—California, District of Columbia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, Washington State, Wisconsin, and the Virgin Islands. Whew! See the table below for details. You can search all of the record collections now for free at FamilySearch.org.

If you are enjoying the steady stream of free records added weekly, please consider “giving back” as a FamilySearch volunteer. You can start and stop volunteering at any time. Find out more at indexing.familysearch.org.

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Latest DNA + Genealogy Round Up

26 April 2011 by Libbi.

 

DNA program during Genealogy meeting

Brazil Times - ‎Apr 22, 2011‎

 

TERRE HAUTE — At the regular meeting of the Wabash Valley Genealogy Society Monday, May 9, Alan Teller will present, “DNA Testing for Genetic Genealogy or DNA Testing for the Layman.” The program is open to the public and will take place from …

 

Spare Times for April 22-28

New York Times - Liz Maurer - ‎Apr 21, 2011‎

 

features Pearl Duncan, an African-American author who shares how she used family nicknames, DNA and genealogy to trace her lineage to families named Opare of the Akan people of Ghana and to Scottish-Americans and British royals; Wednesday at 7 pm, …

 

Victoria Genealogical Society hosts meeting

Victoria Advocate - ‎Apr 21, 2011‎

 

June 4, the Clayton Library in Houston will host a seminar on DNA. The speaker will be Debbie Wayne. All meetings start at 7 pm and are held at the First Christian Church Fellowship Hall, 2105 N Ben Jordan St., All members and guests are urged to …

 

Martin County Community Calendar Updated April 25

TCPalm - ‎Apr 25, 2011‎

 

MC Genealogical Society: “Genealogy & DNA” workshop. Robert Morgade Library, 5851 SE Community Drive, Stuart, 10:15 am-noon, May 14. Ages 12+. Donation. 772-220-1638; mcgensociety.org. “The Honeymooners”: Relive classic moments that shaped future of TV …

 

Martin County Community Calendar Updated April 22

TCPalm - ‎Apr 22, 2011‎

 

MC Genealogical Society: “Genealogy & DNA” workshop. Robert Morgade Library, 5851 SE Community Drive, Stuart, 10:15 am-noon, May 14. Ages 12+. Donation. 772-220-1638; mcgensociety.org. “The Honeymooners”: Relive classic moments that shaped future of TV …

 

Curtin Clan Surname Gathering in Chicago

Online PR News (press release) - ‎Apr 23, 2011‎

 

The conference will cover Curtin genealogy, Irish heritage, local speakers and attendees can meet Margaret Curtain of Australia, world’s foremost authority on the Curtins of Ireland. The Gathering will be held at the Irish American Heritage Center in …

 

We are family

Guelph Mercury - ‎Apr 22, 2011‎

 

In a larger sense though, it is more than just having DNA in common and being on the same genealogy chart. I did a word search through the electronic version of the Baha’i Writings and came up with 3251 hits. Clearly, this is worthy of close …

 

Sackets Harbor woman follows family history back to her doorstep

WatertownDailyTimes.com - ‎Apr 23, 2011‎

 

It reflects on three specific categories which they request whenever authors submit work to their publishing company: American history, local history, and genealogy. “The history of my family in America begins when my emigrant ancestor, …

BU Today

African woman warrior captures BU historian’s passion

BU Today - Susan Seligson, Kalman Zabarsky - ‎10 hours ago‎

A recent fellow at Harvard’s WEB Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research, Heywood had her DNA tested as part of the African American Lives, Genealogy, and Genetics project featured in a four-part PBS series hosted by institute …

Hi Matt!

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Pets and puns

25 April 2011 by Libbi.

This blog is in response to Week 17. Pets. Did you have any pets as a child? If so, what types and what were their names. Do you have pets now? Describe them as well. If you did not have pets, you can discuss those of neighbors or other family members. This challenge runs from Saturday, April 23, 2011 through Friday, April 29, 2011. Amy Coffin of the We Tree blog (http://wetree.blogspot.com/) is responsible!!!

We have a long family tradition of puns as names for our pets. Or at least descriptive quotations. Some examples:

• The first dog I remember was a rat terrier mix. She was a great watch dog, my father declared. Her name was TickTock.
• After TickTock we had a fluffy little dog with various degrees of spitz, some sort of herding dog, maybe Corgi, and many other breeds. The dog’s name came from his white feet and an old  TV show: Sugarfoot. Sugarfoot made the news. He bit a child, so we had to take him to the pound. the pound tried to test out a new tranq gun, I believe it was, on him. Sugarfoot was too fast on his feet for them, they never landed a shot on him. He made the Huntsville Times and someone adopted him. If I ever find my childhood scrapbook, I’ll scan in the newspaper article.
  
• When our rector gave us one of a litter of kittens, of course we named the cat Lucifer.
•  When we had a cat that couldn’t seem to see at night very well, bumping into beds and other furniture, his full name became “Long Leggety Beastie and Thing that Goes Bump in the Night”, usually shortened to Long Leggety.  That’s from an old prayer, “From ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged-ty beasties, and things that go bump in the night, may the Lord protect us.”
  
• We had a cat who would purr, knead and slobber on a wool afghan we had, for all of his long life. He was EddyPuss.
  
• When Mark and I were newlyweds, we got a cat, a purebred Himalayan. We stopped by a friend’s house on the way home to show him off. The friend, who at the time managed a Long John Silver’s, put together our name, the Siamese look of him, and came up with Simon CroweCat.

Yeah. We’re sick people!

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Press Release–National Archives to Host Conference on Media Access to Government Information April 12

9 March 2011 by Libbi.

Press Release
March 7, 2011
National Archives to Host Conference on Media Access to Government Information April 12

Washington, DC…The National Archives and Records Administration and Duke University’s DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy will host the Media Access to Government Information Conference (MAGIC) on Tuesday, April 12, 2011, from 9 a.m. – 4:30 p.m., with a networking reception from 4:30 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. The event will be held in the William G. McGowan Theater of the National Archives Building in Washington, DC, located on the National Mall. Please use the Special Events Entrance, Constitution Ave. and 7th St., NW.

This conference is free and open to the public, but registration is required (e-mail MAGIC@nara.gov). A continental breakfast, lunch, and refreshments will be provided.

Journalists, bloggers and others who write about public affairs will gain insights and learn strategies for improving access to government records. Experts from within the Federal government and from the private sector will provide roadmaps to the often frustrating and challenging task of tracking down government information.

Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero will welcome the participants. Government officials, reporters, scholars and NGO leaders who will participate in the discussions include: Gary Bass, Founder and Executive Director, OMB Watch; Sarah Cohen, Knight Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy, Duke University; William Kammer, Chief, FOIA Division, U.S. Department of Defense, and Vice President, American Society of Access Professionals; Miriam Nisbet, Director, Office of Government Information Services, National Archives; Derek Willis, Web developer, New York Times; Jennifer LaFleur, Director of Computer-Assisted Reporting, ProPublica; Mark Horvit, Executive Director, Investigative Reporters and Editors; and Charles Lewis, Executive Editor, Investigative Reporting Workshop.

The conference will address the following issues:

* Improving access to federal government records;
* Analyzing technical challenges faced by journalists in making sense of government documents;
* Exploring hurdles to gaining access to state and local records;
* Identifying actions that the private sector can take to help journalists access and analyze government records.

More information about the conference is at  http://www.archives.gov/ncast/news/events/magic.html

# # #

For press information, contact the National Archives Public Affairs staff at 202-357-5300.

11-90

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Groundhog Day, Candlemas, and St. Blaise

2 February 2011 by Libbi.

February 2 in our calendar has many traditions: among them St. Blaise Day, Candlemas, and of course in the U. S., Groundhog Day! It is also a cross-quarter day…halfway between a solstice and an equinox.
Candlemas Day traditionally marked the Presentation of Christ in the Temple, and of course Simeon’s beautiful song,

Nunc dimittis
Luke 2:29-32

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, *
according to thy word;
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, *
which thou hast prepared before the face of all people,
To be a light to lighten the Gentiles, *
and to be the glory of thy people Israel.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: *
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever. Amen.

Traditions of this feast include the blessing and burning of candles.

It is also the feast of St. Blaise, who, because of several miracles attributed to him during his lifetime, is associated with complaints of the throat. The prayer for his day:

Saint Blaise, pray for us that we may not suffer from illnesses of the throat and pray that all who are suffering be healed by God’s love. Amen

Groundhog Day is our U. S. transplanting of many European traditions that this midwinter’s day can predict the coming of spring, such as this rhyme:

If Candlemas be fair and bright,
Winter has another flight.
If Candlemas brings clouds and rain,
Winter will not come again.

Of course, like many folk tales, the connection to reality is tenuous. We are six weeks from the spring equinox, come sunshine, snow, or high water! 

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Week #5 : 52 Weeks of personal History.

1 February 2011 by Libbi.

Here’s this week’s challenge:

Week 5: Favorite Food. What was your favorite food from childhood? If it was homemade, who made it? What was in this dish, and why was it your favorite? What is your favorite dish now?

 My favorite food is still one of my favorites: Mama would make a dish of white sauce, onion, mushrooms and pimientos, with a drained can of tuna added in. This would be put on biscuits, toast points, or English muffins for any meal of the day, including breakfast.

Actually Mama would cook anything for breakfast, as long as she could get us to eat before we left the house. Soup, milkshakes made with egg and fruit, even scrambled eggs with catsup (my brother Bill loved those!) would be considered fair game!

 

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