Leave No Stone Unturned -- Finding Information Beyond the Grave

Whenever I attend the Lackey/Sharpe Reunion in Hiddenite, North Carolina, I visit the family cemetery.   It’s a tradition that has been going on my entire life and the lives of my parents and grandparents.  Since I live 8 hours away from Hiddenite, this annual pilgrimage is the only time I can come and pay my respects to my great grandparents and great-great grandparents.  The names engraved on the stones are familiar to me because of stories handed down from my grandfather and other relatives attending the reunions.  I know that spiritually, my ancestors are not there, but in visiting the cemetery, I believe I am keeping their memory alive.

But what about the ancestors we didn’t know we had?  As we discover ancestors, why are we drawn to their resting place?  I think, in a way, as we stand before their headstone, we feel a connection even though we haven’t heard their stories.  For me, it is a hope that they know I care enough to seek them out and get to know them even though they have long since "shuffled off this mortal coil"  (Hamlet 3.1.67).

In the Spring of 2015, my husband and I took a trip to Chicago, Illinois to do some family history sleuthing.  I had been investigating a genetic line of mine that had only recently been revealed to me and I was extremely curious to get to know these people that had passed down their genes to me.  Prior to the trip I researched enough to know this new found paternal family had come from Norway and lived in Chicago before moving on and settling in Pennsylvania. But how did I find their resting place?  

The Death Certificate.

It is amazing at how much information you can glean from a death certificate.   Below we have the death record for my 2nd great grandfather Bernard Clausen.  It gives quite a bit of information.  His name:  notice the abbreviation given as Bernt.  His occupation: Salesman/Pianos.  His date of death: June 14, 1917.  But look!  Something very interesting!  His cause of death: Effects of injuries 'Collision between street car and automobile.  Wow!  I did not see this one coming.  (Well, I guess he didn't either.)  A great piece of information I would later follow up on and will detail in a future post.  But for now, let's look at the bottom of the certificate.

Death Certificate for Bernard Clausen, my great-great grandfather who immigrated from Norway.

At the base of the death certificate we find the name of the informant and his address, as well as Bernard's home address when he died.  We also find the name of the cemetery where Bernt was laid to rest, and even who the undertaker was.  So, while on the surface of this document there remains many missing pieces of the puzzle (birth date and name of parents), we still have quite a bit of information to go on.

The Cemetery

Mt. Olive Cemetery was my first stop.  Cemeteries come in many sizes, and this was an extremely large one.  Large enough to have an office where I stopped to get a map.  This is not uncommon.  Many large cemeteries will have a map that will aid you in finding the plots you are looking for.  While waiting for the clerk to find the location of my ancestral plot, I noticed she pulled a card out of an old fashioned card catalog.  Intrigued, I asked to look at it.  There was some hesitation on her part, but ultimately she agreed.  Below is an image of that card.  Another clue is about to be revealed!

 

Cemetery Plot Record for the Clausen Family. Mt Olive Cemetery, Chicago, Illinois

 Take a close look at this cemetery index record and see what it has to offer.  I thought I would only see a plot number and Bernt's name.  But there was so much more.  On the right of the card is obviously the plot numbers and layout.  It did not surprise me that he had a wife buried with him.  I had learned of her death when I was researching Bernt and his children.  But what I found here was something no immigration record or census record had revealed:  two children - Earl and Ellen.

I knew that Bernard and Jennette had five sons, one of them being named Earl.  Records I had researched had shown the death of a young son Earl, but I already knew of a son Earl that lived to full adulthood.  Norwegian tradition, however, dictates that when a person in the immediate family dies, the next child of the same sex is named after that individual.  So, the living adult child Earl was apparently named after his previously deceased brother Earl.  Mystery solved.  However, there was no record indicating a daughter was born, and no one in the family ever heard of a daughter having been born and lost in this family of all sons.  What a find!  I was anxious to leave the cemetery office and head over to the plot to see the headstones.

This is what I found.

My husband, Ken, stands on the site of where the Clausen's are recorded as being buried.

It is very frustrating to seek out a grave site and find nothing there.  Gravestones provide a plethora of information, and here we have none.  My husband and I searched a 100 yard radius to see if there had been a mistake in the plot location.  We even returned to the office to verify the information given to us and then went back to the site.  No stone.  Very disheartening.  We would have loved to place flowers and taken photos, but it was not to be.

But all was not lost on this visit.  Remember, we found the cemetery plot card and it held details we hadn't known.  The card even revealed who had inherited the plot and who was therefore responsible for it.  I took action and reached out to the descendants of the individual listed on the card, and they had no idea about the cemetery.  In fact, they knew little to nothing about their ancestors, so my correspondence was a revelation to them.

My trek to Chicago was not in vain.  I wanted to know more about my paternal ancestors who had been kept from me.  Following tradition, I had gone to the cemetery to find answers to questions I had about these relatives.  The answers were there.  Well, some of them were, and not in the way I expected to find them, but there nonetheless.  It is a testament that we should leave no stone unturned and always remember to share what we find.  Because...

History Not Shared is History Forgotten!

Sharing Family Memories

As I sit in the Denver International Airport waiting for my flight back to DC, I am filled with excitement to “return and report” all the wonderful things I learned at the genealogical conference known as RootsTech.  To cover it all in one blog post would be insane, so I will stick with the primary theme: Memories

We often think of genealogy as dealing only with the dead.  Well, that is true.  Our ancestors do seem to be the primary focus of family history research.  But how about the living?  We are all family and one day we will be part of someone’s family tree.  Let’s work on our story so that generations to come won’t have to struggle to know us.

Interview and Record.  You’ll be glad you did!

When I was around 9 years old, my family and I took a vacation to Reynolds, Georgia from Lakewood, Colorado.  The purpose of our 1500 mile trip was to make a pilgrimage to see my great grandmother Ollie Posey Wilson.  What we did not know at the time of that visit was that the following summer, Ollie would pass away at the age of 85 years.  It is a visit I will never forget.

One of the reasons I won’t forget the trip is because of the extreme heat.  This was 1976 and we had no A/C in our car.  My father was also trying to defy all records to get to Georgia and back within a certain time frame.  As an adult, I can now understand that he was most likely trying to get back to his job and had limited vacation, but as a 9 year old, to me he was the brute that would allow for only one bathroom break per day of travel and soggy PBJ lunches consumed in the backseat.  My brother and I would vie for space in the cramped backseat that we shared with luggage.  Luggage on the floor.  Luggage between us.  Thank goodness we were small kids.  But I digress.

My great grandmother Ollie was a small woman.  In her prime she was probably 5’3, but as an elderly person she was more around 5 feet.  She wore a simple patterned straight dress.  Her house smelled of lilac.  Her accent was a thick southern drawl.  She loved iced tea.  I had no memory of her from my baby years, but I loved her the moment I saw her. 

Ollie Posey Wilson (RT) with her daughter, my grandmother Kathryn Wilson Watts Kistner.  Circa 1975

My mother had the foresight (or maybe it was planned) to bring a tape recorder with her to this visit.  For about an hour of our visit, my mother and great grandmother talked as the tape recorder dials turned, taking in every word and every noise surrounding them.  Listening now, I am beyond grateful for this tape and the treasures it holds.  I not only have in my possession Ollie’s stories first hand, but I also treasure the sound of her voice and the voices of my parents who have also since passed on.

The details within the stories told that day have opened up genealogical windows – not broken down any walls as of yet – and small details have revealed names of relatives not found in census records.  These were stories of family not written in books.  And, what’s more, just hearing my great grandmother talk about her family opened up an understanding to who she was as a daughter, mother and wife.

"Papa and Mama had to plant corn. Mama dropped and Papa covered it.  They carried me to my aunt's house 'cause I was so bad that my brother couldn't manage me and the baby too.

Oh well, I ran away from my Aunt and went home and made my brother open the door.  I went in and he made me so mad I turned the cradle over and then I slipped back to my Aunt's.  Oh boy did I get a whipping!  I ran from mama all around the potato patch, and when she caught me! Oh my!  I sure got it.  And then, I called my brother a dirty word and oh my! I got it again!”  (Ollie Posey Wilson, 1976.)

What a treasure to hear her talk of her childhood.  I’m sure at the time, she didn’t find it to be a treasure, but to me, it is gold!

We, too, have a story and it is important that we share it.  When we are gone, someone will be ever so grateful to hear our voice and listen to the tales we have to tell about our parents, grandparents and even our siblings.  But where do we begin?

1.     Think small.  Start with just one story and keep it short and simple.  Need a way to prompt for one?  Take out an old photograph that brings back long forgotten memories.

2.     Record your story.  Have an iPhone? At RootsTech I learned of a great program called StoryCorps.  They have an amazing app that allows you to interview family and friends and then preserve your conversation at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.  Imagine that!  Imagine if you had your ancestral stories at your fingertips.  Go to StoryCorps.com and learn more about their program.  It’s free!

3.     Journal.  There are so many ways to journal these days.  Various online journals exist such as JRNL.com – for writing and incorporating digital images, to ProjectLife which is a digital scrapbooking site in which you document your life through your photos.  There are tons of sites out there like the ones mentioned here.  Pick one that is right for you.

4.     Share.   I once heard said, “When a person passes away, a library dies.”  With our passing, so do our stories and memories.  If we think that our lives are mundane and that we have nothing of interest to share with others, we would be wrong.  I would love to read the about the “mundane” day my ancestors had, and I am sure you would, as well.

5.     Encourage others to do the same.  We live in a wonderful age of being able to use media outlets to share our stories.  Schedule a time once a week, or once a month, to sit down with a friend or family member.  Interview each other.  Bring other family members into your “Memories” project and get them excited about their own story.  Your family will be glad you did!

      Remember -- History not shared is History forgotten!

Digitizing and Saving Your Family History Photographs

So, you have inherited a box (or boxes) of family photos and have no idea what to do with them.  They seem old and may be of interest to someone, and you feel like you shouldn’t toss them.  What to do!

First and foremost, go through them.  Each photograph tells a story of someone in a moment in time.  If you are lucky, there will be a name, date and location of where the picture was taken written on the back of the photo.  If there isn’t, don’t panic.  There are a few ways you may be able to deduct who is in the picture.  But we will get to that later.

1.    Sort the photos.  Divide the pictures by time period if you can.  If you come across extremely old photos, like tintypes, you most definitely want to set them apart from all other modern pictures.  Are there theme photos such as family reunions, school pictures or even homesteads?  If so, you can sort that way, too. 

John and Mary Lackey Homestead, Alexander, North Carolina. Built circa 1865.

2.    Identify.  If the photo has a name, date and location on the back, you are lucky!  Too often when we take pictures, we think we will recall names and dates.  The truth of the matter is, we don’t.  However, if you come across a picture of your grandfather, and you know it is a photo of your grandfather, then with pencil write his name on the back of the photo.  Unless you were there when the picture was taken, or you took the picture, you really can’t date the photo.  But you can comment “circa 1950” or something indicating the time period.  If you only “think” you know who the person is, do not write anything on the back of the photo.

Corvisant Wilson with her husband William Hobbs and their children, Tom and Vassar.

3.    Digitize.  Life happens.  Houses flood.  Summer humidity.  People move and forget the boxes in the attic.  If you digitize your family photos and save them on a thumb drive, you will have preserved your family’s photo history for generations to come.  Currently, there are several ways to digitally save your photos:  Dropbox, Trunx, Instagram, or simply on a thumb drive.  If you use a thumb drive, make certain you make that drive distinctive from other thumb drives you are using and place it where you can grab it should you have a house emergency, such as a fire.  (We keep ours in a safe.)

4.    Share.  Any photos you have decided not to keep safe in an album, you should share with other family members.  Perhaps take the extra photos to a family reunion or next gathering with your immediate family.  This would also be a great time to take the pictures you can’t identify and see if there is anyone who can tell you who the photos are about and the stories behind them.

5.    Toss.  Sometimes it is okay to toss out photos.  Photographs of someone’s vacation are not typically something you want to preserve, unless there are some once in a lifetime events in those photos.  (ie. Great Granddad touring Russia or one of your parents visiting the Berlin Wall.)  Keep photos that have meaning and memories for you.

 

Granddaddy Franklin E. Watts.  Snake found while working as a lineman in West Palm Beach, Florida.

6.    Storing.  For the photos you have chosen to keep, think about placing them in a safe album.  If you have numerous albums that must be stored in boxes, make certain they are kept in a dry area free from humidity to avoid mold.  I recently heard about placing rice in cheesecloth in your photo boxes.  The rice will absorb the humidity and keep your photos safe from moisture. 

Who Are These People?

          If you cannot identify a person in the photo, you can do a photo comparison.  Take the photo of the older person and compare it to a photo of a younger person.  Depending on the timeframe of the pictures, you might be able to discern if the man in each picture is the same person in a different time of life.

          Still can’t place a name with the face?  Share on Social Media.  There are sites such as DeadFred.com that will allow you to upload pictures of unknown individuals for others to see and perhaps identify.

Sorting, digitizing and preserving family photos can take time.  Remember to start small.  Only pull out what you feel you can accomplish and put away in one hour.  Slowly but surely you will accomplish this project and be pleased that you were able to share these memories with other people.

Keep in mind:  History Not Shared Is History Lost!