Cyndi’s List

Could you imagine going into a library and finding the books in utter chaos? There’s no card catalog even to look through to locate the book you need. Your visit to the library would be a waste of time. In a way, this resembles the organization of genealogy resources on the internet. Where is what and who has what can be frustrating when researching your ancestors. Not all information is available on FamilySearch, Ancestry, Findmypast, and MyHeritage. Thanks to the hard work of Cyndi Ingle we have a “card catalog” of genealogical internet links organized into subjects making it easier to find the sources that you need.

Cyndi has gathered (at latest count) 336,769 links and has organized them into 220 categories. She receives almost 300 emails daily to categorize. Cyndi’s List (www.cyndislist.com) is a free website. She calls it “your genealogical portal onto the internet.”

She has very easy to understand categories. Cyndi has alphabetized the categories with the U.S. states being listed under the United States and not by their specific name. It is the same with all the countries. You need to go to the country and then find the area you would like to research.

One of the more interesting categories is Outer Space. There are two subcategories under Outer Space: Astronauts and General Resources. Under Astronauts, you find links to biographies and information on U.S. Astronauts. The General Resource section takes you to the “Alien Spaceship Theory of Genealogy,” It even links you to Fold3’s section on government investigations of UFO’s. Maybe one of the investigations involved an ancestor of yours! You can also find the Skywalker Family Tree from the Star War movies.

On a more serious note, for instance, if you search the category for Quakers, Cyndi’s List will link you to sites where you can find vital records, cemeteries, meeting records and much more. It even takes you to how-to guides if you are not sure how to research your Quaker family. If you are researching a U.S. state such as Ohio, there are 5,929 links relating to Ohio research. What a goldmine of information.

Cyndi’s List is a great resource to point you to internet sites that will help you answer your research questions and should be your starting point in your genealogical research. Give Cyndi’s List a try and see what you can discover about your ancestors.

Utah Pioneers

“They say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.” — Banksy.

Is this a fear that our ancestors now realize? Will those who have sacrificed all so that we live comfortably be forgotten and lost from memory too? Will their stories vanish, and their names never mentioned again? Forgetting our ancestors will happen unless we try to keep their memories alive and gratitude in our hearts for giving their all for us, their posterity.

There are several organizations whose goal is to keep these memories alive. One is the Daughters of Utah Pioneers (DUP). DUP is “dedicated to honoring the names and achievements of the men, women, and children who founded Utah.” DUP maintains a collection of over 42,000 pioneer histories. They consider an ancestor a pioneer if they came to the Utah Territory, died crossing the plains, or was born before May 10, 1869, when the railroad came to the territory.

DUP also has a fabulous website, isdup.org. On this website, they have links to indexes of histories and photos. These indexes are valuable to see if DUP has information on your ancestors. You can order a history from their website. To request a history, you must either be a member of DUP or a direct descendant of pioneers. You will need to send a copy of your pedigree chart and highlight ALL the names for which you want histories. Some pioneers have multiple histories. The histories cost 25 cents per page with a minimum of $1.00. They will contact you about the cost of your order before they send it to you. They also have a Photo tab. Under this tab is an index for the photos they have in their collection. Photos are sent on a CD and cost $5.00 an image. You can also get copies of the histories and photos by going to the Daughters of Utah Pioneers main museum in Salt Lake City, Utah at 300 N. Main St. At the museum you can see the histories and photos firsthand.

As the Daughters of Utah Pioneers theme song goes “And we’ll love them more and more, as we read their history o’er.” We are who we are because they were who they were. Let us not let our ancestors die the death of being forgotten.

One Name Study

Unique surnames can be a curse or a blessing. In genealogy, they can be easier to trace, but they are misspelled easily because the name is unfamiliar to those writing it. Many genealogists take these unique surnames and create what is becoming more popular- a one-name study.

A one-name study is a study of a particular surname without following a pedigree. The focus is on collecting all the information available on that one surname. It is following that surname as it occurs throughout history. The one-name study includes the variants of the surname and its frequency. Others may focus on this specific surname in certain geographical location.

If you have hit a brick wall, a one-name study may help you break through that wall. Collecting all the data available on your brick wall surname may help you find the connection you need to go back farther. It will help you find family immigration and emigration that you may have missed. It may also help you find others who are searching this same name and through those connections find the information that you need.

There are the Guild of One-Name Studies (one-name.org) and The Surname Society (surname-society.org) that have a collection of one-name studies. You can check these groups out to see if they have registered your surname with that group. The names are recorded by their original spellings so if the surname you wish to follow is variant of that spelling you will still have to search by the primary spelling. If you find that the specific surname that you are researching is listed, you can contact the researcher of that surname, and they may have the information that will help you in your searching. When approaching the surname researcher be sure and include as much information on the surname that interests you. Your contact information should include locations, dates, and variations of the specific surname whose information you are requesting.

If the surname you wish to study is not registered, this is a fantastic opportunity for you to register this surname and do the research for that name. Investigating a surname and its occurrences throughout history are challenging but also rewarding. By registering and researching a particular surname, you may not only help yourself but others who may need the information you find to break through their brick walls. Is there a one-name study in your future?

Revolutionary War Pension Records

War is an unfortunate event in the history of nations. War can bring so much sorrow and create heroes. But with war comes volumes of records which is fortunate for those wanting to know more about their loved ones who served in these wars. The Revolutionary War is abounding with records that have been preserved and digitized after all these years.

The Revolutionary War’s duration was from 1776 to 1783. The typical ages of service were from 16 to 60 years old. If your ancestor was born between the years of 1715 – 1767, they could have served in the Revolutionary War.

Fold3.com, a subscription website owned by Ancestry, is available for free during holidays that celebrate the military or available for free at the St. George FamilySearch Center. Fold3.com has ALL 80,000 pension applications digitized. These records are from The National Archives and are images of the originals, so you get to see the handwriting, water stains, and all that these records went through during the war.

If your ancestor or heirs applied for a pension, you have a goldmine of information available. These pension records can give you the veteran’s history and the battles they fought in. Many times, it is the wife applying for the pension and to prove their marriage they would take pages out of the family bible for evidence. You can find out their state of health and more about their life after the war.

Be prepared for many pages of information. Some pension files can be up to fifty pages or more. To prove that the pension applicant had served in the Revolutionary War, they sent many pages of correspondence from military leaders and fellow soldiers as proof. These letters were handwritten and often included descriptions of the battles they fought. Heirs had to prove their relationship to the veteran, so they too sent letters as evidence of those relationships. The government kept all evidence and correspondence associated with these veterans. The information you can glean from these records is: birth date and place, their children, death date and place, spouse and marriage date, the military unit served in, physical description, and their residency.

The information available in the pension files is astounding. The battles our ancestors served in become more personal. It also brings these ancestors to life to see letters they, their family and associates have personally written.

Pioneer Mourning Rituals

Daughters of Utah Pioneers’ lesson for May was about pioneer gravesites. The lesson started off with mourning rituals of the pioneers. For our ancestors who lived in the 1800’s, their mortality rate was high. This closeness to death led to many rituals that were important to help them cope with the difficult lives they lived.

Our ancestors brought these mourning rituals with them as they immigrated to the U.S. In Europe, the tradition was to carry the body out of the house feet first so that the spirit could not look back into the house and beckon a family member to join them. The Danish brought the tradition that when a person passed away, they opened a window so that the soul could fly out.

When Queen Victoria’s husband passed away, she created many of the mourning rituals that the English brought to America. There was even a manual printed with detailed instructions for mourning etiquette. Queen Victoria introduced the wearing of black, that included clothes, hat, jewelry and many other rituals.

During this era, the corpse was kept in the parlor of the home and watched over until the burial. This “wake” would last for four to five days. Flowers and candles were brought in to mask the odors. This “wake” was done to allow time to make sure they did not bury someone who had not died and allowed time for family and friends to arrive as travel was slow. A wreath was hung on the door with black ribbons to announce a death. They drew the curtains, and clocks stopped at the time of death. Crepe-covered the mirrors. They often took photos of the deceased for a remembrance. Young couples were asked to “sit up” with the dead. The night watch was not a solemn occasion for them, but an opportunity to court.

There was a fear of being buried alive, so the families buried loved ones with a rope in their hand that was attached to a bell outside the grave. If the person awoke and found themselves in a coffin, they could ring the bell for help and brought about the expression, “saved by the bell.”

These rituals may seem strange and bizarre to us, but they brought comfort to our ancestors. As we read our family histories and come across stories like these, we can empathize with them and the challenging times they had.

Games for Family Gatherings

Games are fun to play at family gatherings. It’s even more fun when you learn about your family and ancestors as you play. Fortunately for us, there are developers who have created fun apps for use with FamilySearch. These apps are great for family gatherings.

The first app that comes to mind is Geneopardy. (geneopardy.fhtl.byu.edu.) It is a Jeopardy-type game that takes information from your FamilySearch file to create questions. Geneopardy is not an easy game and is fun when played in teams. The categories are dates, places, people, facts, and other. The questions can be trivial so that a pedigree chart might be helpful.

Another fun app is Relative Finder at realtivefinder.org. Relative Finder, created by BYU, helps you discover if you are related to Prophets, Presidents, friends, and many categories of famous people. You may discover that you have a Mayflower ancestor and that can spark an interest in the youth and adults alike, and they may want to know more.

Wheel of Family Fortune is another app produced by BYU (wheel.fhtl.byu.edu.). It has up to four players or teams and works just like Wheel of Fortune on TV. The words are from your FamilySearch file so you will have to sign in. It does give a hint about the word. You click to spin the wheel to find out how much you can win if the letter you choose is in the word. It is tons of fun.

Compare-a-Face is so much fun to play. You compare your face to your ancestors to see where you got your good looks from or maybe your nose. You need to upload a picture of yourself, and it compares it to the photos of ancestors found in your FamilySearch file. If you are doing this at family gatherings, make sure the attendees send you photos of themselves to upload into this program. Compare-a-Face is located at familysearch.org/discovery/compare. FamilySearch Discovery has more apps coming soon so be sure and check the website every now and again.

These games will be memory makers at family gatherings. There are more enjoyable games found in the app gallery on FamilySearch or even found by doing a google search for family history games. Learning about who we are and where we came from can sure be fun and is the secret to a happy family!

A Family Tree Gathering

As summer approaches, many thoughts turn to family gatherings and family reunions. A fun reunion is to do a family tree gathering. A family tree gathering is when the family gathers to honor and learn about their ancestors. FamilySearch Blog’s article, “Five Easy Ways to Enrich Your Family Reunion,” has some great ideas for a family tree gathering reunion.

Share Family Stories
One family decided to spotlight six people. The descendants of these people were given a few months to prepare a five to ten-minute presentation about their assigned person. Some did collages, slideshows, videos, or told stories that were full of humor and retrospect.

Share Family Photos
Before the family reunion, organizers called everyone to bring their photo albums, scrapbooks, and family photos. They set up photo viewing stations where family members could go from booth to booth to see the photos brought. The sharing of photos is a great time to scan the photos and have them uploaded to the memories section of FamilySearch.

Some families have put the photos onto cardstock and made a deck of memory cards or find a match. If someone found a match, they could earn extra points for sharing a story of the ancestor pictured on the card.

Perform Family Skits
A skit could be about family love stories or other fun memories from ancestors. Those families that don’t care for skits could assign out to everyone over sixteen a couple to research and share their research with the other members of the family. These stories can be collected and put into a binder to share with everyone and FamilySearch.

Capture Oral Histories
Bring interview prompts and divide up into groups to interview the senior members of the family. Make sure that each person in each group gets to ask a question. Be sure to record these interviews and then transcribe them to share with the other family members and be sure to share these histories on FamilySearch.

Highlight Heirlooms
Before the reunion, ask those who have heirlooms if they could bring them to the reunion and share the story behind them. Be sure and take pictures and share the stories with members of the family and on FamilySearch.

There are many more ideas. As you gather for your family reunions this summer, think of having a family tree gathering. A family tree gathering is a fun way to introduce your family members to their ancestors.