Family Genealogy
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When guessing is all you have…
When Amalie was 7-years-old she was sent to a neighboring farm to work because her family was so poor. I found this little nugget of information tucked in my e-records for my Great-Grandmother (my father’s maternal grandmother) Thyra Amalie Martinsen JENSEN. It took me by surprise because it wasn’t tied to any supporting documentation. I…
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KNOWING vs knowing
In genealogy, there’s a lot of emphasis on the difference between KNOWing and knowing. Take my 2nd-Great-Grandfather Patt O’Brien for example…
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Mommy Dearest or Dearest Mom?
A story persists in the McDowell oral history about Lizzie Martin McDowell, my paternal great-grandmother. As the story goes, she was a wicked thing, mean and abusive to both her children and her husband John as well as being generally promiscuous, having an affinity for the local male population. [1] Poor Lizzie. Will no one…
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A Marvel-ous House in the Big Woods
Remember Laura Ingalls Wilder’s first novel, Little House in the Big Woods? [1] I have a similar tale to tell. The pioneer tale of my father’s father’s father’s father’s mother’s father. [2] Or more succinctly… My 4th-Great-Grandfather, Elisha Marvel. He was a Founding Father.
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Looking for Noah
It’s Easter this Sunday. And for at least one of my maternal ancestors, that would have been a very busy time of year. According to my great-grandmother’s handwritten notes about her family, her grandfather, William Noah Marsh, was “a Baptist clergyman in England.” That really isn’t a ton of information to go on, but I’ve…
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Black Gold
Texas tea [1]… Or, in this case, perhaps Louisiana chicory? Yep, Oil. That same bubbly that enticed Jed Clampett to pack up everything and move also emitted a homing beacon to the McPhail clan. One Hardin Malcolm McPhail answered the call… at the ripe ol’ age of fifty-four.
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Those Nosy News Reporters
I love them! Nosy Reporters, that is. Were it not for a nosy news reporter, I would know far less about my maternal 3rd-Great-Grandmother than I do. Luckily for me, she knew Abraham Lincoln.
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Finally, a lead
It’s far from pay dirt… or gold… In fact, it’s more akin to uncorroborated testimony by a dodgy witness in a murder trial.
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An Irish Tale of…
I’m a little late for St. Patrick’s Day but I have a little Irish tale of beginnings and endings. It begins like all good tales do: Once upon a time…
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When your ancestor’s name is John Smith…
Or, in my case, the Danish equivalent of John Smith: Jens Jensen, my paternal great-grandfather. I know almost nothing about him: he came to the United States in 1900 with my great-grandmother, Thyra Amalia [1] Martinsen, and their son Oscar; by 1910 [2], he was farming in Platte, Nebraska and supporting a family of five–wife…