Genealogy and Local History Blog

Category: Genealogy

Genealogy

Brick Wall or Genealogical Challenge: Rethinking Your Approach to Genealogical Research

Cyndi Ingle of Cyndi’s List wrote a great article in the October-November-December 2013 issue of NGS Magazine about taking a new approach to genealogical research. She talked about what it takes to shake off old or non-productive ways of doing things and re-wire our brains in order to be more successful. Renowned genealogist Elizabeth Shown Mills talked about the importance of using evidence creatively in order to attain new ideas for working with records we already have. Over time, other genealogical writers have stressed the necessity of changing strategies when the old ways aren’t working. The idea behind all of them is to be open to new or alternate ways of finding and identifying ancestors. It’s easy to think we’ve exhausted the resources, but it’s also possible that something else is out there that we didn’t know existed, especially today with new electronic/digitized resources, or that our search focus was too...

Genealogy

Researching Indentured Servants

Introduction Indentured servitude was a major contract labor system in early colonial America, especially in the Chesapeake, before declining in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as African slavery expanded. Servants worked for a fixed term in exchange for passage, food, shelter, and freedom dues. The system was common in English North American colonies from the early seventeenth century. It was not slavery, but a form of unfree labor that limited autonomy and tied labor to debt repayment and migration costs. Indentured servitude developed because the colonies needed labor, and passage to America was expensive. English promoters saw colonies as a solution to social and economic problems at home. The labor shortage after settlement, especially in Virginia, made indentured labor attractive to planters and colonial companies. In 1717, the British Parliament adopted a policy of transportation which banished convicts to the American colonies, usually for seven years. This policy allowed...

Genealogy

The History of Ship Passenger Lists

In today’s blog we trace the history of ship passenger lists from the earliest colonial era (1607) to the mid-twentieth century (1954). We’ll see how ship records changed over time and why genealogists rely on them. The big picture is the shift from scattered arrival references to standardized federal manifests with increasing genealogical value. Why Ship Passenger List History Matters Passenger lists are core immigration sources. They link arrival, identity, and family history as well as reflect the social and political attitudes of the time. As is true for all records of genealogical value, the important things to consider for any record are the agency who created the records, and for what purpose records were created. In order to get the most of out of records not created for genealogists (and that’s ALL of them), we have to know which entity created them and for what purpose. This helps to...

Genealogy / Local History

Going Local: Local History in the Grapevine Public Library

In today’s blog, we’ll look at the different local history resources the Grapevine Public Library has available for research. Local history materials are in the Frances Pittman Malcolm Genealogy Room and the Grapevine Area History Room. The Library has a robust genealogy collection, as well as a significant collection of materials on the history of Grapevine and the surrounding areas. Grapevine is one of the oldest communities in Tarrant County, first settled on the Grape Vine Prairie in 1844 by a group known as the Missouri Colony. The settlement encompassed the present city of Southlake, known for decades as “the area west of Grapevine” until 1956, when Southlake was incorporated. Books In 1979, the Grapevine Historical Society published the book Grapevine Area History, edited by Charles H. Young (Fig.1). It is comprised primarily of family histories, many of whom are descendants of the earliest families, but includes valuable information on...

Genealogy

Researching Quaker Ancestors

Who were the Quakers? Quakers, or Friends, are a Christian group formally known as the Religious Society of Friends or Friends Church. It was founded in England in 1647 by George Fox. The first recorded Quakers in the New World arrived in Barbados about 1655 and from thence went to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, where they faced harsh repression, including imprisonment and the destruction of their writings. Because of Puritan intolerance, Quakers eventually left Massachusetts and resettled in Rhode Island, and also established communities along the Delaware River, including a settlement at Salem, New Jersey, in 1675. In 1681, King Charles II granted Quaker William Penn (Fig. 1) a charter for the territory that became Pennsylvania, where Penn promised religious tolerance to Quakers and other persecuted believers. The densest Quaker settlements in Pennsylvania were in Bucks, Chester, and Philadelphia counties. Other major Quaker centers included New York, Virginia and North...

Genealogy

Census Humor: Behind the Statistics

In a previous blog post, we looked at what it took to be a US census taker. In today’s blog we’re going to have a little fun with the census by looking at some actual enumerator experiences, plus some humorous information that some of them were asked to record. Most examples were found using one of Grapevine Library’s subscription databases, Newspapers.com. 1840 In 1840 New Orleans, one census taker had a hard time finding any women who would admit to being over 30. One wonders if this clipping from the June 20, 1840 issue of the Baton Rouge Gazette had anything to do with it: 1870 In Chicago, one census taker encountered a vicious dog that broke its rope and would have “pinned him by the throat to the floor had he not beat a swift retreat from this den of wild beasts.” This was likely not humorous to the...

Genealogy

The Miscellaneous Record Book: What’s in It for Genealogists?

Miscellaneous record books in U.S. county courthouses are “catch-all” volumes maintained by the county clerk that compile documents too diverse or infrequent for dedicated books (e.g., deeds, marriages, probate). These unbound papers—filed chronologically or by type—get transcribed or bound together, creating grab-bag ledgers with genealogical gems overlooked by standard genealogical searches. They also help to bridge gaps in censuses and vital records prior to 1850, name extended family and neighbors, and document life in the county. Today’s post spotlights the contents of the Washington County, Arkansas “Miscellaneous Record Book,” covering the years 1841–1879, revealing previously unknown but valuable genealogical details. A few records date from the 1830s. Apprenticeships In the nineteenth century and earlier, children were often apprenticed to a skilled craftsperson to learn that trade because they were orphans or had parents unable to support them, and they were apprenticed so they wouldn’t become financial burdens on the county....

Genealogy / Transportation

“The Most Convenient Wayes”: Travel and Transportation by Land in Early America

A “‘most howling wilderness’” was an essential outline of conditions under which the people of America, from the earliest English settlement until shortly before the Revolution, in those days, and for long afterward, lived and moved about early America. Travel was done on foot, on horseback, by wagon, or by boat. (Fig. 1) Water routes were used whenever possible; horses were useless except near settlements or on beaten paths. Extended journeys often had to be on foot. The land was so vast, full of Native Americans and wild animals, that for more than a century and a half, the white population hugged a little strip of seacoast 150 miles wide, from north to south. Most of our knowledge about colonial and early American travel has been pieced together from fragments such as diaries, personal letters, and travel accounts by domestic and foreign travelers. Many include motives for the first travel...

Genealogy

They Couldn’t Take It with Them: Using Estate Inventories in Genealogical Research

You can learn a lot about your ancestors by looking at their possessions, or at least by looking at lists of their possessions if you don’t have historical artifacts or documents. Today’s blog will discuss estate inventories and how they were made by the wealthy, poor, and all those in between. Whether they held $50,000 in bank stock or only a cow and some pots and pans, our ancestors deserve to be remembered for who they were. Estate inventories are frequently overlooked by genealogists because they believe these documents don’t provide genealogical evidence. But they do provide a glimpse into your ancestor’s personal life and the material culture of his or her time. For this reason, we’re going to take an economics approach as well as a genealogical one. By blending these approaches, we can get a much clearer and closer understanding of the world our ancestors lived in and...