Tag Archives: Mother

Woman struck blind on seeing her son …

Posted on by

Obituaries can give us the details of our ancestor’s lives that we just don’t find anywhere else.

Today I found this obituary in GenealogyBank for Judith Tormey (1800-1898) who died in Newark, NJ.

Baltimore Sun 4 July 1898


This obituary article gives us lots of details and clues to fill in the family tree.

1. Mrs. Judith Tormey – her name and tells us that she was married
2. Died on Friday night at her home and then gives the exact street address
3. She has “lived in Newark since 1847″
4. “She was born in County Cavan, Ireland, in 1800″
5. “Her father (not named) was 101 years old when he died and her mother was ninety-nine”
6. “A grandmother died at the age of ninety-nine”
7. “She was the mother of five children”
8. “She lost her sight in 1894″
9. “In that year her son Edward died”
10. She was blind from the final moment “she was taking a farewell look at his face in the coffin”

Incredible – we learn not only about four generations of the family – but also the dramatic story of how she became blind in the last years of her life.

GenealogyBank has millions of obituaries from over 3,700 newspapers.
We add even more every day.
Click here and search GenealogyBank right now.

What will you find?

A Good Woman Can be Hard to Find…

Posted on by

It can be very difficult to find women in the early 19th Century – finding sources that actually give their names and genealogical details. It was common in the 19th century for genealogical sources to be brief and give only the basic information about a household in the census – or an entry in a birth register.

The 1800 – 1840 census – only named one person in the entire family – the head of the household – while that could have been a single woman who never married or was widowed – it was most often the husband. Most American’s men and women were not named in the census.

Birth and church registers often record brief information – with entries like:

1812 July 28. A son, to Walter Hickenlooper.
What was the son’s or the mother’s name?

So researchers become experts in tracking down records that give more information – that fill in the missing details of our family trees.

Genealogists write me all the time with their success stories in finding their elusive ancestors using GenealogyBank.

GenealogyBank is particularly strong on pre-1850 newspapers – with over 1,300 titles.

GenealogyBank has over 3,700 newspapers – that range from 1690 to today ….. you can find the details about women in GenealogyBank – information that is just not in the census and often not found in other early 19th century sources. Newspapers you just won’t find on other sites.

I have been working on my Brundage line and documenting all of the grandparents; aunts and cousins in Westchester, New York and the family members that have spread across the country.

I found this Brundage obituary notice (Hudson River (NY) Chronicle 8 Oct 1839) that illustrates the point –


In the 1820 Census – John Brundage is living in Bedford, NY – with his wife (unnamed) and family. By the 1840 census – neither one of them was listed. Why?

This obituary article tells us that John has died and that his “widow” – Rachael Brundage died on 26 Sep 1839 at age “about 44 years” – well before the 1840 census. I now knew what had happened to them.
Clue #1 – Name: Rachael Brundage: a widow of John Brundage; her age; her date & place of death
Clue #2 – Name of husband: John Brundage – and that he had predeceased her

In addition to the details about Rachael & John Brundage – the article has two other obituaries.

Look at the facts that we find about these women: Harriet Sutherland and Deborah Cornwell.

Harriet Sutherland

The article tells us that Harriet Sutherland died on 25 Sep 1839 at “Middle Patent” – (North Castle, NY) – the widow of John Sutherland. It gives her age as “aged about 46 years”.

Clue #1 – Name: Harriet Sutherland: a widow of John Sutherland; her age; her date & place of death
Clue #2 – Name of husband: John Sutherland- and that he had predeceased her

And in the third obituary in this article we learn that “Miss Deborah Cornwell, daughter of the late Jonathan Cornwell” died 6 Sep 1839 in Henrietta, Monroe County, NY at the “fiftieth year of her age” and that she was “formerly of New Castle (NY).”

Clue #1 – Name: Deborah Cornwell: a daughter of Jonathan Cornwell; her age; her date & place of death; that she formerly lived in New Castle, NY.
Clue #2 – Name of father: Jonathan Cornwell- and that he had predeceased her

It can be difficult to find a good woman in the early 19th century – but newspapers are a terrific source and GenealogyBank has more of them than you will find anywere else.

Click here and search GenealogyBank right now and see what you will find.

14 Children in 7 years – Mom says: "These are the dearest little things"

Posted on by

Sunday September 29, 1901 Josephine Ormsby (1871-) gave birth to children number eleven, twelve, thirteen and fourteen – three boys and one girl.

The proud mother Josephine Ormsby said “These are the dearest little things” as she was “propped up in the bed with the three boys in her arms and the little girl lying crosswise at the foot of the bed.”

What a terrific family scene – and what a find in GenealogyBank for the Ormsby family history.

Here they are a few years later in a 1910 photograph: Front row, from left – William, Theodore, Edith, John, George & Helen; 2nd row, Mrs. Josephine Ormsby, and Daisy. (Photo courtesy – Library of Congress American Memory Project LC No. #ichicdn n005169)

This article (Pawtucket Times – 2 Oct 1901) not only describes the other children – but gives their dates of birth too.

Nov 1, 1896 – twins, one died: Daisy Ormsby survived
Sep 19, 1897 – twins, both died
Sep 24, 1899 – triplets: Carter Harrison Ormsby died; Helen Gould Ormsby and George Dewey Ormsby – survived.
and lastly:
Sep 29, 1901 – quadruplets: Edith Viola Ormsby, John Studebaker Ormsby, Theodore Roosevelt Ormsby and William Hearst Ormsby.

According to the article the mother was herself “one of a set of triplets”!

What will you find in GenealogyBank?
Click here and start searching now!

Newspapers are a good source for birth records – family details

Posted on by

The Duluth News Tribune (13 Jan 1918) reported that more than half of the births registered for Duluth were simply listed as “male” or “female” child. This can be a problem for genealogists today but it was also a problem for one Minnesotan in 1918 who was trying to establish he was the legal heir to a family estate.

Per the article the local health department was going to begin to routinely follow-up with parents to have them file ammended birth certificates so that the names of the children would be permanently recorded.

Newspapers regularly published birth announcements which included the names of the new child; date/place of birth; names of the parents and often the names of siblings, grandparents and other genealogical information.

In this example from the Columbus (GA) Enquirer Sun (22 Sept 1922) you can find the core information – names of the new children, their parents and the dates of birth.

Note that the announcements also give the maiden names of the mother and that Porterdeat Golden Smith was named for his maternal grandfather.

Newspapers are a terrific source to get the details we need to document our families.

Search GenealogyBank and see what you’ll find.
.

Thank you GenealogyBank!

Posted on by
We get letters all the time from ecstatic genealogists who broke through their brick walls in GenealogyBank. Grateful letters that say – “Wow – I finally found him” in GenealogyBank … thank you, thank you.

Tonight I received a “Wow – I finally found him” note from Jane Giavelli Lauhon. She wrote:

Thank you so much for your hard work and dedication by maintaining your website.


Since 1980 (when I began my genealogy search) I have been trying to find a connection to Italy for my Dad’s Giavelli side.
Our Giavelli ancestor’s have been a huge, huge challenge because they were affiliated with The Ravel’s (a circus group from France). I have been researching Ravel’s hoping to find information about my 2nd great grandfather, Leon Giavelli and his wife, Harriet Wells.

Today I was finally able to find the connection and am very, very happy.

I knew this family originated in Italy; I just didn’t know it until today when one of your articles connected us to Giavelli’s in Italy.

My mother’s father, Guissepe Manno, is Italian and I have been wondering how much Italian ancestry I have. Now I can say I am 1/2 Italian!

Thank you again and I am going to keep searching your site to see what other goldmine’s I can find.

Sincerely,
Jane Giavelli Lauhon

This is what Jane found – what will you find?
Give GenealogyBank a try right now click here and sign up.

Wild Bill Obama

Posted on by

May 27th was Wild Bill Hickok’s day – I wrote about how easy it is to find newspaper articles about him in GenealogyBank.

Wild Bill Hickok is in the news again – when Barack Obama mentioned his family tradition that he was a distant cousin to Wild Bill – James Butler Hickok (1837-1876).

(Photo: Texas Observer Blog 27 Feb 2007)

Don’t you love it when politicians talk about their genealogy!

The New England Historic Genealogical Society does and issued a statement yesterday verifying Obama’s family tradition:

Obama and Hickok are sixth cousins, six-times removed. Their common ancestor is Thomas Blossom, who came to Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1629 from Leiden, Holland. Obama’s 4th great-grandfather, Jacob Dunham, was 6th cousins with Wild Bill. Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann, is also a Dunham.

“The ancestry of Wild Bill Hickok was published by NEHGS some years back, which showed he descended from the Blossom family of Cape Cod, an early family written up in one of our scholarly publications,” said Child. He added, “Since we had also recently done the ancestry of Senator Obama, finding this connection was a little easier.”

Click here to see the Obama – Hickok family tree – Wild Bill is related to Obama through his mother Polly Butler.

This just in – Viewer Mail

Posted on by

Hi Tom,
I really do need to share with you GenealogyBank‘s latest contribution to my family history research!

I really do love GenealogyBank. Without it, I would not know about the accident that caused the death of my grandmother’s youngest brother. Nor would I have known when it occurred. Nor would I have found out the exact date of death of my gr-grandfather’s youngest sister. Nor would I have found so much anecdotal information about my Dad’s family as he grew up. But the greatest find of all from GenealogyBank solved the problem of where did William go.

William was the older brother of my Dad’s father. He married a girl from Pond Creek, and they started on a large family. But William and his family moved around a lot, from Wilkes-Barre to Plains, both in Pennsylvania, to Jersey City, in New Jersey, to Brooklyn, in New York, to East Orange, in New Jersey, and back to Plains by 1950. In 1950, his youngest brother died, leaving William the last of my grandfather’s siblings still alive.

But, he wasn’t buried in St. Mary’s Cemetery, Wilkes-Barre, like his three brothers were. So, he must have moved again from Plains, it seemed. But, in 1950, William was 76 years old, so it didn’t seem likely he was going to do much more moving around.

Then I started finding newspaper clippings on GenealogyBank about William’s family many years ago. On at least three occasions during a 20 year period of time, a young child had died – and, according to the newspaper article, was brought to White Haven for burial.

Since I knew his wife had been from White Haven, I suspected her family might have had a family burial plot in a cemetery in White Haven. It took a lot of searching, since White Haven is a cute little, charming little, community, but it does have two cemeteries, neither of which has an office or anyone in attendance during the day. But I did find the family burial plot of William’s wife’s family – and next to them is a stone with the name KROPP on it.

I was able to find who had the cemetery records, and she verified for me that, among the 12 people buried in the KROPP plot is my elusive and peripatetic William! I even got the date of his death! I still have a lot of work to do on this, but it is so much easier starting with a date of death than with an “uh, I don’t know.”

Yes I do love GenealogyBank, and I owe it to you to let you know how much help excitement it has contributed to my genealogy research. I am thrilled for the newspapers there, covering Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Now, I can’t wait for newspaper coverage of Crawford County (Steelville) Missouri so I can get going on my mother’s genealogy!

Thank you so much for GenealogyBank!

Donna
Peachtree City, GA

Birth Announcements – newspapers are packed with them

Posted on by

Newspapers have been announcing births since the 1700s.

It is common to see birth notices in newspapers all across the country, like this one for triplets born to “Mrs. Rust of Wolfeboro, NH” in 1796. It appeared in the Massachusetts Mercury 14 Oct 1796.
You’ll find millions of births recorded in newspapers on GenealogyBank from the colonial period right up to recent times.
Newspapers often had regular columns for all area births. Sometimes these were listed by the name of the hospital. These notices often give the names of the child, parents and even grandparents.

Some are written in a fun, familiar style – as this one from the Dallas Morning News 1 June 1967 – “She’ here…” and went on to give the details of their new daughter.

This 1918 birth notice from the Belleville (IL) Democrat 8 March 1918, gave three generations of genealogical information including the name of the grandmother, the mother’s maiden name and the name of the parents – but not the name of the baby!

Other newspapers simply gave the essential facts of their area births. Like these births from the San Francisco (CA) Daily Evening Bulletin 12 August 1856.

But no matter how much detail the newspaper included, genealogists will find GenealogyBank a practical tool for uncovering the birth notices for their relatives.

Since the name of the child is not always given, search for them by the name of the parents or simply the surname. You may limit your search by date or place to see if the birth of the children you are looking for was published in the newspaper.

For a complete list of the newspaper titles and dates of coverage click here.

Newspapers are a great source for finding the historical records that document our family tree.

Tracking down Family Bibles ….

Posted on by

Family Bibles have been treasured by families for generations, but finding them today can be difficult.

It was common for families to have a family Bible – a large bound book that was prominently displayed in the family parlor – “…a large octavo volume, with a more or less ornate binding, with blank pages inserted on which to record births, marriages and deaths, and sometimes the near-slaying of Isaac, Moses in the bulrushes, the infernal regions and other interesting dramatic and historic incidents narrated in the [Bible]“. (Boston Journal 13 May 1908).
(Image from Antique Holy Bible Item #330235937204 – Ebay.com)
I spotted quite a few newspaper articles that cited the old family Bibles and who their current owners were.

For example – Henry Peters of Trenton, NJ used his family Bible to prove that he was “sixteen years old and two months older than that” so that he could get in to the show at the Trent theater. (Fort Worth (TX) Star-Telegram. Nov 4, 1909).
An article in the Columbus (GA) Enquirer (2 Sep 1898) tells us that “Mrs. Billard, the daughter of the late Rev. Edward Oldrin, who lives on Bank Street [Stamford, CT]” … and that she got it “by inheritance from her father. … The book is in the original binding and well preserved, the Old Testament part having been printed in 1597 and the New Testament in 1596. The covers are of wood.”

This is an important point. Always check the dates that each of the Testaments was printed. Printers often printed them separately and then joined them together when they published the Bible. This is a way to date a family Bible.

“Inscribed on the yellow fly-leat are the words: Edward Oulldron owns this book and after his death to his son Edward Oulldron, given by his grandfather – 1651.” Elsewhere it states “Edward Oldrin’s [note the change in spelling] book, given by his father on is deathbed in the 1827, July 28, to be kept in the family.”

Mrs. Jennie Fairbanks Milligan of Springfield, Ohio brought the family Bible when she was called to testify in a case trying to break the will of the late Delavan Smith of Lake Forest, IL. (Dallas Morning News. 1 October 1921).

John M. Butler of Ocean Grove, NJ found out by double checking his family Bible that he was 101 and not 100 years old when he went to celebrate his birthday. He said it was a “pretty tough job trying to keep track of so many birthdays.” He said with a smile … “I must have lived two years in Brooklyn [NY, the] one year that I was there. That’s the only way I can account for the discrepancy.” (Evening Times – Pawtucket, RI – 17 jan 1901).

But you won’t find the Belin family Bible. It seems that in November 1908, Joseph Belin of Wilkes-Barre, PA “came home intoxicated and threatened [his mother] and then burned the family Bible.” There were 7 prisoners in court that day for “being drunk”. Six of them were fined $1.00 but Joseph Belin was fined $5.00. (Wilkes-Barre (PA) Times Leader – 18 Nov 1908).

Historical newspapers are packed with family history information. Research more than 3,400 newspapers and document your heritage on GenealogyBank.
Give it a try right now.

Clementine Breaux – 110 yrs. old – 1,000+ Descendants

Posted on by
Happy Mother’s Day!

Clementine (Robicheaux) Breaux, the widow of Paul Breaux, must have set a record.

As of March 19, 1915 – she was still going strong at age 110 – the mother of 13 children and the matriarch of more than 1,000 descendants born in her lifetime. She lived in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana and her family lived there in Thibodaux and “scattered over the entire state” of Louisiana.

Even though she was 110 years old according to the article in the Duluth (MN) News Tribune (19 March 1915) she was still active. Her eyesight was still good enough “to permit the threading of a needle” and she enjoyed “getting out in the yard and feeding the chickens and poultry.”

You learn the most amazing things about your family in these old newspapers.
GenealogyBank has over 3,400 newspapers from across the country. Give it a try right now.

So – here’s to our mothers everywhere, of all generations.

Happy Mother’s Day!