Give Me An Hour

Earlier this week when I found myself with a free hour I decided to work a question in my genealogy. It couldn’t take more than an hour or so and had to be doable free online.

I chose my paternal grandmother’s family which I have not ignored but have not done much work on. I knew her parents’ names and had information on her mother’s line. I turned to her father’s line, a painfully common name and a puzzle. To complicate matters, in my maternal line and in the same geographic area I have the same common name. I had tracked the line far enough to know the paternal Wood line is not related to the maternal Wood line which I have back nearly 300 years.

Wilma Wood married Robert Rothwell on January 1, 1923. She was the daughter of William Tobias Wood and Eva Nora Bozarth of Illiopolis, Sangamon County, Illinois. I had William Tobias’ death certificate and the marriage record indicating they had married February 17, 1889, in Illiopolis. I knew the state database had a typo on the date. I had tracked back into the Bozarth line a couple generations a few years ago.

Wood was a puzzle. I knew he was born August 23, 1863, in Shelby County, Illinois. I knew that his parents were William Wood Sr. and Emily Rice. I knew that did not mean William Sr. was named Tobias but it might. I knew from the 1860 Shelby County census that Emily’s father was Nathan Rice. I knew William Wood did not appear on the 1870 census although Emily did with William Tobias. Emily appears in the household of Joseph Beason in 1880 with William Tobias listed as his stepson.

I knew a William Wood had served in the Civil War, age 22 in 1863, Pvt., Company F, 5th Illinois US Calvary, who mustered in at Effingham County and mustered out at Springfield in 1865. Emily also had a daughter Hattie Wood who was 13 on the 1880 census - although she does not appear on the 1870 census. This would suggest William Wood returned from the Civil War, fathered a daughter and died between 1866 and 1870. A Civil War pension search is on the to do list.

Using the online Illinois State Archives marriage database I found the marriage of Emily [listed as Rice, not Wood] and Joseph Beason. Using the death database I found Emily’s death on April 27, 1927. Joseph Beason must have died before 1916 when death certificates were required and had to be recorded with the state.

Using the Sangamon County ILGenWeb site I found that Emily was buried at Riverside Cemetery. The Pritchett Funeral Records transcription by Mary Ann Kaylor on the same site indicate Emily's age at death as 83 years, 2 months and 13 days. Using an online birth date calculator I got a birth date of February 14, 1844.

The same records list Emily’s parents as Nathan Rice and [unknown first name] Little. Back to the Illinois State Archives databases where I found Nathan Rice married Emily Little on March 13, 1828, in Shelby County, Illinois. Presumably there were children born between the marriage in 1828 and Emily’s birth in 1844 who are just waiting to be found. While I was there I found a Hattie Wood married a Charles H. McCorkle in Sangamon County on March 28, 1886. On another day I’ll tell why I’m sure that is my great grandaunt.

Lots more to go but in a little over an hour I was able to find plenty of new leads to check out free online.

The Dress

This is the dress made for Ethel Ryan for her marriage to Ellis Downing on January 19, 1910, at the Lincoln Christian Church. Check out that waist - 18 inches.

In 1910, as told in an earlier post, Ethel, her two older sisters and her mother were pregnant. Ethel's sister Cora had made the dress. When Cora's daughter was born she cut up the dress to make baby dresses for her daughter. Ethel was not thrilled. Cora said Ethel would not be needing a wedding dress again so what was the big deal. It always rankled but the two remained close until Cora's death less than 14 months before Ethel's.

How Did You Meet Grandpa?

Sunday, April 14, 1907, was Ethel Ryan's 15th birthday. Although not a member, she went to the dedication of the new Mt. Pulaski Christian Church building with her friend. There was a social. Also at the event was Ellis Downing whose minister ancestors and their family founded several of the Methodist Churches in Logan County and across central Illinois. Ellis enjoyed music and dancing, which the Methodist Church in 1907 did not, so he and his brother were attending the Christian Church. The couple met that day.

Ellis was the second of the four sons of William Nelson and Eliza Sciota Harding Downing, our Lida of prior posts. Ellis' father, who farmed land his family originally settled, had died of typhoid in 1903.

Ethel was the third daughter of Edward Daniel and Lillie Margaret Wood Ryan [see "A Family Affair"]. Teddie was a bricklayer whose ancestors came from Ireland in the 1830s. Both of Lillie's parents were descendants of Abraham Lucas. To be kind, Teddie liked his drink. The families did not know each other, certainly were not in the same social or economic circles. Most would have said the couple had nothing in common.

Ellis' older brother Clarence was dating Lena Drake. Her stepfather was Charles Brooker. The Brookers lived half a mile west of the Downing household. The families were friends and the couple seemed well suited.

Eventually the talk to turned to marriage and it seemed natural to have a double wedding. Lena could afford a wedding. Ethel could not. In order to have the double wedding Ellis paid for Ethel's dress. The couples, joined by their mothers, went by horse and buggy to Lincoln on January 19, 1910, where they were married at the Lincoln Christian Church. Both couples settled down to farming.

Ellis and Ethel had five children. She died on January 8, 1975, 11 days short of the couple's 65th wedding anniversary. Ellis wrote his family story to be placed in the cornerstone of the new sanctuary of the Mt Pulaski Christian Church, starting with the story of their meeting in 1907. He witnessed the dedication of that new sanctuary in 1977 and died on June 28, 1978.

Clarence and Lena had one son, Darwin. They eventually divorced. One September day in 1942 Clarence showed up at Ellis and Ethel's' home and said he felt ill. They put him to bed and called the doctor but Clarence died on September 28, 1942. Lena died in October of 1985.

Identifying Photos Revisited

I got involved in revising my file system, going to Network Attached Storage and installing Windows 7. The last required a clean install and a reinstall of all programs. Thus I downloaded the last version of Picasa which is 3.6. I turned it loose on my pictures in their new location. This time I was able to do with an unattended laptop that I didn't need for the day so it was allowed to do its work uninterrupted.

The latest version seems faster and also seems more adept at facial recognition. It has identified nearly 7,000 faces and identified about 100 people who are in multiple pictures. It has found the younger version of people I only knew as old and, upon inspection, has been right most of the time. It thinks at times my sister might be me and makes other interesting family connections, my niece in a close up and my grandfather for example. I don't see the resemblance but it must be there.

Some of those 7,000 faces are people who happened to be in the picture, maybe in the background. You can tell Picasa to ignore those. Some are part of historical group pictures I own but cannot identify. Why my grandmother had them if there are no relatives in them escapes me so I continue to look.

I have been able to identify about 700 of the 7,000. Some are relatives I never met, knew or even heard of. Some are children of friends of my mother or grandparents that I never knew. When I have a rough time frame and perhaps a last name and location I have posted the information to boards and lists, so far without success.

I have enlisted extended family in identifying the pictures. I don't understand why people get possessive about pictures. Scan them, share with all, get help with the identification. I'm not one who has to own the original but even if you feel you must you can still scan them and share.

We say we should have ask these questions, identified these pictures, etc. when the older generations were still here and yet we aren't doing it for future generations.

I'll get off the soapbox now but considering making scanning and identifying your photos, old and newer, a New Year's resolution.

A Family Affair

In 1910 the three oldest daughters of Edward and Lillie Wood Ryan were "in a family way." Sarah Katherine Ryan Kinert, the eldest, already had a young son, Floyd. It would be the first for Cora Ryan Lipp and Ethel Ryan Downing. Their mother was also expecting.

On August 9, 1910, the Ryan sisters' youngest sister Margaret was born. On August 26 Ethel's eldest son Orville was born. On December 1 Cora's only child Dorthalene was born. On January 18, 1911, Sadie's daughter, Adela, was born. Then things went terribly wrong. Eight days later Sadie died, apparently of sepsis.

The widower was unable to take care of the children and work too. Floyd went to live with Cora. Adela was raised by another family.

Cora and Ethel lived past 80. Floyd died of an infection at 28. I never knew Adela. My mother never met her. I don't recall hearing her mentioned except in response to direct questions. By the time I had enough information and the internet to track her down she had died.

Using Picassa 3.5 to Identify Photos

I have been playing with the facial recognition in Picassa 3.5, Google's free photo organizing and editing software. I have a lot of pictures scanned [and at least as many to scan]. Working with photos is not my favorite thing. After playing with the latest version of Picassa for about an hour I'm down to only 9,000 to identify!

The most interesting thing to me is it often chooses family members as potential matches. When I was labeling my granddaughter Marly's pictures it brought up for my consideration some of her sister Sarah's pictures. It did the same with my brothers.

I was hopeful that it would use this family resemblance to help identify some of my unknown ancestors but that has not happened so far. The only photo it has identified that I didn't know was one baby picture. It suggested it was my #2 brother. Upon closer inspection I believe it is. So there is hope it will find others as I start to identify the ancestors.

By pulling up the faces it did show me pictures I didn't even remember or know I had, an interesting side benefit.

I don't like the way it wants to link the pictures with an email address from my Google contacts. To foil it I used full names for men, maiden and married names for women. For those woman who don't use a married name I included their middle name. It seems to be looking for a perfect match in contacts and accepts these as new people. Of course, the problem will not arise with the old pictures but I tested on those I was sure about.

The price - free - is right so you have nothing to lose and maybe some photos to identify.

Keeping Up

We all have multiple lines we are researching. It seems I pay more attention to some lines and less to others. I field more queries about those lines and am generally more familiar with them. The other day I got an inquiry about a line and I couldn't recall the details. Then I realized I haven't had an inquiry about that line in years.

There was a time when I had so many inquiries on that line my expert sent his GEDCOM file so I could just pull it and find out a few things, decide where to sent the researcher for more. In those days my internet connection was dialup and things were slow. Now internet is always on and generally fast. I realized that I didn't even have a bookmark for the database my expert has developed [and keeps up] so I hadn't had an inquiry since I moved five years ago.

I could say it means interest in lines goes in spurts and that's probably true. It also means I have neglected to keep up with my genealogy. I'm more organized but I've gotten sloppy on the lines no one asks about, particularly when there are others who are paying attention to those lines.

Is it possible to keep up with all the lines? Is there a formula for how much time to devote to each one? Is it okay to forgot some lines because others are devoting all their time to them? Contrary to what some might suggest, we cannot possibly do all the original research on all our ancestors. What is the compromise?