One ancestor I’m really trying to learn more about is my great-great-grandfather William (“Billie”) Sanford. He was born in 1809 in Virginia and died in 1916 in Texas at the age of 106! A book I read says that he is the oldest person buried in the “colored” section of the Old City Cemetery in [...]
Continue reading about Carnival of Genealogy: 106 Years in America–And More!
In my Jamboree posts the week before last, I alluded to a special mission I had attended to as part of my trip to Southern California. I took part of the time I was there to meet my father’s step-mother. I never knew that my father had a step-mother, as such, until the last few [...]
Actually I’m going to dinner at the home of my great-great grandmother, Matilda Manson, in Rockdale, Milam County, Texas, on a day in 1900. Grandma Mattie has been kind enough, at my suggestion, to invite her son Otis, and his wife Bettie Sanford, as well as Bettie’s 90 year old father, Billie Sanford. Bettie is [...]
Lisa, who has the energy to write several interesting blogs, posed the question, “Where was your family in 1908?” on, appropriately enough, her 100 Years in America blog. A century ago, neither of my paternal grandparents had been born yet, although one, my grandmother Jessie Beatrice Bowie, was just a year away. Her parents, my [...]
An important tip in genealogical research is to re-plow ground you’ve already been over before. And if that’s not productive, do it again! Why? Because it works. Miriam at Ancestories had a Christmas Day surprise when she finally found some elusive in-laws for whom she had searched for years. In an idle moment, she tried [...]
Continue reading about Important Genealogical Tip: Try, Try Again!
She’s there every morning, watching me, this pretty teenager. Her eyes dipped slightly, confident yet demure; slender and shy. She grips a rosary in her hands. A long veil falls down her back to the floor where it merges with the pool that is the train of her dress. She watches me, this teenager from [...]
HARP, the Historical Appellate Review Project, has had a great launch. We are already pursuing several cases and have had inquiries about several more. These may take months to resolve, but we’ll tell the stories here! A HARP Case One of the HARP cases I’m pursuing for my own family is that of my great-grandmother, [...]
I’ve written about this before, but it fits this topic exactly, so I’ve reached into the archives and dusted this one off. Matilda Manson is listed in the 1850 census of Talbot County, Georgia, with her mother, Jane Manson and her sister, Mary Manson. Matilda’s age is given as 6 years old; Mary is reported [...]
School days, school days,Dear old golden rule days.‘Readin’ and ‘ritin’ and ‘rithmetic,Taught to the tune of a hick’ry stick. I wish I had some stories of my ancestors in school. Unfortunately, I have no stories, except the now-debunked story that my grandfather was teased (today, we would say harassed) in school in Georgia because he [...]
