What if you are looking at the wrong guy?….

In 1860, J. W. and Nancy McAlpine are living in Davidson County, TN with their three children. (Click on any image to see a bigger view)

J. W. McAlpin household, Davidson County, TN, Dwelling 707, Family 707.  1860 Federal Population Census, Davidson County, TN, (National Archives Microfilm M653, Roll No. 1246), National Archives, Washington, D. C.  Viewed online at www.ancestry.com

 

So the next step is to find a marriage record for J. W. and Nancy.

Ancestry.com. Tennessee State Marriages, 1780-2002 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008.

Original data: Tennessee State Marriages, 1780-2002. Nashville, TN, USA: Tennessee State Library and Archives. Microfilm.

 

So okay, John W. McAlpin married Nancy Proctor in 1839 in Davidson County, TN so let’s go find them in 1840..

Name:
John Mcalpin

Home in 1840 (City, County, State):
Williamson, Tennessee

Free White Persons – Males – 5 thru 9:
1

Free White Persons – Males – 30 thru 39:
1

Free White Persons – Females – Under 5:
2

Free White Persons – Females – 5 thru 9:
2

Free White Persons – Females – 10 thru 14:
1

Free White Persons – Females – 30 thru 39:
1

Slaves – Males – 36 thru 54:
1

Slaves – Females – 24 thru 35:
1

Persons Employed in Manufacture and Trade:
1

Free White Persons – Under 20:
6

Free White Persons – 20 thru 49:
2

Total Free White Persons:
8

Total Slaves:
2

Total All Persons – Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
10

 

And all goes well, until we try and find the same family in 1850 and find:

John  McAlpin household, Williamson County, TN, Dwelling 386, Family 386.  1850 Federal Population Census, White and Willaimson Counties, TN, (National Archives Microfilm M432, Roll No. 900), National Archives, Washington, D. C.  Viewed online at www.ancestry.com

Wait, what? Who the heck is Jane?  Are Nancy and Jane the same woman?  Well, let’s go back to the marriage records and we find….

Ancestry.com. Tennessee State Marriages, 1780-2002 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008.

Original data: Tennessee State Marriages, 1780-2002. Nashville, TN, USA: Tennessee State Library and Archives. Microfilm.

 

We can’t confuse the John W. McAlpine who married Nancy Proctor and is found on the 1860 census in Davidson County, with the John McAlpine who married Jane M. Blackburn in Williamson County and is shown on the 1840 and 1850 census in Williamson County as the same man.  While I still do not know where John and Nancy were in 1840 and 1850, or why they did not appear to have children before 1851, it is obvious the man found in 1840 and 1850 in Williamson County, TN is not the same man who is later shown in Davidson County in 1860.

Had we just stopped at the 1840 census, it would have been easy to assume that John and Nancy had 5 children by 1840 (unlikely since they married in 1839) and  that those 5 children died or married by the time we found them in 1860.  Instead we are looking at two different families. 

So my next trick of the trade was to search for the surname Proctor in Davidson County, TN and low and behold found this!

John A. Proctor, household, Davidson County, TN, Dwelling 386, Family 386.  1850 Federal Population Census, Davidson County, TN, (National Archives Microfilm M432, Roll No. 875), National Archives, Washington, D. C.  Viewed online at www.ancestry.com

Yup, that’s right. John W. McCoppin and wife Nancy and daughter Sarah C.  and living next door is a man named John A. Proctor and his wife Sarah, who appear to be the correct age to be Nancy Proctor McAlpine’s father and mother!  Yup, a new great great aunt and two new ancestors!  And look at all those brothers and sisters of Nancy’s I have to research!  Surely one of them can help me go back another generation. Just got to prove the link between John and Sarah Proctor and Nancy Proctor McAlpine.  That should be fairly easy to do!

So be careful when just using the census to find families. Sometimes its very easy to confuse two families living close to each other as the same family.  Which is making me question who really is John W. McAlpine’s father. Because I think other researchers may have made the same mistake I came very close to doing and William McAlpine and Patsy Wooten may not be his parents after all.  Two parents possibly found, two possibly lost. All in a days work for the genealogist.

 

To Timeline or Not To Timeline….

Let me preface this by saying I do not use Family Tree Maker. I tried once back in 1996 for a friend. She wanted her very basic family information typed into FTM, so she could then print a chart for a family reunion. Knowing I was a genealogist, she asked me to do it.  I agreed for a fee of $10. Figuring it would take less than an hour to type in her 30 names, I figured that was a pretty good fee. 

So, after about two hours of beating my head against the wall on how to enter names, dates, etc, I gave up, typed all the names into Brother’s Keeper, and GEDCOMMED the data into FTM.  At the time I was using one of the Roots III, IV, V versions, but Brother’s Keeper was the easiest for data entry and so I picked it. 

Now that we have determined that I know absolutely nothing about Family Tree Maker, let me say, I do use The Master Genealogist and have since 2001.  Before that I used the Roots products from Roots III to Ultimate Family Tree. All those programs use events or tags where you can attach unlimited numbers of people to the same event via “roles”.  If I create a census tag for my parents, me, and my brother, then I go from my father’s Person View to my brother’s, that same census tag will show in both person’s Person View Screen.

So as I enter data from wills, deeds, census, etc, each person gets a Person View screen that shows all the events in their life. 

Now I also listen to a lot of Podcasts, and one thing I hear over and over again is create a TIMELINE of your ancestor’s life.  The people saying this almost always use FTM, so I assume that FTM doesn’t have the ability to do this.  However in TMG,  as I add new events, a timeline for my ancestor forms.  I don’t need to create a timeline for him, because his Person View screen (shown below) is a timeline of his life. (Notice a new feature in 8.08 is the ability to accent events by type by color.)

I can even add in historical timelines and see how they fit into this same ancestor’s life.  Here we see the Presidential terms of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson added to the timeline of my ancestor.

So I guess my questions are, doesn’t your software create a time line for you?  Shouldn’t a time line be a basic requirement for picking a good genealogy software?  And how do you do genealogy if you don’t see your ancestor’s life’s events in context to the historical events that were happening all around him/her? 

To Timeline or not to Timeline, why is that a question?

Research Logs….

Like most genealogists, when I first started doing genealogy, I attended lost of genealogy conferences. All the speakers were fond of Research logs, however, they weren’t real fond of telling you how to keep up with all that information once you got past five ancestors. I think the main reason was that they didn’t know how to either. Well, time has gone by and lots of ideas have been laid out, and so the most recent band wagon is one I decided to give a ride.

Lots of people are fond of Evernote.  I tried it, but found it really slowed down my computer, so I abandoned it. But then someone pointed out that you can have folders that are stored on your local machine. You have to be responsible for backing them up, but hey, I have to back up everything else I use on my computer so why not give it one more try.

So the first thing I needed was a list of ancestors to keep up with research for. We all have those ancestors that are our own research, and those that we got from some distant cousin taking us back to Adam and Sarah (yes, they are that prone to mistakes).  I didn’t want to add all of them, since I want to do the research myself, so I decided my fourth great ancestors and down was  good place to start. Most of that is my own research.  I started by creating a note for each ancestor so I could link from that ancestor to records.

Once I had a note for every ancestor I knew, I then created a list of ancestors that I needed to look up on all the records in TN.  For the most part all my ancestors to that point were in TN at some point during their lives. 

Once I had a master list of ancestors, I copied that to a new 1850 Census Research note. (continue through all the census years to 1940).  Then I created a check list.  Marked off all the ancestors who were either already dead by 1850 or hadn’t been born yet, and now I have a list of ancestors that I need to find the 1850 census for. As I work through the list, I make notes to myself, like where they were found, who was living there, etc. 

I hope after a few years months of doing this, I will have a good research log to use with my genealogy program. In the mean time, I will at least know where I left off working on finding my ancestors. 

I don’t know if this method is going to be the greatest research log until I have used it for a long time, but at least it is helping me keep up with who I have found and who I haven’t and that has to be beneficial in some way.

Genealogy Organization: Or why do you fight me on it…..

I see blog posts all the time telling people how to organize their genealogy papers and I see people saying, “What a great idea, wish mine were organized.”

Well, if it’s a great idea, why are you fighting me on it? Why don’t you follow the system and get it done already?  What are you waiting for?   Here is my filing system for my genealogy:

I have two four~drawer filing cabinets.  My mother, father, mother-in-law and father-in-law each get a drawer (or two as needed) and a color.

I bought hanging file folders in each of those colors, and using a family tree sheet for each of them created surname folders for each new ancestral line, the paternal ancestor’s surnames. 

Then I bought those three ring folders that you can buy for school reports, in the same colors for documents. Page protectors in bulk.

Now take all the documents you have in stacks all over the house, in the laptop bag, in the basement, and divide them into piles based on surname.  A third cousin once removed is going to go under the same surname as the common ancestor that you share.  We are just getting papers filed, not getting them ready to parade in front of the family.  Sort them as quickly as you can. This is not rocket science. Got a deed from your Jones cousins to their brother. Put it in the Jones folder.  For now, we just want them filed away and off the desk, chair, floor, cat box….Go ahead and put them in the sheet protectors now.  That way they are protected from the elements.

 

Once you have filed every document, then you can pull out one surname folder and start entering information.  Once the document has been entered, then take the three ring folders, and put them in those folders by document type.  If you want to record what documents are in the folder, you can create a spread sheet in Excel and print it for the front cover.  I use the source number assigned by my genealogy program, The Master Genealogist. And a smiley face sticker to mark documents that have been scanned.

You can work at this pace until you are done, or until you die; whichever comes first.  As you find new documents, go ahead and file them by surname. You will get to them. Few of us can afford to travel, so we have more entering, scanning, transcribing time than we do photographing, archives time any way.

But the main thing is get them filed away. Imagine if you went to the doctor and was told your file is around here somewhere as the receptionist fumbled through papers, knocking over stacks and when she finally produced the file, it was covered in last week’s lunch and the papers weren’t organized?  You’d find a new doctor’s office and quick.  Well, you are the keeper of your family’s history.  Don’t future generations deserve for you to be as organized with their past as you’d expect the doctor’s office to be with your file?  Notice the doctor files you documents right there while you are standing there. They do not wait until they are scanned. (and yes, they are scanned and filed off site).  So make it a priority to see up a simple filing system, and start using it. Don’t like mine?  That’s fine, there are many more out there, just Google it.

 

 

The Organized Office, Dream, or Pipe Dream….

I joined a group on Facebook about organizing your genealogy and it seems to be a common thread among the group of how to organize our genealogy.  If you’ve read my blog since the beginning, God help you. you know that I have struggled with it along the way. But these days, I work from home, so my office has to work for genealogy, for my youth stuff, and also I share it with a guinea pig.  So I thought I’d share a little bit about how to organize your space, keep your sanity and at the same time, have a presentable room when family came.

 

First off, my room is about 12×12. It was supposed to be a formal dining room, but we have a nice eat in kitchen and so the dining room became a home office.  It is off the formal living room and can be seen from the front door, so it has to stay relatively clean.

Second, I don’t deal well in chaotic environments. My mother loves clutter. Her house was always clean, but she loved “the lived in look.”  I do not share her love of clutter.  I can’t stand stuff just sitting around.  Only at holidays do I have things that sit on the floor for decoration.

So without further ado, here are some basic tips on how to organize your space.

First off, I prefer to pick pieces that are pretty and functional at the same time.  I posted here http://generationsgoneby.wordpress.com/2008/12/01/the-perfect-find/ about the piece I use to store extra paper, file folders, school supplies, my microfilm, etc in.  This piece is now used in the living room and we moved the old entertainment center to my office. I collect Nativity sets, and it’s just a show piece in my office for them. 

Second, look for things to file with that have closed fronts. 

I searched Google for an image of a disorganized stacking shelf.  The term returns 978,000 examples of shelves overflowing with papers, books etc.  So obviously, this is an issue.

My computer desk is one of the that you bought 20 years ago at the office supply store, that had a place on one side for the printer, and the computer hard drive. You know those big bulky pieces of equipment that had to have lots of space on the floor.  Well, these days I use a laptop, and the new printer scans, prints, faxes, does laundry. 

Not really the laundry part, but it was too wide for under the desk, so I set it up on top of the desk and the underneath part is now the perfect book shelf.  And I have room to store some extra printer paper

. 

 

When company comes, I simply shut the door.

Another thing I do is I attached the power strip to the wall on the back of the computer.  Now all the cords are up out of the floor and under the desk is nice and neat.

Now add a garbage can to help keep it that way all the time.

Next is the filing cabinet. I have two four~drawer ones. They are mostly full of the documents I have copied over the years.  I do use one for storage of those big things I need to keep up with, so they are not in plain view.

My filing system is simple. Each of my ancestors and hubby’s get’s a drawer and a color.  Each new ancestral surname gets a hanging file folder. Any descendant under that surname (even if they have a different last name goes under that surname). Women are filed with their fathers until they marry, with husband’s thereafter.

 

Within those surnames, documents are divided by type.  Here you see marriage, deaths, births.

And an example of the documents within the folder, inside protective sheets.

Finally, yes, I have a book shelf. Probably the one area of the room that could use some decluttering this week.   I said I was organized, not perfect. 

And finally, my room mate. The one whose hay makes all the dust bunnies in my house possible. He lost his brother a few months ago, but seems to have adjusted to being a genealogy pig.

And he keeps his side of the room fairly neat and tidy as well.

The top of my desk is for the computer and printer.  But I do have one more item, I could not do without when working from actual paper. I got this piece at Walmart a few years ago and it’s perfect for when I am working with photocopies. And yet it folds up for easy storage when not in use.

So there you have it. Basically, a genealogy room can be functional, organized, and look nice when family comes.  I think the bane of any organizational challenge frankly is the Rubber Made Tub. I know people who are fond of them, but frankly, I am not a big fan. Yes, as you can see they are great for holding hay under the guinea pig cage, but I don’t care for them as storage items. I think they welcome disorganization and clutter, and they are expensive.  I think it’s better to properly store items we do need and use, and toss those we do not.  But I know I am in the minority there since Rubbermaid had an increase in sales last year of 2.2% ~http://ir.newellrubbermaid.com/investor-relations/press-releases/press-release-details/2013/Newell-Rubbermaid-Reports-Solid-Fourth-Quarter-2012-Results-and-Provides-2013-Guidance1133345/default.aspx

A Clustering We Will Go….

So I decided that the best approach to figuring out my Susan Markham problem was to do the old cluster genealogy research.  The Markham family is mainly from Cannon, DeKalb, Warren, Anderson and later in Wilson County, TN.

So I decided that the best thing to do was to start in one of the counties and go from there. Since Berry/Ben is from Cannon, that was where we started. We, being me, and well, the voices in my head. We discuss research paths a lot lately and often out loud. Do not judge, Susan will do that to you.

So I started with Ancestry’s marriages of TN and abstracted all the Mar*m families I could find in Cannon County.  My genealogy program, The Master Genealogist, allows for any number of parents for a person, so I started by creating a Pseudo Father called Cannon County, Markhams.  This allowed me to cluster the family under this non-primary father figure and easily find the families in that area.

So I went through all the marriage records, creating new people where necessary up to 1860.  Then I went through and found them all on the 1860 census when our Susan was supposedly around 12 years old.

What I found was very interesting.  I did not find Susan, but I did find that Patience Davis Markum remarried in 1859 to Daniel S. Ford and they have a daughter named Caldonia Ford in 1860, who is ten years old. This Caldonia would not be Patience’s daughter, but since I am looking for Susan and her daughter, Virginia Caledonia, this perked me up. It’s the first time I’d seen the name used by someone close to the Markham family.

But then it got better.  In 1851, Eliza Marcum married Green Bethel. I think this Eliza is Patience’s daughter.  And in 1854, she named her daughter Caldonia Bethel!  This is the second time this name has been used as a Markham girl’s name, and our Virginia Caledonia wasn’t born until about 1866.  Unfortunately, I haven’t found the 12 year old Susan living with any of this family group.

But since I am beginning to see a pattern of using the name Caldonia among the Markhams, I am holding out hope of someday tying my Susan into them. As early as 1860, some of these Markhams were starting to migrate on to DeKalb County, TN.  So that will probably be my next cluster group family to work with. Hoping to see Caldonia continue to be a family name. 

 

Then I decided to look at the marriage record for Susan J. Markum and Mat Dennis. Many researchers claim they married in Cannon County and so I had ruled out Susan J, the daughter of Mary J. Unknown and possibly Barlett as my ancestress.  But here’s the marriage record:

So now I am not so sure.  Not convinced that name is Markum, Marcum, or Markham.  Comments?  If she is Susan Markum, then that rules out the daughter of Mary Unknown Markum.  I believe that Susan is also a relative of Ben/Berry Markum, and that would rule him out as a relative to our Susan.  But if Mat Dennis did not marry Susan Markham, then she is still on the table to be my ancestor. 

Ah to live and to research another day.  Special thanks to my Rootsweb friends on Facebook for jumping in with suggestions and research ideas. Couldn’t do it without them.

Yeah, it just doesn’t work on her….

So I found an offer online a few months ago where I could get Ancestry for $49 for six months.  The offer had been sent to the blogger and she’d posted it online and I thought, “What the heck, I am only working 20 hours a week now, and I have wondered what they have and it’s summer….”  So I signed up.  I have only two real brick walls, George L. Gee, and Susan Markham. 

So I decided I would research George’s wife, Sarah Jane Rash. Sarah Jane is the daughter of Robert Rash and Rebecca Sills.  As I started researching, Rebecca, whom my great aunt had said was Rebecca Stills, I found a lot of Stills family living around her and thought okay, perhaps she was Rebecca Stills instead of Sills.  So I started researching on Ancestry and found one Josiah Stills. But as I researched the Stills family in Virginia, two things became apparent. Josiah was NOT her father, and Rebecca did not live any where near where the Stills were from.  So I decided to trace the Sills family in VA.  First I looked for Sills in Lunenburg County in VA in 1810, since Rebecca had married Robert Rash there in 1809. But there were NO Sills in Lunenburg County in 1810. So I went back to the drawing board.  Robert and Rebecca move from Lunenburg County, in 1810 to Greensville County in 1820 and then back to Lunenburg by 1830. WHY? 

 

Well, the 1820 Greensville census tells the story. The county is full of Sills.   One of which is a Rebecca Sills (not our Rebecca).  I believe she is from Greensville, though it isn’t clear why Rebecca married two counties away in Lunenburg County just yet. Still have some research to do, but have several good candidates as her parents.  Cluster research for the score.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So I decided to try some of this cluster genealogy with Susan Markham. I’d trace all the Wilson County Markham’s back and see if a Susan emerged.  Yeah right!  It didn’t take long to realize that there just aren’t any cluster around Susan to research..

In 1860, there is John and Susan (too old to be our Susan)  in the 10th District and Nancy Telford Markham in the 25th District.  Neither family has a daughter named Susan living at home. Research on Nancy Telford Markham shows her son John to be the only heir of his father. 

In 1870, there is Ben Marcrum, in the 21st. I have thought for a long time Ben was related to Susan, just haven’t been able to prove it.  Another researcher states the Susan I thought was Ben’s niece is actually married to a Matt Dennis.  So that would rule our Susan out. 

In 1880, there is J. F. (Ben’s son) in the 21st, and Berry (Ben) in the 11th. There is the only time we see Susan living with her son-in-law A. J. Lannum, and there is Winson Markham, age 21 and Sophia Markham age 12,   born in KY. and living with Z. A. Baird

So since I have already traced Berry/Ben Markham and his son J. F.  and haven’t proven a relationship, that left John and Susan, and Winson. 

I found Winson and his sister Sophia living in the house of Winston Markham, age 37 in 1870 in Caldwell County, KY. (Though Susan states she was born in TN, for now I am open to that part being a mistake.)  Living with him is H. H. Markham, a physician age 39, John, 13, Winson age 11, and Sophia age 3.  They have a black female named Susan Wilson, age 46 and a black female named Sylvia age 12 as domestic servants.  Next door is Ben and Sarah Board (Baird?)

So I then searched for al Markhams** in Caldwell County.  No one that fit our Susan, age 22 and Caldonia age 4.

So I searched for Victory Baird, because Winson and Sophia were living with Z. A. and Victory Baird in 1880.  And I find Winson and Sophia also living with Zeblon and Victory Baird.  They are listed on the 1870 as Bairds.  Not sure if the Winson and Sophia living in Caldwell County are the same as the Winson and Sophirah living in Wilson County, TN are the same people, but it seems like they could be..

 

However, this gives me another surname to research looking for Susan. Since I have never found Susan and Caldonia in 1870, I believe they are enumerated under a different surname. What if they were living with family and were enumerated under that surname and not Markham? 

While the Baird family is large in Wilson County, TN, I did not see anyone with a Susan or Caldonia that could be ours.  I haven’t given  up on Zeblon* or Victory Baird though. I think there may be something there. Winson and Sophia are their niece and nephew. Though Zeblon was 25 years older than Victory (Victoria), I do believe they were married. In 1850, he is living with Andrew and Martha Baird. In 1860, he and Victoria are living with Andrew and Martha. In 1870, he is head of household.  But so far, I have not been able to find a marriage record for him. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So I go back to Kentucky.  Winston Markham married Mrs. Ann M. Throckmorton on 28 Nov 1855 in Caldwell County, KY. 

In 1860 Winston and Ann have a son John, age 3 and a son Winston Jr. age 1.

In 1870, Ann has apparently passed away and we see Winston living with H. H., the physician and his, John, age 13, W. B., age 11, Sophia age 3. That same census year, we see Winson and Sophia living with the Bairds and they are enumerated as Bairds. 

So what is the relationship between Zeblon of Wilson County, and Winston of Caldwell County, and does any of this show a relationship to Susan?  Well, obviously I don’t know. But it’s apparent that Winston is not Susan’s brother.  If they are related, at most he would be a cousin.  So that leaves me back with John and Susan and Berry/Ben.  Ah Susan, why do thou allude me?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So far even cluster research ain’t helping me with Susan. 

*Zebelon is not to be confused with the Zebelon Baird living in Davidson County at the same time.

 

**Note Markham is spelled numerous ways. Most of the time, I search for Mar*m.  That tends to return almost any spelling.  I tend to use the standard Markham when talking about the people and the way the name is spelled on the record if available otherwise.  They are all in the same.