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DATABASES OF THE DAY (Free for 10 Days!)
Kankakee City, Illinois Directory, 1876
Sitting astride the Iroquois River, Kankakee Illinois is a short fifty miles south of Chicago. This directory which makes up this database was compiled in 1876. Originally created by W. H. Bristol, a long time resident of the city and newspaper editor, it provides each resident's street address and occupation. Containing the names of over 2,600 persons, this database can be useful for researchers of Illinois ancestors in locating residents from the east-central part of the state.
Bibliography: Bristol, W. H. "Kankakee City, Illinois Directory, 1876." Spendard, Andrea, ed. [Database online] Orem, UT: Ancestry, Inc., 1999.
To search this database, go to:
http://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/search/3969.htm
Atlantic County, New Jersey Marriage Records, 1837-1880
Home to Atlantic City in southern New Jersey, Atlantic County was formed from neighboring Gloucester County in 1837. This database is a collection of county marriage records between 1837 and 1880. Each entry provides the names of both bride and groom and the marriage date. It contains the names of nearly 5,700 individuals. Originally published in the nineteenth century, the records were compiled by Stanley Craig from documents kept by the county clerk. For researchers of New Jersey ancestors, this can be a helpful source of information.
Bibliography: Craig, Stanley H. "Atlantic County, New Jersey Marriage
Records." Merchantville, NJ: H. Stanley Craig, - .
To search this database, go to:
http://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/search/3970.htm
California Narratives: Gold Rush Merchant
Prospective miners were not the only immigrants to California following the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill. Stephen Davis and his brother left their homes in Nashua, New Hampshire, and traveled to Northern California to act as agents for local merchants. This database is a collection of Davis' journal entries between 1850 and 1854. The original journal is housed at the Henry E. Huntington Library in California. Researchers will find descriptions of Marysville, Coulterville, Stockton, San Francisco, and his four Panama crossings. It also includes an account of his trip to Oregon, and his business interests in general stores and boardinghouses. For persons attempting to understand the life of a typical merchant in the California gold rush, this can be an illuminating narrative.
Bibliography: Library of Congress. "California As I Saw It: First-Person
Narratives of California's Early Years." Vol. 72. [Database online]
Washington: Library of Congress, 1999. Davis, Stephen Chapin. "California
Gold Rush Merchant." San Marino, CA: Huntington Library, 1956.
To search this database, go to:
http://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/search/3971.htm
Newsday (New York City), Obituaries, 1995-1999 (Update)
Bibliography: UMI Company. "Obituaries from the Newsday, 1995-1999." Orem, UT: Ancestry Inc., 1999.
To search this database, go to:
http://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/search/3614.htm
TODAY'S FEATURED MAP
Religious Situation in Central Europe, ca. 1618
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"BROKEN AXLES AND TEA WITH THE NEIGHBORS:
GLEANING OLD NEWSPAPERS" by Michael John Neill
I still get my hometown weekly newspaper. It's been years since I've lived "at home" but I always make a point to keep up on the latest news, who got married, who died, who had a child, who got divorced, who bought or sold land, who was fined in circuit court, who had an anniversary, etc.
Newspapers are a tremendous genealogical resource. Not only do they contain obituaries, but they also contain birth announcements, wedding announcements, anniversary notices, probate notices, court information, and a wide variety of other material.
There were newspapers that printed news of the local court, including what cases were coming to trial. Individuals searching for "scandalous" court cases might also want to search the newspapers at the time when the case came to trial in addition to the time when the "scandal" actually took place. Testimony and other information from the trial might appear in the paper.
Legal notices for probate and estate settlements will also be found, but it is possible in some areas to find a summary of the will published in the newspaper. Property transactions can also be located, sometimes with the amount of the sale. Names of those serving on juries can also be printed. It really is up to the editor to determine the content and some were much more concerned with local matters than others.
A potential gold mine can be had in the "social" columns or the correspondents' columns. These columns were frequently letters of "news" submitted by readers of the paper. Many of the submissions were social events, but a wide variety of items made their way into the columns. A paper in the county seat may have columns for many of the towns in the county, even if these towns have their own newspapers.
Reading these columns can be an eye-opener. When searching the Carthage, Illinois, newspapers, I make certain to read the gossip from Warsaw, Elvaston, Breckenridge, West Point, Stillwell and all those small towns where I had relatives. Some town names that are used may be no longer in use today and users unfamiliar with the local area should consult a map to determine approximately where the columns are coming from.
It does take a tremendous amount of time to read the newspapers, especially when one is searching the correspondents' columns for an event that took place at an unknown time. One can also glean significant information by simply reading the column. If nothing else, a more local, more detailed, and more scandalized view of history can be obtained.
I tried using newspapers to solve one of my most difficult research problems: my great-grandmother Ida Sargent, born 1874 in Iowa, Missouri, or Illinois. There was little to go one and Ida's mother "vanishes" sometime circa 1882. I found several items in the Warsaw (Illinois) Bulletin regarding Ida and five family visits that took place in 1891 and 1892. Below is one of them:
Warsaw [Illinois] Bulletin, 29 May 1891, "Breckenridge" "Ira Sargent and family, of Lima, spent Sunday with his daughter, Ida Sargent, of this vicinity."
Ida moved from Breckenridge to Warsaw in the spring of 1892. No mention of the move is made in the paper, but I was pleasantly surprised to find so many references to the family.
Sometimes the items are interesting and may appear non-genealogical. However, the genealogist can usually glean something from an entry. While the following entry does not mention exactly who "Grandma Dirks" is, the researcher familiar with the family will know the reference is to Anna's mother, who was obviously alive in October of 1921.
Golden [Illinois] New Era, 13 Oct 1921 "Mrs. Anna Goldenstein and son
Jurgen, daughter Altje and Neora Janssen visited with Grandma Dirks Sunday afternoon. On the way home they broke an axle on their car near Coatsburg and were compelled to make the rest of the trip on the nine thirty train."
An entry a few years later indicates Jurgen has left home and is working approximately fifty miles away.
Golden [Illinois] New Era, 16 Aug 1923, "Mrs. Anna Goldenstein visited
Tuesday with her son, Jurgen, who is working in Keokuk."
Residences of former residents of the area can also be obtained.
Warsaw [Illinois] Bulletin, 8 July 1892 , "Phil. A. Troutfetter, editor of the Colby, Kansas, Tribune, made the Bulletin a pleasant call Tuesday. Mr. Troutfetter was a Warsaw boy 20 years ago, but has resided elsewhere during that period."
Until I ran across this notice, I was unable to track down this branch of the family.
Warsaw [Illinois] Bulletin, 28 Dec 1900, "Tioga Items", Born to Mr. & Mrs. George Trautvetter, a daughter.
There might be mention in the newspaper of births that are not in official records or of births that took place before registration was in place. The notice in the paper might mention details that are not included on the birth certificate. Today many newspapers include such announcements. The Galesburg, Illinois, newspaper includes such announcements along with the names of grandparents and great-grandparents. It is not the only newspaper to carry such information. In some cases adoptees have used birth announcements in newspapers when the birth name, date, and place are known. Adoption records might be sealed but newspapers are not. It is worth a try.
Obituaries are an excellent reason to look at old newspapers, and there are some things to remember as you search, especially the weeklies. The obituary might have appeared two months after the individual died. While it is unusual, it did happen. Bad weather might delay mail delivery and harvest season might have delayed writing the obituary. Old time weeklies did not contain obituaries and death notices so that individuals would get the news in time for the funeral. While the editor wanted timely information, there might not have been a "rush" to get the information in the next edition.
Always search the paper a few weeks after the obituary runs. Pay attention to the social columns from the town where the ancestor was from. Sometimes the social columns contain information about individuals from out of town who attended the funeral. These short items might contain the names of potential friends and relatives of the ancestor along with their residence.
Do not be surprised if there is no obituary at all. Women were underrepresented in the obituaries in early papers (especially pre-1900) and individuals from "lower" socio-economic classes are not as likely to be included either. All you might find is a one-line death notice: "Grandpa Rampley died last week. The entire community is saddened."
The difficulty with newspapers is that they are for the most part unindexed and they may contain errors.
LINKS
The following links are not meant to be comprehensive. The state links are a sampling and vary widely in terms of size and content. When looking for a specific state, try and locate interlibrary loan policies and determine if an inventory has been published in book form.
To locate information on newspapers in a certain state or town, searches
on a search engine might also be helpful.
The United States Newspaper Program
http://www.neh.fed.us/html/usnp.html
Canadian Newspapers on Microform:
Held by the National Library of Canada
http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/services/news/cnie.htm
National Library of Canada Interlibrary Loan Page
http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/ill/e-ill.htm
INCOMPLETE list of newspaper links. This is meant to be a sample, not a comprehensive listing.
Alaska Newspaper Project
http://www.educ.state.ak.us/lam/library/hist/newspaper.html
Catholic Newspapers in Microform at Notre Dame
http://www.nd.edu/~archives/cathnews/cathnlst.htm
Kansas State Historical Society: Guide to Newspapers on Microfilm
http://www.kshs.org/library/news.htm
Maryland State Archives: Guide to Maryland Newspapers Collections of the
Maryland State Archives---newspapers by County/City
http://www.mdarchives.state.md.us/msa/speccol/news/indices/html/counties.html
North Carolina Newspaper Project: Guide to Newspapers on Microfilm in
the North Carolina State Archives
http://statelibrary.dcr.state.nc.us/ncnp/intro.htm
Oregon Newspaper Microfilming Project (inventory)
http://libweb.uoregon.edu/preservn/ONPTitles.html
Texas State Library and Archives Commission: Circulating Microfilm:
Texas Newspapers
http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/lobby/ref/news.htm
There are undoubtedly many more. Use your favorite search engine and
search for:
(Your state or town) newspapers microfilm
Always search for the section on interlibrary loan to see if it is possible to have your local library borrow the microfilm. Your librarian might find that another library also has this microfilm. Use the inventories as a clue that the film exists and print out the appropriate pages and take them to your librarian and ask nicely if the film can be ordered. I have much better luck when I've also printed out the lending libraries interlibrary loan policy page.
Looking up these links was bad for my free time, now I've got microfilm
I'd like to order!
Good Luck.
Copyright 1999, Michael John Neill. Michael John Neill, is the Course I Coordinator at the Genealogical Institute of Mid America (GIMA) held annually in Springfield, Illinois, and is also on the faculty of Carl Sandburg College in Galesburg, Illinois. Michael is the Web columnist for the FGS FORUM and is on the editorial board of the Illinois State Genealogical Society Quarterly. He conducts seminars and lectures on a wide variety of genealogical and computer topics and contributes to several genealogical publications, including Ancestry and Genealogical Computing. You can email him at: mneill@asc.csc.cc.il.us
or visit his website at: http://www.rootdig.com/
EASTMAN'S ONLINE GENEALOGY NEWSLETTER - - HEADLINES
IN THIS ISSUE:
- A Moving Experience
- Generations Grande Suite 6.0
- Jewish Records Indexing - Poland
- "The Family History Experience" Birmingham, England
- West Surrey Family History Society Computer Conference
- The FreeUKGEN Initiative
- Another ALA "Best Reference" Award
- "Our Loose Ends"
- Who Is the Biggest?
- Ancestry.com, Inc. Closes $33.2 Million in New Funding
- New Computer is the Size of an Aspirin
- Upcoming Events
- Home Pages Not Highlighted
To read this week's newsletter, go to:
http://www.ancestry.com/columns/eastman/eastnew.htm
ANCESTRY QUICK TIP
Become familiar with the surnames in the area you are searching so that you can recognize them, even with only half their letters distinct. Study a county history, contemporary newspaper, tax list, landowner's atlas, or other record.
THOUGHT FOR TODAY
There is not one big cosmic meaning for all,
there is only the meaning we each give to our life,
an individual meaning, an individual plot,
like an individual novel, a book for each person.
- Anais Nin, 1903-1977
PRODUCT OF THE DAY AT THE ONLINE STORE
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Best Wishes,
Juliana Smith, Editor, Ancestry Daily News
Rebekah Thorstenson, Associate Editor
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