This entry would be of interest to both the Codwise and James family descendants.

Wish This Was My Janos
The 1924 record of Janos Jeno Szucs caught my eye since we have three generations of Janos/John Szucs in our family. It includes an "Affidavit to Explain Protracted Foreign Residence and to Overcome Presumption of Noncitizenship." The document reveals that he had been living in Felsogagy, Hungary, and in it Janos states that,

I was brought back to Hungary by my mother in 1900 when I was one year old and have ever since resided with her. Owing to lack of funds I could not return earlier to the United States. I have three times been called upon to perform military service but was found physically unfit for such service.

The document goes on to give the names and addresses of his cousin, Steve Dvoracaki, and uncle, Stephen Kokai, in the United States. An affidavit is provided by another apparent relative, Lajos Kokai, a native of Budapest, Hungary. That same page lists Janos's baptismal certificate--"issued by the Holy Ghost Church of So. Bethlehem, Pa."--as an identifying document and goes on to says that he'll be joining his cousin Steve in Niles, Ohio. There is also a photograph of Janos.

What a wealth of information on the family! And I couldn't help but think how confusing he might be to research without the details contained in this document.

Something for My Own Family
I did manage to find one of my relatives in this database. My mom was adopted by her mother's sister and her husband when she was very young, and she grew up with that family. Her uncle, who we always called Grandpa Pyburn, was a mining engineer in Mexico. His passport record is six pages long and includes a photograph of him from 1919 when he was twenty-five. Among the other cool things I found in his file was an affidavit from his father with his father's signature and included dates and places of birth for both of them. Their address in 1919 is also included, as well as the name of the company Grandpa worked for.

Grandpa Pyburn worked in Mexico for many years and although he was married in 1923 in Brooklyn, he does not appear in the 1930 census because he was working outside the U.S. And he certainly wasn't the only one who found employment outside U.S. borders.

Working Outside the U.S.
In browsing through entries for other surnames in our family tree, I ran across a record for George Sterling Dyer, also in the mining industry--although his work took him to Siberia. (Brrrr! I think Grandpa Pyburn had the right idea!)

Following Mr. Dyer's passport, is a request for his wife Carrie (along with her photograph) and an amendment that states, "it is necessary for me to have included in my passport my two minor children, Florence and Jessamine." A photo of the two girls is on that page as well.

Another businessman, Michael Dyer was headed to Havana, Cuba, with his wife and son. Their passports followed his and an added bonus is Michael's date and place of birth--Brackloon, Ballyhaunis, Ireland, on 29 September 1865.

Traveling to Settle Estates
I found two records of individuals returning home to settle family estates. Not only does the usual information provide clues, but the reason for their traveling could give you a clue as to the death date of a parent or other family member.

In the record of Marius Nielson I found a reminder of the effects of war. He was returning to Denmark in November 1919 because, "both parents died during the War and I must visit the home relative to settling [sic] the estate."

Using This Database
The records in this database cover more than a century of records and the content will vary by era. Earlier records that I viewed tended to be a little sparser in content but typically contained the age of the applicant. And if you can identify an ancestor in these records you will likely be rewarded with a good description of that person, since they didn't have photographs to identify people in those days.

You'll want to search for everyone in the family too. You may find your ancestor signing as a witness for a brother, sister, or some other collateral relative, and in many of the records, those providing affidavits typically also listed their address.

As I mentioned earlier, there is usually more than one page pertaining to each applicant, so be sure to click through to the next image and back to the previous records to see if there is additional information or other family members. I also found a number of instances like the Dyer example above where other family members' applications followed.

Use Census in Tandem
Finding Grandpa Pyburn's passport application brought back a flood of
memories. I remember when we would visit him he would take me to the
grocery store with him--just the two of us--in his car that I thought
was very cool because it had a push-button gear shift. And he would
always let me go on the rides in the front of the Piggly Wiggly
grocery store. I watched Neil Armstrong walk on the moon with him in
his den. When I was growing up, he was also the only one who
always called me Juliana--although it was also occasionally used when
I was in trouble for something.

The memories prompted me to revisit his family history, and I even managed to find his father's family in the 1880 census--a record that had evaded me for years--using the birth date his father gave on the affidavit. (They were enumerated as Pylerson thanks to an enumerator with crummy handwriting.)

I now have the Pyburn family in censuses going back to 1860. I even found Grandpa Pyburn's grandfather in the New York Emigrant Savings Bank database that gave his place of birth as County Cork, Ireland, his arrival in the U.S in 1851, and his wife's name, Mary Ryan.

Coincidentally my mother recently discovered some letters from Grandpa's father in her files and I can't help but think that it's appropriate that all these things are surfacing at this time of year, as the 20th of November marked the 28th anniversary of his death. Although he was not a blood relation, he is definitely an important part of our family history.

What Stories Have You Found?
I'm sure you're going to have some fun with this database too. Please let us know what kind of gems you find in the comments section of the blog.

Juliana Smith has been an editor of Ancestry.com newsletters for more than nine years and is author of The Ancestry Family Historian's Address Book. She has written for Ancestry Magazine and wrote the "Computers and Technology" chapter in The Source: A Guidebook to American Genealogy, rev. 3rd edition. Juliana can be reached by e-mail at Juliana@Ancestry.com, but she regrets that her schedule does not allow her to assist with personal research.

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by George G. Morgan

I wrote a column for the Ancestry Daily News a number of years ago that enumerated my ten favorite genealogy books, some genealogy reference CD-ROMs, and my favorite websites. One of the readers of the Ancestry Weekly Journal wrote to Juliana and asked for an article about what specific genealogy research books, common to both beginners and advanced researchers, would be recommended for every serious researcher to have in his or her library.

This is a difficult challenge for several reasons. First, it is a subjective matter and depends on what geographical area an individual is researching. Second, a list that is too "generic" risks losing people's interest. Finally, the fact is that books are an expensive commodity and not everyone can afford to buy every title they would like to have.

However, there certainly is a core collection of books that every genealogist would find helpful to have close at hand as reference materials for their research. I'll accept the challenge with the understanding that your list and my list may or may not be the same, and that some of the books may not be applicable to your research. However, it makes sense for each of us to consider a personal genealogical reference library that includes books from each of the categories below.

Basic Reference Works
I recommend that you have some basic reference works within reach at all times. These include:

• a collegiate dictionary and thesaurus;
• a contemporary atlas of the U.S. and Canada, and either a detailed atlas or folding sheet map of countries and/or regions where you are researching;
• a historical map or atlas going back as far as possible (check garage sales, flea markets, and used book stores);
• a good world history;
• a gazetteer (place name dictionary) for the place(s) where you are researching; and
• Elizabeth Shown Mills's Evidence! Citation and Analysis for the Family Historian. (Her newest book, Evidence Explained: Citing History Sources from Artifacts to Cyberspace, made its debut at the Federation of Genealogical Societies Conference this year.)

A very fine atlas and gazetteer is Philip's World Atlas & Gazetteer, published by the Royal Geographical Society and available at online booksellers' sites.

"How-To" and Reference Books
Your core personal genealogy collection should contain books that are comprehensive on a number of topics. Let us assume that we are starting our search in the United States and then branching out to other countries and regions. The best of these books are these.

• The Source: A Guidebook to American Genealogy (3rd edition), edited by Loretto Dennis Szucs and Sandra Hargreaves Luebking, covers virtually everything that any genealogist would want to know about U.S. research, including record types, methodologies, repositories, and so much more.
• Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources (3rd edition), edited by Alice Eichholz, provides state-by-state historical information, detailed descriptions of record types and where to find them, a table for each county of every state with its courthouse address, its origin and date, and dates of the oldest record types to be found there.
• How to Do Everything with Your Genealogy, by George G. Morgan, covers every aspect of genealogical research for beginners to advanced, with record types in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and Australia described, illustrated, and explained. Computer resources and Internet research are also explained.

Computer and Internet Books
We all know that the Internet is an exceptionally dynamic resource; it changes daily, if not hourly. However, some essential books for computer users and for those who rely on the Internet for research help should be considered for your core collection.

• Your genealogy software manual should be an essential component in your genealogy library. If you looked at it when you opened the box, turned up your nose, and tossed it into a closet, think again. The user manual should be read and practiced one chapter at a time, and then referred to as needed. Remember, not all built-in help is as thorough as the manual.
• The Official Guide to RootsWeb.com, by Myra Vanderpool Gormley, CG, and Tana Pedersen Lord, is a brand new book, published by Ancestry Publishing. It provides an in-depth tour of the world's largest, free genealogy website. There is no one who knows the content and potential of RootsWeb more than Myra. She has been a working member and guiding force in the development of the site for many years and is the perfect guide for helping all genealogists unlock the potential in RootsWeb.
• The Official Guide to Ancestry.com, by George G. Morgan , is another brand new book by Ancestry Publishing. If you are a subscriber to Ancestry.com, there are now more than 24,000 databases online for you to search-–and searching the databases takes skill and patience. The personalized "My Ancestry" and "Ancestry Community" are powerful facilities to be worked with in tandem with all the other research you do. Learn how to really use Ancestry.com effectively and successfully.

Record-Type-Specific Books
As you become more deeply involved with different record types, there are some which are of extensive detail or particular complexity that really require their own reference books.

• They Came in Ships: A Guide to Finding Your Immigrant Ancestor's Arrival Record, by John P. Colletta, Ph.D. , is a slim but intensive reference to researching ships' passenger lists and introduces you to the ports of arrival as well.
• They Became Americans: Finding Naturalization Records and Ethnic Origins, by Loretto Dennis Szucs, is the definitive resource for understanding and searching for the several types of records involved with the U.S. naturalization process--from ship's passenger lists to the certificate of naturalization--and all the legal changes since 1789.
• Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920, by William Thorndale and William Dollarhide, is an unparalleled classic historical map reference. It depicts each state for each of the decades at which time a federal census enumeration occurred. Each map shows the outlines and names of the counties a) at that time, and b) at the present. Notations about county boundary changes are included, and these can be compared to the states' tables in the Red Book to fine-tune where you should be looking for records of a specific historical period.
• Courthouse Research for Family Historians: Your Guide to Genealogical Treasures, by Christine Rose, is a long-needed guide to the broad variety of different record types and the methods of organization in American courthouses.
• Walking with Your Ancestors: A Genealogist's Guide to Using Maps and Geography, by Melinda Kashuba, is the definitive guide to locating and using many different types of maps, as well as GPS navigation, in your genealogical odyssey. This is a must-have for genealogists of all ranges of experience, especially the directionally challenged.
• The Census Book: A Genealogist's Guide to Federal Census Facts, Schedules, and Indexes (PDF online), by William Dollarhide, is one of several excellent census reference books. However, this one is the easiest to read and comprehend, and the lists and tables are excellent for quick reference.
• Land and Property Research in the United States, by E. Wade Hone, continues to be the best reference work about every state's land records.

International Reference Books
There are so many, many excellent books concerning research in other geographical locations that it is impossible to begin to enumerate them. You will have to conduct some research on your own to locate the best one(s) for your personal library, especially for the countries and time periods you are researching. Your list and my list will, of course, differ. I realize, too, that it is impossible to buy all these books at once. However, I recommend searching used booksellers' sites on the Internet, eBay, and even perusing the used books at Amazon.com. You never know what bargains you can find!

Happy Hunting!
George

George G. Morgan is the best-selling author of The Official Guide to Ancestry.com and How to Do Everything with Your Genealogy, both of which are available in the Ancestry Store. George and Drew Smith produce The Genealogy Guys Podcast each week. George is also now teaching online genealogical workshops for Pharos Tutors and for the Continuing Education Division of the University of South Florida in Tampa. Visit his company's website at AhaSeminars.com to view his schedule of upcoming conference events.

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The following items were posted to the 24/7 Family History Circle blog over the past week:

• Catching Up
  (U.S. Passports, Interview with Megan, and How did you get started?)
• British Phone Books Collection Completed, 1880-1984
• Family Tree Maker 2008 Service Pack 2 Now Available
• Photo Corner: Luigi's Shoe Repair Shop
• Book Review: Bonny Kate, Pioneer Lady
• Book Review: The United States in 1800

Save 20% When You Buy Both The Source and Red Book.

Since 1984, The Source has set the standard for family history references, winning the American Library Associations's "Best Reference" award and earning the top spot on Family Chronicle's "Top 10 Genealogical Books" list. Each chapter in this new edition is a mini seminar written by an expert in a specific genealogical field that shows what sources are available, how to find them, and most importantly, how to use them.

And no scholarly reference library is complete without a copy of Red Book. In it, you will find both general and specific information essential to researchers of American records. This revised third edition (2004) provides updated county and town listings within the same overall state-by-state organization.

Save 20% when you purchase these books together for $99.95, or buy them separately and save 15%.

Click here to buy The Source/Red Book bundle.

Click here to buy The Source.

Click here to buy Red Book.

Today's image (in the upper, right-hand corner of this newsletter) is from the Library of Congress Photo Collection, 1840-2000 at Ancestry.

Glengariff Harbor. Co. Cork, Ireland

by Jana Sloan Broglin, CG

All too often when digging through the attic or basement for items of genealogical value, we overlook the papers, composition notebooks, and drawings our parents and grandparents kept for themselves and their children. A composition book used by my mother, Joanne Beard Sloan, was found in an attic along with clippings from the Swanton (Ohio) high school newspaper. The notebooks contained many assignments done in various English classes from 1940-46. The writings made for great reading including a poem with her thoughts about Adolph Hitler and one entitled "Crossroad" about what she wanted to do with her life.

The clippings from the school paper had information regarding writing contests, the Senior class school play, and who had dates after the play. It was fun to learn when my parents went on a date.

So don't overlook school/homework papers when researching your ancestors.

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Family History Garland
I just went to our local Festival of Trees which has a variety of decorated trees, wreaths, and garlands for the holidays.

One garland caught my eye. It had miniature photo frames with pictures of someone's ancestors in each frame. The frames were then secured to the garland. The garland was also wrapped with ribbon and vintage miniature decorations.

I recently found lost cousins on Ancestry.com in central New York state. I spent four days with them in October and obtained photos, maps, etc. I plan to make a similar garland for my home and also frame the property maps as gifts for my father.

Cheers,
Alyson Williams

Force of Will
Locating my Grandfather James Henry Allen and his father of the same name has been almost impossible. He disowned his family before he married and died when my father and his twin brother were only eight years old. There was little information other than some family myths and stories. My grandmother and father started looking for more information in 1961.

One of the stories was that James Jr. had a sister Mary. Through draft cards and census records, we recently located his mother Maria Britton, and from her obituary, we discovered the sister, Mary Jeanette. She had married Frank Bird and they had a daughter, Frances who died in 1984.

It's sad to think we missed the opportunity to talk with her and learn more about the family. We found her will in Norfolk County, Massachusetts. Her executrix was a woman, Frances, who, according to her obituary, was a close friend and housemate.

It then occurred to us to look for the housemate's will. Unfortunately she had died in the ‘90s, but being persistent, we looked up her executrix--a grand niece, Pat. It didn't take long to find Pat's phone number on the Web. After she got over suspicion and surprise, we had a great talk. Pat knew my aunt and had inherited all of her aunt's scrapbooks. She told me great stories about how they met at work, and how this group of women came to live together in mutual support. My aunt even had a bird, and when you know nothing about a person, this feels like an important detail. Pat will keep looking in the scrapbooks for lost history, and at the very least, I've met another person in the family web.

By being persistent, we found an unexpected opportunity. Perhaps this can help someone else.

Jim and Sue Allen

You Never Know Where You Will Meet a Cousin
I am a nurse in a nursing home. I had a patient admitted to my floor about a week ago whose surname was the same as one I was currently working on in my genealogy. I told her that I had Wilmots in my family line, and we joked that we were probably long lost cousins. When I went home, I was thinking about it and copied down my Wilmot line and took it to work with me the next day. She called her husband and he read off their Wilmot line to her and she wrote it down. We sat down together and started comparing our lineage and found a common ancestor in William Wilmot of New Haven, Connecticut, born in 1632. How cool is that? She is eighty years old; I'm forty-seven. We live in Idaho and we both have our genealogy back far enough to find each other because the name was familiar. She says she is sure she will get really good nursing care from her cousin.

Clyde Young in Idaho

If you have a suggestion you would like to share with other researchers, send it to: Juliana@Ancestry.com. Thanks to all of this week's contributors!

Quick Tips may be reprinted, with credit to the submitter, in other Ancestry publications, so if you do not want your tip included in a publication other than the Ancestry Weekly Journal please state so clearly in your message.

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The year was 1915 and in Europe, World War I was underway. By now the war had settled into the trenches and it was difficult to make advances on either side. In 1914, the French had used non-lethal tear gas grenades in an attempt to stop German troops that were moving through Belgium. But in 1915, gas warfare took a more sinister turn as the Germans used chlorine gas against allied troops at the Second Battle of Ypres.

The U.S. was still neutral in the conflict, but the sinking of the Lusitania by a German U-boat killed 128 Americans, compelling President Woodrow Wilson to address the situation with Germany. Although the incident did not draw America into World War I at that time, it did help sway American opinion and move the U.S. one step closer to entering the conflict.

In the Ottoman Empire, under the control of the "Young Turks" since 1913, Armenian scholars, political leaders, and clergy were rounded up on 24 April 1915 and a large-scale genocide of the Armenian population began. It would eventually claim an estimated 1.5 million lives.

In Mexico, the revolution that had begun in 1910 with the overthrow of the government of Porfirio Diaz continued, and in 1915, Venustiano Carranza declared himself president of Mexico. Francisco "Pancho" Villa continued to fight and in April was defeated by Carranza's forces led by General Alvaro Obregon. When United States president, Woodrow Wilson, recognized Carranza's government, Pancho Villa began attacks on Americans in Mexico and even staged a night-time raid on a New Mexico town. Wilson responded by sending 12,000 troops into Mexico after him. Led by General Pershing, the troops on horseback never found Villa and were punished by the harsh desert conditions. The Mexican Revolution prompted 900,000 Mexicans to immigrate to the United States to escape the war.

In Chicago, Illinois, on July 24, a picnic for the employees of Western Electric turned to tragedy when the S.S. Eastland, which was to ferry the group to Michigan City, Indiana, rolled over in the Chicago River killing more than 800 of the 2,500 passengers aboard.

Major hurricanes in the U.S. struck Galveston, Texas, and New Orleans, Louisiana.

In New York, Mary Mallon, better known as "Typhoid Mary" was found making a living in the only way she knew how--as a cook--at Sloane Hospital for Women in Manhattan under the name of Mary Brown. Mallon had been detected as the source of a small typhus outbreak in 1906 and was put in quarantine until 1910 when she was released under the promise that she would no longer work as a cook. The 1915 transgression landed her back in quarantine where she would live out her life.

One of America's favorite dolls, Raggedy Ann, was born in 1915, the creation of cartoonist Johnny Gruelle.

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If you'd like to see your ancestor's photograph in the Ancestry Weekly Journal, send it to Juliana@Ancestry.com.

Contributed by William M. Freeman, Esq., Ontario, California Here's a photo of my parents Alice and Charles Freeman at the New York World's Fair in 1937, the year they were married. They were on an excursion from their home in Rockland, Maine. Maybe that's why they look like such "country folk."	Contributed by Samuel Phillip Collins, Morehead City, North Carolina This is a picture of my great-grandfather, Loderick Tanner Collins. He was born in Wake County, North Carolina, (Panther Branch Township) in May 1853, and died in Sterling Mills Township, Robeson County, North Carolina, on 22 August 1940.

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Has Ancestry helped you make a significant breakthrough with your family history research? If you have an Ancestry success story you'd like to share, please send it to us. We'd love to hear about it! Click here to share your story.

Evidence! Citation & Analysis for the Family Historian
by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Elizabeth Shown Mills' stunning book, Evidence!, provides the family history researcher with a reliable standard for both the correct form of source citation and the sound analysis of evidence. In successful genealogical research, these two practices are inseparable, and the author's treatment of this little-understood concept is nothing short of brilliant.

This dual-track theme is introduced early on, and is best summed up in a few choice paragraphs from the introduction: "Successful research--research that yields correct information with a minimum of wasted time and funds--depends upon a sound analysis of evidence. Source citation is fundamental, but it is not enough. The validity of any piece of evidence cannot be analyzed if its source is unknown.

Normally this book retails for $16.95, but for one week you can buy it in the Ancestry Store for $14.40.

Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920
by William Thorndale and William Dollarhide

The county has always been used as the basic Federal census unit. Genealogical research in the census, therefore, begins with identifying the correct county jurisdictions. This work shows all U.S. county boundaries from 1790 to 1920. On each of the nearly 400 maps the old county lines are superimposed over the modern ones to highlight the boundary changes at ten-year intervals.

Also included are (1) a history of census growth; (2) the technical facts about each census; (3) a discussion of census accuracy; (4) an essay on available sources for each state's old county lines; and (5) a statement with each map indicating which county census lines exist and which are lost. Then there is an index listing all present-day counties, plus nearly all defunct counties or counties later re- named.

Normally this book retails for $49.95, but for one week you can buy it in the Ancestry Store for $42.45.