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Ancestry Daily News
2/4/2003 - Archive
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Honoring Our Ancestors: Another Family Bible Returned! |
Honoring Our Ancestors: Another Family Bible Returned!
Back in November, I wrote an article about Marge Rice, a genealogist who rescues
orphan photos—those family treasures that stray and wind up forlorn in flea
markets and antiques stores. Among the many responses was a request for assistance
in tracing the family whose Bible had wandered into the hands of reader Rudy
Streng. On 19 December, I shared the steps Rudy and I took to make that happen.
At that time, I asked whether folks would be interested in more such articles
and invited readers to tell me of other items that could possibly be reunited
with their families of origin. Once again, my e-mail box overflowed, so how
could I resist playing family detective again?
Another Meandering Bible
Ruth Allen's plea concerning a Bible she had accidentally purchased caught my
eye:
"Please help me find a family member I can give this Bible to that was
in an old suitcase I bought years ago. I promised myself I would not discard
it, but have had no luck on the Internet and hope you can help me. The family
name is FERRALL: Edith born July 15,1914, died 1916; Howard born April 30, 1917,
died March 13, 1976 (Ohio); Gordon Bernard ("Roger") born 1923; Dorothy
born 1886-87, died June 18, 1926 and buried in Chelan, Washington; and Frank
C. born May 25,1883, died December 5, 1942 at 59 years of age and buried in
Cortland, Ohio. The Bible belonged to Dorothy and has some beautiful poetry
in it. HELP!!!!!!"
With all these names and dates, I was optimistic that it would be possible to
pick up the trail of this family. Incidentally, all of the above-mentioned people
are deceased or I would have changed names or dates in the interest of privacy.
The Search Begins
From the information provided, it seemed logical to suppose that Frank and Dorothy
might have been the parents of most or all of the others mentioned. I could
have begun this search by using the Social Security Death Index (SSDI) for a
few of the names and then ordering death certificates, but I wanted to see if
the family could be located another way. Many states restrict death certificates
to direct descendants and some take months to reply to requests. For this reason,
I opted to start with the 1930 Census every-name index on Ancestry.com, even
though Dorothy had passed away by then.
I decided to search for twelve-year-old Howard Ferrall and he quickly popped
up along with his widowed father, Frank, and his little brother, Roger. They
were residing in the Blanchard, Hancock Co., Ohio household of Frank's parents,
William H. and Ella Ferrall. I was a little surprised to find the family in
Ohio, given that Dorothy had died in Washington, and even more startled to learn
that both Howard and Roger had been born in Montana and their deceased mother
in England. Clearly, this was a family with a touch of wanderlust.
Going Backwards To Come Forward
Since I had accidentally acquired the names of Frank's parents, I decided to
see if I could find his family in the 1900 census. I figured that doing this
would give me the names of most of Frank's siblings, thereby giving me more
family lines to possibly trace forward.
Fortunately for me, William H. Ferrall was much more stationary than his son
and I found him with his family in Blanchard, Ohio, where they still resided
three decades later. From this document, I learned that Frank had siblings named
Jason J., Harvey, Vere, Clare, and August H.
Since the siblings were all born between 1880 and 1898, I reasoned that at least
one of them would probably be found in the SSDI. Taking a look, I found an August
Ferrall with a likely birth date who had passed away in Allen County, Ohio.
Hmmm . . . Allen County as opposed to Hancock County. A quick peek at a trucker's
road atlas I keep on my desk revealed the two counties to border each other,
increasing my confidence that I was dealing with the right man.
Returning to the 1930 census, I searched for August Ferrall and found one of
the appropriate age in Allen County. Fortunately, he had the foresight to give
his children names a little less common than John and Mary, so I picked one
of the boys and used Ancestry's phone and address listing to locate him today—as
it happens, in the same town in which his father had passed away.
Reunion Time
Fairly confident that I had located a nephew of the Bible's original owners,
I passed the information onto Ruth and asked her to make contact. On the day
before Christmas, she snail-mailed a letter to the alleged nephew, and on 4
January, she received an excited call confirming the connection. The Bible was
on its way back to the family the following day. After almost twenty years,
Ruth had made good on her promise to return it.
Now Ruth and the new-found nephew are on another mission. Howard apparently
had a son, so they intend to locate him since the Bible belonged to his grandparents.
As Ruth says, "this is better than a soap opera and so rewarding!"
The preceding was but one of many paths that could have been taken to locate
the family. In fact, I have streamlined the search for the purposes of this
article, but took detours along the way to view items pertaining to this family
in Washington cemetery records on RootsWeb.com, both Ohio and Texas online death
indexes, and Ancestry.com's digitized newspaper collection.
Let's Do This Again!
The more of us who know how to rescue orphan items, the better, so I'd like
to profile some more searches. Once again, I invite you to send a brief summary
of the details you have about any orphan items you might have in your possession.
Approximately once a month, I'll select one, play detective, and share the results
in an article. Because of the volume of e-mail I receive, I can't promise to
pursue all that come my way, and due to privacy concerns, I'm not at liberty
to write about all the "cases" solved, but every step in this direction
helps.
Links
1930 U.S. Census at Ancestry.com
(with every name index)
SSDI
Ancestry.com Directories
(Click on the link for "US and European Phone Listings" to view current
directories)
Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, author of Honoring Our Ancestors (HOA)
and In Search of Our Ancestors, can be reached at: megan@honoringourancestors.com
Click the following links for:
Resources for rescuing orphan photos
and
information about HOA grants
Upcoming Events
Carpatho-Rusyn Society
23 February 2003, Annandale, VA
Half-day event with talks including "Jump-Starting Your Eastern
European Research" and "Building a Village-Based Community."
Ohio Genealogical Society 2003 Conference
"Ohio: 200 Years of Heritage"
25-26 April 2003, Columbus, OH
25 -- "Honoring Our Ancestors" 11:30 (luncheon)
26 -- "Jump-Starting Your Eastern European Research" 2:30-3:30
Copyright 2003, MyFamily.com Inc.
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