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Ancestry Daily News
12/19/2002 - Archive
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Honoring Our Ancestors: Returning A Family Bible |
Honoring Our Ancestors: Returning A Family Bible
The orphan photo article of 14 November 2002 really touched a nerve and we (Marge
Rice, Juliana Smith, and I) were pleasantly inundated with e-mails in response!
For that reason, I'd like to explore the topic a little further.
It was wonderful to hear from so many people who have already embarked on the
generous hobby of reuniting stray photos and items with their families of origin.
I suspect this is one of those quiet phenomenons that just hasn't been particularly
noticed yet. At least, I hope that's the case! I was also delighted to learn
of success stories from those who visited www.deadfred.com
such as this one from Kathy Kalin:
"Thank you very much for mentioning this website. I didn't know about it
at all and I found a picture of one of my grandmother's first cousins there.
I always look at the pictures in antique stores, hoping against hope that I
would see some family pictures. We have virtually no pictures of my maternal
grandparents . . . (as) my grandmother died of TB when my mother was seven .
. . Since we are in the same geographical area, I keep hoping that I will run
across pictures of my grandparents. Maybe with Dead Fred, I'll have even more
luck."
In fact, Dead Fred's latest newsletter states, "We were mentioned in Ancestry
Daily News. Consequently, we were inundated with comments, questions, and
newsletter subscriptions." It goes on to credit recent articles with eight
orphan photos reunions. This clearly demonstrates the power of such sites when
enough of us take the time to use them. The more traffic, the more success stories!
If you haven't already, you might want to consider visiting http://honoringourancestors.com/orphanphotos.html
for a list of sites geared toward getting those wandering family treasures back
into the right hands.
The Case Of The Family Bible
Editor Juliana Smith received one response in particular that brought out
the detective urge in me! Rudy Streng wrote to explain:
"I have in my possession a large bible with a marriage certificate bound
in the center. It was discovered by my parents about 1945 in Norwalk, CT and
has the names Albert W. Monroe marrying Linie (Lina G.) Fitzpatrick, both of
NYC. The certificate is dated July 2, 1877. I would like to locate some descendant
of these people to pass this bible on to them."
I work on the Army's Korean Repatriation Project, tracing families of servicemen
who were MIA or KIA about fifty years ago. Consequently, I've become fairly
skilled at what I call "reverse genealogy" - that is, following families
forward in time, rather than back, to locate them today. Juliana knew this and
suggested I have a go. How could I resist?
On The Trail
I thought it might be useful to outline the steps I took, but I also want
to be sensitive to privacy issues. For that reason, I'll summarize my research
here, but leave out details such as names from recent generations.
Noting that the marriage occurred in 1877, I began by consulting the 1880 every-name
census index created by the Family History Library. I have it on a collection
of CDs, but now tend to search it directly at www.familysearch.org
since it was placed there in October of this year. Within moments, I found the
young couple with their first two children, so now I had a few more family details.
At this point, I tried a tactic that, in my experience, remains a bit of a long
shot. But in those cases when it succeeds, it is so helpful that it would be
foolish not to at make an attempt. I simply consulted several resources where
individuals have uploaded family trees to the Internet.
I found slightly different versions of the family tree in the Ancestry World
Tree and another collection of lineages. By combining information from both
trees, I was able to determine the likely names of two living descendants, great-grandchildren
of the couple in the Bible.
Luck was on my side because one of them was publicly listed in online phone
books, such as the one at Ancestry.com. Total time? Perhaps fifteen minutes.
I gathered the information and sent it to Rudy, who had written the original
e-mail about the Bible.
A Happy Ending
Rudy made the contact and the excited descendants immediately confirmed
their relationship and thanked him for taking the trouble to locate them. One,
as it happens, is an avid genealogist. Better yet, due to a long road trip Rudy
was about to make, the Bible will be presented to one of the great-grandchildren
personally in the very near future.
Granted, this is an exceptional case in terms of how quickly and easily it was
resolved, but there are probably plenty of other orphan photos and items that
could be returned to grateful relatives without much more effort. In fact, I'd
like to hear from readers about whether you would be interested in occasional
articles profiling the process used to locate appropriate recipients for family
treasures. If so and you've got something in your possession, send a brief summary
of the details you have. Because of the volume of e-mail I receive, I can't
promise to tackle all that come my way, but each de-orphaned photo is progress!
Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, author of Honoring Our Ancestors (HOA)
and In Search of Our Ancestors, can be reached at megan@honoringourancestors.com.
Information about her HOA grants can be found at: www.honoringourancestors.com/grants.html
For those who were interested in learning more about Creative Combustion,
the teenagers who are rescuing a Reno, NV cemetery (featured in October's HOA
article), they have just launched a website at www.teenarts.net
and will be adding information about the Hillside Cemetery shortly.
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