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Ancestry Daily News
4/8/2003 - Archive
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Honoring Our Ancestors: A Daughterly Chain |
Honoring Our Ancestors: A Daughterly Chain
Once again, it's time to play detective to try to reunite some orphan
items with their families of origin (please see previous articles
if you're new to this series). I'd like to thank all of you who have taken the
time to write about photos, Bibles and other treasures that have come into your
hands. It's wonderful to hear that so many are interested in making this effort
and I notice that more and more people are having a go at doing the sleuthing
themselves. An article sharing some of your success stories is probably in order
in the near future. For now, I'm doing my best to find the "rightful owners"
of items described to me in e-mails and would like to walk you through the steps
taken to complete the latest reunion.
Family History For $2.00
Sonia Martin of California wrote to me about a bag of photos and postcards that
needed a rightful owner:
"I purchased a bag of photos from a flea market in Pasadena, California
for $2.00. There are approximately 40 beautiful photos and a few postcards with
short notes on them. A couple of postcards are written in a foreign language
and have foreign stamps. The postcards are addressed to:
Miss Helen E. Swenson, 310 S. 19 Avenue East, Duluth MN
Mrs. Linus Svenson, same address as above
Ms. Ella Swenson, same address as above
The postmarks are from 1909 to 1910
"I would like to track down relatives who may be interested in these beautiful
photos of their ancestors. I have posted a couple of messages on some websites,
but that is as far as I've gone."
Sonia later made a closer inspection of the bag's contents and realized that
she actually had closer to a hundred photos. Imagine what a find this would
be to the Swenson/Svenson family!
First Stop: The 1930 Census
With a scenario such as this one, it was obvious I should start with the 1930
every-name census at Ancestry.com. I typed in Linus's name since his was the
most unusual, and only one entry popped up. Examining it, I found that he was
living in Pasadena, California, but his daughter, Helen, had been born in Minnesota.
His wife, Ella, was also in the household. Clearly, this was the right family.
Both Linus and Ella had been born in Sweden, so the foreign language and stamps
made sense and it was now quite apparent how the possessions of a Minnesota
family found their way to California.
But with this particular entry, I also received an unexpected bonus. Their daughter
was married and had just given birth about a month earlier, so now I had a married
name for Helen and the birth name of a Linus and Ella's granddaughter.
Vital Records Vital To The Search
Since I was dealing with a California-based family, I decided to go to
VitalSearch
to see if I could pick up the trail of the family in more recent years. Among
other indexes available here are 1949-1959 marriage records listed by bride.
Taking into account the patterns of the time, I guessed that the granddaughter
might have married in this time frame. For privacy purposes, I won't use actual
names here, but I quickly caught another lucky break when I found the granddaughter's
marriage in one of the first years I searched. My success reminded me how important
it is for genealogists to rally to the support of efforts to counter various
states' attempts to restrict access to vital records or their indexes.
Finding The Granddaughter
So now I had the granddaughter's married name, as well as the name of her husband.
Going back to Ancestry, I searched on their names and found an entry in a file
that had been uploaded to the World Tree. I could have contacted this submitter,
but it was clear that the researcher was more focused on the husband's genealogy,
so I decided to see if I could find the granddaughter without an intermediary.
Still, I kept the submitter's contact information as a back-up.
Fortunately, I had an easy time of it yet again when I quickly found a person
I believed to be the granddaughter publicly listed in an online phone directory.
I sent this information to Sonia and asked her to make contact. She sent a letter
and several weeks later, I was delighted to receive this confirmation from Sonia:
BINGO, we found Miss Helen Swenson's daughter. I received a call from her today.
She was so happy and is very excited to see the photos and postcards. She was
so grateful and wants to thank you as well for finding her. She said that her
daughter is currently working on their family tree and doing genealogy research,
so she was excited to learn about the photos.
I just had a baby (Monday) and am still resting, but as soon as I am able, I
will send the pictures "home."
Until that moment, I had no idea that Sonia was even pregnant, but learning
this seemed to bring this story full circle. It was the discovery of a baby
girl in the 1930 census that had provided the vital clue to locating this family,
and now Sonia had returned the family treasures to her within days of giving
birth to her own daughter. How fitting!
Any More Out There?
Another successful rescue! I am continuing to work on some of the others submitted
previously, but welcome descriptions of other orphaned items that you'd like
to send home. Please be sure to provide at least a few clues - any names, dates
or places you might have. Or drop me a line to tell me about your own success
story. Unfortunately, I can't respond to every e-mail, but I'll tackle as many
as I can and your own experiences may include fresh tactics the rest of us hadn't
considered. Every step helps.
1930 Every-Name Census Index (Available to Ancestry.com Census Subscribers)
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 her HOA grants.
Upcoming Events:
In upcoming weeks, Megan will be at:
Colonial Williamsburg Welcome Center (19 April 2003, Williamsburg, VA)
Ohio Genealogical Society 2003 Conference (25-26 April 2003, Columbus, OH)
National Genealogical Society 2003 Conference (28-31 May 2003, Pittsburgh,
PA)
Lake Erie Chapter of the Carpatho-Rusyn Society (1 June 2003, Erie, PA)
New Jersey Chapter of the Carpatho-Rusyn Society(7 June 2003, Passaic, NJ)
BookEnds, book signing(9 June 2003, Ridgewood, NJ)
Central Jersey Genealogical Club(10 June 2003, Hamilton, NJ)
Westchester County Genealogical Society(14 June 2003, White Plains, NY)
Genealogical Society of Rockland County (14 June 2003, New City, NY)
For details and links to upcoming events, click here.
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