The Genealogist’s Memory
Sometimes things just come together and force a post to be written. Last week I wrote about some stories of a man’s descent from some famous members of the Putnam family of Salem Village. None of those...
View ArticleRated G or Rated OMG
I find that family stories often take multiple forms as they are preserved. It reminds me of one of the truly strange things that one learns in physics—that a subatomic particle can take more than one...
View ArticleDNA 2.0
For years now genealogists have been interested in genetics. DNA testing can help us solve genealogical puzzles. It can tell us about unknown relatives. It can give us insight into ethnicity. Sometimes...
View Article“Family Time” the Genealogist’s Way
Have you ever noticed how differently we perceive time? Every circumstance implies its own meanings for “a long time ago” and “recently.” Every human activity has different ways of measuring time. A...
View ArticleThe Tale is in the Tellings
“…as daylight began to dawn…a bloodcurdling yell of a large band…on ponies and firing at everyone that showed his head…” Poring over newspapers sometimes turns up something exciting. In this case, the...
View ArticleThe Two Deaths
The other day I ran across a new concept that I’ve thought about many times before. I suppose the right way to put it is that I heard it put in a new way. I also heard it in French and that always...
View ArticleConserving Ancestors
A few weeks ago I was looking at a photograph with a client. It isn’t your ordinary snapshot. It measures about one foot by three feet. It is also about one hundred years old. It also had a problem. It...
View ArticleRest in Peace
This is, even now, not an easy post to write. When I wrote a genealogical obituary for my Aunt Melva, I was saddened but not surprised that her time had come. No one expected my father-in-law to be...
View ArticleTall Tales
When I started being interested in my family history one of the things my aunt taught me was that sometimes family stories turn out to be wrong. It was an easy lesson for her to teach. The family story...
View ArticleHousehold Archeology
A week or so ago and in a round-about way, I got a question about a memorial plaque found in the ceiling of an old house during renovation and it got me thinking about the things we find that tell a...
View ArticleThe Genealogists’ Memory
A person’s memories are not created instantaneously. There is a process of assimilation. We think of our memories as if they are created by a recording device—formed instantly, perfectly and...
View ArticleMemory Palace
Every once in a while I hear someone make a comment about how they can only name people along a few generations of their ancestry even if they have researched a dozen generations. I find that there is...
View ArticleMemory’s Moorings
A remark in a recent program on PBS caught my attention. A woman who was born into an Amish community showed a picture of herself as a child. It should not exist. In her community you were not supposed...
View ArticleFunhouse Mirror Memories
Nearly all genealogy begins with memories—your memories, your cousins memories, your great aunt Gertrude’s memories. Someone’s family recollections peak someone else’s interest. Grandma gets...
View ArticleThe Forgotten Plague
By the dawn of the nineteenth century, the disease had killed one in seven of all people that had ever lived. That is a statement that will catch one’s attention. I heard it at the opening of a recent...
View ArticleForgetting
Recently, a project of mine ended before it even began. The person who was to be the beneficiary, and from whose memories the project was to begin, only wanted to forget. It happens, of course, but...
View ArticleGaps in the Curb
Just yesterday I was driving home from a presentation and I passed where an aunt of mine once lived. Now you can only guess that people once lived there. The house is gone and nothing has replaced it....
View ArticleFading
It had been a long time since I have missed my regular weekly post, if I ever have, but last week I missed. There is a reason. Life, or rather the end of life, takes priority. Four and a half years...
View ArticlePassing
I took another week off from blogging last week against my instincts, but it felt like the thing to do. My father’s fading came to an end. He passed away just before Father’s Day. I had thought I would...
View ArticleThe Genealogists’ Memory
A person’s memories are not created instantaneously. There is a process of assimilation. We think of our memories as if they are created by a recording device—formed instantly, perfectly and...
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