Ephemeral migrants and Wisconsin vital record duplicates

Three lessons from long day trip for research in central Wisconsin:

(1) DEEDS ARE GOOD. I often see family members who move west, stay briefly, and then go back home or strike out in a whole different direction. These folks are hard to track. They constitute another reason to look at all the deeds created by other family members who we already know stayed longer. I have an original four-page 1847 letter from Thomas Mozley to his younger brother Edward, extolling Wisconsin's climate (he'd been there a whole year) and a particularly promising site for Edward's smithy. Since Edward does not seem to appear there in 1850 or 1855, I assumed he never showed up at all. But he was there long enough to witness at least one deed created by another family member.

(2) VITAL RECORDS CAN BE WEIRD, but pre-1907 Wisconsin vital records are still wonderful. In this same family there appear to be at least three separate records of a single 1873 marriage: one apparently contemporary with the wedding (of course that's the one I didn't get to see before time ran out), one submitted in the 1890s, and one submitted in the early 1900s. I viewed the last two. They are largely in agreement, but the later one contains a bit more information than the other. Huh. How reliable is that? (Informants are not named; the evidence suggests that nobody paid attention to the earlier entries. All weddings should get such coverage!)

(3) I LOVE CHICAGO, BUT NOT DRIVING AROUND IT. There is no rational way for me to get to Wisconsin without navigating either Chicago or some suburbs. Getting up at 5 a.m. is not early enough. One alternative would work only if the marvelous State Historical Society at Madison is the goal -- take the Indiana airport shuttle to O'Hare, and then take the Wisconsin airport shuttle to the University of Wisconsin campus. Has anybody actually done this?

(4) I ALREADY HAVE A FOLLOWUP LIST FOR WHEN I GET TO GO BACK. First item: Learn how to count. Second item: Avoid weather. I saw large trees that had been pulled out of the ground, roots and all, by storms the day before.

Wonderful Wisconsin and a Warning

I haven't spent enough research time in Wisconsin in the past three years, and a long day trip earlier this week was a partial make-up. Because I was mainly doing lookups for an article I was able to cover a lot of ground -- three counties' registers of deeds plus the state archives and library in Madison. (I was reminded why Dave McDonald has made a case that the Wisconsin Historical Society is the #2 genealogy repository in the country, not that I am either equipped or inclined to adjudge the matter.)

Everyone I met in the various offices was kind and helpful, and they have a good institutional framework within which to work. I especially appreciate Wisconsin's openness with vital records. They are in the custody of the county registers, rather than the health departments. Copies are costly but the information is available within reason.

In my absence from Madison, the bound volumes of the agricultural schedules of 19th-century US censuses have moved upstairs from the library to the archives. That means more exercise (good news) and an earlier closing time (not such good news). And that gets to my warning. In examining Waushara County for 1860, I learned two facts that had escaped me years ago. One is that the census taker often changed jurisdictions or left off for the day in mid-page, labeling those points. The other is that the pages for some reason were not bound in the numerical order the census taker gave them. As a result, farms in Richford Township appear on four different pages (I believe) in three different locations in this small county.

Perhaps this was the only county so treated. (I don't know; I was doing well to leave five minutes before closing time as it was.) But if you're working with these books -- or with any microfilmed or future on-line version -- be very careful. It would be easy to miss some of the deceased farmers that you were seeking.



Photo from the photostream of wackybadger (Joshua Mayer) per Creative Commons
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/wackybadger/4355029933/ : accessed 2 November 2012)

Harold Henderson, "Wonderful Wisconsin and a Warning," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 3 November 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Learn more about Indiana vital records

Did you know that the Genealogy Center at the Allen County Public Library has a blog in addition to the monthly e-zine "Genealogy Gems"? Well, it does, and the most recent post, by John, advances our knowledge of how to work with Indiana vital records sources, especially in Lake and Allen counties, two of the most populous in the state.

One thing we almost always learn from such careful examinations is that the popular derivative sources (in this case the typescript WPA indexes and the Ancestry.com database derived from them) are not always complete, or as simple to use as one might think. There's more going on here than the usual problem of derivative sources being copied at several removes from the original records. Check it out!

Montgomery County Illinois on line in a big way

The Historical Society of Montgomery County's digital archive holds tons of information that would be even better with a bit more context:

* searchable index of 27,044 death certificates 1877-1950, with a link to the form for requesting actual copies from the County Clerk/Recorder.

* searchable index of 6,946 first land purchases, mid-1800s; helpful information on how to read these descriptions is at the Illinois State Archives' web site, from which at least some of the information appears to come.

* vintage photos, biographies, and historical tidbits for 17 towns from Butler to Witt.

* searchable list of 10,214 veterans with DD 214 discharge forms registered with the county clerk/recorder, going back to World War I.

* searchable index of 22,737 obituaries 1980-2008 from two local newspapers, as scrapbooked by society members.

* names and detailed location information for 125 cemeteries.

And that's just on the research tab! If you don't lose track of the time perusing this site, your ancestors sadly must not have passed this way.

Hat tip to Cyndi's List What's New.

Methodology Monday with Cynthia at ChicagoGenealogy

The indispensable Cynthia of the Chicagogenealogy.com lookup site is also the blogger at ChicagoGenealogy. She doesn't post real often, but it's worth the wait.

9 June: how to find a Cook County marriage license with only a newspaper listing and not a number.

4 July: a post for anyone interested in unrecorded Cook County births, passport applications, or The Devil in the White City.

The ultimate online resource for Kalamazoo

There's a good meeting scheduled for Kalamazoo nine days from now, but if you just can't make it, don't despair -- there's an excellent online site for that county, combining indexes and digital images of original records. You're going to wish your ancestors camped there in 1830 and never left.

Let me count the goodies at the bare-bones site kalamazoogenealogy.org:

vital records indexes and images (page by page in the original books), with a link to local library information;

cemetery transcriptions and (some) images;

"family trees";

directories (for the city, nine between 1860 and 1915), transcriptions and images;

school yearbooks 1859-1976, transcriptions and images;

WWI veterans;

Schoolcraft Express obituaries 1917-1972 with a link to the Kalamazoo Library database; and

probate 1831-1857.

I found useful information about my only relative in the county, a peripatetic stonecutter, and his wife and children. Those of you with more relations here will have a blast.

Portage County Wisconsin obituaries and so much more

For many archival purposes, the Wisconsin Historical Society has divided the state into 14 Area Research Centers (ARCs), where a surprising variety of records that you might only otherwise find in courthouses reside, including vital, tax, school, property, probate, cemetery, business, and other record types. Check out this overall map and pick your spot -- every center operates a little differently. If your main interest is pre-1907 vital records, there's a statewide index here.

The university library at Stevens Point appears to be especially active genealogically speaking. Among other things they maintain the Stevens Point Area Obituary Index, a collaboration between the university archives, the Portage County Public Library, and the Stevens Point Area Genealogical Society. If you find a research target therein you can request a copy ($10 for up to 5 requests, but be sure to read their terms of service carefully -- clearly they have to deal with a lot of clueless people and you don't want to be one of them). The index is said to cover the following newspapers and date ranges: Stevens Point Weekly Journal 1872-1920, Stevens Point Daily Journal 1895-1980, Stevens Point Journal 1981-, Gazette 1878-1923, Portage County Gazette 1999-, and Wisconsin Pinery 1864-1890.

BTW, after I wrote this post I received the new issue of the always excellent NGS Magazine, which contains a meaty, detailed account of Wisconsin's ARCs by native son and veteran researcher David McDonald, CG. Check it out!

St. Clair County Illinois Quarterly #4 of 2008

Like most ambitious state and regional publications, the St. Clair County Genealogical Society Quarterly welcomes actual articles, but still subsists largely on a diet of transcribed records. Why not write up your southwestern Illinois ancestors for them?

In issue #4 of 2008:

"Extracts from Death Register Book II, 2 January 1886 - 6 July 1886, tr. Melinda Cahill and Diane Walsh

"Marriage Index 1911," tr. Judy Phelps

"Document Conservation," an information-packed one-page summary of a recent society meeting where former Belleville Public Library archivist Patricia Hamilton spoke.

"Military Discharges 'L'," tr. Art Rubeck and Sheila Kronenberger

"Plan, Analyze, Begin Again: A Davis Family Example," by Diane Walsh. At the Salt Lake Institute last month I complained a bit about the lack of information about how to do research planning beyond the stage of brainstorming and list-making; this article is the beginning of an answer, as the quarterly editor takes us through an actual research situation and shows how to respond to new information, when to focus on the task at hand and when to draw back and make a note of an alternative path to perhaps be followed later.

Barberton Births and Deaths 1938 forward

A link on the Akron-Summit County Public Library website led me to this online index of relatively recent vital events in Barberton, just southwest of Akron in Summit County, Ohio. It's a work in progress of the Barberton Health District (includes Norton) with records being entered monthly, and eventually to be entered back to 1909. (Although at one point the database is said to cover only up to 2001, I found an entry for 2003.)

Separate search engines for births and deaths work similarly. The main engine works only if you enter first name, last name, and full event date. You can select a secondary engine that will produce all results for a given surname. Otherwise, no browsing, but this is still a partial local substitute for censuses not yet available. Search results may include both parents' full names. You can crown a successful search by ordering an official (certified) birth or death certificate for $27 through VitalChek.

Ohio Genealogy News spring issue

OGS always has a lot going on:

"Ohio, the Gateway to the West: Genealogy Resources at the Columbus Metropolitan Library," by Russ Pollitt

"Ohio Death Certificate Images Online, 1908-1953," by Deb Cyprych

"2009 OGS Conference Call for Papers"

"Cemetery Chronicles," by Lolita (Thayer) Guthrie

"More Accessible Resources in the Cincinnati Public Library's Genealogy Department," by Patrician Van Skaik -- including an RSS feed, the River History Collection, "the leading African American research collection in the nation," and digitized Cincinnati city directories for many of the years 1819-1866.

St. Clair County IL GS Quarterly

SCCGSQ's second issue of 2008:

"Extracts from Death Register book II," 1883-1884, by Melinda Cahill and Diane Walsh

"Marriage Index 1909," by Audrey Cannady Massingill

"Military Discharges 'K'" by Annette Weber and Edith Hock

"Walnut Hill Cemetery: A Memorial Tribute to Our Forebears: New Project"

"Unindexed Bounty Land Applications," by Diane Walsh

"Vital Statistics Extracted from the Belleville Daily Advocate 1927-1954," comp. Nancy Giles

"Milwaukee Area Research," by Mike Ackley

COOK COUNTY, ILLINOIS, VITAL RECORDS ON LINE

The long-awaited rollout of Cook County Clerk David Orr's Genealogy Online: Historical Cook County, Illinois Vital Records is upon us. More than 6 million of 8 million records are now searchable (after your free registration) and available to be ordered @ $15 a pop, so updating will continue. (IOW, don't assume your research target got hatched, matched, or dispatched somewhere else just yet!)

Celebrate Indpendence Day by searching for records of:
Births 1872-1933
Marriages 1872-1958
Deaths 1872-1988

By the way, some thought has gone into this. You can search using a surname's Soundex code (explained in the helpful hints on site).

H/t to the Newberry Library blog, and the Newberry is where you go to find Sam Fink's index of earlier vital records as compiled from newspapers.

Midwestern sources at Family Search Labs

Several blogs and email lists alerted me to new database items with original items at FamilySearch Labs' Record Search. Here's the current list of Midwestern sources available there:

Illinois: Diocese of Belleville, Catholic Parish Records 1729-1956 (browsable only)

Michigan: Births 1867-1902, Marriages 1868-1925, Deaths 1867-1897 (searchable and browsable)

Ohio: Deaths 1908-1953 (searchable and browsable)

Wisconsin: State Censuses 1855, 1875, 1885, 1895, 1905 (browsable only)

This is both an opportunity to make new searches in sources difficult to find before, and an opportunity to "clean up" your existing records with higher-quality sources.

Expected and Unexpected Resources from SW Illinois

The first 2008 issue of the St. Clair County (Illinois) Genealogical Society Quarterly has enough material to make some state publications jealous. Contents include:

the second of two parts of a county marriage index for 1908 (alphabetical by bridal surname, from Lizzie Crowder to Helena Zubrawski).

"E. St. Louis Gazette: Some Vital Stats, 1866, Tidbits 1872."

"Extracts from Death Register Book 1, 8 March 1882-28 April 1883," by Melinda Cahill and Diane Walsh

"Biography of James Bissell 'J.B.' Davis," by Thomas W. Davis, Jr.

"Belleville Public Library Website Adds Features," including a glimpse of a genealogical source I'd never dreamed of: an archival document in German, listing books checked out, the individual patrons' names, and the due dates, 1863-1866. What was your ancestor reading?

Announcement of a new SCCGS project and a first installment of its index: a Funeral Card Collection.

St. Clair County, Illinois -- where you hope your ancestors lived

One of the most active local societies in Illinois, with a sizeable web presence, is in the southwest, right across the river from St. Louis: St. Clair County. I'm a member, so don't take my word for it -- check out their stuff.

They've just announced a new free newspaper database: "Vital Statistics Extracted from the Belleville (Ill.) Daily Advocate, 1927-1954," the gift of Nancy Giles. For those of us who have ancestors after the 1930 census (!) and who are twentieth-century impaired, this is a wonderful thing. My own Flint and Thrall lines converged in St. Clair, so it's already done my database some good and I look forward to zeroing in on the original articles the next time I'm over that way.

Best and worst for vital records

Check out Craig Manson's posts at Geneablogie where he lists and describes states with exceptionally good and bad policies on access to vital records. (You'll want to stay awhile for his family stories, too. Hat tip to Randy Seaver at Genea-Musings for the pointer.)

The oversimplified quick story on the Midwest is that we go to extremes: Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri are good; Iowa and Michigan are not so good; and Indiana is located in "Vital Records Access Hell." Read the whole thing for the informative details.

Michigan Genealogist covers everything from Virginia to Ontario

Michigan Genealogist (PDF) isn't a publication of the Michigan Genealogical Society, because there isn't one (the only statewide genealogy organization is a council of local groups). It's the quarterly newsletter of the state's Department of History, Arts, and Libraries, and it's an on-line publication.

The fourth issue of 2007 -- mostly written by librarians and archivists with reference to their employer's holdings -- covers an amazing amount of ground. The following is a selection:

"Map Guide to German Parish Registers," by Kendel Darragh

"Researching Your Ontario Ancestors"

"Using Online Indexes to Michigan Land Records," by Gloriane Peck

"Research with Probate Records," by Kris Rzepczynski

"The First Three Years of the Michigan First Vital Records Act" (i.e., 1867-1870), by Charles Hagler

"Virginia Genealogy Sources for Michiganders" (this is not a joke!), by Edwina Morgan

"The Birth and Death of Lansing's Black Neighborhoods," by Robert Garrett

And where else are you going to learn that the Library of Michigan holds a microfilm index to the 1855 state census of -- Illinois?

Help from upstream

Lots of Midwesterners have lines going back to upstate New York (which, geographically speaking, is most of it). If you're working in that area, don't miss the long, detailed, and extremely helpful new post on finding vital records there at Upstate New York Genealogy Blog.

(Extremely short version: start yesterday.)