History and Genealogy in Indiana with THG: Connections

The new issue of the semi-annual The Hoosier Genealogist: Connections (Spring-Summer 2010) is out, with a focus on the interconnections between genealogy and history. Robert W. White reflects on "Hoosier Genealogy and Indiana History: Using Each to Inform the Other." Tanya D. Marsh shows how it's done in "Following the Bee Line," an account of the Scherman/Sherman family who came to Indianapolis to work for the railroad and stayed to do many more things.

Other articles include a mysterious general store ledger from Bond County, Illinois, in 1888; a calendar of musical performances in Marion (Grant County), 1897-1898; abstracts of Montgomery County court papers; and letters from a not altogether appreciative itinerant bookseller, S. Harper Crawford, who attempted to sell books in Dearborn, Ripley, and Decatur counties in 1855.

Crawford didn't care for the wet lands in southeastern Indiana: "Their mode of building houses is as follows -- They select the driest spot they can find -- saw off oak logs about 5 feet in length [,] set them up on end and thereon erect their hut. I noticed a number of them with water enough under them to float a small boat."

White co-authors the second and final installment of the White-Eggleston family in Decatur County, Indianapolis, and points west. Timothy Mohon has a second very thorough installment on Baptist records, this involving two almost identically named Baptist organizations who covered the same western Indiana territory. (If you have Indiana Baptists, you need this resource!) And Autumn Gonzalez gets us started on federal documents.

And speaking of history, this issue begins the 50th year of the state historical society's publishing a genealogical magazine. Don't forget to visit its virtual companion, "Online Connections" as well, once it gets installed on the new IHS web site.

Methodology Monday with nonpopulation census schedules

Ancestry has started putting up the nonpopulation US census schedules, including my favorites, the agriculture schedules for 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880. If the link doesn't work, look for them in the census list, but not under U, C, or A -- they're under S for Selected, because not all states are up yet.

These records have been notoriously hard to find, and notoriously ignored by many genealogists, so this is great news. But don't forget to mess around with them and get acquainted before searching. When I did that, I discovered that at least two Michigan counties were improperly filmed for 1850 and 1860. Berrien and Hillsdale include only the left side of the mammoth double-page spread. Half the questions is still better than nothing, but not quite as advertised. I saw no similar problem in Fulton County, Illinois, for 1870, or Allegany County, New York, for 1880.

Always look that gift horse in the mouth.

Also: don't assume that everyone listed as "farmer" in the population schedule will get an entry in the ag schedule. There were much more precise thresholds for the ag schedule. And some folks who appear only once in the population schedule may appear twice in the ag schedule, I suspect because of their involvement in different farms.

The real fun with these is comparing one individual against his (occasionally her) neighbors, and against him/herself in later and earlier years. Also you can get an idea of the county average from published federal and state agriculture statistical summaries.

Even if you have zero interest in your ancestor's agricultural proclivities, these nonpopulation schedules may give you a second chance at deciphering his/her name, in a different handwriting. Enjoy!

Back from Ohio Genealogical Society in Toledo

The biggest state genealogy organization in the country wound up its annual conference yesterday in Toledo. High points for me were working with fellow Great Lakes APG members in the meeting, roundtable, and Ancestors Road Show; meeting old, new, and prospective ProGen Study Group members at lunch Friday; and hearing Connie Reik on farm sources, and Craig Scott on World War I and colonial wars. The syllabus has plenty of material to catch up on, and to make me sorry I couldn't go to more.

Saturday's variable weather gave me an opening to walk over to the Toledo-Lucas County public library. Newcomers are well advised to study the library's web site before going. I didn't, and wound up getting lost (there are two different third floors -- for local history you want the elevators at the back of the building, not the front). The library has great resources for its locality (which I didn't get to work with), and the very busy librarians were kind and helpful. For out-of-towners with Lucas County roots, the web site has an index to Toledo Blade obituaries, 1970-present.

But for Ohio counties and other states, the collection is saddled with a peculiar cataloging decision. Within each Ohio county and each other state, books are ordered by author or title, rather than by subject! This works fine if you happen to know the authors of all the books pertaining to, say, Green County, Kentucky, but most of us don't conduct our research that way. A glance at the online catalog ("classic catalog" allows search by subject) would have helped me make the most of the situation.

One last thing: the ongoing tragedy of inadequate library funding was much in evidence. The library's hours are limited, and the joint was jumping midday Saturday, with a lot of folks hoping to be able to use local history computers for general purposes and not being able to do so. We as genealogists need to step up to the plate and say it straight out: free public libraries are a resource provided by the community for the community, an investment in equal opportunity. Taxes paid for libraries are a good thing. Period.

One other last thing: I took the scenic route home in order to take some cemetery photos. If you fail to associate "scenic drive" with Toledo, try taking Ohio 25 and US 24 southwest out of the city in mid-spring, with enough flaming purple redbuds along the river to light up the gloomiest day.

Michigan county clerks and archival blog

I've long been a grateful consumer of the Indiana Genealogical Society's very thorough county research address list. Now I learn that Michigan is growing the same thing (despite its disadvantage of not having a strong statewide organization) at the Archives of Michigan web site, a GoogleMap of county clerks. (I'm a little suspicious of that link; if it doesn't work, go here and follow.)

And if you've been keeping up with The Anecdotal Archivist blog byMark Harvey, you knew this.

More ways to learn about Fort Wayne

The Genealogy Center at the Allen County Public Library has its own blog -- not to be confused with its e-newsletter. Check out the April 5 post. They have a 363-volume unindexed set of family research papers -- but there is a way to search for significant mentions of families by using the catalog.

Methodology Monday with Oglala Sioux

Is there even such a thing as specializing in "Native American" research as opposed to a specific tribe? This month's discussion article in the NGSQ study groups provokes thought on this point. But mainly it applies standard genealogical reasoning to identifying parents in the largely oral Oglala Sioux culture, which has an elaborate kinship system unfamiliar to other Americans, and which includes name changes during an individual's lifetime. It's by Dawn C. Stricklin: "Namesakes, Name Changes, and Conflicting Evidence: The Search for the Mother of John Little Crow," National Genealogical Society Quarterly 94 (December 2006): 245-58.

Don't expect to get it all on the first reading. Visit your good genealogy library, or pony up for an NGS membership and you can print out a PDF copy.

Yankees in Michigan

Writing in the April issue of the online history magazine Common-Place, Notre Dame professor-to-be Catherine Cangany isn't too enthusiastic about a new book by James Schwartz, currently at Eastern Illinois University, Conflict on the Michigan Frontier: Yankee and Borderland Cultures, 1815-1840 (De Kalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2009. 192 pp., $30.00).

I have not seen the book yet. Cangany writes

Schwartz's argument is this: with the influx of unprecedented numbers of Yankees into the Great Lakes Basin after the war (especially after the completion of the Erie Canal in 1825), Michigan's long-standing "hybrid" or "borderland" traits underwent a systematic "civilizing" process (4, 92-94). East-Coast newcomers waged war on the "savageness" of Indians, the "wildness" of backcountry whites, and the "lawlessness" of the West. They were determined to eradicate "inferior" and "dangerous" cultural practices and political attitudes, and in their stead impose order, restraint, and authority.

In her view he doesn't say enough about divisions among the Yankees, and gives readers little chance to hear the voices of the people, including those of French descent, they were trying to reform or remove. I look forward to being able to have an opinion. In the meantime, read the whole thing!