Getting around in Rome, Wild West nuns, and more history items of potential interest

* Orbis at Stanford is the coolest thing I've seen in a while: a model of travel in the Roman Empire. "By simulating movement along the principal routes of the Roman road network, the main navigable rivers, and hundreds of sea routes in the Mediterranean, Black Sea and coastal Atlantic, this interactive model reconstructs the duration and financial cost of travel in antiquity." . . . Help me out, here, techies: how hard would this be to implement for, say, Connecticut in 1670, or Indiana in 1830? (Hat tip to Planetizen Newswire.)

* Farther west than this blog usually goes, the New York Times foretaste of Anne M. Butler's Across God’s Frontiers: Catholic Sisters in the American West, 1850-1920 looks spicy. (Hat tip to Legal History Blog.)

* In which historians discover that there is always more of it, at The Historical Society -- and then they discuss family history too.

* You've heard of house histories -- how about a history of the multistory luxury co-op at 1540 North Lake Shore Drive on Chicago's Gold Coast, complete with the full history of the underlying land, vignettes of Chicago life in the course of its existence, and profiles of movers and shakers who lived there? Grace Dumelle's Heartland Historical Research Service has published the 113-page book. (Full disclosure: I did some work on it as a subcontractor.)



The History of 1540 North Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois (Chicago: Heartland Historical Research Service, 2012).


Harold Henderson, "Getting around in Rome, Wild West nuns, and more history items of potential interest," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 30 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Common source vs. obscure source SMACKDOWN!

In the course of a volunteer local abstracting project, I recently came across the roster of 71 individuals who bought items at the estate sale of Valentine Cattron in early October of 1840 in La Porte County, Indiana.

I was thinking what an obscure record this is. Many people do genealogy for years without going near a probate file (yes, I was one of them). By contrast, everyone uses the census, early and often. And -- hmmmm! -- this obscure record, buried in a microfilm reel of loose papers in a probate case, was created only a few months after the 1840 census.

One way -- by no means the only way -- to evaluate a source or a research tool is what it can find for us. Did the 1840 census pick up everyone who attended that sale? Or can this obscure sale list expand our reach? Why not find out? (Note that the timing of this test favors the census; an 1845 sale of similar size might well catch even more people not in the county for either 1840 or 1850.)

After working the Ancestry.com census index and reading through two counties (the deceased, like every other ancestor, lived near a border), and very conservatively counting everyone who was doubtful as "identified," I still ended up with sixteen individuals who bought at the sale but who were not enumerated in the 1840 census.

16 missing out of 71 is 22.5 percent. Call it one out of five. That's a lot, especially if your guy is one of them. That's a reason to index or abstract those sources and make them available, and to use them when you can. (There are other reasons, but that'll do for today.)

BTW, we can crowdsource this if anyone has the leisure time. The sixteen purchasers who do not appear in the 1840 census in either Porter or La Porte counties, according to me, are James P. Cain, Isom Campbell, Hezekiah Cattron, John Eaheart, Edward Evans, Wm. Lynn, Daniel Mahony, Daniel Main, Samuel Maine, James McCord, Samuel Parkinson, John Pattee, Wm. Petro, E. J. Simmons, Edwin A. West, and Daniel Wooley. Let me know if you find any of them -- or if you've wondered where they were hiding in 1840!

(A good word for Ancestry.com's indexing, too: I did find one individual in the read-through who I had missed when working the index, but I think I should have been able to find even him by creative searching.)

Why would they be missing at census time? Most, I suspect, were "hidden" in relatives' households, because only household heads were named in 1840. Some were probably elsewhere in June but not in October. And perhaps some were missed, or fell victim to bad handwriting and random spelling.


La Porte County, Indiana, estate no. 160, Valentine Cattron, sale record 1-2 October 1840, loose papers; microfilm E1, 48th item on roll, County Clerk, La Porte.

Harold Henderson, "Common source vs. obscure source SMACKDOWN!" Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 30 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Newspapers tie Midwesterners back to New England, and a double dose of Henry

Newspapers tie Midwesterners back to New England in two articles in the spring edition of the New England Historic Genealogical Society's popular magazine, American Ancestors.

Patricia Dingwall Thompson unearths a hostage-taking episode near Detroit in the War of 1812. "Living in Montana, I connected with a man in Missouri who owns a handwritten family account of events that occurred in Michigan. I then found historical corroboration from a man in Florida, the Bentley Historical Library at the University of Michigan, and a database supplied by NEHGS in Boston."

Patricia Bravender describes how she used family reunion notices in newspapers to untangle some of her Hines ancestors, many of whom ended up in Lorain County, Ohio.

Readers also get a double dose of New England Historical and Genealogical Register editor Henry B. Hoff:

* a nice appreciation of the New York State censuses of 1855 and 1865, and

* a methodological smorgasbord (mostly from the Register's table) of "When Do You Think It's Proved?" (In my perfect world that show would replace WDYTYA.)

Hoff sees some gray areas in the landscape of proof: "Since every genealogist is different and every genealogical situation is different, there are still many instances when genealogists disagree on whether to categorize an identification or a connection as definite -- or with a modifying word such as probably, likely, perhaps, or possibly."


All in American Ancestors, vol. 13, no. 2 (Spring 2012):
Patricia Dingwall Thompson, "From Family Myth to Historical Account: The McMillan Incident in 1814 Detroit," pp. 25-27.
Patricia Bravender, "Establishing Kinship with Family Reunion Announcements," pp. 38-41.
Henry B. Hoff, "Weighing the Evidence," pp. 33-34, 41. 
Henry B. Hoff, "Appreciating the New York State Census," pp. 54-55.



Harold Henderson, "Newspapers tie Midwesterners back to New England, and a double dose of Henry," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 29 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

The toughest genealogy course you can take?

I haven't taken every possible genealogy course, but I suspect that the Advanced Evidence Practicum is the hardest. It's being offered for the second year 14-18 January 2013 at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy. (Registration opens 9 AM Mountain Time, Saturday morning June 2.) The following was published earlier this week as a guest post on Angela McGhie's blog Adventures in Genealogy Education, and benefited from her editing:

Want to spend a week solving the toughest genealogy problems, a new one every day?

That describes the most challenging genealogy course I've ever taken, the Advanced Evidence Analysis Practicum at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy (SLIG). Oh, I learned more in the advanced methodology classes given annually by Elizabeth Shown Mills at the Institute of Genealogy and Historical Research (IGHR) at Samford University and Thomas W. Jones at SLIG. I could not have functioned in the practicum without them. But the level of difficulty in the practicum is something else because I had to apply that knowledge repeatedly, and found out right away whether I had headed in the right direction or found the answer. I also had to adjust to very different record environments and kinds of problems than I was used to working on.

The course actually grew out of the 2011 session of Tom Jones' Advanced Genealogical Methods class at SLIG. He gave a couple of homework assignments involving a problem to be solved, with evidence provided. We enjoyed the challenge and wanted more of this type of assignment. One day four of us were sitting around and somehow the idea was born of trying to design a whole course consisting entirely of this kind of homework. Now two of that group are coordinating the 2013 course, one is the director of SLIG, and I'm the only one remaining with a purely student's-eye view.

The format of the Practicum course is simple. Every afternoon a different expert, usually a board-certified or accredited genealogist, presents the initial evidence for a genealogical case that they have worked on and solved but not yet published. In some cases, all the evidence and documents are provided and the students analyze and correlate it, trying to come to a well-grounded conclusion. In other cases, some evidence remains to be found, either on line or in records at the Family History Library. Where off-line records are required (as they were in four of last year's five cases), the information is available in digitized files on request if the student can figure out exactly what s/he needs (since even the Family History Library can't be expected to create two dozen copies of those particular microfilms everyone will be wanting). The following afternoon, the group reconvenes to discuss their research and evidence-evaluation adventures with the expert and find out how they approached and solved the problem. And then it's time for the next case to be introduced.

The format differs from most genealogy institutes in that there are five faculty members (experts), so you deal with a new personality every day as well as a new problem. The 2013 lineup of instructors is mostly different from last year, but my main sense last year was, “I had no idea there were so many different ways to be equally excellent!”

Compared to the usual SLIG class schedule, this course looks light. So few hours in the classroom! But few of us had time for anything else. (I had invested in some evening lecture sessions but ditched most of them because the problems were so tough, and one of my main approaches to such problems is to spend a lot of time fussing.) Most participants found it both educational and humbling. Questions of research strategy arose that I'd never heard discussed so specifically anywhere else. If you've been through an advanced course or the equivalent, and want a truly challenging workout in a friendly setting, this is the course for you.

If you're still wondering whether this course is a good fit, name three of your favorite articles from the National Genealogical Society Quarterly. If you can't think of any, or if you don't enjoy reading the Quarterly, maybe you're not ready. Because this course is like being dropped down the rabbit hole into the middle of one of those articles, and having to claw your way out.

[Also now available: Melinda Henningfield's take on the same course.]


Harold Henderson, "The toughest genealogy course you can take?" Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 28 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

New on Midwest Roots

I've added nine more free lookups at Midwest Roots for a total of sixteen.

LA PORTE COUNTY

* La Porte, Indiana, city directories for 1971, 1984, 1987.

* Index to the Justice of the Peace records for New Durham Township, La Porte County, Indiana,1879-1906. (Surnames listed on web site.)

* Harold Henderson, comp., In Court In La Porte: An Every-Name Index to the First Legal Proceedings in La Porte County, Indiana [prior to 1836] (La Porte: Blurb.com, 2011).

INDIANA

* DAR-transcribed St. Joseph County, Indiana, marriage records 1830-1855, 1886-1906 (not the originals).

* Eric Pumroy with Paul Brockman, A Guide to Manuscript Collections of the Indiana Historical Society and Indiana State Library (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, 1986).

* Charles Alexander Martin, ed., Alumnal Record DePauw University (Greencastle IN: DePauw, 1910).

* Dorothy L. Riker, comp., Genealogical Sources Reprinted from the Genealogy Section of Indiana Magazine of History (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, 1979).

* Ronald L. Baker and Marvin Carmony, Indiana Place Names (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975)

ILLINOIS

* Almost 100 Flint-Thrall family letters 1870-1898, mostly from, to, and about southern Illinois.

* 1931 yearbook of Tilden Technical High School, Chicago.

* Edward Callary, Place Names of Illinois (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2009).

MICHIGAN

* Walter Romig, Michigan Place Names (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1988).

BEYOND

* Margaret R. Waters, Dorothy Ruiker, and Doris Leistner, Abstracts of Obituaries in the Western Christian Advocate 1834-1850 (Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, 1988).

* Karen Livsey, Western New York Land Transactions, 1804-1824, Extracted from the Archives of the Holland Land Company (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing, 1991).


Harold Henderson, "New on Midwest Roots," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 27 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Weekend wonderings: discursive endnotes

Why do so many publications at the state level continue to use endnotes rather than footnotes? Is there an insoluble layout issue here that I don't understand?
The spring issue of the Ohio Genealogical Society Quarterly includes an annotated transcription of Caleb Swan Walker's autobiographical fragment from 1861 to 1863, chronicling almost daily his experiences in Clermont County just east of Cincinnati and in Dennison General Hospital with wounded soldiers. Annotations are necessary because what was obvious to Caleb is no longer obvious to us. When he alludes to "Hon John McLean" dying on 4 April 1861, an editorial endnote identifies McLean, citing sources. Likewise when Caleb dined with C. W. Deland at the Burnet House, we learn who and what they were.

This kind of diligent well-sourced detail work has been my favorite feature in the Ohio Civil War Genealogy Journal, and I hope the new OGSQ will keep it up after OCWGJ goes away next year. (And, yes, I know they need material and I owe them a bunch about my Ohio relations.) Doing such annotations right is a difficult and underappreciated part of genealogy and microhistory, because the closer we get to the past the more mysterious it can be. (I blogged last month about a less thoroughly annotated Illinois treasure.)

The downside for me is that in this case the annotations appear in endnotes. So they are (a) essential to the enjoyment of the read, and (b) several pages away! I await the graphically-gifted genealogist who can make this kind of annotation work better.




Polly Day Staley et al., "Caleb Swan Walker's Autobiography, 1861-1863, Clermont County and Dennison General Hospital," Ohio Genealogical Society Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 1 (Spring 2012):39-52.



Harold Henderson, "Weekend wonderings: discursive endnotes," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 26 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Hidden in plain sight: Indiana Historical Society manuscripts

As a member of the Indiana Historical Society, every other month I get a newsletter, INPerspective, in the postal mail from the society. I always turn to the page near the back full of fine print that says, "New in Collections and Library," and look at the manuscript collections that have recently been "processed, cataloged and made available for research," as we say in archive world.

In the May/June issue, my eye fell on "Martindale Family Papers, 1839 to 1948," IHS collection M 1026. I went to the "Manuscripts and Visual Collections" page and then to the on-line finding aid for this collection. Hello, any researchers in Warren County? That was the home base for this family. The bulk of the collection is financial papers and accounts for their farm and business operations, but also some World War I information, including "a panoramic photograph of the all black 317th Trench Mortar Battalion, 92nd Division taken upon their return home."

At this point I took a look at a nearby collection in the M's: "Methodist Episcopal Church Cicero Circuit Records 1845-1861," IHS Collection SC 2553. Of course it helps to know stuff, like where Cicero is. This collection consists of just one notebook, about the circuit centered in Jackson Township, Hamilton County, Indiana: "Minutes are largely concerned with the licensing of preachers and exhorters. In other sections of the book are a list of members; marriages 1845-1849; baptisms 1847-1848; and genealogical records of the Bowman and Gipps (Kipps) families." Anybody got a mid-19th-century brick wall in Hamilton County?

The point? You never know until you look. It's true for books, web sites, and most of all archives.

Note: Many of the collections listed on the IHS web site don't have on-line finding aids. Do yourself a favor and stop by their actual building soon (Tuesday-Saturday). It's also the best parking deal in downtown Indy.


Harold Henderson, "Hidden in plain sight: Indiana Historical Society manuscripts," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 25 May 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]