30 January 2019
QUESTIONS and COMMENTS - ANCESTRY WORSHIP GENEALOGY
I enjoy getting questions and comments so feel free to leave them, just don't expect emergency responses. 👌
26 January 2019
CENSUS WORKERS for the 2020 CENSUS
I got a call from a friend, asking me if I was going to apply to be a census worker for the 2020 census or volunteer for the 1950 census project. These projects are going to be a HUGE endeavor, the 2020 many times more HUGE than the 2010. The population expanded rapidly. It was the post World War II baby boom. Suburbs were being built and Americans were expanding out from living in cities. GI's were using the low interest mortgage rates for veterans to be home owners. Stay at home moms were financially possible. Some of us are going to read this 1950 census in 2020 (or thereafter) and just wish we were living back in the day.
Genealogists get very excited about census and census is called "The backbone of American genealogy."
I have such memories of the 2010 reveal. The NATIONAL ARCHIVES SITE was not functioning completely or well for a while as people rushed to use it. Of course other database owners attempted to have theirs up better and faster. Indexing lagged behind. Some pages were missing or out of order. I used the National Archives site at a few libraries including my local LDS Family History Center to get in there with my list of people who had not appeared on 1940.
These mix ups and frustrations one also experienced when the Ellis Island ship manifests site first went up. I remember finding ways to get what I needed, ways to mine the data.
I spent hours reading 1940 census pages one after another because they were not indexed yet with mixed results. I still wish I were turning microfilm rather than clicking the mouse till I need a forefinger joint replacement.
I've learned a bit about the data on census and why looking at the name of the census taker can be a good thing. For instance I noticed German surnames of census takers associated with assignments of going into Polish and Hungarian neighborhoods. The language the census taker speaks may reflect the spelling of the surnames.
So pre-2010 of course I applied to be a census worker. I took a class and the test and got an A. Soon I got a call asking if I speak Spanish. I do not. I didn't get the job. They wanted people to be in their own neighborhoods and mine at the time probably had a significant percentage of Spanish speakers. I met the man who did get the job. He was frustrated. He said that he had to go back to a building three times because he was having trouble being let in. People were not answering their doors. After three tries his supervisor would go with him and then would make the building manager let them in. Overall they thought they were encountering illegal residents who did not want to be on census or talk to anyone governmental. Probably true.
So I suspect in our political climate (i.e "Build the Wall") that the 2020 census next year will be fraught with such issues. WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF CENSUS. It's a statistical analysis that helps our government understand the population and these statistics are often cited when our officials are looking for causes or funding.
Although I do not believe in the past the census information was shared with the INS (or equivalent) people who are not citizens may worry.
Think of the past census, say taken of those Ellis Island immigrants in which census takers asked people if they were citizens, if they were aliens, if they were in process, and what year they were naturalized. There is a historical precedent for asking residents about their immigration status. Sometimes when I cannot find people who left a ship on a census I wonder if they hid out for the same reasons as the people do in recent history.
C 2019 All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights. This post has been edited and expanded July 2019
Genealogists get very excited about census and census is called "The backbone of American genealogy."
I have such memories of the 2010 reveal. The NATIONAL ARCHIVES SITE was not functioning completely or well for a while as people rushed to use it. Of course other database owners attempted to have theirs up better and faster. Indexing lagged behind. Some pages were missing or out of order. I used the National Archives site at a few libraries including my local LDS Family History Center to get in there with my list of people who had not appeared on 1940.
These mix ups and frustrations one also experienced when the Ellis Island ship manifests site first went up. I remember finding ways to get what I needed, ways to mine the data.
I spent hours reading 1940 census pages one after another because they were not indexed yet with mixed results. I still wish I were turning microfilm rather than clicking the mouse till I need a forefinger joint replacement.
I've learned a bit about the data on census and why looking at the name of the census taker can be a good thing. For instance I noticed German surnames of census takers associated with assignments of going into Polish and Hungarian neighborhoods. The language the census taker speaks may reflect the spelling of the surnames.
So pre-2010 of course I applied to be a census worker. I took a class and the test and got an A. Soon I got a call asking if I speak Spanish. I do not. I didn't get the job. They wanted people to be in their own neighborhoods and mine at the time probably had a significant percentage of Spanish speakers. I met the man who did get the job. He was frustrated. He said that he had to go back to a building three times because he was having trouble being let in. People were not answering their doors. After three tries his supervisor would go with him and then would make the building manager let them in. Overall they thought they were encountering illegal residents who did not want to be on census or talk to anyone governmental. Probably true.
So I suspect in our political climate (i.e "Build the Wall") that the 2020 census next year will be fraught with such issues. WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF CENSUS. It's a statistical analysis that helps our government understand the population and these statistics are often cited when our officials are looking for causes or funding.
Although I do not believe in the past the census information was shared with the INS (or equivalent) people who are not citizens may worry.
Think of the past census, say taken of those Ellis Island immigrants in which census takers asked people if they were citizens, if they were aliens, if they were in process, and what year they were naturalized. There is a historical precedent for asking residents about their immigration status. Sometimes when I cannot find people who left a ship on a census I wonder if they hid out for the same reasons as the people do in recent history.
C 2019 All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights. This post has been edited and expanded July 2019
16 January 2019
THE MAN WITH THE NATIVE AMERICAN DATABASE and FREE RESEARCH
Perhaps it's the synchronicity of having a couple potential clients who want to prove Native American ancestry, but the other day, just sitting on a bench outside a restaurant, I met a man who introduced himself and said he was a Native American genealogy expert. That's not what the outside of his van said, but he handed me his card proving he was accepted into a tribe and said it had taken him 15 years to be accepted.
His route of research was not a steady plan of documentation but I don't hold that against anyone. Most of us have had to go around an individual to find them again such as following a brother or sister or other relative to get back a generation or so.
Then this man blew me away by saying he had a personal database of HALF A MILLION NAMES which he had posted but kept private on a contributory genealogy database you all know of. He said he paid high yearly fees to have just about everything they offered. Further he said that ALL NATIVE AMERICAN ARE RELATED and HE CAN PROVE THAT.
The more he talked the less convinced I became. Besides the task of listing half a million names, I doubted the privacy he claimed to have. Mostly I feared that a lot of people who are lazy genealogy hobbyists or simply ignorant will take his word for it and never bother to do the proofing.
I told him I was a genealogist but he wasn't interested in my story, just impressing me with his.
The tribe he is a member of gave him the card saying he was 5/32nd blood. We all have two parents, four grandparents, eight great grandparents, and 16 great great grandparents, and thirty two great great great grandparents. A simplistic example of how one gets to be 5/32nds Native American would be that five of the 32 great great great grandparents were Native American. But there are other combinations since it's possible that some or all of these many people in his genetics are some part Native American too.
OK, he looked convincingly Native. He had studied the tribe and taken on some of their cultural attributes such as, he said, doing free genealogy research - for those who wouldn't mind their charts also being in his database.
Early in the conversation I'd mentioned preliminary research into the tribes of these two people who say they want to know their heritage. He wanted me to tell them their names. It would not be professional for me to divulge this. I felt put on the spot. I did not.
He went into the restaurant before me and that was the end of the encounter.
C 2019 Ancestry Worship Genealogy BlogSpot All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights
His route of research was not a steady plan of documentation but I don't hold that against anyone. Most of us have had to go around an individual to find them again such as following a brother or sister or other relative to get back a generation or so.
Then this man blew me away by saying he had a personal database of HALF A MILLION NAMES which he had posted but kept private on a contributory genealogy database you all know of. He said he paid high yearly fees to have just about everything they offered. Further he said that ALL NATIVE AMERICAN ARE RELATED and HE CAN PROVE THAT.
The more he talked the less convinced I became. Besides the task of listing half a million names, I doubted the privacy he claimed to have. Mostly I feared that a lot of people who are lazy genealogy hobbyists or simply ignorant will take his word for it and never bother to do the proofing.
I told him I was a genealogist but he wasn't interested in my story, just impressing me with his.
The tribe he is a member of gave him the card saying he was 5/32nd blood. We all have two parents, four grandparents, eight great grandparents, and 16 great great grandparents, and thirty two great great great grandparents. A simplistic example of how one gets to be 5/32nds Native American would be that five of the 32 great great great grandparents were Native American. But there are other combinations since it's possible that some or all of these many people in his genetics are some part Native American too.
OK, he looked convincingly Native. He had studied the tribe and taken on some of their cultural attributes such as, he said, doing free genealogy research - for those who wouldn't mind their charts also being in his database.
Early in the conversation I'd mentioned preliminary research into the tribes of these two people who say they want to know their heritage. He wanted me to tell them their names. It would not be professional for me to divulge this. I felt put on the spot. I did not.
He went into the restaurant before me and that was the end of the encounter.
C 2019 Ancestry Worship Genealogy BlogSpot All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights
09 January 2019
CHILDHOOD WITT and SAYINGS a PART OF FAMILY HISTORY WRITING
A new friend and I started reminiscing about all the things our parents said to their children when the children were playing creatively or rough. We were watching some other people's children throw sand in the air and yelled and that sparked the conversation. We didn't want anyone's children to get sand in their eyes or ears. The children were having such fun though. They proceeded to go exploring on a big mountain of compost.
My friend said his dad used to yell "Don't run with a spoon in your mouth."
I recalled that in my childhood home there were a lot of ways to "break your head open." These included racing up stairs and around swimming pools, swinging on the swing set too high, and well, just about all dangerous activities.
We agreed though that today's children are overprotected, and making them wear helmets to ride bikes and plugging up electric sockets, for instance, makes for the implication that they are fragile and (too) precious.
My friend and I compared notes and decided that though we are of the same generation and the sayings we heard growing up to warn us of danger and injury had seemingly not made it all the way to the next state.
Childhood wit and sayings that are part of your upbringing ought to be included in your family history writing. They tell the story not only of your generation but of race, class, ethnicity, of generations - of time and place. They will certainly sound odd to future generations.
C Ancestry Worship Genealogy 2019 All Rights Reserved
My friend said his dad used to yell "Don't run with a spoon in your mouth."
I recalled that in my childhood home there were a lot of ways to "break your head open." These included racing up stairs and around swimming pools, swinging on the swing set too high, and well, just about all dangerous activities.
We agreed though that today's children are overprotected, and making them wear helmets to ride bikes and plugging up electric sockets, for instance, makes for the implication that they are fragile and (too) precious.
My friend and I compared notes and decided that though we are of the same generation and the sayings we heard growing up to warn us of danger and injury had seemingly not made it all the way to the next state.
Childhood wit and sayings that are part of your upbringing ought to be included in your family history writing. They tell the story not only of your generation but of race, class, ethnicity, of generations - of time and place. They will certainly sound odd to future generations.
C Ancestry Worship Genealogy 2019 All Rights Reserved
05 January 2019
STARTING THE YEAR OUT WITH NATIVE AMERICAN GENEALOGY QUESTIONS
NATIVE KNOT: Native American Tribal Registration
Two people have asked me to help them with Native American genealogy to prove they should be members of tribes - One Seneca and the other Kiowa. In the past I mentioned that tribes usually expect 16% genetic link - as proven by genealogy documents not DNA - which means one great grandparent or two great great grandparents. However, I discovered this is NOT the case with the Seneca or the Kiowa. I wonder if it's changed since the days when I sat in on Native American classes at my local LDS Family History library.
I found this web site that has informational links to SOME - not all - of the many Native American tribes that did or do exist. Also there are some generally small groups of Native Peoples that are still fighting for governmental recognition as a tribe for all the benefits possible.
Take a look and see if the tribe you're interested in is listed!
01 January 2019
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