The "LOST" Census

I guess I should have some "order" in the blog/tips, but quite honestly, I think if I don't post my "ah HA!" moments when they happen, they may be lost out there forever.

My latest "AH-HA!" moment just happened a few minutes ago.

My grandmother lived in a VERY small town of Holton. Actually, it's more of a township, I believe, though, it has a zipcode....it is considered "unincorporated". She was maybe 5 miles north of "town" on 80 acres of land her dad owned. Her dad also owned an additional 40 just north of the 80. Next to the 40, was an additional 40 that her mother's dad owned (her grandfather). That 40 was sold to the McGeever family. I knew there was a John born in '24 and Elizabeth born in 23. Elizabeth married a Wilke and they were friends of my grandma's.

I was curious to their roots so I did a search plugging in Elizabeth McGeever, her year of birth, and "holton, MI".

Nothing except for in Illinois. I know nothing about them in Illinois, as least at this point.


None even CLOSE to the Muskegon County area. Not Newaygo. Not Oceana County. NOTHING.

UGH.

You will have "UGH" moments. They are bound to happen.

Here is what I did to overcome mine (at least one of them).

I knew Elizabeth Wilke was in Holton Cemetery. I knew her maiden name was McGeever. How many McGeevers do YOU know?? Exactly. So any McGeevers in that cemetery HAVE to be related, right?

In Cemetery Transcriptions (AMAZING website, BTW), I found a Patrick and Elizabeth McGeever. The dates seemed to make sense to be parents of John and Elizabeth so I went with it. Thankfully, whomever did the transcriptions also had headstone pictures (did I mention that headstones DO NOT lie?? USE THEM!).

I found this:




Yep. See that KEY piece of information on the headstone??

Illinois. ILLI-FREAKIN'-NOIS! WOOOOOHOOOO!!!

I plugged in the same information and used ILLINOIS versus Holton.

BA DA BING:





OK..I have NO idea why the other half of the above picture is not showing, but you get the idea: THAT WAS MY MCGEEVER. When I opened the census record, John and Elizabeth were listed as kids. WIN!

If you can't find what you want in the way you are looking, completely try to go about it another way! :) I now know the McGeevers had lived in Illinois (Thanks to a little thing called a headstone :) ).

GREAT Cemetery Website for Iowa!

So, as I was plugging along on the information from my last post, I came across a website *HAVE* to share!

Iowa WPA Graves



If you have roots in Iowa, this is a MUST BOOK-MARK website. Supposedly, these are pretty complete records...more than what you will find a Find-a-Grave, etc...and so far, I've had a TON of luck!! Just plug in whatever information you know and hit search! If there is a match, the results will come back giving you full name (on record), dates of birth/death, cemetery, and location. That is awesome! I've even seen a few records where people can put sticky-post-it notes!

Bookmark it....do it now! :)

Obituaries, Headstones...and how they can work for you!

As I was sitting here working a line for a friend of mine, I came across a situation where I had to "think outside of the box" a little bit to get the information I needed.

I knew from a marriage record that the main person I was working on was married once, but didn't know about a second marriage until I came across his headstone as his headstone does reflect a different spouse.

That is why you've GOT to love cemeteries. They do NOT lie.

Headstone:




With that in mind, I decided to do a search for Mary L. Brand.

VOILA. Because the dates matched the headstone, I knew I had the correct person:

Mary Louise Brand, 97, of Oskaloosa, formerly of Fremont, died Saturday, Dec. 20, 2008 at Crystal Heights Care Center.Open visitation will be at the Fremont Funeral Chapel 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Tuesday. Funeral services will be 10:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Fremont Funeral Chapel, Rev. Todd Holman officiating. Interment will follow at Cedar Township Memorial Cemetery (South) in Fremont. Memorials may be made in her name to the Fremont Fire and Rescue.Mary was born May 21, 1911 in Kirkville to William Boyd and Mary Elizabeth Walker Nash. She graduated from Fremont High School in 1929 where she held the honor of being Valedictorian, a title she maintained for several years.She was united in marriage to Carl Anderson May 21, 1930 in Eddyville. He passed away in 1952. In 1952, Mary started working at the telephone company in Fremont as a switchboard operator and was employed there until retiring when the business closed. She also helped at the Fremont Funeral Chapel for many years. She was united in marriage to Vernal Brand in 1964. He passed away in 1983.Mary enjoyed gardening, building doll houses, raising fowl, reading, word puzzles, current events and college basketball, especially the Cyclones. She never missed attending the Fremont School Alumni Banquets until her health prevented her from going.She is survived by her sons, Rex (Dee) Anderson of Rose Hill, and Clair Anderson of Albany, Ore., 12 grandchildren, 23 great-grandchildren and five great-great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents; both of her husbands; a son, William Charles Anderson; a daughter, Joy Lee Anderson and two grandsons, Allen and William Todd Anderson.Fremont Funeral Chapel in charge of arrangements.Obituary may be viewed at: www.legacy.com/ottumwacourier/Obituaries.asp


Look at ALL of that information in that obituary!!!! It's CHUCK FULL of good stuff!
We know Mary's parents (and her mother's maiden name). We know where she was born. We know where she went to school. We know she was married previously and we know her kids from her previous marriage!

Utilize cemeteries if you are able to. Most cemetery offices are very willing to look up a person for you. If you aren't able to find cemetery information, call the funeral home. If you don't know that, call more than one. It isn't like there are hundreds of funeral homes in any given city, realistically. :)

The information *IS* out there to be found :)