tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52715063402867902812024-03-17T10:38:29.349-05:00Ancestry SistersEllen and Elizabeth of Ancestry Sisters are Professional Genealogists in business for 12 years. From basic to complex jobs, we conduct Genealogy Research and DNA Reviews for clients anywhere in the U.S., Ireland, England, Scotland, Canada, Australia, Europe, Mexico and more. Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.comBlogger24125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-54390038571487105882021-10-01T19:41:00.001-05:002023-06-19T08:00:12.594-05:00Searching for my Adopted Grandmother's Birth Parents <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZxdskfE53_11ldXLzq18QJQ2iwWV3vCvM78f-OEWZW8c3edXYukVceySVBnvq3EMB1qU-wXaHI4_8QlhrvQy5ZA7HwoRtqIANqidakyl8MVVQVRGZ4-tx5DDolis5vH0Ri63ubDlvrSA9zwnXZDq1_eMKQgclgWKyYf6w9fUdBu_8VTiEQEJwh1995yY/s1280/Better%20Helen%20and%20Fanny-Enhanced.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1280" data-original-width="908" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZxdskfE53_11ldXLzq18QJQ2iwWV3vCvM78f-OEWZW8c3edXYukVceySVBnvq3EMB1qU-wXaHI4_8QlhrvQy5ZA7HwoRtqIANqidakyl8MVVQVRGZ4-tx5DDolis5vH0Ri63ubDlvrSA9zwnXZDq1_eMKQgclgWKyYf6w9fUdBu_8VTiEQEJwh1995yY/s320/Better%20Helen%20and%20Fanny-Enhanced.jpg" width="227" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">
“Your mother was adopted.” That’s what my grandfather
told my father on the night of his mother’s passing. This kind, wonderful woman grew up too
ashamed to tell anyone her big secret, not even her 7 children. It’s heartbreaking and I can’t imagine what
was running thru my father’s head at that exact moment when his dad drops the
bomb. Here he is, dealing with the
death of his mother Helen at the age of 74 from Breast Cancer, and now he has
to process the fact that her parents were not her parents. Or were they..........</div>
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Fast forward 30+ years later, and I’ve decided it’s time to
find out exactly where I came from. It
started out as a simple concept. Let’s
do a little family research on my ancestors and see what I can find, maybe even
understand who I was named after.
Someone named Ellen. That’s it,
that’s all I wanted to do. But one day
into my initial search, I was hooked.
My great grandfather worked at the Cracker Jack factory in Chicago. Very cool.
I had ancestors that came over on the Mayflower. I was related to Liza Minelli. Wow.
My great-great grandmother had 16 children. Forget it. </div>
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At this point, my search was spiraling out of control and I
couldn’t stop. My sister and her
husband called my office the “war room”.
But I wasn’t touching the adoption situation, at least not yet. That was too daunting a task and I was
convinced I wouldn’t find out anything.
So I let it sit at the bottom of the pile, at the bottom of my list of
things to do. </div>
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About a month later, I decided it was time to peek into the
file and see what I could find out about my grandmother’s adoption and birth
parents. Basically, all I remember
hearing over the last many years was a story about how her father really wasn’t
her father, and the birth mother was a servant named Fanny. But then there was this little whisper in my
family that maybe her adopted Bohemian father Frank really was her birth father
after all. Yet the birth certificate
said the father was a German man named Fred.
Where that rumor originated from is still unclear to me, but hopefully
one day I could get to the bottom of that issue. </div>
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Fanny, Fred and Frank.
Seriously, could you have given me at least one name that didn’t start
with an F? </div>
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To begin, I had 2 documents to help me in my search. One of my dad’s siblings actually petitioned
Cook County and got Helen’s adoption transcript. In the transcript, it names the birth mother, which led to
Helen’s birth certificate. That’s all I
had.</div>
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Oh, did I mention that the birth mother lied about her name
and address on the birth certificate? She used a fake name of Kate on the birth record, but was quoted in the
adoption record as Fanny. What I will
eventually uncover is that this is one of many lies that I would come across in
my search. She obviously had something
to hide and that’s what I needed to understand. So what else was she lying about? The birth father listed on the certificate? Probably.</div>
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I initially felt lucky because my grandmother was born in
Feb of 1900, and the once-every-10-year census came out in June of 1900. I thought it would be fairly easy to find a
4-month old baby Helen in the census records of Chicago, but I was wrong. So where was Helen in the census, and where
was she for her first year? According
to the adoption transcript, Frank says that he took Helen home around the age
of 1, and eventually adopted her at the age of 11. I was convinced the birth mother took her home in an attempt to
raise her, although it was possible she could be at an orphanage (Frank gave
money to a Bohemian Catholic Orphanage in his will). </div>
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My first serious search was to look thru all the Chicago
orphanages in the 1900 census. It is a
painstaking process to flip thru many pages trying to drill down to the exact
location of each orphanage, but it had to be done. Yet I came up with nothing.
So then I wrote to the Catholic Archdiocese and spoke to the woman in
charge of the archives. She agreed to
research the Bohemian orphanage run by the nuns in the year 1900. But after waiting 2 months for a response,
all she came back with was that the records couldn’t be found for that
timeframe. </div>
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Then I went back to the census record, and searched for baby
Helen and mother Fanny, or Helen and Kate.
I did this search multiple times with no luck until I decided to do a
generic search for 4-month old girls.
That’s when I came across a very interesting entry = Baby Helen, born in
Feb, living with mother Annie (no father with them). When I looked closer at the document, the mother’s name was actually
Fannie. It had been indexed wrong after
having missed the first letter of her name. I was convinced this could be them.
I also notice that they list the place of birth of baby Helen’s father
as Hungary (not Germany, which is the nationality of Fred listed on the birth
certificate). Very interesting
indeed. The only hiccup was that it had
more lies – the last name of the mother was wrong, the age of the mother was
off by 10 years, and she said she was from Hungary, not Bohemia. <br />
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Here is the interesting part on this census record. This woman Fannie lived next door to a
policeman in the census. And why that
gave me chills is because Frank (the adopted Bohemian father) was a cop. So now this story begins to form in my
head. Adopted Father Frank is the real
father, and has squirreled mother and daughter away with a co-worker so no one
would find them. I was also convinced
that Fred, listed as the father on the birth certificate, was another lie and
they were never married. That is until
I found Fanny’s marriage record to Fred 5 years before the birth of Helen. Ugh, I mean, yeah !!<br />
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So now I know that Fanny and Fred were actually husband and
wife. But I never did find them living
together in the 1900 census, much less with a baby. Of course, they got married by the Justice of the Peace in 1895,
which means they didn’t marry in the church, which means there isn’t a church
record to find. When I searched the
Chicago City Directory of Addresses for Fred, I found him listed during the 1<sup>st</sup>
year of their marriage, and then I never found him living in Chicago
again. I searched about 20 years of
directories, and only found him twice – in 1894 and 1895. Now I am back to my theory that he is not
the father, and had left Chicago long before baby Helen was born in 1900. </div>
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I’m now months into this search before I finally come across
another hit – Fanny living in Yellowstone Wyoming. She is living as a servant in the house of a military officer in
the 1910 census. The entry does say
that she is married and is the mother of 1 child, but she is not living with a
husband or a daughter. At this point, I
know that Helen is living with her adopted parents as a 10 year old. Nonetheless, I found Fanny again, and that’s
progress. </div>
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Yet I’m running out of ideas and fear I will never figure
this out. But I had one big idea left
and that was to search for divorce records since I never did find Fanny and
Fred living together in a census. Not
knowing what this meant, I ventured down to the Cook County Archives and sat at
the microfilm desk. (I knew Illinois
was broke, but for Pete’s sake, could they get a machine that you didn’t have
to crank by hand? What year is this,
1912?) So I cranked away for an hour,
and I’m getting highly annoyed I might add.
That is, until I hit the jackpot.
Finally. I found a divorce index
– Fanny and Fred, March 1911. </div>
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To quote Harry Carey, HOLY COW. Now I’m fired up and it’s all I can focus on. I also realized that the divorce date was 1
month before the official adoption papers were issued for Helen, and the lawyer
on the adoption was the same lawyer for the divorce. That cannot be a coincidence.
Frank, did you pay the bill? It
took 2 weeks of patience, which is not a virtue I possess, but the day finally
arrives for me to go back to the courthouse and view the record. I’m giddy and bouncing in my shoes as I walk
the 15+ blocks to the Loop. I can’t imagine what it will tell me, but I’m
beyond excited. What I get is a
document folded in 3 parts that hadn’t been opened since 1911. The original rusty staple holding the pages
together was still there. </div>
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The first word I saw was “abandoned”. According to Fanny’s testimony to the
courts, husband Fred abandoned her in 1899 (Helen was born in 1900). In addition, there is a sister named Anna
who testifies to the abandonment. And
finally Frank, the adopted father, testifies that he knew Fanny for the past 10
years, she lived alone, and did laundry for a living. But the part that still breaks my heart is that Frank tells the
court that Fanny would occasionally go to his house to visit her little
girl. Remember when I said I was
bouncing with excitement on my way to view the record; well, my walk back home
was met with a somber tone, and a few tears.
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My whole perception of my great grandmother changed in an
instant and I began to feel a connection that I cannot explain. Whether I am right or wrong, this is what I
think went down. She came to the US in
1889 to live with her siblings in Chicago, and eventually got married in
1895. 1 year later, her husband left
her and never returned. She was broke,
lonely and she got pregnant out of wedlock.
Fanny attempted to raise Helen by herself, but had no money, and lived
the life of a servant in someone else’s house, doing someone else’s laundry of
all things. I’m sure bringing an infant
into this situation was problematic with her employer. So she had to give up the baby to a better
life, which I’m confident broke her heart.
I truly believe this just based on the fact that she often went to visit
her as a child.</div>
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Fanny’s sister in the divorce record was my goldmine to
their family. I found sister Anna and 2
other siblings living in Chicago, and I even confirmed their parents’ name and
birth location in Bohemia. However, it
was sister Anna’s obituary in 1935 that mentioned her sister Frances. But now Fanny has a new last name. Obviously, she remarried and it only took me
a couple weeks to piece it all together.
I found Fanny’s 2nd marriage record in Ohio, which took place 2 months
after the divorce, and 1 month after the adoption. I found her in the 1920 census with her new husband Clyde and a 6
year old son living in Idaho. I
immediately found her death record in 1942 and subsequently received her death
certificate 2 weeks later. <br />
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And yes, there was more lying that I uncovered. On the marriage certificate to her 2<sup>nd</sup>
husband Clyde, she used her first married last name as the name of her parents,
instead of her real maiden name. Then
she checked the box that said she had never been married before, which probably
means she didn’t tell her husband about her past. She also said she was born in Chicago, even though I have her
immigration record and a picture of the boat she came over on from
Bohemia. But who cares at this
point. She lived in an era where shame
was the devil, and god forbid you made a mistake. Yet that mistake led to a wonderful mother of 7 and grandmother
of many, including me. That is not a
mistake in my book. Fanny just stumbled
into an unconventional path to motherhood that other people had a hard time
accepting. The hardest thing for me to
reconcile is how it affected my grandmother.
I hope to god she isn’t mad at me for uncovering everything. I wish she were alive today because I
believe she would have felt more comfortable telling others.</div>
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So there it is. 9
months of brick walls, all to come tumbling down from a divorce record.</div>
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I want to meet Fanny in person, but that can’t happen until
I see her in Heaven. So for now, I’d
settle for a picture. I haven’t been
able to come up with that yet. And I
will definitely visit her grave in Twin Falls Idaho. Hopefully soon. Maybe one
day I will get the guts to reach out to the children of her son who now live in
Utah. But I’m too chicken to do
that. I fear they have no idea that
grandma had another life.</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "georgia"; font-size: 11.5pt;">As for the birth father, I briefly mentioned
that I thought Helen’s adopted father was really the birth father. I have
yet to uncover one single hard fact to substantiate this claim. My theory
is based on whispers, and gut. Frank knew the birth mother and let her
into his house. I doubt that would happen if he picked up a baby at an
orphanage. Also, Frank and his 2<sup>nd</sup><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span>wife were 46 years old & childless when he brought
Helen into his home. I can’t imagine he wanted to be changing diapers and
chasing a toddler into his 50’s. Don’t forget another key fact - Fanny
lived next to a cop in the 1900 census. Ok, that may be a stretch, but it
doesn’t shut the door, just helps to keep the theory alive.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "georgia"; font-size: 11.5pt;">In addition, my grandparents grew up as
neighbors, which is how they met and eventually married. Thus, my
grandfather knew Helen's "adopted” parents. Last year I ordered
Helen's death certificate, which was filled out by my grandfather. The
birth father was listed as Frank, but birth mother was listed as unknown.
That's a huge clue, because if they were both adopted parents, then he
would have listed her too.<span class="apple-converted-space"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "georgia"; font-size: 11.5pt;">There is one other factor in my gut speaking
to Frank as the real father. In 1972, my journalist father did a taped
interview with his parents so he could document their family history.
What a blessing this has been to my research. But it is haunting to listen
to my grandmother speak, especially now that I know the full story. Keep
in mind nobody knew she was adopted during this interview. So when my
father began asking questions, she ran away from the microphone and told him
she didn’t want to do it and didn’t know anything. He eventually coaxed
her over, and we get to listen to her speak glowingly about her father
Frank. Yet, when he asks about her mother, she said she doesn’t know
anything and changes the subject. It’s definitive that something is not right,
yet she speaks with such reverence to Frank. So now I ask you, why would
she love her adopted father so much, yet avoid speaking about her adopted
mother? See what I mean? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "georgia"; font-size: 11.5pt;"><span style="background-color: white;">This past summer, I traced Frank’s roots to
a distant cousin in Chicago. We met in person and are discussing a DNA
test. I’m all for checking that box on my research skills,
and adding to the story, even if it’s only in my head.</span><span style="background-color: #eefcff;"><o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "georgia"; font-size: 11.5pt;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "georgia";"><span style="background-color: white;">MAJOR UPDATE = I am excited to confirm that my research was correct all along. Frank is the father of my grandmother ! My cousin and I both took a DNA test. We had to wait a few anxious weeks once the test was taken, but it was an amazing moment to see the results come back positive and confirm her as a 3rd cousin. If you have any doubts in your family about possible lineage, I strongly recommend taking part in an Autosomal DNA test such as Family Tree DNA, Ancestry.com, My Heritage or 23andMe. </span></span><br />
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-36985117355437448242021-08-25T11:49:00.001-05:002024-01-07T15:24:53.178-06:00Was Mary Doefour really Anna Myrle Sizer? Help us find new clues and confirm this mystery.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">In 1978, an amnesia patient died in a nursing home in Morton, Illinois. This photo and story appeared in the
Peoria Journal Star, in Peoria, Illinois on February 25, 1979. We pulled the story from the public library's microfilm and transcribed this article exactly as it was printed in February of 1979 for easier reading. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The photo’s caption stated:<b> </b></span></div><div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><b><i>Were these two women the same person? The one disappeared more than 50 years ago in
Iowa, and no trace of her was ever found.
The other died last year in Morton, and for more than 50 years nobody
knew who she was. Rick Baker’s
compelling account of “The Search for Mary Doefour” starts today and continues
throughout the week.<o:p></o:p></i></b></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 16pt;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part I)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 16pt;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Sunday, February 25, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
In early March of 1978, I first heard of Mary Doefour. She was an old woman who had just died. And a funeral home owner was calling in her
obituary. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It was the most nebulous death notice I had ever heard. Her parents were unknown. Her birthplace was unknown. Her birthdate was uncertain. If anybody survived her, nobody knew.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And Mary Doefour was not her actual name. Nobody knew her real name.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
She died of a heart attack while in bed at Queenwood East
Nursing Home in Morton March 2.
Intrigued by the vague obituary, I went to the nursing home about a week
after the old woman’s death in an effort to find out more about her life.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
While nursing home residents sang broken hymns in the
background, a therapist at the nursing home, who’d gotten to know Mary Doefour
recounted the tragedy of the woman’s life.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The therapist had trouble hiding her emotion. I had trouble hiding my disbelief. The horror of the woman’s life had been
incredible. And the fact that she lived
such a life in government sanctioned institutions made her story more horrible.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
After leaving the nursing home where Mary Doefour died, I
had enough information on Mary Doefour to write a rambling, 14-page account of
the nightmare the woman had lived for almost 50 years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That story was published in the March 12, Sunday edition of
the Bloomington Pantagraph, a newspaper I worked for at the time. The paper had a circulation of more than
50,000.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And maybe there was a chance – a slight chance – that
somebody who knew who Mary Doefour really was would read the story and reveal
her identity before she was given an anonymous, pauper’s burial by the state.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
While there was no solid information in those 14 pages of
who the woman might have been, there was some information that could be
pursued. Following that information up
would involve a lot of legwork. And it
would probably be futile. But there were
some unanswered questions.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Much of the information in the original story was a result
of piecemeal records that survived the institutions in which Mary Doefour
spent for decades. We don’t know how the
institutions found some of the information, or why it wasn’t checked further.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Here’s a brief recount of the Mary Doefour story:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-bottom: 5.0pt; margin-left: 49.5pt; margin-right: 31.5pt; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 31.5pt 5pt 49.5pt; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>About 50 years ago, a young, attractive woman
was found dazed near a road in Northern Illinois. She’d been beaten and raped, and couldn’t
remember anything about herself.</li>
<li>Soon after she was found, she was placed in a
state hospital for the criminally insane at Manteno. She wasn’t a criminal, and her only apparent
mental problem was amnesia. Efforts to
discover her identity were apparently minimal.<span style="font-size: 7pt;"> </span></li>
<li>She was pregnant as a result of the rape, and
she had a child she probably never saw while at the hospital for the criminally
insane. The child was probably put in an
orphanage as soon as it was born.</li>
<li>It was somehow learned during her early
incarceration that she’d been an elementary schoolteacher, perhaps first grade.</li>
<li>Her attempts to convince people she didn’t belong
in the institution for the criminally insane were met with efforts to calm
her. She was given so much medicine she
shook constantly from pseudo-Parkinson’s Disease.</li>
<li>She was lined up with other residents of the
institutions and frequently given electro-shock treatments. When the treatments knocked her out, she was
tossed in a large tub of cold water.
That revived her.</li>
<li>After 10 years at Manteno, she was transferred
to the state mental hospital in Bartonville.
At Manteno she was known as “Mary Doe.”
At Bartonville she was known as “Mary Doefour” because there were other
Mary Doe’s in the institution.</li>
<li>At Bartonville, the formerly articulate,
well-education woman adapted to her environment, defecated on the floor for
lack of a toilet, washed herself in a toilet bowl when one was available, and
blew her nose on her dress.</li>
<li>She was in Bartonville about 30 years, never had
a visitor, was kept calm on massive doses of medicine and frequent
electro-shock treatments.</li>
<li>When the state ordered Bartonville closed in
1972, she was transferred to a nursing home in El Paso, then to the nursing
home in Morton. In 1977, she went
blind. Less than a year later, she died.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-bottom: 5.0pt; margin-left: 49.5pt; margin-right: 31.5pt; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 31.5pt 5pt 49.5pt; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That’s a short synopsis of the original story. And I thought it would do something to help
find out who she was. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But it didn’t.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Last November, I decided to leave my job at the Bloomington
paper. I rummaged through some newspaper
clips and picked a few out to send along with a job application to The Peoria Journal
Star. I ran across the Mary Doefour
story.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It had been almost eight months since she died and seven
months since I’d thought much about her.
I stuck the Mary Doefour clip in with the job application.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I was hired in early January. And the second week I was on the job, the
managing editor brought up Mary Doefour.
He said he found the story interesting, and thought it might be worth a
follow.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Perhaps by now, there was some indication of who she
was. Perhaps the mortician, who’d been
ordered by the state to keep her ashes kept in an urn that looked something
like a coffee can were due to be buried in six weeks.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
No. There had been
no inquiries. In fact, Robert Perry the
mortician said the only inquiries about the woman since she had died had come
from me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Still, it seemed worth another story. The fact she would be buried soon was enough
of a news peg. And the Peoria paper has
more than 100,000 circulation. Again,
perhaps there was a chance somebody would know her, or make an extensive effort
to find who she was.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The story was played well across the top of page. And the Associated Press liked the story well
enough to send it to other papers with my name on it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The story appeared in the Jan. 10 Midwest edition of the
Chicago Tribune, in the Metro-East Journal in East St. Louis, and in seven or
eight other Illinois papers.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I got my hopes up again.
Perhaps Mary Doefour’s identity would be discovered. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But two days later all the response I was to get was on my
desk in the form of three letters.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
One of the letters was from a woman in Southern
Illinois. In the envelope was a clipping
of the story that appeared in a Mount Vernon, IL newspaper. The lady said she thought the story was very
sad, and her uncle died in a mental institution.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That was no help.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The second letter was from a woman in Wisconsin. That letter contained a clip of the story
from the Tribune. The woman was
irritated because her copy of the paper was printed poorly and she could read
only half the story. She wanted another
copy.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That was no help.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The third letter was from a woman in Iowa. There was another Tribune clip in it. She said the story brought back memories of a
Mount Vernon, Iowa schoolteacher who got on a train about 1930 and was never
heard from again. The teacher’s names
was Alice Zaiser. The woman had an aunt
in the Clinton, Iowa area. Unfortunately, the aunt was dead.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The best thing to do seemed to be to buy some beer, go home
and watch television, and try to forget about Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
At the office about a week after I’d given up any hope in
finding who Mary Doefour was, I decided to pursue the story even though it did
not seem promising.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I reread the letter from Iowa and decided it could be
something. Then I spent the morning
re-examining everything I knew about Mary Doefour. And there wasn’t much that I hadn’t already
run into the ground.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
So I telephoned the woman from Iowa who wrote the letter in
response to the article in the Tribune.
She said she didn’t know anything more than what she wrote, but was sure
someone in Mount Vernon, Iowa would be able to tell me about the case.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I called a secretary in a grade school in Mount Vernon and
asked if she knew anything about an elementary schoolteacher from that area
disappearing about 50 years ago. She
said she didn’t but she’d ask a few people and would call back if she found
anything. I didn’t expect to hear from
her again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But I did. She
called back and said a few people had heard something about a teacher
disappearing back then. They said her
name was Alice Siezer, not Alice Zaiser.
She gave me the name of a man who she said might be able to help.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I called him, and he said the schoolteacher’s name wasn’t
Alice Siezer. It was Anna Myrle Sizer.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
By the time I hung up the telephone, I was close to
certain I had just talked to Mary Doefour’s brother – a retired banker who had
not heard a word of his sister since she’d disappeared more than 50 years ago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-align: center; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW5N8414tr4C81pzNcWT9VYK5t7uH7bwbkWi5R1wNGyrhZkvQQVgwK6MWg4Q3WxrwwLt5NVxaxU5pg6CvMnpdQsY6HIig8U31JIWYZYVdtvQf3Xzil5hjV1cDcY5Q1VM0ttMjTJXpdIDk/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+I+newspaper+image.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW5N8414tr4C81pzNcWT9VYK5t7uH7bwbkWi5R1wNGyrhZkvQQVgwK6MWg4Q3WxrwwLt5NVxaxU5pg6CvMnpdQsY6HIig8U31JIWYZYVdtvQf3Xzil5hjV1cDcY5Q1VM0ttMjTJXpdIDk/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+I+newspaper+image.jpg" width="194" /></a></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-align: center; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Tomorrow: The story of Anna Myrle Sizer</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="color: red; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: red; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: red; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 16pt;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part II)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 16pt;">A Possible
Clue to Mystery Found in Iowa<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: 16pt;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Monday, Feb. 26, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The secretary at the Mount Vernon Iowa grade school simply
said she thought Harry Sizer might be some relation to the schoolteacher who
had disappeared from Iowa more than 50 years ago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Harry Sizer lives in Lisbon, a small town near Mount Vernon. The secretary gave me his number and I called
him from the Peoria office.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
After spending several hours making futile phone calls and
explaining the Mary Doefour story about a dozen times to no avail, I didn’t
want to go through the explanation again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
When he answered the telephone I just said I was told he
might know something about an Alice Sizer – a schoolteacher who’d been missing
from the area about 50 years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Her name was Anna Sizer,” the man said. “Anna Myrle Sizer. Alice was her sister.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“How do you know that?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The man hesitated.
He wasn’t anxious to talk. “Anna
was my sister,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Do you have any idea what happened to her?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Why do you want to know?” he asked.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I’m a reporter from Illinois. A lady died down here recently and nobody knows
who she was. I’m trying to find out,” I
said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“It’s not my sister,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“How do you know?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Nobody’s heard from my sister for more than 50 years. My parents died waiting to hear from
her. My brothers died,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Nobody heard from this lady either,” I explained. “Do you have any idea what happened to your
sister?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“She got off a train in Marion, Iowa,” he said. “Somebody saw her get off. That was the fall of 1926. And we haven’t heard a word of her since.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Did anybody look for her?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Of course,” the man said.
“We hired detectives. The state
had its detectives. We looked for
years. As far as California. But we never found anything. Nothing.
Ever.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“What grade did your sister teach?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“It’s been 50 years.
I can’t remember,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Could it have been first grade?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I can’t remember,” he said. “What was the name of the woman who died down
there?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I don’t know.
Nobody knows. That’s what I’m
trying to find out,” I said. “Was there
any chance at all your sister could have run away?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“None,” the man said.
“Our family was very close.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“No chance at all?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“None,” the man said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
By now, it appears there’s a chance this man is Mary
Doefour’s brother – a good chance, I think.
How many elementary schoolteachers simply disappeared about 50 years
ago?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Some things fit,” I said.
“The woman who died down here could be your sister.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Are you sure?” he said softly.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“No, I’m not. I’m
not sure at all. But there’s a chance
this is your sister.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“What happened to the woman who died down there?” he asked.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I can’t tell him over the telephone. It might be his sister. I can’t tell him she was raped, beaten,
thrown in an insane asylum, kept so doped up she couldn’t think straight and
eventually given a pauper’s funeral by the State of Illinois.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Do you have a picture of your sister?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Yes,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I’d like to have it,” I said. “If I can show it to a woman who knew the
woman who died down here, we’ll be able to tell if it was your sister.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“It’s been 50 years,” he said. “She wouldn’t look the same.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Yeah. But it’s all
I’ve got to go on. This could be your
sister.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I don’t know,” he said.
“It’s been 50 years. We all
thought she was murdered. Maybe it would
be best to forget about it.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I don’t want to bother you. But I need the picture. This could be your sister. Her remains haven’t been buried yet. Maybe we could get this thing straightened
out.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I’ll think about sending you the picture,” he said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“You don’t have to send it.
I’ll come to Iowa and get it,” I said.
By now, I’m all but sure I’m talking to Mary Doefour’s brother. Maybe I’m grasping a straw, but I feel
positive.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
After 11 months, I think I’ve discovered the identity of
Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I tell the newspaper’s managing editor that, and he OK’s a
trip to Iowa to prove it. I tell my
state editor that I’m almost sure I’ve found Mary Doefour’s identity. And he OK’s the trip to Iowa.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I’ve got the backing.
The paper’s willing to spend the time and money on it. And if I’m wrong I’ll look like a real jerk.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But I’m sure I’m right.
I’m sure I’ll come back from Iowa with a photograph of Mary Doefour and
the story of her life before it turned into a nightmare.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Tomorrow: What I found in Iowa</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part III)<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Tuesday, Feb. 27, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Mount Vernon, Iowa – Situated among the rolling hills of
Eastern Iowa, there’s a college called Cornell – a private institution
affiliated with the United Methodist Church.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It’s an attractive college of classic brick buildings
tucked on and between the hills of Mount Vernon. And in the early 1920’s, a pretty young woman
who strolled along the walks between the buildings stood to graduate at the top
of her class.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Her name was Anna Myrle Sizer – known to her family and
friends as just Myrle. While she was
among the top students at the school, she was from a poor, hard-working family
trying to make it through some tough times.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Going to private colleges cost money. But Cornell was the college Myrle chose and
she was willing to pay her way through.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
After three years at Cornell, with a short stint at the
University of Colorado, Myrle quit school to become an elementary
schoolteacher.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
She didn’t want to quit.
But she didn’t have the money to continue at Cornell. She planned to save enough money from her
teaching salary to soon return to the college and finish her education.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“If she had finished at Cornell, she probably would have
been Phi Beta Kappa,” her younger brother, Harold, said recently.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But something happened to Myrle. Before she saved enough money to quit
teaching and return to college, Myrle Sizer disappeared. That happened during the fall of 1926, as far
as her brother could remember.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The Library in which Myrle Sizer used to study contains
microfilm of Mount Vernon’s weekly newspaper, which was called The Mount Vernon
Hawkeye Record and Lisbon Herald in 1926.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And I was hoping if I sat in that library long enough, and
stared at enough feet of microfilm, I would eventually come across something
about Myrle Sizer in the paper.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
With no more specific data than “the fall of 1926,” I began
looking at issues beginning in August of that year.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Stories about the missing teacher from Iowa could help
prove or disprove my theory that a woman who died an anonymous death after 50
years in state institutions and the Iowa teacher were the same woman.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It’s Saturday, Jan. 27, 1979 – more than 52 years since
Myrle Sizer last appeared on the campus at Cornell.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
From the first of August, I read every article on the front
page of each edition, hoping an editor long ago would have had enough news
sense to put the story on page one.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Two hours after reading the first headline, I find it. Finally.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The story reports how Anna Myrle Sizer had been missing
since Nov. 5, a Friday. The last time
she was definitely seen was that afternoon.
A friend saw her getting off a train in Marion, a suburb of Cedar
Rapids.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
She was also believed to have been seen the following
Wednesday, wandering in a kind of a daze along U.S. 30 about 75 miles east of
Cedar Rapids. U.S. 30 is the main
highway between Cedar Rapids and Chicago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
State records indicated Mary Doefour was found wandering in
a kind of a daze somewhere south of Chicago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The news report in the local paper said Miss Sizer’s eyes
were blue, and hair was light brown.
When Mary Doefour was found, she had light brown hair that later turned
silver. Her eyes were blue.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The news account in the local paper is scattered. Information is broken and incomplete. The story doesn’t even contain her age, where
she taught or what she taught.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The story is made up of comments like, “The fact she is of
a very high character has made her disappearance a mystery.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
About five days after she disappeared, a motorcycle
policeman thought he saw her wandering along U.S. 30. The policeman said she appeared to be in a
kind of a daze, but didn’t think much about it until he heard about the missing
schoolteacher.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The policeman gave Miss Sizer’s parents the description of
the woman he’d seen walking, and the fact she’d been wearing a green, plaid
coat. Mr. and Mrs. W.R. Sizer said the
woman was probably their daughter.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Search parties were organized. Hundreds of volunteers looked for weeks.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
A woman who ran a boarding house in Cedar Rapids told
police that on Nov. 6, a man came to her house looking for a room, saying he
needed it for a young lady who was sick.
The woman who ran the boarding house said she didn’t have any room and
the man drove off with a lady in his car.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Two weeks later, there’s another front page story about
Myrle Sizer in the Mount Vernon Newspaper.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It tells how a formal organization has been formed to
spearhead the search for her. The
purpose of the group is to raise money to hire detectives and “carry on a
systematic hunt.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Pledge cards are printed and a campaign for solicitation
will be made.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The next report in the Mount Vernon paper is in
mid-January. It says rumors that Miss
Sizer is now home are false. “There is
nothing else to report except this wildly false story.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
While detectives traveled as far as California looking for
the missing teacher, no trace of her was found during more than 50 years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And the pretty young woman who stood to graduate Phi Beta
Kappa from Cornell College never returned to campus.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That apparently was the end of the Mount Vernon paper’s
interest in the case.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
So I drove 20 miles to Cedar Rapids where a much larger
paper, The Gazette, is published. But I
got there on Sunday, and the newspaper was closed, and the building was empty
except for a security guard.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I explained Mary Doefour’s story and my situation to the
guard. He was fascinated, and quickly
agreed to call a list of newsroom employees until one of them agreed to come
down and help me wade through microfilm.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The first person the guard called – the paper’s weekend
editor, Chuck Fishwild – agreed to sacrifice some of his Sunday off to come to
the newsroom and give me access to the paper’s library.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I agreed to give Fishwild what information I had on Mary
Doefour after my paper printed her story.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The Cedar Rapids paper had followed the story closely, the
microfilm showed. In November of 1926,
the story of Anna Myrle Sizer – a respectable schoolteacher – being missing was
front page news for several days in a row.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And it has some solid information. Anna Myrle Sizer was 28 years old when she
disappeared on Nov. 5, 1926. She was a
second and third grade teacher in Maquoketa, Iowa, 40 miles northeast of Mount
Vernon.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
She customarily traveled, via train, from Maquoketa to her
hometown of Mount Vernon every weekend.
She regularly withdrew $10 from her bank account each weekend for the
trip. And on Nov. 4, 1926, records
showed she withdrew $10<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
On Nov. 5, a friend of Miss Sizer saw the woman get off a
train at Marion, a northern suburb of Cedar Rapids. And as far as police knew, that’s the last
that she was ever definitely identified.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“She was not the kind of Girl to take a sudden notion to go
someplace,” her father quoted as saying in the paper. Possibilities of a love affair were quickly
discounted by police.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Miss Sizer had blue eyes and light brown hair. A massive search was organized on Nov. 7, two
days after the woman was reported missing.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
On Nov. 10, the Cedar Rapids paper carried a report that a
middle-aged man was frantically searching for a room to rent in Cedar
Rapids. The man said he needed the room
for “a woman who has just had a nervous breakdown.” Police thought the woman could have been Miss
Sizer.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
One of the women who turned down the man asking for a room
said she saw the woman who’d apparently had a nervous breakdown sitting in the
man’s car. She covered her face with her
hands, the woman said. The woman in the
car wore a black hat. Miss Sizer was
wearing a black hat when she disappeared.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Her mother is nearly prostrated with grief,” the newspaper
said on Nov. 10.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Police said Miss Sizer had an extended “illness of some
kind” at the beginning of the school year and missed some of the semester as a
teacher. In the same edition as the
reported illness, police theorized “she may have become ill and is unable to
give her name and address.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Then I got my first look at Anna Myrle Sizer.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
A sad-eyed and pretty young woman looked out from the
microfilm of the 10<sup>th</sup> page of the 53 year old edition of The Cedar
Rapids Gazette. Above her photograph was
the blunt headline: Still Missing.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
This photograph could be the key. If I could get a copy, take it back to
Illinois, and show it to those who knew Mary Doefour before she died, perhaps
the identities could be matched.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The photograph of Anna Myrle Sizer meant nothing to me,
because I’d never seen Mary Doefour. I’d
never heard of the old woman until I took her obituary almost a year ago. And the nursing home where she finally died
said there was no photograph of her.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
All I knew about Mary Doefour’s face was that a social
worker who knew the woman said – that Mary Doefour apparently had been
attractive when she was found. But 50 years
in mental institutions erased that attractiveness.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“We don’t have any machines that will copy that picture,”
the weekend editor of the Cedar Rapids Gazette said. “And we don’t have a copy of that photo in
our files. We didn’t keep very good
files around here until recently.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
As uncomfortable as it might be, I was going to have to
approach Anna Myrle Sizer’s brother and get a photograph of the woman.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
When I’d called him on the telephone a few days before
going to Iowa, Harold Sizer acted as if he wasn’t anxious to find out if the
woman who died in Illinois was his sister who had disappeared more than 50
years ago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Harold Sizer’s hesitation seemed understandable. He and his family had tried several years to
find out what happened to Anna Myrle.
His mother and father and three brothers had died wondering what
happened to her. All that was left was
Harold and an older sister.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The family had hired private detectives to aid state detectives
in the search. And nothing substantial
was ever uncovered. The family
eventually assumed she had been murdered and nothing ever would be found.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“We’ve almost forgotten all about it,” the brother said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But now, the brother was the only option left. I had to have a photograph.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Lisbon is a small town about 20 miles east of Cedar
Rapids. Harold Sizer recently retired as
president of the town’s bank. Anna Myrle
was nine years his senior.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And shortly after meeting Harold Sizer, I realize he has no
intention of giving me the photograph unless he’s made to believe there could
be a chance the woman who died in Illinois was in fact his sister.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
He asked several questions about the woman who died in the
nursing home. And, eliminating a lot of
details about the shock treatments, overmedication and the conditions of
institutions in which she was kept, I told him what I knew.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
He goes through his details. I go through my details. Mary Doefour’s birthdate was unknown. But she would have been about the same age as
Anna Myrle Sizer. Anna Myrle was a
schoolteacher. About all Mary Doefour
could remember was that she was a schoolteacher. Anna Myrle was last seen in a kind of daze
along a highway.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The highway Anna Myrle was seen walking beside was U.S.
Route 30 in Iowa. Mary Doefour was found
south of Chicago. Route 30 went to
Chicago. Anna Myrle had not been heard
of for more than 50 years. Mary Doefour
was in the custody of the state, an anonymous woman for more than 50 years.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I don’t know,” Harold Sizer said. “This woman in Illinois would have been about
90 when she died. People in my family
don’t live that long.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
After all the comparisons, that’s all he can come up with
as evidence Mary Doefour was not his sister.
And that didn’t seem like much at all.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I thought I’d given him enough information to merit his
giving me a photograph. But if he chose
not to give it to me, there wasn’t much else I could do. He could have just about put a stop to the
search right there.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I’ve got a heart condition,” he said. “This certainly isn’t doing that much good.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I’m sorry to have bothered you,” I said, and accepted the
fact he wasn’t going to give me the picture.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“My other sister and I have talked,” he said. “And we won’t accept that our sister may be
this woman. We simply won’t accept it.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Then he reached into his coat pocket, pulled out a clear
photograph of Anna Myrle and handed it to me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikrES5GElatZgbVW3dY4UVbQOXXXcy9zvXwb2wPL4G7BNjLODm4as82TuZ9wvzMuxLzLvVB2pHHW7FoNUc90Gba_dlhW5BoqxvXsTeuOwZ7-7uxy4zjfpEKddl1dYYQZ-DwLVHhZ7xLDk/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikrES5GElatZgbVW3dY4UVbQOXXXcy9zvXwb2wPL4G7BNjLODm4as82TuZ9wvzMuxLzLvVB2pHHW7FoNUc90Gba_dlhW5BoqxvXsTeuOwZ7-7uxy4zjfpEKddl1dYYQZ-DwLVHhZ7xLDk/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Page 1</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitxFne0bquY-RYB_9XrMumkZvxCuXqOCASaCx4Vav0efLRRYkOZMSwCL5wTPAtB-PEBtVUXtI38-R2EDtXweKq2H7afYZmm1JNAW2-uSA1KsEDSGSEod3c2q5A2XWBVwWa-wg5EyVEpsM/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitxFne0bquY-RYB_9XrMumkZvxCuXqOCASaCx4Vav0efLRRYkOZMSwCL5wTPAtB-PEBtVUXtI38-R2EDtXweKq2H7afYZmm1JNAW2-uSA1KsEDSGSEod3c2q5A2XWBVwWa-wg5EyVEpsM/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Page 2</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy0t1zKmREIyn32fqTYgsh51MICk7EcIZHMV_ZR-nnage7dO5Og8q7OBUecC_-r5X821CNoogJGkiz5q-t017nqPkcvSunEQk1MekOTbFk9sNFR-I58LphVBpVOraUAdJLtEN9-XPNgCk/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+3.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy0t1zKmREIyn32fqTYgsh51MICk7EcIZHMV_ZR-nnage7dO5Og8q7OBUecC_-r5X821CNoogJGkiz5q-t017nqPkcvSunEQk1MekOTbFk9sNFR-I58LphVBpVOraUAdJLtEN9-XPNgCk/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+3.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Page 3</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoOWsbQaWRG0GowRoZUbntoxVrde79_ZAZ0U6deUpO_6UUHjE6NL6sQxDsHk2d7oL7_bPhP2lr0R-3W8Tze1E_k9vdcbUCQIfEBQQxbxA5szIH2urM4D_vYMu-8ibEVItPGe5KkZEem6w/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+4.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoOWsbQaWRG0GowRoZUbntoxVrde79_ZAZ0U6deUpO_6UUHjE6NL6sQxDsHk2d7oL7_bPhP2lr0R-3W8Tze1E_k9vdcbUCQIfEBQQxbxA5szIH2urM4D_vYMu-8ibEVItPGe5KkZEem6w/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+III+page+4.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Page 4</td></tr>
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<b><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></b>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Tomorrow: I show the picture to people who knew Mary Doefour.</b></span><br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part IV)<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Wednesday, Feb 28, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Hilda Heren is a nurse’s
aide at Queenwood East Nursing Home in Morton.
And she knew and cared for Mary Doefour the last several years of the
woman’s life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I hand her the photograph of
Anna Myrle Sizer – the schoolteacher missing from Iowa for more than 50
years. And Mrs. Heren studies it
carefully.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Yes,” Mrs. Heren says after
looking at the photograph for about a full minute. “This is Mary Doefour.” I’d bet anything on it.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Mrs. Heren has been at the
nursing home since it opened and was at the home when Mary Doefour
arrived. She knew Mary Doefour longer
than anybody now at the home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Diana Alvis is the head of
nurses at the home. She knew Mary
Doefour for a few years. And Mrs. Alvis
studies the picture and points out similarities between Anna Myrle Sizer and
Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Among those similarities are
naturally wavy hair, a roundish face, slope shoulders, high cheekbones and a
wideish nose.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">On the photograph of Anna
Myrle Sizer, a vaccination scar is evident on the left bicep.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Did Mary Doefour have a
vaccination scare there?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Mrs. Alvis looks at the
photograph. “Yes. She had a scar like that in the same place.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">A secretary at the nursing
home says “We ought to compare that photograph to the one we have of Mary.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">What?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">When I tried to get a
photograph of Mary Doefour 11 months ago, the nursing home said there was no
photo. When I tried again a couple of
weeks ago, I was again told there was no photograph.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The secretary goes to her
desk and brings back a photograph of Mary Doefour. The hair is strikingly similar, even after 50
years. Other features look like they
could match.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">While age has taken a lot
from Mary Doefour and the roundness of her cheeks has disappeared because her
left teeth have been pulled, the two photographs look like they very well could
be the same woman.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Holding the photographs side
by side, it appeared there was a possibility one of the pictures could have
been printed backward by mistake.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">In the photograph of Anna
Myrle Sizer the left eye appears to be open wider than the right. And in the photograph of Mary Doefour, the
opposite is true.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">But apparently both photos
were printed properly. A corsage was on
Anna Myrle Sizer’s left side, as is proper.
The lapels of the men’s suits in the background of the Anna Myrle Sizer
photograph were buttoned properly. And
buttons of Mary Doefour’s dress were on the proper position.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Diana Stroud worked at
Queenwood East Home when Mary Doefour was there. Mrs. Stroud knew Mary well and said she became
convinced that Mary Doefour should have never been institutionalized.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Her only problem was
amnesia. I’m sure of that. A little counseling would have probably
brought her out of it. Instead, she was
treated as if she were insane.” Mrs.
Stroud said when I did the first story on Mary Doefour about a year ago.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Since the original story,
Mrs. Stroud has left Queenwood. She now
works at the Galena Park Nursing Home, Peoria.
I took the photographs to her.
She studied them for a while and said, “Congratulations. I’m satisfied these photographs are of the
same woman.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">What about the records kept
by the state, then? The birthdate would
have been wrong. The date she was found
would have to be wrong.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“They’re wrong, then,” Mrs.
Stroud said. “That doesn’t surprise me.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Holding up the photograph of
Anna Myrle Sizer, Mrs. Stroud said, “If I were you, I’d feel secure in saying
this is Mary Doefour. Everything looks
the same. Their backgrounds sound the
same. I’m satisfied it’s her . . . .
. for sure.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">By now, I’m almost certain
I’ve found Mary Doefour’s identity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I rush back to the newsroom
and tell the managing editor people who knew Mary Doefour have said she is the
same woman as Anna Myrle Sizer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">And now I’ve got a
photograph of Mary Doefour for comparison.
I’m elated. I think I’ve done
it. Maybe we can get this damned thing
straightened out before her remains are buried.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The managing editors looks
at the two photographs and shakes his head.
“That’s some story,” he says.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Yeah,” I said. I think it’s her. I really think it’s her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“I know,” the managing
editor said, and handed the photographs back.
“You’ve thought it was her for a couple of weeks.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Now all you have to do is
prove it.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">(I thought that’s what I
just did. I thought that’s what I’ve
been running all over the Midwest doing for the last two weeks.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“There are other
possibilities,” the managing editor said.
“I don’t want somebody coming back and asking why we didn’t check all
the angles.” So I drive to Chicago.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Professor Charles Warren is
an anthropologist and an expert in identifying skeletal remains. A professor at the University of Illinois’
Chicago Circle Campus, he’s currently busy trying to identify remains found
beneath the home of accused mass murderer John Gacy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">After getting Warren’s name
from another university anthropologist, and the anthropologist’s claim that
Warren was the best bet for matching the photographs taken more than 50 years
apart, I called Warren.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">And he agreed to study the
photographs of Anna Myrle Sizer and Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">He said he wasn’t optimistic
about his chances of definitely matching the photographs. He could prove or disprove the two
photographs were the same person only if he had an X-ray of Mary Doefour’s
skull.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Warren used a method of
identification that has been accepted as proof in court. He puts a skull X-ray over a photograph of a
person the skull is believed to have belonged to.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Skulls are kind of like
fingerprints – no two are alike. If the
skull fits exactly into the features on the photograph, identification is
definite.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">But I had no X-ray of Mary
Doefour’s skull that could be put over the photograph of Anna Myrle Sizer’s
photograph. And there was no chance of
getting one. Mary Doefour had been
cremated 11 months ago.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Still, Warren agree to look
at the photographs. “Even without seeing
them, I can tell you I don’t think I’ll be much help,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">It seemed worth a try.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">I hurriedly hand him the
photographs. He doesn’t look at them
right away. He puts the papers already
on his desk in neat little stacks. When
he does pick up the pictures, he holds them together, upside down and looks at
them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Eh, excuse me. But you’re looking at those pictures upside
down,” I tell Warren.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Warren turns to me, peers
over his glasses, and says “I know.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Features in faces are easier
to compare when they’re studied while upside down, he says. When one looks at a photograph rightside up,
one sees a person with a personality.
Upside down, one just sees a bunch of facial regions.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">After looking at the
photographs upside down for a while, Warren turns them rightside up and studies
them. He studies the photographs about
five minutes. Then he takes his glasses
off and says, “I can’t be sure. I’m an
expert in bones.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Using photographs of other
dead people and X-rays of pieces of skulls, he shows me how he could prove it
with an X-ray. But that seems
futile. We don’t have an X-ray and can’t
get one. Mary Doefour’s skull is ashes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Accustomed to testifying in
court as an expert witness, Warren is hesitant to make any statements he’s
unsure of. He doesn’t even want to make comparisons
of the photographs.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“How about the chins? The younger woman has a cleft chin. It looks like the older woman might have a
cleft chin,” I say.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">“Oh Yes,” Warren says
without even looking at the pictures again.
“Both women have prominent mental processes of the mandible. She’s wrinkling her chin in the later
photograph to hide the fact she’s missing her teeth.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">A prominent mental process
of the mandible means “cleft chin.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">All right. That’s one more piece of the puzzle.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Thus far, here’s what we
know: Both have naturally curly
hair. Both have blue eyes. Both have cleft chins. Both have high cheekbones. Both have similar wideish noses. Both have vaccination scars in approximately
the same places.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Both have similarly sloped
shoulders. Both were taller than
average. Both were elementary school
teachers. Both had not been heard of by their
families for more than 50 years. Both
were intelligent women.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Anna Myrle Sizer was
believed last seen wandering in a daze along a highway in Iowa in the fall of
1926. Mary Doefour was found wandering
in a daze along a highway in northern Illinois about the same time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Both would have been about
80 when Mary Doefour died last March.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Two women who knew her last
said both are the same woman.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Maybe I’ve got enough. Maybe I’ve got all I’m going to get. I go to the managing editor again and rehash
all the information.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">The managing editor nods his
head understandingly, then says “You’ve got to pin it down. I don’t want a story saying this might be
her.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWI4Rt47EPlyswAum0jya0rLD2xA0P9aLbW3_oxT8zwdhYuyoWMGvdevAAgQ9XxePOWSwnDXlpC4ftWdRbV11lAB84YRvoFvpquYOHopNLvpax8S3lCXv-AGdyHfkgwqD0lwF_li2N4aA/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+IV+page+2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWI4Rt47EPlyswAum0jya0rLD2xA0P9aLbW3_oxT8zwdhYuyoWMGvdevAAgQ9XxePOWSwnDXlpC4ftWdRbV11lAB84YRvoFvpquYOHopNLvpax8S3lCXv-AGdyHfkgwqD0lwF_li2N4aA/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+IV+page+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; mso-add-space: auto; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: center; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Tomorrow: I go to the Manteno State Hospital</span><span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part V)<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Thursday, March 1, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Manteno – “I can tell you this much,” the assistant
superintendent of Manteno State Hospital said.
“This woman didn’t lead much of a life after 1926.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Yeah. That’s
becoming obvious.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
About 30 miles south of Chicago, the mental hospital at
Manteno is a sprawling bunch of red brick geometry which makes up a virtual city
that appears all but abandoned.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
More than 50,000 people have been institutionalized here
during the last half century. Mary
Doefour spent 10 years here. When she
was here, this place had a population of about 9,000. It now has less than 900.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And nobody remembers Mary Doefour here. She was just one more face. One more Mary Doe. There have been 19 Mary Does at Manteno. They either couldn’t remember who they were
or decided not to let anyone know.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
So they were named Mary Doe. And following their names, a number was
attached so people at the institutions could tell which Mary Doe was which.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
That seems kind of stupid.
There are plenty of female names floating around. Why not give them all different first names,
rather than attach numbers to them. It
would give them each an identity and make record keeping easier.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“That’s a good questions.”
John Steinmetz, the assistant superintendent said. “The medical librarian named them. For a very long time, our medical librarian
was a woman named Mary. She apparently
liker her first name, and gave it to everyone who couldn’t remember their own.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Our Medical Librarian now is named Nadine. Pretty soon, we may have a bund of Nadine
Doe’s running around.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Since the institution opened there have been 12 Jane Does. 50 John Joes’, one Charlie Doe, one George
Doe, one Sarah Doe, and one Wendell Doe.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And it seems nobody can remember one Doe from another.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
There used to be a photograph of Mary Doefour in a file
here. And I thought if I could compare
the photograph of Anna Myrle Sizer to Mary Doefour as a young woman, I could
get some very solid evidence the two were the same woman.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The photograph of Mary Doefour has been burned. She left that institution in the early
1940’s. She transferred to
Bartonville. And files at Manteno are
kept for 10 years, then burned.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The only evidence of Mary Doefour ever being here is a
small index card with little information on it.
And some of that information is obviously wrong.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Mary Doefour was probably known as Mary Doe by a different
number while at Manteno. A secretary
said Manteno records indicate Mary Doefour was a black woman. The Mary Doefour who died in Morton was
white.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
A woman known as Mary Doefive at Manteno appears to have
some of the same information on her card as the woman who died in Morton had in
her files. Mary Doefive’s card indicates
she was born in 1907 and was from Missouri.
That information was also in Mary Doefour’s records when she died.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
It appears there were so many Mary Doe’s at the
institution, the information could have easily been stuck in the wrong
file. Mary Doefive was obviously not the
woman who died in Morton. She was
released in the custody of the state in 1941, records show.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Mary Lamply has been working at Manteno almost 40 years as
a nurse. I show her the picture of Anna
Myrle Sizer, and she doesn’t recognize it.
“That was a long time ago,” she said.
“Back then, there was one staff member for every 155 patients.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Two other employees who were at the institution when Mary
Doefour was there don’t recognize the photographs of either Anna Myrle Sizer of
Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Nothing’s working.
Nobody recognizes the women. The
records appear jumbled. The photograph
has been burned.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“If it’s any comfort to you,” Steinmetz says, “the records
that exist from back then have no credibility whatsoever.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Something’s been nagging me about this story lately. It’s the date state records have her as being
found – 1932. Yet she disappeared in
1926.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“She couldn’t have been here since 1926,” Steinmetz
says. “This place didn’t exist in
1926. It wasn’t here until 1932. She was probably transferred here from
someplace.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
He calls the records office to see if a woman who couldn’t
remember her name was transferred from a mental hospital in Kankakee. Yes.
One was transferred from a mental hospital at Kankakee. But that’s all the card shows. It doesn’t indicate how long she was at
Kankakee.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
If Kankakee records indicate she was found about that time
she was missing from Iowa, it could be another piece of evidence.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The Superintendent of the Kankakee institution isn’t
in. The secretary says he won’t be in
for the rest of the day.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I explain my situation to the secretary and hope she’ll
find the story interesting enough to look up the date the woman was admitted to
Kankakee.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I can’t do that,” she says. “It’s illegal to give out information like
that unless you have the person’s permission.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Yeah. But I can’t
get her permission. She’s been dead for
11 months,” I explain.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Then you’ll have to get a court order,” she says.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Listen, I’ll just give you this date here. It’s November 5, 1926. You take a little peak at that card and just
tell me if this lady was brought here about that time,” I say.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I can’t give out any information like that,” she says.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“But you’re not giving me any information,” I say. “I’m giving you information. All you’d be doing is verifying it.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“Why are you trying to find who this woman was? Did she leave a bunch of money or something?”
the secretary asks.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
This is maddening.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicaMSIpWlLBbw4AWgJfhnmJ0Xq5sutcVqwOGY7n3NO0oPM-T5SfweasTS4yJL28zhPerlMXWypWSTWlfWuKB4_6jqzHAJUBtRY-vbGQ5yiXBytv70awl1raXpKXJ_cTbBr0n5GXOYTDLo/s1600/Mary+Doefour+Part+V.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicaMSIpWlLBbw4AWgJfhnmJ0Xq5sutcVqwOGY7n3NO0oPM-T5SfweasTS4yJL28zhPerlMXWypWSTWlfWuKB4_6jqzHAJUBtRY-vbGQ5yiXBytv70awl1raXpKXJ_cTbBr0n5GXOYTDLo/s320/Mary+Doefour+Part+V.jpg" width="194" /></a></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Tomorrow back to Iowa</span><span style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="color: #cc0000; font-size: large;"><br /></span></b>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">The Search
for Mary Doefour (Part VI)<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">By Rick
Baker<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16pt;"><span style="color: #cc0000;">Peoria
Journal Star, Friday, March 2, 1979</span><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Lisbon, Iowa – It’s Feb 7.
This morning I drove to Iowa for the second time in 10 days thinking I
could well seal the identity of Mary Doefour and she could be properly buried –
that after 50 years of anonymity in state institutions, something would finally
be done.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I had information that I thought could convince the missing
schoolteacher’s brother that the woman who died in a Morton nursing home last
year was in fact his sister. If he was
convinced of that, we would sue the state of Illinois for further information.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Two weeks before, the brother had said he simply wouldn’t
accept Mary Doefour and Anna Myrle Sizer were the same woman. He said that acceptance would be too painful
and that he couldn’t believe his sister was in Illinois institutions for
decades without his family knowing.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But since I’d talked to him last I’d gathered a lot more
information – stuff that I thought may well make him accept his sister was Mary
Doefour.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
I’d carried a photograph of Anna Myrle Sizer, taken in the
mid 1920’s, to two women who knew Mary Doefour well before she died. And the two women said Anna Myrle Sizer
appeared to be Mary Doefour.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Everything seemed to fit.
Naturally wavy hair. Blue
eyes. Cleft chin. Same nose.
Full Face. Anna Myrle Sizer was
an elementary schoolteacher. About all
Mary Doefour could remember about her life was that she was an elementary
schoolteacher.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Anna Myrle Sizer was reportedly last seen wandering in a
kind of daze along U.S. Route 30 in eastern Iowa. Mary Doefour was found wandering in kind of a
daze near Chicago about the same time Anna Myrle disappeared. US. Route 30 goes to Chicago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Both had vaccination scars on the lower left bicep. Both were intelligent and articulate.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And if we could get records now being kept in the George A.
Zeller Mental Health Center in Peoria, perhaps we could get more information to
link the two. But mental health records
are private.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
One wanting to examine mental health records needs the
consent of the person the records are about.
And Mary Doefour was dead. But a
judge could allow a relative of the person’s to see the records.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
For the relative to see the records, he’d have to sue the
state government. And the newspaper was
prepared to help Anna Myrle Sizer’s brother do just that.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Richard Ney is a reporter for the Peoria Journal Star. Ney is also a licensed attorney. And he said he would gladly represent Harold
Sizer for no charge. Sizer wouldn’t even
have to appear in court.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
All Harold Sizer would have to do would be sign a form
appointing Ney as his attorney. Then Ney
would go to court and attempt to convince a judge to turn over the records to
Anna Myrle Sizer’s brother. Ney said he
thought chances of a judge agreeing to do that were good.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But this morning, Harold Sizer said the information I had
didn’t convince him Mary Doefour was Anna Myrle. He said he didn’t see any similarity between
a photograph of Anna Myrle and Mary Doefour.
And he said he didn’t want it pursued any further. He would not sign the retainer agreement.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
He’d accepted the fact that his young, pretty sister was
abducted and murdered more than 50 years ago.
He’d learned to live with that acceptance. “This is just rubbing salt in the wounds,” he
said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
“I don’t want anything more to do with it. I want the picture of my sister back,” he
said.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
Instead of helping a family, as was the intent of this
whole thing, I was instead irritating a family.
My information was obviously traumatic for Anna Myrle Sizer’s
brother. He’d said from the beginning he
didn’t want any part of the search – that he would rather let old wounds stay
closed.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
But I insisted on opening them. I had telephoned him several times. I appeared at his door unexpectedly. Each contact was obviously painful for him.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
And I wasn’t going to push it any more. Instead of bringing relief, I brought
pain. Instead of helping the situation,
I was apparently hurting it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
All the angles had been covered. Everything that could be done had been
done. Almost a year of on and off
searching had been, for all practical purposes, an exercise in futility.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
While I remained near certain Mary Doefour was in fact the
young schoolteacher who disappeared from Iowa more than 50 years ago, I couldn’t
prove it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
The search was over.
The case was closed. The managing
editor said he didn’t want a story that said “this might be her.” But that’s what he got.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top: 0in; text-align: left; text-indent: 13.5pt;">
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-24178593191701525832020-05-31T19:04:00.000-05:002023-06-15T14:06:52.566-05:00Mayflower Society Application Process<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have gone through the Mayflower Society Application process and our family has been officially accepted as members. Our roots traced our family back to Francis Cooke, Stephen Hopkins and Elizabeth Fisher Hopkins who came over on the Mayflower in 1620. <br />
<br />
What an exhausting yet rewarding process. What is exhausting is the detail that the society expects when proving a connection. This is critical in order to ensure you have the true relationship established. <br />
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Memberships are handled through the individual state societies. So you will need to choose a state and work with their society to go through the application process. However, some states do not have active websites. </li>
<li>One must provide all vital documents for the current 3 generations in your line (birth, marriage and death records). They require the courthouse documents, not church records. And if a vital record doesn't exist because a state didn't require them at that time, then they need something in writing from the government agency that the records did not exist at that time. Also important to note is that they require these records for both husband and wife, even the spouse not in the line to the Mayflower.</li>
<li>Connecting the generations beyond the current 3 requires birth, marriage and death records; however this is where it gets tricky. States didn't always require them earlier in the US, parents were rarely listed on these documents, and records were often destroyed in local courthouses. One must truly be crafty to figure out how to properly establish kinship.</li>
<li>Census Records earlier than 1880 do not establish the relationship to the head of the household. Thus, they rarely accept them as documentation. </li>
<li>All written Wills and Probate records used in your documentation must include a typed translation. This sounds easy but some of the older wills were written with such elaborate scripts that they are very hard to read.</li>
<li>All newspaper obituaries must include a typed translation. Again, this sounds easy but some copies of newspaper obituaries are extremely blurry. </li>
<li>All documents must include sources and any cover pages if using materials from books. </li>
</ul>
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<br />
The rewarding part came from the fact that all of my hard work over the years in tracing my lineage paid off in spades when I had about 95% of my application complete by the time I submitted my documents. But that is most often very rare. What was left to do was gather a few vital records since they would not accept church records as the main document to connect the dots. My family left just enough snippets of clues to let me know there was a connection, and then gave me a trail to satisfy that connection. It was just up to me to collect the necessary documents which included everything from Vital Records, Probates including Wills and Land Records, Newspaper Obituaries, Church Records, Census Records, Widows Pension Record, Cemetery Records, Cemetery Headstone Photos, and more.<br />
<br />
At the end of the day, I didn't realize how much this membership would mean to me until I received an official acceptance. It is an honorable distinction to know that my family had such strong and admirable ancestors that braved the cold seas to bring us life in this new land. Just looking at the picture of the Mayflower ship below, I am not sure my stomach could have handled that journey. I am forever grateful to my family roots.<br />
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-49563505932926201632019-08-02T15:36:00.001-05:002019-08-02T19:03:18.764-05:00DNA – A Moral Dilemma?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Untangling
family trees can be like untangling Christmas lights, and it’s very easy to
become impatient and want to scream and/or punch something.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is nothing new and we’ve all been there.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Back
in the day, people had no idea DNA could catch up to them and possibly “out”
their secrets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, that day has
definitely arrived. But even with the DNA results of today, the lies told on birth certificates,
marriage records, etc., ensure there will be days when you just want to throw
your hands in the air and wave the white flag.</div>
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A 1<sup>st</sup>
cousin shows up unexpectedly on your DNA matches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><u>But…….you don’t have any 1<sup>st</sup>
cousins!!!</u><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, naturally you reach
out via ancestry.com, but he does not answer you back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crickets, radio silence, nada, nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, you find a way to telephone him and he
hangs up on you, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">BUT </b>not before
asking you to text him what you want.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So you text him, and he reluctantly (imagine a turtle) texts you back
and tells you what he knows, intermittently and over the course of about 6
months, which unfortunately is almost nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A year goes by, he texts you again out of the blue and this time he says
he’s got paperwork to send you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Excitedly,
you tell him where to mail said paperwork.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, another year goes by, and you hear nothing, and he never sends you
any paperwork, so you dive in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I tried to explain to him how to make his DNA
results private so people like me wouldn’t find him, but he refused my
help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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There’s
a reason he’s left his DNA results public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He won’t or can’t admit he wants to know about his parents, but he
obviously wants to know.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Everything
about this 1<sup>st</sup> cousin’s father seems to be a lie – his birth record,
his own marriage record(s) and even his social security application. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps his mother simply lied to him her
whole life and he never really knew who his biological father was. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A tale as old as time……..<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If his mother lied about his birth, was it because
the secret was hurtful or harmful?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Should I butt out? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Genealogists
only butt in, not out! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Should I just let
things be?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, if our clients want to
know about their families, don’t they have the right to know?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is DNA really such a great thing?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you yourself really do not want to connect
with unknown relatives, why not privatize your results???<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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Currently,
I am still in the middle of a huge tangled mess of family lies, but at least
for today, I am not giving up…….<o:p></o:p></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-81333564055889201372018-04-07T12:44:00.001-05:002023-06-12T12:49:22.673-05:00How to Save Your Tree from Ancestry.com to Your Personal Computer. Don't Lose Any of Your Hard Work !<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;">We have been working with Ancestry.com trees for many years, and have tips for how to save all of your hard work so that you don't lose any records. Also, you want to take ownership of everything you find. This includes Media, such as Census Records, Vital Records, and Military Records through the Ancestry.com Collections.</span><br />
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If you build a tree on Ancestry.com, you can only research their collections if you pay for a membership. Also, if you cancel your membership at a later date, you will not be able to open up these saved Ancestry.com documents until you pay again. It will only show the Citation.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The good news is that any photo or document that you personally upload to an ancestor's profile page (in the gallery section) is yours to view any time. </span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">We recommend that you buy the software program Family Tree Maker (FTM) and sync your tree, with all the media attached, to your hard drive. Once you do that, it is yours forever.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU6jEDfHVw8lG52fvLTjxB2XiMxu5kc9u1KSgK1B_IIr6KutNrBNUe1FQTodJBEwdwgmwty39Xs3OVcSgBcxrjJ8OVzKCaFl5wTB6UWKekktXeD8-Ijh9B2r1JucHfmEkU55nl-DsMFem_qo6QsvyRkLYjTe_9HHyDayRGFleotDbUN5uTYUYIgCVI/s101/FTM%20Snip%202.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="101" data-original-width="94" height="101" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU6jEDfHVw8lG52fvLTjxB2XiMxu5kc9u1KSgK1B_IIr6KutNrBNUe1FQTodJBEwdwgmwty39Xs3OVcSgBcxrjJ8OVzKCaFl5wTB6UWKekktXeD8-Ijh9B2r1JucHfmEkU55nl-DsMFem_qo6QsvyRkLYjTe_9HHyDayRGFleotDbUN5uTYUYIgCVI/s1600/FTM%20Snip%202.jpg" width="94" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If you hire a genealogist to build out your family tree, and they own your tree on their Ancestry.com account, you should have them download the tree (with media) to their own FTM software. Once they do that, then you can give them your Ancestry.com Login and Password and have them Upload the Tree to YOUR Ancestry.com account. </span></li>
</ul>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLmlBmIF5Ja3HEAVUbuZ91Jadd0y-jKo-y7vIZUTQ4O97tdLjkW_9Jba_8x-QFDvXYD81IuwcSmiZ0FPPhzicYFCxvG-QAeAewVJ5JYLZSM8No6we7coblFVYa2larZH7mqaXwmKyrxns/s1600/Upload+to+Ancestry+Snip.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="112" data-original-width="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLmlBmIF5Ja3HEAVUbuZ91Jadd0y-jKo-y7vIZUTQ4O97tdLjkW_9Jba_8x-QFDvXYD81IuwcSmiZ0FPPhzicYFCxvG-QAeAewVJ5JYLZSM8No6we7coblFVYa2larZH7mqaXwmKyrxns/s1600/Upload+to+Ancestry+Snip.png" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The tree will now exist in your Account, with the media. You can then follow the step above to sync this tree to your personal FTM software on your hard drive.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">If you export a GEDCOM file of your tree, the media does NOT come with it. That is why syncing to the FTM software is key. </span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large;">The Media is one of the most important things for you to make sure you retain for future generations. </span></li>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-2160400152527228392018-03-25T10:40:00.000-05:002018-10-01T20:10:45.482-05:00A Chicago City Lamplighter in 1903<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "old english text mt"; font-size: x-large;">Charles Driscoll, the
Young Lamplighter</span></h1>
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<li><strong><span style="font-size: x-small;">The pay was lousy, and so were the hours.</span></strong></li>
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<li><strong><span style="font-size: x-small;">We had to go out twice a day, once to light the lamps in the evening and then to put them out in the early morning.</span></strong></li>
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<li><strong><span style="font-size: x-small;">I had as many as 120 lamps to light, and my pay was between $12 and $16 a month, which the boss gave to my mother.</span></strong></li>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>One time it was 18 below zero for a full week. "I was
bundled up as if I was going to the Klondike." </strong></span><strong style="font-size: small; text-align: -webkit-center;">Charles Driscoll (1960)</strong></td></tr>
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Charles Driscoll, who was born in Chicago in 1891 and
died in Florida in 1980, spent three or four of his teenage years as a
lamplighter, working with gas streetlights on the west side of Chicago. His
career was ended by his need for better paying work and also by the installation
of electric lights. He tells of his experiences as a lamplighter in a recorded
interview, which is available at the Chicago Historical Society library or at
the University of Illinois (Springfield) in its Oral History collection.. The
interview was conducted in 1973 by his nephew, Thomas Driscoll, of Peoria , IL.
The drawing is reproduced by courtesy of the St. Petersburg, FL, Times, which
published a story about Charles Driscoll in 1977, when he was living in
Gulfport, FL. The drawing was made by Times artist Jack Barrett. </div>
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<b><u><big><br /></big></u></b></div>
<div align="center">
<b><u><big>The Interview</big></u></b></div>
</div>
<i> When Charles Driscoll gave this interview in Florida in June, 1973,
he was 81 years old, but still active and vigorous. A widower without children,
he had moved to Florida in 1969 with his brother, Edward, and Edward’s wife,
Helen. Until then he had lived in Chicago, where he was born in 1891. Before he
retired he did office work for several different employers, including the
Continental Bank in the Loop and Harold Pitman Co., a producer of engraving
supplies, in Cicero. During his lamplighting years he lived at 3006 W. Fillmore
St., near the corner of Fillmore and Sacramento Blvd. The text of the interview
has been lightly edited to eliminate duplication and enhance
clarity.</i><br />
<br />
Q. When were you a lamplighter in Chicago?<br />
<b>A. From
1903 to 1907.</b><br />
Q. How old were you then?<br />
<b>A. I was between 12 and
15.</b><br />
Q. How big an area did you have?<br />
<b>A. I had about half mile east
and west and a quarter mile north and south.</b><br />
Q. On what streets?<br />
<b>A.
Madison, Monroe, Wilcox and Adams - north and south. And from Rockwell street to
Sacramento avenue. On the west side of Chicago.</b><br />
Q. How did you get a job
like that?<br />
<b>A. The man I worked for was a friend of the alderman. And the
alderman let out these contracts to fellows, and they would hire kids to light
the lamps.</b><br />
Q. Would you have asked him for a job?<br />
<b>A. No, he would
come around the neighborhood to find kids maybe that had paper routes or
something, who were out early in the morning, who were maybe working milk trucks
or something like that, figuring that they wouldn't mind getting up early in the
morning to put the lights out.</b><br />
Q.You didn't have to be a good Democrat or
Republican?<br />
<b>A. Oh, no. Politics had nothing to do with it</b>.<br />
Q. Did
any of your brothers have a lamplighting job?<br />
<b>A. Yes, Pat, Frank and John.
They were my older brothers. Frank lit about five years, that was the longest,
and I lit about four and a half.</b><br />
Q. Is that the way you talk of it - I
lit for so many years?<br />
<b>A. Well, I'm talking about lighting and putting
them out or extinguishing them. Lighting them and putting them out. That was the
terms used.</b><br />
Q. Did you take over the job from Frank?<br />
<b>A. Yes. Or if
the boss had more lights and a bigger route, and some kids weren't reliable
enough, he'd ask us if we'd take over that kid's route. And he'd let that kid
go. He'd fire him. If we were good workers he'd always want to add on 30 to 40
more lamps, which meant a little more money.</b><br />
Q. How much was your
pay?<br />
<b>A. The highest was $16 a month, and the lowest was about
$12.</b><br />
Q. How many lamps would there have been on your route?<br />
<b>A.
Well, the most lamps I lit was maybe 120, and the least number about
80.</b><br />
Q. So it varied?<br />
<b>A. Yes. An 80 lamp route paid $12 a month, and
130 or 140 lamps $16. I never heard of anybody making more than that. That took
care of lighting them and putting them out.</b><br />
Q, How did that compare with
other jobs, like a paper route? Did it pay better or about the same?<br />
<b>A.
About the same, I would say.</b><br />
Q. It wasn't an especially high-paying job
then?<br />
<b>A. No, no. It was a very poor paying job. You had to pay for your
own wicks that you burned in your torch, and you had to buy your own kerosene to
put into your torch.</b><br />
Q. Where did you get that stuff?<br />
<b>A. First, we
started out by using that material that's used in mops, used to mop up floors
and so on. Then we found out that that stuff wore out too fast. Then I used to
buy the wicking at the Fair Store downtown in Chicago. We'd get wicks seven or
eight inches long and get a little piece of piping from a hardware store and put
that into your thing and screw into your torch. And that would make the light
last a long time. Sometimes you wouldn't have to put a new wick in for six
months. Just pull up the wicking every once in a while. You didn't have to have
it up too much or it would burn the wicking out too quick.</b><br />
Q. When you
lit lamps was your torch burning all the time?<br />
<b>A. Yes. You had your torch
burning all the time.</b><br />
Q. And then how did you turn the gas jet on in the
lamp?<br />
<b>A. There was a cross T up inside of the head in the lamp posts. Some
of them were square and others had a round, more up-to-date, shade on them. But
most of them were square. But they had a key in there. And you'd come along with
your torch and you turned your key up there. And it'd go poof as soon as your
light came in contact with the gas.</b><br />
Q. In other words you'd turn it on
and light it all in the same motion because your torch would be lit?<br />
<b>A.
Yes, just like you were turning a key on your gas stove. And you'd get your
torch up there and shove it up that way. And as soon as you did that the gas
would come up the pipe and poof and light. And put it out in the morning you'd
get your stick in there. You didn't have your lighted torch then. You had a
stick. You'd come along in the morning and get ahold of this end of the key and
push it up this way, and that'd shut the lamp off.</b>Q. And then when did
you have to light them, what time of day?<br />
<b>A. You had a timetable. And in
the wintertime you had to be out at about a quarter to four, about 3:45 because
you know it gets dark early in the winter. You had to be out on your route about
3:45 at the earliest. And you'd be through about 4:15 or 4:30, something like
that. You weren't supposed to go out and light the lamps when the sun was
shining. The sun was supposed to be down, almost all the way down.</b><br />
Q.
Otherwise you'd be wasting gas, right?<br />
<b>A. Yes. That's why you had the
timetable. In the summertime the days were longer. Of course daylight saving
wasn't known then. And in the summertime you'd go out as late as a quarter to
seven at night, 6:45. That would be three hours later than the winter. That
would be your earliest to go out. A quarter to seven, and get them out anywhere
from 7:15 to 7:30 in the wintertime. And in the summertime you'd be out earlier
in the morning to put them out. You went out at 3:30 in the morning. You leave
the house about 3:30 in the morning in the summertime. In the wintertime you
left about 5:30.</b><br />
Q. How long would it take you to do the whole
route?<br />
<b>A. From the time you leave the house and be back to your route,
sometimes your route was anywhere from a half a mile to a mile away from your
house. And by the time you got back you were gone from an hour and a half to two
hours.</b><br />
Q. Was the gas flame all that there was to provide the
illumination?<br />
<b>A. Well at first, but they improved the lamps by putting the
Welsbach mantles in them. But they were very delicate. You had to be very
careful to put your stick up because if you were very rough at all you would
break the mantle.</b><br />
Q. Did the mantle give more light, was that the
idea?<br />
<b>A. It was a much whiter light. Before that, when you had only the
flame, it was a fiery color. Before the Welsbach came, you had different tips
that went on the gas pipe. First they had a bone tip that went in, and then they
came in with an aluminum tip. Then came the Welsbach mantles. And then, after
that they put in the electric lights. That knocked the gas guys out of a job.
Madison street was the first one to knock me out.</b><br />
Q. What year was
that?<br />
<b>A. Oh, that was 1903 of 1904, something like that. I was born in
1891 so nine more years would make it 1900, and I was lighting lamps when I was
12 years old or 11. So it was somewhere around 1903 or so, 1904, 1905,
1906</b>.<br />
Q. Were there a couple of lamps in every block, or just on every
corner, or what?<br />
<b>A. On the corner and in the middle of the block. Say this
is a street here. Here's a corner. There's a lamp here, and here's an alley
going through here. At this alley here's another lamp. And then down here is
another street and there's a lamp here. So there would be three -- corner here
on this street, corner this street, and at the alley over here.</b><b> And
then, in addition to lighting and putting the lamps out, I had to make a report
of any broken glass in lamps. And in the wintertime they'd freeze. Frost would
get down in those gas pipes and freeze them.</b><br />
Q. What would you do
then?<br />
<b>A. Pour alcohol down there.</b><br />
Q. Did you do that?<br />
<b>A. No,
the boss did. But he wanted me to carry the ladder around. Or if I didn't carry
the ladder, to carry three- to a five-gallon can of alcohol with a little cup on
it. And he'd put the ladder up the thing and I'd pour out the alcohol and he'd
unscrew the cap of the lamp and pour the alcohol down it.</b><br />
Q. What would
that do?<br />
<b>A. Yes. If there was any ice down in that stem, why it will thaw
it out. Sometimes the lamp didn't thaw out the first day. Sometimes it'd take
two days before that alcohol took effect. And you'd be surprised. You'd go along
there the next night, sticking your torch up. No light. And then all of a sudden
you'd go along some night and touch it and whoof! One time the whole thing blew
up. It was an eruption. There was a leak somewhere. The whole top blew
off.</b><br />
Q.The glass and everything broke?<br />
<b>A. Blew the whole top of the
lamp off. Once there was some tomboy girl who wanted to around the route with me
-- Liz Kelly. And the first lamp was like in the middle of the block, like in
an alley. I gave her the torch. I said, "All right, there's the lamp." She said
she knew how to light lamps. It was one of those lamps; she stuck the torch and
the explosion blew up the lamp. She dropped the torch and ran home. That was the
last I saw of her.</b><br />
Q. Would you ever miss a day of lamplighting? I mean,
you'd have to light every day of the week, right?<br />
<b>A. Yes, every
day.</b><br />
Q. What happened if you were sick?<br />
<b>A. You had to get your
brother, if you had a brother who knew something about it, or report it to the
boss. He'd have to go out and hire somebody. Every kid didn't know how to light
lamps. But the boss was supposed to know something about it. Some of them didn't
know a damn thing.</b><br />
Q. They were just political appointees?<br />
<b>A. Sure.
It would be nothing for those guys to get two or three hundred dollars from the
city hall, from the alderman, and they'd pay us kids anywhere from 12 to 16
dollars a month, and the rest was shoved in their pocket. The city supplied them
with glass, but they'd have to install it in the broken lamps. And they supplied
them with the alcohol to thaw the lamps out. That's about the extent. They were
supposed to go around and clean the windows.</b><br />
Q. What else do you remember
happening?<br />
<b>A. Drunks would be out in the morning, especially on Saturday
night or Sunday morning. They'd be walking home with their girls, and you would
be putting the light out, and they'd say, "Don't put that light out." Otherwise,
they'd say, they couldn't find their way home. "If you put that light out we'll
get you." I put it out anyhow. Some of them were too drunk to chase
you.</b><br />
Q. What about bullies? Any other kids picking on you?<br />
<b>A. No,
no. Nothing like that. Nobody was out that early in the morning.</b><br />
Q. But
what about in the afternoon when you were lighting?<br />
<b>A. No, nobody. Lots of
the kids would like for you to let them take a torch and light a lamp. That'd
satisfy them. That was great to have the honor of sticking a torch up there to
light a lamp. But the people all along the route would speak to you. Many a time
a person would ask me to come up on their porch and have a big glass of lemonade
or some homemade root beer or something like that.</b><br />
Q. Were there
streetcars running in those days?<br />
<b>A. Yes, there were. In the early morning
hours they had horses pulling the streetcars. Horses. Until five o'clock in the
morning. And then the cable cars came on. </b><br />
Q. Did you ride any of
them?<br />
<b>A. Sometimes in the wintertime. I'd get in there. They had hay. The
motorman would be driving those teams of horses, and they had hay on the floor.
I'd go get on the back end and sit down and ride a half a mile on the thing,
riding home.</b> <b>That was on Madison street. That's the only street that had
cable cars or the horse cars.</b><br />
Q. What else do you remember?<br />
<b>A. Oh,
there were lots of stories connected with the lamplighters. I was putting out
one of my last lamps one time when a picture frame factory on Polk Street and
Washington Avenue caught fire. The whole roof exploded. Boy! A saloon keeper on
the corner came out in his pajamas. "What was that?" he said. I said, "The
picture frame factory; the whole roof exploded." It was a half hour before the
first fire department came. I stayed around there for a while. I had to get back
and get some sleep. I had to go to school.</b><br />
Q. Oh, so you went home and
went back to bed?<br />
<b>A. Yes. It was kind of hard getting up early in the
morning at three o'clock, three thirty.</b><br />
Q. Did you have your own alarm
clock?<br />
<b>A. No, my mother was the alarm clock. She had the clock. Otherwise
we'd never get up. She used to say that she was the alarm clock. I remember my
father saying he wouldn't get up for any amount of money. She said, "Well,
that's the difference between you and me." She said, "You'll never have the debt
paid off on the house if I don't have the boys out lighting lamps."</b><br />
Q. So
she got the money you were paid?<br />
<b>A. Yes, the fellow we worked for, he
wouldn't give it to us. He'd come to the house and give the money to my
mother.</b><br />
Q. It was a hard job, wasn't it?<br />
<b>A. Well, especially the
hours, the business of getting up at 3:30 or so. You don't have to get up that
early with a paper route. And of course you have to do it every day of the week.
And go out twice a day. It didn't make any difference whether the temperature
was 99 or 100; you had to get out and light the lamps that night. And I had one
week when it was 18 below zero for a full week.</b><br />
Q. And did you walk your
route even then?<br />
<b>A. Sure. I would be bundled up as if I was going to the
Klondike. I'd have paper lined around my stockings, and then I had Russian boots
on and underwear. Maybe two sets of underwear. Heavy corduroy pants, two pairs
of mitts, a stocking cap, scarfs, mufflers. My mother fixed up a fascinator
under my mouth. It just fit under your nose. And then the steam from your mouth
would come out there and come up in your eyes and form icicles on your
eyelashes.</b><br />
Q. What caused you to give up lamplighting?<br />
<b>A. They put
in electricity. It ran us out of business. It started on Madison street and then
came to Monroe. And then one by one about every six months. First they put the
poles in, see, and then they wouldn't be connected for three or four months.
Madison was a very principal street, so naturally it was first. Then they got
the other main streets like Kedzie, Halsted and so on. They were all
electrified. And that was the end of lamplighting.</b><br />
<br />
<br /></div>
Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-14055823947377476762017-11-24T09:33:00.012-06:002023-06-17T08:55:55.344-05:00Where was my Irish GG Grandmother born ?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_Wxpy8g4eKJVOGAbbU5N_PZYWh31qRap6dbOEn1O7sJ8mMDQDgf_WSXpB9-uO9Nt-WsNgBm5pYmpoUav1udew5-mwugrHn-F7yzA41Cb7EAHhi5Ub-WgeukcYdDbkTicVeZuEADwbyQdS-Q2BJmsZODDzx-yWEIXYSecWjXj3dnzDbfhbnEmDnrgS/s231/4%20leaf%20clover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="218" data-original-width="231" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_Wxpy8g4eKJVOGAbbU5N_PZYWh31qRap6dbOEn1O7sJ8mMDQDgf_WSXpB9-uO9Nt-WsNgBm5pYmpoUav1udew5-mwugrHn-F7yzA41Cb7EAHhi5Ub-WgeukcYdDbkTicVeZuEADwbyQdS-Q2BJmsZODDzx-yWEIXYSecWjXj3dnzDbfhbnEmDnrgS/w149-h141/4%20leaf%20clover.jpg" width="149" /></a></div><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Ellen Heffernan is my great great grandmother. That much I know for sure. But beyond that, I cannot figure out a single
thing about her life in Ireland, including her parents, siblings, and where in Ireland she
was born. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">It has been a frustrating bunch of years trying to write her
life story. I tire of using the phrase
Brick Wall. Quite frankly, she is not a
brick, nor a wall. She is my Direct Ancestor,
whom I share her name. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">So thus, I am sharing my research to date, and asking for
suggestions and ideas for what I have missed and where I go next. I am thinking that I am too close to her
story and am missing a clue.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
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</div>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Her death certificate says she was born May, 1829 in
Ireland. No parents were listed. Figures.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Her obituary says she came to the US at the age of 14 with
her parents, but they failed to name her parents (grrrrr). This puts her immigration around 1843. An Immigration Record has not been found
because it was a few years before the great migration, and records are
sparse. Also, there are many Ellen
Heffernan’s coming to the US in the 1840’s.
Who knew……..</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Now I know her parents came to America with her. But where they are is a mystery as well.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Ellen married John O’Connor sometime around 1851 and they
lived in Seymour, Connecticut. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">I cannot for the life of me find Ellen in the 1850 census. I found John in Chicopee, Massachusetts as a
single man with his sister and 4 brothers, but Ellen does not appear to be
living in that area.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">No marriage record has been found. I went thru the Chicopee town records by
hand, and the Catholic Church records in Connecticut, but nothing.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Her first born baby was a girl named Bridget born in Seymour
Connecticut and baptized at St. Mary’s Derby, CT. Ellen and John clearly followed the traditional
naming patterns of the Irish, so I am 100% confident that this is her mother’s
name. However, her father’s name is
unclear. Their first born son was David,
and that is John’s father. Second born
son was named John, which usually the 3<sup>rd</sup> born son is named after
the baby’s father, and 2<sup>nd</sup> born after the Mother’s father. So was baby John named after the father, or
Ellen’s father, or both? Or was there a
baby that died at birth? Based on the
fact that she had a baby almost every year, there is a window where another son
could have been born.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">There was another Heffernan living in Seymour, Connecticut. His name was Patrick Heffernan and I did find
his marriage record in 1855 at the approximate age of 37. Ellen is not a witness to the marriage. She does not appear to be a sponsor to any of
Patrick’s children. However, there is a
Patrick Halloren as a witness to baby John.
Was this a misspelling for Heffernan?
Patrick’s marriage record at the Derby Courthouse says he was born in
Limerick. I doubt this was his first
marriage but I cannot connect the dots to another one.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">There is an Ann Heffernan living as a servant in Seymour,
Connecticut in the 1850 census. At
first, I thought this was Ellen, thinking the census taker misunderstood her
when she spoke her name. That is until I
found the marriage of Ann Heffernan and James Plunkett in 1851. Is Ann a sister? Ann goes missing along with her husband and
son after the 1860 census.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Ellen spent up to 40 years in the Connecticut Valley
Hospital from 1873 to her death in 1916.
Now you see why I am obsessed with figuring out her life?? Diagnosis
was melancholy from having too many babies (at least 12 that I know of). The hospital exists today and they sent me
her medical records from 1873 – 1886, but no clues help define her past other
than her condition was hereditary. Gee
thanks, that’s helpful.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Baby Bridget’s sponsors were Michael Heffernan and Mary
Gannon. I am confident these are
siblings. Mary Gannon has been elusive
to find. As for Michael, would you
believe there were 2 Michael Heffernan’s that died in Derby CT. One in 1899 and the other in 1900. The first died as a pauper in a poor house,
having lost his wife, child and house, and father was listed as Michael
Heffernan on the D/C. The 2<sup>nd</sup>
died as a widow, before the 1900 census was taken, but father was listed as
James Heffernan, and James is buried in the same cemetery as his son. I tend to think her brother was the first one
that died as a pauper. His obit says he
had a sister Bridget Heffernan who lived in New Haven. Ellen wasn’t listed, but then Ellen had been
in the hospital for over 20 years at this point. Were they embarrassed to name her, or had
they forgotten about her? God I hate
this journey at this point.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">James Heffernan, father of Michael Heffernan, has the parish
of Glenroe County Limerick on his headstone. But guess
what? Church records for Glenroe don’t
start until 1850. I even visited the
church on my trip to Ireland in 2012, but there wasn’t a single Heffernan
Headstone at the Glenroe cemetery. I
still wonder about Glenroe, because it is all of 15 miles from where John O’Connor
was born.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Ellen’s last baby was born in 1874, the year after she was
admitted to the hospital for the first time and then sent home 2 months
later. Margaret O’Connor was raised by
her sisters (including my great grandmother) since her mother was in the
hospital for her entire childhood. I
have a picture of Margaret and now have a very clear understanding of where my
blue gray eyes with the dark rim around the iris came from. I have the eyes of either a Heffernan or O’Connor.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The Heffernan name is misspelled in so many ways – Hefron,
Hefen, Hefferen, etc. Online searching
is a nightmare</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">No Land Records or a Will were found at the courthouse.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Ellen is buried at the Catholic Cemetery in Seymour, but no
headstone or location of burial plot was found.
No burial card, nothing. The
cemetery caretaker told me that the Irish were discriminated against at that
time, and even the priest wasn’t interested in keeping proper records. Sigh.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">I have a subscription to Find My Past. They have a large database of Irish birth records
in Limerick. In looking for any Ellen
Heffernan’s born to a mother named Bridget around May, 1829, there are a couple
of options. But none of the father’s listed
were either John, Michael or James. Another
lovely needle in a haystack.</span></li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">In conclusion, I still think my biggest clues
are as follows:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">She was born in the month of May</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Her mother was named Bridget</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Possible siblings include Bridget,
Ann, Mary, Patrick and Michael</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Patrick Heffernan says he was from County Limerick</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">My plan is to go back thru the Connecticut Catholic
Church records one more time next year, and look at every entry from 1850 thru
1880 in 3 local churches. I will look at
misspelled names, sponsors of every baby born, and witnesses at every marriage to
see if Ellen’s name is listed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Beyond that, I am out of ideas. But I cannot quit and will never stop
thinking about her. So offer up any
ideas and suggestions on where you think I have missed a clue. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">I have prizes, awards, and a lifetime of
accolades for the person the can help me figure this out.</span></span></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-44671670165538259592017-11-01T08:30:00.001-05:002023-06-12T13:01:42.604-05:00Thank God I was born in the 20th Century<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhda97eCWx4lkPYNf0RO8L1oWOBHdX_FHrcbrCt2hUn4OrddkNx4d0-2RvKfiq3EK1uUnxCUISpgh_Gyz6BjzycYwX7P4aGDU4Kq05MonPdoYqOsyILzVa32wFfmJ11ZPphThPL7FWC4VeGq1KTWajuTlaZFAqGys5KefcDt3Miv0J584jawi3MKmkW/s293/Early%20Hair%20Dryer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="193" data-original-width="293" height="148" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhda97eCWx4lkPYNf0RO8L1oWOBHdX_FHrcbrCt2hUn4OrddkNx4d0-2RvKfiq3EK1uUnxCUISpgh_Gyz6BjzycYwX7P4aGDU4Kq05MonPdoYqOsyILzVa32wFfmJ11ZPphThPL7FWC4VeGq1KTWajuTlaZFAqGys5KefcDt3Miv0J584jawi3MKmkW/w225-h148/Early%20Hair%20Dryer.jpg" width="225" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";">I thank god every day for the fact that I was NOT born in the 1800’s (or before).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If there is one thing I can gain from my addiction to genealogy, it’s an appreciation for what I have in this lifetime.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";">My Top 10 Reasons for Why I am Grateful for being born in the 20<sup>th</sup> Century:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">1.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Hair Dryers</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – oh boy would I be ugly without my hair dryer<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">2.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Air Conditioning</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – oh boy would I be crabby without air conditioning<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">3.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Indoor Plumbing</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – no explanation needed<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">4.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Planes, Trains and Automobiles</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – my other addiction is traveling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I really don’t care where I go as long as I have a vacation in the works.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To think people never left their hometown is very sad to me.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">5.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Drive Thru Fast Food</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – I love it that I never have to get out of my car to buy lunch.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">6.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Pants</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – The outfits that women wore in the 1800’s were ridiculous.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those poor women in humid Louisiana!<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">7.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Birth Control</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – sorry, but I’m not interested in having 16 children over a span of 20 years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Throw in outhouses for when you feel ill, and I would have run away<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">8.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The Internet</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – it’s made searching for my ancestors a breeze<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">9.<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span><u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Modern Medicine</span></u><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – How did they handle allergies to ragweed?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sneeze all day for a month?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo3; tab-stops: list .5in;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";"><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> <u>Equal Rights</u></span><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> – again, no explanation needed</span></span></li>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-65746952440190232392016-07-16T08:59:00.000-05:002016-07-17T11:54:40.654-05:00Adoptees: Using DNA and Social Media to Find Your Birth Parents<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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About 18 months ago, I was contacted by an adoptee who had
been trying to find her birth parents since 1984. To start your search at the age of 30 and
keep up the hunt for another 30 years must be the ultimate feeling of resignation and wonder. Yet thanks to the emerging science of using
DNA by adoptees, and a creative use of Social Media, I am thrilled to say that she now knows who her birth mother
is and has 5 new siblings. The icing on
the cake is that she also knows her lineage brings her to the Sokolov region of
the Czech Republic. <o:p></o:p></div>
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How did we do it?<o:p></o:p></div>
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We were presented with the only documents that she had
gathered over the years – the original birth certificate from Chicago, adoption
papers and a letter from Catholic Charities.
The OBC had a mother’s name, but the father’s name was filled in with
the words “legally omitted”. The other
small clues given to us by Catholic Charities were that the mother was 23 years
old, from a small town in Wisconsin and of Czech descent; while the birth
father was of Irish descent. That was
all I had to work with.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Thus, I began by setting up a tree and searching for quite
some time to find any females born in Wisconsin with the given name from the
OBC. After finding a few candidates with
this name, sadly I was able to locate all of them and cross them off the
list. It became apparent that some facts
within the OBC were falsified, if not all of them (which is very common). The address on the Birth Certificate didn’t
help us either because it led us back to a former location for Catholic
Charities. These dead ends meant that
DNA was more important than ever.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So we patiently waited to get her DNA results back from
Ancestry.com, which confirmed that 44% of her DNA was Eastern Europe, 20% Ireland and 15%
Western Europe. However, the closest
match was a 3<sup>rd</sup> – 4<sup>th</sup> cousin. 3<sup>rd</sup> cousin
matches means you probably share the same 2x Great Grandparent, and 4<sup>th</sup>
cousins mean you probably share the same 3x Great Grandparent. Because that takes us back over 150 years,
you then must forward reconstruct the tree on all branches to find a candidate
for a parent. With limited clues, and
the daunting # of branches, this makes it difficult to pinpoint a family of
interest. <o:p></o:p></div>
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After waiting an entire year, we finally got a 2<sup>nd</sup>
cousin match. Now it gets
interesting because as I set up the tree for this match, it became clear this
person was 100% Czech from the Chicago area.
I was on a roll, setting up all branches and building it back with
helpful records from the Cook County Illinois area – Naturalizations, online
vital indexes, Chicago Tribune Obits, and more.
But as I got back to the 1930 era (when the birth mother was born), I
found one Great Uncle to our match that was living in a very small town in
Wisconsin (population was less than 1000).
And this Great Uncle had a daughter born in 1928, who was of high
interest. All fitting to our Catholic
Charity clues. If this is our mother, we
know this DNA match is a perfect 2<sup>nd</sup> cousin match to the adoptee.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Since this family was the only one found living in a small
town in Wisconsin, I urged our adoptee to reach out to the children of this
woman of interest. I found the birth
mother’s obituary that named her children and spouses. Thus, I was able to locate a daughter thru
Facebook. It is thru this initial
contact that she began to communicate with the family. Eventually, they offered to take a DNA test so we could determine a relationship. When
the results arrived, Ancestry predicted a “Close – 1<sup>st</sup> Cousin”
Match. To confirm these findings, I
downloaded the Raw DNA for both the adoptee and the potential sister, and then
uploaded it to GEDMATCH where we performed a 1 to 1 comparison. The results showed that they shared 29% of
their DNA. This is a perfect range for
sisters that share one parent. <o:p></o:p></div>
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It is only because of the generosity of this potential
sister that we were able to confirm the birth mother. Now this part of the journey is over for the
adoptee and a new journey begins to get to know her new-found family. </div>
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And oh yes, we still need to find the birth
father. The search never truly ends……………<o:p></o:p></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-44066823517433749772014-07-03T20:04:00.002-05:002023-06-12T10:12:33.982-05:00ANNE FRANK MAKES CERTAIN THE HOLOCAUST WILL NEVER BE FORGOTTEN<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">This newspaper article
was written by our father, Thomas F. Driscoll, about a year before his
retirement after 46 years working as a journalist for the Peoria Journal
Star. He was obsessed with Anne Frank
and her story. All of his life, he
wanted to visit her home in Amsterdam, more than he wanted to visit Ireland,
the land of his ancestors. He got his
wish, wrote this story, and today is probably bugging her from above for a live
sit-down interview. <o:p></o:p></span><span style="line-height: 115%;">We have transcribed the newspaper article
exactly as it appeared in the paper on Sunday, June 3, 1990.</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikwhvDEZ54cQXLRs9BOCCmPsahxVMstrWqvlrqlfUVKKSHAa04f7fMZcmI5cQsMTR8FPni8LhRpjaDeKaKlZuF7B7tQjSqmRvfE5iuhSq60UOU6Zu-_IjsFmCxSvJzaVJxsaeKvvQHpT8/s1600/anne+frank+article+photo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikwhvDEZ54cQXLRs9BOCCmPsahxVMstrWqvlrqlfUVKKSHAa04f7fMZcmI5cQsMTR8FPni8LhRpjaDeKaKlZuF7B7tQjSqmRvfE5iuhSq60UOU6Zu-_IjsFmCxSvJzaVJxsaeKvvQHpT8/s1600/anne+frank+article+photo.jpg" height="243" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: x-large; line-height: 115%;">Reminder</span></b> <span style="font-size: large;"> <b>At 263
Prinsengracht, Anne Frank makes certain the Holocaust will never be forgotten<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 9.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Written by
Thomas F. Driscoll<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 9.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">Peoria
Journal Star, June 3, 1990<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">AMSTERDAM – It’s painful standing on the sidewalk outside of Anne Frank’s
home, knowing she used to play hopscotch there with her friends.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Across the street, the triangular park is still there, the place where
the kids used to turn cartwheels and do handstands, something Anne could never
master, much to her chagrin.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="line-height: 115%;">Around the corner is the same bookstore where her father bought the diary
with the red-and-white cover that he gave her for her 13<sup>th</sup> birthday,
the one in which she wrote her way to immortality.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="line-height: 115%;">A month after she got the diary, the family one morning in July, 1942,
walked the three miles in the rain to the secret Annex, where they hid for more
than two years until the Nazis – German and Dutch – found them and sent them
off to die. Eight people hid together in
the Annex, and the only one who survived Hitler’s death machine was Anne’s
father, Otto Frank. He was a German Army
officer in World War 1 who fled Germany with his family in 1933 when Hitler
took power and his hatred of Jews became public policy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Something like half a million people now go through the tiny rooms of the
Secret Annex every year, trying to visualize what it was like for the eight
people to share the confinement and the fear for the 25 months. The eight had this in common: they all were Jews, and they were taking the
only option open to them to escape the concentration camps.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">The Frank family – father Otto, mother Edith, older sister Margot and
younger sister Anne – went into hiding after Margot, who was 16, got a postcard
ordering her to appear for shipment to a Dutch work camp, which was the first
stop on the way to death. By the end of
World War II, something like 120,000 Dutch Jews had been killed by the Germans
for the crime of being Jewish. Only
about 25,000, Otto Frank being one of them, survived.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Anne Frank lives on as a symbol of the Nazi horror because she was a
gifted and prolific writer even though just a child. She kept a diary from the day of the family’s
confinement, when she was 13, until they were arrested when she was 15, not
knowing she was writing for posterity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">She didn’t just keep a diary but also wrote many stories and sketches
that were found in the hiding place after the police had gone. They demonstrate a remarkable talent for one
so young, but that is not what has given her writing its impact.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Her diary made the world see that Hitler’s victims were not just
incomprehensible statistics, such as six million Jews gassed, shot, tortured
and starved to death, but people with names, families, dreams – even little
children plucked out of school and sent away to be killed. Anne Frank left a record that personalized
the Holocaust. Her diary has sold more
than 20 million copies and been translated into 50 languages.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Walking through the Secret Annex is chilling. It would be more so, no doubt, to do it
alone, for in the never-ending line of visitors the sense of isolation and fear
get submerged.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">The building, at 263 Prinsengracht, along one of Amsterdam’s many canals,
is a narrow structure four stories high.
It was the place where Mr. Frank ran his business, selling pectin for
jam and later spices of various kinds, and the Annex was an unused portion in
the rear.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">To get to it, you climb narrow, steep stairways to the third level, go
down a long hallway, and there is the now-famous bookcase, hinged to the wall
and pulled aside to reveal the door to the hiding place. Go through it and you are in Mr. and Mrs.
Frank’s room, where Margot also slept, and where Anne’s room, which she had to
share with a dentist who went into hiding too.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Anne used to cut pictures of American movie stars from magazines and put
them on the wall of her room. They are
still there – Deanna Durbin, Jean Arthur, and all the others. She fantasized about becoming an actress and
wrote a short story about a girl she named Anne Franklin, who wrote to actress
Priscilla Lane, who invited her to Hollywood.
She went, but was disillusioned by life there and happily returned home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Next to Anne’s room is the common washroom that they all shared, a sink
and a flush toilet, something they could never use except at night because not
all of the workers in the building knew of their presence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Upstairs is the room of the Van Daan family, including their teenage son,
Peter, with whom Anne gradually fell in love.
Who else, after all, was there for her to fall in love with since none
of the eight people ever set foot outside of the Annex in two years and no
other children ever came in?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Outside the window of Anne’s room, the big horse chestnut tree that she
loved to watch as the seasons changed is still there, bigger than ever. A few doors up the Prinsengracht canal, the
church bell tolls in the Westerkerk – the same bell the prisoners listened to
day and night for all those months.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">To the adults, the confinement was dreadful. Anne alone seemed able to make it into an
adventure, something to write stories about in the future. She wanted to write, she said, because “I
want to go on living even after my death,” never realizing that death was
imminent.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Most of the time in the Annex she was happy. One day, after being confined for a year and
a half, she wrote in her diary: “I
looked out of the open window, over a large piece of Amsterdam, over all the
roofs and on to the far distance, fading into purple. As long as this exists, I thought, and I may
live to see it, this sunshine, the cloudless skies, while this lasts I cannot
be unhappy.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Six months later, she and all the others were arrested, betrayed by
someone never identified for certain.
Six months after that, starving and in rags, Anne died of typhus in the
German concentration camp at Bergen-Belsen.
Margot died there too, a few days before Anne, in February or March,
1945, only a couple of weeks before the camp was liberated. Mrs. Van Daan died in one of the camps
too. Mrs. Frank died of starvation in
Auschwitz, where Mr. Van Daan was gassed. The dentist died in Neuengamme. Peter was among those marched from Auschwitz
by the SS when the Russians approached, and he died in Mauthausen on the very
day the camp was liberated by Americans.
Mr. Frank was freed from Auschwitz by Russian troops.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">All eight of the prisoners had left Holland on the last train that took
Jews to Auschwitz. Two months after Margot
and Anne Frank died, the war ended and the Netherlands was free again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Amsterdam, or rather the Anne Frank Foundation, has done a good job keeping
the Secret Annex available to tourists without letting it become tawdry. Located in the center of the city, it is easy
to find and to get to – and profoundly moving.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">There is nothing in Amsterdam, however, to mark where the Frank family
lived before abandoning the apartment and entering the Annex. Their home was at 37 Merwedeplein, which is a
V-shaped street around two sides of a triangular park on the south side of
Amsterdam. No plaque or statue or any
kind of memento exists there, but the apartment building looks largely the same
as it did when the Franks lived there on the third floor (known as the second
floor in Amsterdam, where the ground floor is not counted as the first).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">Because it has not been made into a tourist attraction, it is a more
profitable place to go, to sit on a bench in solitude in the park where Anne
and her friends used to play, and meditate on how all these unspeakable crimes
could have happened, even to children, in the lifetimes of many of us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;">And to wonder whether it could happen again – in what
we like to refer to as western civilization.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="line-height: 115%;">____________________________________________<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="line-height: 115%;">Thomas Driscoll is executive editor of the Journal
Star. He was in Amsterdam last month.<b style="font-size: 9pt;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></i><br />
<i><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></i>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-73616898202183848092014-05-18T12:42:00.001-05:002014-05-26T18:30:27.235-05:00EARLY ADOPTIONS, ORPHANAGES AND GUARDIANSHIPS = Amazing Stories Related to our Hardest Family Brick Walls<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All family mysteries are interesting to me, but it is always
the Early Adoption stories that grab my attention and send me on an unexpected
journey. I call them “Early Adoptions”
because they took place long after the Adoptee has passed away, and require
creative legwork to figure out where to look since the records are old and laws
may not have been in existence. These Early Adoptions are muddied by the fact that courthouses burned or flooded,
family stories handed down are manipulated to hide the truth, laws were not
passed yet requiring a paper trail, and basically people were too ashamed to
talk about it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Heartbreaking for sure.
But all mysteries can be solved.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here are some of our most interesting adoption cases that we
have worked on to date:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1. Giulia was an Italian woman born
about 1878 and the family believed she was adopted in Chicago Illinois after
escaping Italy due to a fear for her life.
After researching her family, I discovered that Giulia was born in
Calvello Italy. I had the good luck of
finding the online birth records for this small town, but they were written in
Italian, not English. I don’t speak
Italian. So I literally went thru the
records by hand looking for 3 names that I could read = the name Giulia or her
adopted parent’s Rosaria and Nicolai. I
still cannot believe what I stumbled across.
After spending an entire day flipping thru about 5 years of births, I
found a record at the back of the book where special cases were written about.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Note the name on the left says Giulia. The top row on the right shows the name
Rosaria. I had a translator in Italy read
the document and tell me the following: <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">This is the birth record (#14) for Giulia
Agrifoglio</span></i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; margin: 5pt 0.75in 0.0001pt 1in; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">Rosaria, a 23 year old seamstress, is not
declaring that she is the mother, but that she found the infant. She presents
the infant to the official who gives the infant the name Giulia, and the
surname [cognome] Agrifoglio. This was usually a "made-up" name and
not found in the town.</span></i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><span style="color: #222222;">I believe Rosaria requested that the child be
left in her care.</span></i><span style="color: #222222;"> <i>No mother or father is identified... that
is why you see "Esposita" under Giulia's name in the left column
where you would normally see the parents' names.<o:p></o:p></i></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></i></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is an amazing
discovery but unfortunately one that probably means the family will never know
who her real parents are.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2. An infant named Nellie was adopted in Indiana
around 1885. She supposedly searched a
few times in her life to find her birth family but with no luck. 128 years later, her great granddaughter took
it upon herself to try to research the birth, but also hit a brick wall. So she contacted us for help. After spending several frustrating hours
without finding any records, I searched for and found an orphanage in the town
where the family lived. There it was,
Nellie’s record of being taken home by her adopted father, and it named the
birth mother and birth grandmother who had dropped her off. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; margin: 5pt 0.75in 0.0001pt 0.25in; text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3. A baby named Joseph was born out of wedlock in
Boston around 1924. We were lucky enough
to know the birth mother’s name, but the family could not figure out where she
was after the birth. I was able to
locate a simple obituary for Joseph’s birth grandfather, which named the birth
mother and her new married name. All the
pieces fell together and we located 11 living cousins for the family to reach
out to. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4. One of my most interesting and frustrating
cases was a son who told me the story about his mother being switched at birth
in Quebec around 1929. She was told the
harrowing story after her “adopted” father passed away, and the details were
that her real birth parents were unmarried from the United States. On the same day of her birth, in the same
hospital, a son was born to the adopted parents but died because he was a
hemophiliac. The doctor agreed to switch
the babies and no records existed. My
research uncovered her baptism to the adopted parents that raised her in
Quebec, but no death record of the hemophiliac son. To date, we do not know who the real parents
are.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">5. This month, we just helped a woman in
Minnesota figure out the real birth father of her Irish great grandfather James. Her brick wall was based on a family story
that James was told upon his mother’s death that the father he grew up with was
not his birth father. In fact, James’
mother was previously married, gave the first 2 sons away who died in the Great
Chicago Fire of 1871, and kept baby James before getting remarried. With only this story to go on, we scoured through
the local courthouse and Catholic Church, and found a vital record entry of her
2<sup>nd</sup> marriage noting her name as Mrs.
That told us she was a widow. The
client immediately found his death record in the 1870 US Federal Census Mortality
Schedules of 1870. We have not found
what happened to the other 2 children born to this couple and even researched
local Guardianship records in the County Courthouse. Sadly it appears the story may be true. Our next step is to research the cemeteries
in Chicago for a burial record since a certificate of death was not found for
either son.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">6. Then there is our own family story where my
father found out his mother was adopted on the night she passed away. After spending an entire year digging through Cook
County courthouse records, I found the birth mother had actually taken my grandmother
home for the first year in 1900, gave her to the “adopted” father in 1901, and
would occasionally visit her in Chicago until she moved away before 1910. By 1911, she agreed to let the official
adoption take place, and then remarried the next month. She died in Twin Falls Idaho. But the most amazing part was the whispers
that the adopted father was actually the birth father. So we found a living descendant of his
sister, and she agreed to take a DNA test.
It came back as a strong 3<sup>rd</sup> cousin, confirming that he was
actually the real father but had to adopt her because he was not listed on the
birth certificate. Thank God for DNA. Read the full story at the link below:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://ancestrysisters.blogspot.com/2012/04/searching-for-my-grandmothers-birth.html"><i>http://ancestrysisters.blogspot.com/2012/04/searching-for-my-grandmothers-birth.html</i></a><i><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">7. Today, we have taken on an adoption case that
takes us back to Nova Scotia Canada. It will be
very difficult to research foreign records from the 1880’s but we are ready for
the challenge. Fingers crossed for
success.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Ancestry Sisters has started a new Facebook page called Adoption Genealogy. This is a community to help answer questions on how and where to research your family's mysteries related to Early Adoptions, Orphanages, and Guardianships. Follow us, LIKE our page and ask questions on the link below. </i></b></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Adoption-Genealogy/514354208687246?ref=hl">https://www.facebook.com/pages/Adoption-Genealogy/514354208687246?ref=hl</a></span><o:p></o:p></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-80074796597316362392014-04-19T12:02:00.001-05:002014-04-19T12:04:37.648-05:00CHICAGO IRISH GENEALOGY<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b>Announcing a new Facebook Page = Chicago Irish Genealogy</b></div>
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We are here to help you research your Irish ancestors who lived in Chicago, Illinois. Click on the link below, follow us and post questions. </div>
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<a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-Irish-Genealogy/1421431758111823?ref=hl">https://www.facebook.com/pages/Chicago-Irish-Genealogy/1421431758111823?ref=hl</a></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-49166042844515107502014-03-29T12:19:00.005-05:002018-10-09T18:11:39.821-05:00Chicago Genealogy & Cook County Genealogy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b>* How to Research your Chicago Ancestors *</b></div>
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Chicago has such a rich history, and is so ethnically diverse,
that it just begs you to search all the various goldmines around the city for
clues to solving your family mysteries. Immigrants
flooded the city in the mid to late 1800’s, which helped to shape the Chicago
that we know and love today. Your ancestors could have helped build the
railroads, rebuild the city after the 1871 Great Chicago Fire, and design and
build the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893, also known as the White City. <o:p></o:p></div>
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There is a lot to learn about Chicago Genealogy and what is available
to research, but here are some of my favorite resources and what they can tell
you:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Chicago Vital Records</u></b> – After 1871,
vital records are available and fairly easy to research. The challenge is that death and
marriage records before 1900 do not name parents. But other clues can be gathered, including
where the person lived on a birth or death certificate, or whether the person
was married in a church or by the Justice of the Peace. And
the Illinois index of early marriages and deaths is a great resource,
especially for finding misspelled names.
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<b><u>Church Records</u></b> – While the Great
Chicago Fire destroyed all vital records before 1871, Church Records help to
fill in those early blanks and can take you back as early as 1850. Certain Catholic Churches even kept records
that identified where the person was born and when. This is especially true in the Italian and
Polish ethnic churches. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Cemetery Records</u></b> – Not only can
you find the date of death, but headstones can include place of birth, year of
birth and if lucky, where they were born.
You can also see who they are buried with, or near, for major clues. Don’t just rely on Find a Grave. Go visit the cemetery in person. One of my favorite stories is how I began to
research the Catholic Cemetery of Calvary in Evanston. I started out by pulling the cemetery record
of my Irish Great Great Grandmother.
What I uncovered was a burial plot with 8 people in the same grave. Then it spiraled out of control - who were
these people buried with my Julia who died in 1884? Over a period of about a year, I bet I went
back to this cemetery 25 times, becoming fast friends with the office manager. But my biggest discovery was finding my 3x
Great Grandfather from Quebec who was buried in the same plot with his grandson.
I had no idea he even came to the US and
never thought to search vital records for him.
Without searching for his grandson’s cemetery record, I would have never
found him in Chicago. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Voter Registrations of 1888, 1890 and
1892</u></b> – These records identify the courthouse where the person was
naturalized, how long the person lived in Chicago, how long they lived in
Illinois, and their current address. It
is often in alphabetical order by last name so it can help you see other
potential family members. This is a
great replacement for the destroyed 1890 Federal Census.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>City Directories & Telephone
Directories</u></b> – Published books began around 1839 and help you plot the
areas where your family lived, and when they moved. These addresses help you define nearby
relatives and what churches they may have attended.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Ward Maps</u></b> – The city was
constantly changing its street names and ward boundaries. It’s important to identify where your
ancestors lived, but that can also be a challenge. Sometimes they lived in the same house on
multiple census records, but the street names are different. Ward maps can help you figure out these
changes.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Census Records</u></b> – Chicago census
records show the street a person lived on starting in the 1880 census. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Naturalization Records</u></b> – There
are 3 places where an individual could have been naturalized in Cook
County: Circuit Court, Superior Court
and District Court. The first 2 are
found at the Daley Center, while the District Court filings are found at the
NARA Great Lakes Region.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Immigration</u></b> – the Newberry
Library houses many books on ethnic immigration that has an index of names,
making it easier to find often misspelled names. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>NARA Great Lakes Region</u></b> – This repository
houses the District Court Naturalization records of Illinois, Indiana,
Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin, along with many other court records.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Divorce Records</u></b> – While records
are off-site, once you find an index of a divorce, the record is a goldmine for
information. The divorce of my adopted
Grandmother’s birth mother led to naming her sister as a witness in the
trial. That led to helping me find where
the birth mother ended up dying, and ultimately where she was born. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Probates</u></b> – Again, these records
are kept off-site. If an index is found
for that person, then it takes up to 2 weeks for them to arrive for viewing. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Land Records</u></b> – Did your ancestors
own the property they were living in and for how long? That can be found by researching land
records. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Adoptions, Orphanages and Guardianships</u></b>
– There are various ways to research this difficult area of your tree. Illinois adoptee birth records prior to 1946 can now be obtained
by family. Also, Catholic
Charities can be helpful in finding records at a Catholic Orphanage. Guardianship Records in Cook County can be
viewed on microfilm, and census records can be combed for children living at
local orphanages. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Autopsy Records</u></b> – These records
don’t necessarily lead to family clues, but are interesting and help shape the
stories of a person’s life.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Newspaper Obituaries</u></b> – The challenge
with early obituaries in Chicago is that the city had so many people dying on
any given day, that the obits were just kept to the basics. Unless the person was of prominence or had an
interesting life story, the most you can get from them are maiden names,
children, if the person was single or married, along with what church they
attended and where the burial will take place.
On a few obituaries, it will tell you what country they were born, but
that is rare.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><u>Libraries</u></b> – Several key
libraries are essential to finding nuggets of Genealogy information: Newberry Library, Harold Washington Library,
Family History Library, and Northeastern Illinois University Library<o:p></o:p></div>
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If any of your ancestors lived in Chicago, or even had a
brief stay in this great city, then I strongly encourage you research them
immediately. My simple advice is to
never give up until you exhaust all avenues available to you. Based on my years of experience in Chicago,
it can be an expansive yet rewarding search.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-38973107917688399602014-03-21T21:30:00.000-05:002014-03-23T10:09:20.108-05:00Adoption Mystery Solved<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">Ancestry Sisters just helped our client solve his family's adoption mystery from 1900. Read the story below.</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><i>My
maternal grandmother was a wonderful Christian woman born October 1, 1900, in
Fulton, Illinois. She played her churches organ every Sunday for more than
thirty five years. She told me a sad story she thought was true: her mother,
Ethel Lynn, died during her birth. This caused her great
pain and worse, she believed that her father apparently could
not care for five children with one a newborn. She was told that he moved them
to York, Nebraska, then asked the County of York to assume guardianship of them
in about 1905. My grandmother passed away in 1994, but she got to meet her one sister after a separation of seventy-one
years. Her three brothers had all died before she found out who they were
from a family descendant in 1984. She died believing that her birth caused the death of her mother and
the wardship and separation of her and all four of her siblings, a sister
and three brothers, by York County because her father could not raise five
children. </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><i>I retained Ancestry Sisters to investigate the facts because they
sounded odd to me. It was discovered that her mother, Ethel, became ill with
“consumption” a full five months after my grandmother was born and died on 3
July 1901, nearly a full nine months after
her birth and five months after becoming ill. Her mother’s death was unrelated to her birth. Her father had
moved to Clinton, Iowa, across the Mississippi River from Fulton, IL, and
Ethel’s sister, Elisabeth, and Elisabeth’s husband, George, assumed
their guardianship in July 1902. In May 1904 the York County, Nebraska, Court
ordered the adoption of my four year old grandmother by the couple whom she
always knew as her loving parents, Charles B. and Ella Mae of York,
Nebraska. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><i>A professionally authored and persuasive letter prepared by Ancestry
Sisters persuaded the York County Court to release the adoption record (which
is routinely a sealed document). The factual revelations Ancestry Sisters
discovered gave me the true story
behind my grandmother’s past, one quite
different from the one she died believing. I just wish I had acted before
that wonderful Christian woman passed away.<o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><i>Walter, California</i></span><br />
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-54750855239298816372013-11-19T18:32:00.003-06:002013-11-19T18:32:41.208-06:00Ireland Reaching Out<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">Our Chicago client (and friend) Marsha was chosen as part of the Ireland Reaching Out project and featured in the Tar Abhaile video as they traced her roots back to Ireland. We helped her research her Irish relatives in Chicago and now you get to see what she learned on her journey back to County Limerick. This is a fun video and I love how it is spoken in Gaelic. And of course there are great views of Chicago to begin the Journey. Enjoy</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> <a href="http://www.tg4.ie/en/player/tg4-player.html?id=2841564288001&title=Tar+Abhaile" target="_blank">http://www.tg4.ie/en/player/tg4-player.html?id=2841564288001&title=Tar+Abhaile</a></span></div>
Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-34561256135942002962013-11-02T09:05:00.001-05:002013-11-06T15:12:55.554-06:00Daughters of the American Revolution DAR Application Process<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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My first experience with the Daughters of the American
Revolution was at the very beginning of my family research. As a matter of fact, the DAR was there to
help me solve the very first mystery that drove me crazy for weeks about my
great-great grandmother Eliza. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I had no idea that Eliza even existed. She died at the young age of 24 in 1872 in
Rosamond, Illinois (population 205), and before vital records were required by
the state. It wasn’t until I found a
tattered letter in the bottom of my mother’s files where I read the story of
the early death of Eliza. The letter
also mentioned the cemetery where she was buried, but that was 132 years ago
and a lot of time to erode the etchings on the oversized headstone.<o:p></o:p></div>
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When I called the county’s chamber of commerce, they gave me
the name of a local man who was the caretaker of this small but mythical
cemetery. Upon returning my phone call,
he first shuffled some papers and immediately confirmed that he did have a
record of Eliza being buried at the Rosamond Cemetery in 1872. In fact, he explained to me how the DAR spent
time in 1962 recording every headstone in the cemetery and it was the only
record he had with an index of older graves.
1962 may sound like yesterday, but every year that goes by is another
year for the outside elements to wear away the script on the headstone. And 50 years later, her marker is barely
legible.<o:p></o:p><br />
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What the DAR did to record a 90 year old headstone is
monumental to my family research today. <o:p></o:p><br />
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The Daughters of the America Revolution is a truly amazing organization
with dedicated volunteers and a commitment to preserving our American History,
including mine. And best of all, our
family was lucky enough to have a Patriot that fought in the American
Revolution. I was able to document this
Patriot, apply to the DAR, and successfully be accepted as a member within a
month of my first contact.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Based on what I have learned about the process of applying
to become a member of the DAR, here are some tips I can offer up for a
successful outcome.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Visit the national Daughters of the American Revolution
website to verify if your Patriot has already been documented.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">If your Patriot is listed in the index, you
can then buy the lineage report that details how far down the line the society
has proven records.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">This will tell you
which ancestor in your line that you need to start documenting.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><o:p> </o:p><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Determine
which local chapter you are interested in applying through.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Each chapter’s rules for applying are
different.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I filed my application in
Chicago and it was a very easy process where I was able to send all the
documents via email.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I didn’t even have
to print anything out.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The historian
filled out the application for me and federal expressed it to me for my
signature.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I was approved in all of 4
weeks.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">However, I also have worked on a
membership for a client in a very small town in Mississippi.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">This local MS chapter didn’t have a budget
for paper, so I had to mail 2 copies of every document.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">We were approved in less than 2 months.</span></li>
</ul>
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<li><o:p> </o:p><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Do your legwork up front before applying.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Gather all your documents for each generation
and make sure you have them scanned into your computer in file folders.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I strongly recommend you save and send every
census record for each ancestor too.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">
</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">These may or may not be needed, but I have learned over time that it is
better to include everything, otherwise there can be delays due to additional
documents needed.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><o:p> </o:p><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Each generation that requires documents needs to
show clear proof of a connection to their parents.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><o:p> </o:p><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Government Vital Records (Birth, Marriage and
Death certificates) are required for each generation.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Once you get far enough back where vitals
were not mandated by the state, then records with clear proof of a family
connection to the prior generation need to be found.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">This can be in the form of Wills, Land Records,
Newspaper Obituaries, Pension Records, and Bible Records (as long as you have
the original bible in your possession).</span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><o:p> Effective January 1, 2014, t</o:p><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">he DAR will accept Y-DNA as a supplemental tool of
lineage.</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Be patient and don’t get frustrated.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Delays are inevitable as you need to
completely satisfy the society that you are tracing the correct lineage.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">But the reward is worth the wait, and your
descendants will thank you for your hard work in passing down this bit of
family history.</span></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-88310291708244662922013-07-07T10:26:00.002-05:002016-01-02T09:50:10.708-06:00When to Hire a Genealogist and How to Hire a Genealogist.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Whether you are just beginning to research your family history, or you have been working on your branches for years, there comes a time to hire a professional genealogist.<br />
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<b><u>When to Hire a
Genealogist: <o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>When you want to find out more about your family and don’t
know where to begin</li>
<li>When you are trying to find named or unknown heirs in a testate or intestate estate.</li>
<li>When you have hit a brick wall</li>
<li>When you have been looking at your brick wall for way too
long. It’s time for a new pair of eyes
to give you a fresh perspective</li>
<li>When you don’t have time to devote to the details. Sometimes the smallest of clues lead to the
biggest results.</li>
<li>When you are looking for something specific</li>
<li>When you are writing your family history</li>
<li>If you are applying to a Society that is very specific about the documents needed to prove lineage. It can be a very slow process and require a lot of legwork to tie up loose ends.</li>
<li>When you want to give the gift of a family tree to a loved one</li>
<li>When you just want someone to collaborate with. We have made many friendships with our
clients and they bounce ideas off of us long after our project is complete.</li>
</ul>
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<b><u>How to Hire a
Genealogist:<o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><b>Learn as much as you can
about the process</b>. I hired my first
professional about 6 months into my family research. I was specifically looking for more
information on my Irish relatives on the East Coast. The woman I hired was extremely knowledgeable
about the Irish and gave me a wealth of information, in addition to gathering
documents that I was not familiar with.
I learned everything I could from her along the way and asked a lot of
questions. This knowledge has served me
well with my clients of today.</li>
<li><b>Have a plan</b> <b>and communicate your goals to the
genealogist before hiring them</b>. The
genealogist can then assess what is needed to achieve your goals and provide a
proposal for next steps.</li>
<li><b>Hire someone that is
current and up to date on what is new in the world of genealogy</b>. Social Media has become a major tool for
communicating with clients. It can be
very helpful to find someone with the following: Website, Facebook Page, Twitter Account, Blog.</li>
<li><b>Hire someone that knows
how to retrieve a hard-to-get record.</b>
Your families lived in many places.
You don’t necessarily need to hire someone that lives in one location. There are several ways a
professional genealogist can gather those documents from any geographical region. An example would be a Civil War Pension
Record, or a simple obituary.</li>
<li><b>Hire someone with access
to many subscription databases.</b>
There are several key websites out there that have a comprehensive
collection of documents, such as newspapers, regional records, military records,
etc. For example, we belong to several
newspaper websites. Just recently, we
found a marriage announcement from 1819 in upstate New York that helped our
client prove lineage for the Mayflower Society.</li>
<li><b>Hire someone that is willing to do the legwork and physical research. </b> Online searches are not the only way to find documents and answers to your brick walls.</li>
<li><b>Ask lots of questions</b>
to ensure the genealogist can help you in your area of interest.</li>
<li><b>Be prepared to pay
for document retrievals</b> that are out of pocket expenses to the genealogist.</li>
<li><b>If travel is required</b>
to various locations to follow the family, then that may require additional
expenses that need to be paid.</li>
<li><b>A good genealogist
will even help you find someone local</b> to a specific area and subcontract
the work if that is needed to accomplish your goals.</li>
<li><b>If you need help
outside of the US</b>, there are tremendous records available online for
specific countries. However, there may
come a time when you need to hire someone in that foreign country. They should be able to help you find a
genealogist in that area.</li>
<li><b>Look for an active
Genealogist in the following areas: </b><span style="text-align: center;">Referral from someone who has previously hired a professional and had a good experience, </span><span style="text-align: center;">Website of the Association of Professional Genealogists, </span><span style="text-align: center;">Local Historical Society or Genealogical Society, </span><span style="text-align: center;">Local Library, or the </span><span style="text-align: center;">Website of the Board for Certification of Genealogists. </span><span style="text-align: center;">We have even had clients find us from a Google search and Angie's List</span></li>
</ul>
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<b><u>Other things to
consider:<o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Is the genealogist responsive to your initial request for
information? This can be an indication
of how they communicate in the future.
If you are looking to complete your research in a specific time frame,
then communicate that in advance so they know your expectations.</li>
<li>Be realistic about results.
Even the most knowledgeable genealogist will hit a roadblock if a record
does not exist. Keep in mind that vital
records before 1850 are rare, except for church records. And even those are spotty based on the
religion and church that kept the record.
A top-notch genealogist will think outside the box and put on their
creative hat. Examples of outside the
box thinking include researching sponsors of the child’s baptism, or searching
for divorce and probate records. One of
the hardest cases we have to date is a Switched at Birth story in Quebec. We have found some key information on this
case by individually flipping through pages of the church book one by one. You cannot just rely on a search engine to
help you find the exact name you are researching. </li>
<li>If all you need is document retrieval, then someone local
can be your best bet. However, there
are ways for a knowledgeable genealogist to gather what is needed. This includes utilizing the inter-library system,
and outsourcing a specific job to another genealogist in a specific area. A good professional will have contacts all
around the US, or know how to find someone quickly.</li>
<li>Ask the tough questions – how much do they estimate this
project will cost, how long will this project take to complete, how will they
provide the documents and recaps of all findings, etc.</li>
</ul>
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And most importantly, find someone to have fun with. Learn as much as you can and enjoy the
process.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9yHkuMY7EWnw3xgT5xrCxaEHUtNXAOmgGcphE_MpgwRUyTEpXjVD077SG11rJ4Widw0LiEvRKjO07tg2acOX0LVUM-3zOz2_19aXvOSkGkX3btsFOFtCe6Mqj_OjDnDtsuVpTHKa2RJQ/s1600/AS+Cemetery+Walk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9yHkuMY7EWnw3xgT5xrCxaEHUtNXAOmgGcphE_MpgwRUyTEpXjVD077SG11rJ4Widw0LiEvRKjO07tg2acOX0LVUM-3zOz2_19aXvOSkGkX3btsFOFtCe6Mqj_OjDnDtsuVpTHKa2RJQ/s1600/AS+Cemetery+Walk.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ancestry Sisters hard at work</td></tr>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-41203315316526179302012-10-01T13:12:00.005-05:002023-06-17T08:56:14.910-05:00Our trip to Ireland<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We just returned from our 1<sup>st</sup>
ever trip to Ireland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a long
time coming as we’ve been planning on going for years, but this year finally
was <u>the</u> year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was
bittersweet, however, since our Irish Dad just passed away this past June.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knew we had the trip planned and was very
excited for us to be going, since he himself never got to travel there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">And, we felt our Dad lending his
usual loving, helping hand in things the whole week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For example…….<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">My sister missed her connecting
flight in London, but by some miracle was able to get rebooked on another
flight to Dublin, even though they told her that flight was sold out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was only<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>2 hours late in meeting me in Dublin…..thanks, Dad!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">When we checked into the hotel,
they had upgraded us to a Jr. Suite.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
was bigger and nicer than the 1<sup>st</sup> 4 places I lived in as a young,
married person……thanks, Dad!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Her luggage was lost and the
airline told her they had no record of it once she connected through
Washington, DC.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All her research
paperwork for our trip was in her luggage, as well as all her clothes and most
importantly, her hair care products!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, at 2 in the morning, she received a text from the airline saying
her luggage had been found and was now at the front desk of our hotel….thanks,
Dad!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The weather this past summer in
Ireland has been a record year for rain, yet for the 6 days we were there, we
only had ½ day of rain……thanks, Dad!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We easily found the church of
some of our ancestors, which is still an active Catholic parish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was unlocked and when we walked in, there
were bottles of holy water at the back of the church, as if they had been
filled<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and were just waiting for us to
walk in and collect 2…….thanks, Dad!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">One day, as we sat in our rental
car at the side of the road, detoured by road construction and completely lost,
a woman named Eva came walking down the road out of nowhere and guided us
successfully around the road construction to the next town on our
itinerary…..thanks, Dad!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Driving on the interstate in the
middle of nowhere there suddenly appeared an unmanned tollbooth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We dug through our belongings for Euro coins
and came up with only $1.80.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Guess what
the exact amount of money that was necessary at this tollbooth was?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You guessed it, $1.80.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thanks, Dad!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">A beautiful rainbow at the end
of the day, which ended right at the edge of our hotel……thanks, Dad!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The whole country felt friendly
and almost familiar to us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Never once
did we feel like strangers or outsiders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We were welcomed everywhere we went and made several new friends.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would urge anyone who has the least bit of
Irish blood in his or her family tree to visit this country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And even if you don’t, you should add
visiting Ireland to your bucket list.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">My sister and I flew from
different parts of the U.S. to Ireland separately,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>drove our own rental car (remember they drive on the wrong side
of the road & on the wrong side of the car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, ok, my sister did all the driving!) planned our own
itinerary, drank Hennessey, ate some pretty suspicious-looking food, picked
hotels in towns we’ve never heard of and did this all on our own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some people think we were really brave for
doing it this way………..</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We’ll write about the
differences of being brave today vs. being a brave Irish person way back when,
in next month’s blog.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s NO
comparison!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-79787724583280398562012-09-03T06:47:00.000-05:002012-09-03T07:42:25.727-05:00The Scary Side of Your Family Tree<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>For those of you
that don’t quite share my addiction to family research, let me assure you that
the emotional roller coaster ride I have been on in my quest to figure out
where I came from has been amazing.
Yes, finding out my ancestors came over on the Mayflower is remarkable. Or how about the fact that my
ggg Grandfather was a Doctor that served in the Civil War. I barely paid attention in history class and
now I find myself to have an interest in Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War. My dad would be so proud.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>And if I go
really far back in the family tree, I am actually related to Adam and Eve. Yep, it’s true.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b> <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>However, I say
roller coaster because not every story is the happy awe-inspiring fairytale
that you expect to get along the way.
Behind my fascination with genealogy are life-realities that can be a
little frightening to face, much less talk about. And I guarantee there is a story in your
tree as well.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Imagine my fear
when a cousin pointed out to me that in the 1880 census, my gg Irish
Grandmother Ellen was listed as living at an Insane Retreat. I think I stared at that one for several
days, not fully understanding the word retreat. Sounded like she was spending a day at the spa, but I’m pretty
sure the word insane wasn’t going to lead to anything good.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>My heart bleeds
for her as I write this because nothing I uncovered was good news. Of course, my obsession made me keep
searching until I unearthed the full story.
That’s the least I could do for her. Give her life some dignity, and give me
an understanding for what she endured. <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Is it fair to say
that having 12 children could make you crazy?
I would say a big fat yes, considering I never attempted to have even
1. Well, Ellen was a typical Irish Wife
living with a typical Irish Husband following the traditions of the Catholic
Church in Connecticut in the mid 1800’s. Women must be
subservient to their husbands, have sex for procreation only, and endure the
racial stigma of being Irish in the US during that time. Ellen was also very fertile, and had at
least 12 children in a span of 20 years (from 1853 – 1873). I believe there was also a 13<sup>th</sup>
child born in the 1850’s that died without a trace. In fact, her first 3 children (probably 4) died within 5 years of
each other, and before the 1860 census was even taken. By 1871, she had lost another daughter, and
was pregnant again in 1873 at the age of approximately 44. I’m exhausted for her.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>I never did find
Ellen again in any census record after 1880, yet she lived until 1916. Oh god, where was she for 30+ years? With the help of a knowledgeable genealogist
from Connecticut, I found her 1880 record at the Connecticut Valley
Hospital. It didn’t tell me much other
than confirming which hospital she went to.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Being pulled by
the serious weight of curiosity for her life, I made a trip to the area in my
search to find Ellen’s parents and siblings.
Instead, what I found were her probate records ordering her into the
hospital in 1873 (the year of her last child’s birth). That’s not what I came to find out, but it
was the direction I was meant to go. So
I got in my car and drove down to the hospital, which
still exists today. <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>To say this
hospital is a creepy place is being nice.
It sits atop a bluff, overlooking a river, with beautiful views. There are a series of red brick buildings
that clearly were built over 130 years ago.
And because of some upcoming renovations, many of the older buildings
sit empty, abandoned and decrepit, broken windows and all. <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>As creepy looking
from the outside as this hospital was, the current administration was kind
enough to humor me and dig into the archives for any records of Ellen’s visit
in 1880. I can honestly tell you that
of all the “aha” moments I’ve had in my family research, I would have been fine
without this one coming true. <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>The medical
records that showed up in my mailbox consisted of 13 years of doctor’s
notes. Amazing when you consider this
was from 1873 thru 1886. The records
show that Ellen suffered from melancholy with a diagnosis that it was from
having too many children. I often
wonder if maybe she didn’t want to have sex any more for fear of getting
pregnant with #14. So she used this as
an excuse to get away? That’s a dumb
thought, but it would be very creative of her if true.<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>So what do I do
now with this new-found information? I
use it to keep the fire under my feet to further my research into her lineage. I still need to find her parents. They are missing and buried in CT
somewhere. </b></span><b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I also need to find out where exactly in Ireland she was born. </b><b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hopefully one day I can unlock her past. </b></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In conclusion, I am a passionate believer that Everyone needs to understand their roots so they can pass this knowledge onto their living descendants, warts and all. We all have ancestors in our tree with a scary story that may include criminal behavior, divorce, abandonment, mental health issues, or worse. But don’t turn your back on their lives, understand them and celebrate the fact that they gave you life. We need to enjoy the fascination of discovering where we came from. Bumpy ride and all.</b></div>
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Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-65925423402948467022012-07-31T19:14:00.003-05:002012-07-31T19:14:37.377-05:00The Importance of Researching Siblings<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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His name was Valentine, and he was the younger brother of my
great-great grandmother Eliza. Well,
happy Valentine’s day to me because his death solved one of the weirdest
mysteries in our family tree and ultimately found a missing loved one. Ok, so it took me 2 years to figure it out,
but my gut knew it all along, I was just slow in following thru. </div>
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Let’s back up. My gg
grandfather Henry was born in the small town of Grombach, Baden, Germany in
1841. I am fascinated by Henry. He immigrated with his entire family and has
been fairly easy to trace. I have a picture of him and will say he looks like a
cocky, I mean confident, gg grandpa. I
guess you had to be confident when you are the type of person that would travel
by wagon to the state of Nebraska in 1875, without a home, set up camp in a
cave, and eventually become a wealthy farmer with hundreds of land acres at the
time of his death in 1919.</div>
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But Henry had 2 wives.
It wasn’t until I uncovered a tattered letter from 1942, packed away in
a box at my mother’s house, that I discovered my gg grandmother Eliza was
actually Henry’s first wife who died at the young age of 24 in 1872. My line wasn’t 2<sup>nd</sup> wife Margaret
after all. First wife Eliza was the
mother of my great grandfather Fred. In
the letter, it told us where she was buried, along with a baby daughter that
nobody knew about. I reached out to
the cemetery caretaker and he helped me locate the headstone, which my sister
visited and photographed last year.</div>
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It turns out the cemetery is in this dinkly little Illinois
town of maybe 400 people today, so probably 20 people 142 years ago. Mystery solved, sort of. I had Eliza down, now I began work on her
mother Martha. Crap, instant brick
wall.</div>
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For almost 2 years, I searched for GGG Grandma Martha. She was born in Missouri and lived most of
her life there until I found her living as a widow with Eliza and Henry in the
1870 census, near the town of Eliza’s burial location in Illinois. But I never found Martha again - ever. I searched the 1880 census so many times it
was almost ridiculous. No death record
on file at the archives dept for the state of Illinois. I assumed she went back to the state of
Missouri and where her 2 sons were living, but nothing. So I started chasing everything I could
think of including her son Valentine and another son George. I also searched for their children, their
children’s children, etc. I chased what
I think (but I’m not sure) are a few brothers, a probable father, and a couple
sisters, but no luck. I even called
the caretaker of the Illinois cemetery back to ask if he had a record of
Martha’s burial. Nope.</div>
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Eventually, I obtained the death certificate for Martha’s
youngest son Valentine in 1918. Here’s
where it gets weird. Valentine died 47
years later in the same dinky little Illinois town that his sister is buried
at, even though he lived all of his life in Missouri. His death certificate said he had only been in town for 3 days, a
coroner’s inquest was performed, and they could not determine cause of
death. </div>
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What’s that about?
I will secretly admit I feared maybe he suffered from dementia, went to
the grave of his sister and took his life.
But I desperately hoped that maybe his mother Martha was actually buried
there after all, and he was there to pay his respects. </div>
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Here’s another fun fact - Valentine died on my
birthday. Maybe the universe was
sending me a sign? Keep digging,
Ellen.</div>
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It finally dawned on me that even though Valentine wasn’t
from this dinky town where he died, the suspicious nature of his death might
lead to a newspaper article about the circumstances.</div>
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Ding Ding. His
death made 2 newspapers in the area. It
turns out he really was visiting his mother’s grave. While trying to fix her broken headstone, he had what was most
likely a stroke and fell over onto a pile of rocks. His body wasn’t found for 24 hours. </div>
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I’m sorry Uncle Valentine, but I will be forever grateful to
your stroke. Hallelujah, GGG Grandma
Martha has been found. Now if I could
only figure out where Martha’s parents are.
The hunt truly never ends.</div>
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</div>Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-55597325492603183692012-07-02T12:28:00.002-05:002023-06-17T08:58:02.042-05:00Don't be afraid of the Cemetery<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Have you ever just walked around
a cemetery?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If not, you should!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, no, we are not ghost busters, devil
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Here’s the thing; it will be
what <b><u>you</u></b> make it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For us,
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go visit a friend who passed away shortly before his 40<sup>th</sup> birthday.
I’m now well over 40.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cemeteries also
provide perspective…..lots and lots of perspective!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Suddenly, things like your slow internet connection or a long line at the grocery store seem relatively unimportant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The real estate for almost every
cemetery we have been to, is usually the best in town, with the best views to
boot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Your relatives’ final resting
place may have expansive ocean views and sweeping mountain views, or<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>even 360</span><span style="font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">°</span></span><span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> city views.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">You can wander about and see
actual pictures of the deceased (thank goodness for modern conveniences, i.e.
hair dryers, curling irons, lip waxing, etc.), very interesting names, entry
gates with incredibly ornate detail, decades- old magnificent shade trees, and
sometimes, if you are lucky, you may even learn a little something from a
headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At one particular cemetery,
we even saw a bullet hole shot straight into the face of the deceased, the
picture of which was on the headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What the heck is the story behind that?!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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relatives’ final resting place, get going!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Of course, it’s understandable if this is a hard thing emotionally for
you to do, but it doesn’t have to be a sad, morose place to visit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can make your visit a happy and
spiritual trip, believe it or not! Mother Nature is really the only thing that
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<span style="font-family: Papyrus; font-size: 14pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Where is<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the most beautiful cemetery you have ever
visited?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Share with us your
stories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, a special shout out to
anyone who can identify the cemetery in the picture at the top of this blog………<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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</div>Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-36501160091421968742012-06-02T06:57:00.003-05:002012-06-05T13:28:38.728-05:00Why The Irish Drive Me Crazy, and Why I Love Them So Much (From a Genealogist’s perspective)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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They Drive Me Crazy</span></h1>
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<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">They were so NOT creative when naming their
children. The # of Irish families
with children named Mary, John, Patrick, Margaret, and Michael makes
searching for them often impossible.
Good luck finding the right John Driscoll from Cork Ireland in 1840
– there are only 100 of them to consider.
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<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">They can’t add.
Every single record from their past has a different year of
birth. Sometimes they get
younger. It’s quite
maddening. How is it possible that
my gg grandfather was the same age in the 1850 census as he was in his
1848 passenger ship record? Aaah,
what’s a couple years??</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Sadly, the Irish Catholics were seriously
discriminated against in the 1800’s.
Many US and Ireland records were sporadic because townspeople
didn’t bother to record their vitals.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Their poverty was epic. The Irish Potato Famine of the 1840’s took the lives of a
large number of our ancestors. How
heartbreaking for a mother to lose half her family, like my great-great
grandmother, who lost 5 of her 10 kids.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">The food is all about Potatoes. My diet makes me think I am Italian.</li>
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Yet I Love them So Much</span></h1>
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<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in left 423.0pt;">They had a tradition of naming their
first-born son after the paternal grandfather and the 2<sup>nd</sup> born
son after the maternal grandfather.
This has been a huge help in figuring out the correct
families. For example, my gg
grandfather was John O’Connor. His
first-born son was David, who died 5 years later. Then he named his next son David. That was my clue to know his father was
David. This led me to find 3 of
John’s brothers in Massachusetts – all with first-born sons named David. Currently, we have 10 David O’Connor’s
in our tree just from this one branch.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in left 423.0pt;">They were extremely loyal. Family and friends lived together in
packs making it very easy to locate loved ones. Either by living in the same house or as next-door
neighbors. Fast forward to today. Who wants to live next to their family?
Anybody????</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in left 423.0pt;">Their bravery makes us proud. They ultimately survived the Potato
Famine, and crossed the ocean as stowage, all for the sake of finding a
better life for their families, including me. </li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in left 423.0pt;">Their religious conviction leaves
something to be desired in the 21<sup>st</sup> century. That left us with a wealth of church
records to hunt for including baptisms, marriages and burials. Baptism records identify sponsors. Sponsors were usually siblings, and siblings help us connect the dots to the correct family.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 27.0pt; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in left 423.0pt;">They gave us beautiful redheads,
porcelain skin, green eyes and lots o’luck. For that, we thank you!! </li>
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</div>Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-88558234229191222652012-05-17T20:46:00.002-05:002012-05-18T10:07:46.638-05:00Knight, Night and Nite....names that drive us crazy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; text-align: justify;">For all you genealogists out
there, I know you feel my pain when I talk about how census takers and/or the
family speaking to the census takers,
drive us crazy with the misspellings of names.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Take for instance the last name
Knight. Seems simple enough,
right? In this day and age, yes. Back in the day, no way. I’ve seen it spelled so many different ways,
I sometimes forget the correct way to spell it. Was it the fault of the census taker and his/her lack of spelling
education or lack of ability to hear, or the fault of the person speaking the
last name? Or…….did the person, who
actually had this last name, know the correct spelling? We will never know exactly how it was delivered and received, but it
remains a thorn in the side of all genealogists, trying to piece together a
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regarding the last name of Knight. In
my own personal family search, the last name currently is Knight, but this name
was just arbitrarily and randomly changed from NITZ to KNIGHT, back around 1860
sometime. Family members traveling away
from Ohio and the Nitz family,
suddenly somewhere along that journey, changed the last name to
Knight. Was there a conversation in the
covered wagon about how the last name Nitz (Nitze, Nits, Nitse…you get the
point), reminded them of a bedbug? Or,
was the family fleeing the Nitz family and in a desperate attempt to be
unreachable and never again found, just decide to change the last name? And why Knight? Because it’s noble?
Because it kind of sounds like Nitz and maybe a small child wouldn’t be
so confused when Mom and Dad told them their last name is now different? So many questions, and absolutely no
knowledge of the answers, or will there ever be. It’s all just speculation.
And, it drives us all crazy!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
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<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">And then there’s the spelling,
or more accurately, the misspellings of names.
Knight is Night is Nite and so on and so on. Nitz is Nits is Nitse is Nitze and so on and so on. When I came across the last name of another
family member of Neighbors, I thought to myself “wow, it’s such a unique name
it will for sure be easier to find records with this name!” Oh boy, was I wrong! Neighbors is Nabors is Naghbor and so on and
so on!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">And of course, there’s the issue
of naming several of your kids the same name?
You rarely, if ever hear about a family in today’s world, naming more
than one child the same name. But back
in the day, it happened all the time.
How many times have you seen a child born and named, only to pass away
at an very young age, and then the parents’ next baby was named the exact
name? Crazy, right? Or was it?
Did they do that to honor their now deceased child? Or because they just really loved that
name? Or because that’s what everyone
did back then? Or because the slew of
names available then were limited and
weren’t thought up like they are today, what with all the made up names
and all. Maybe we should be grateful
for the simple names like Mary, Daniel, Ellen, etc. Again, so many questions, and absolutely no knowledge of the
answers!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
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<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">It forces us (or me at least) to
become creative, trying to put myself in these people’s shoes and figure out
why and how. How many different ways
can I spell Knight, Nitz or Neighbors? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">I must confess, those census
takers were much more creative than I am.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Stay patient, think outside the
box and happy hunting! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
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<span style="font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Feel free to share your crazy
name stories with us!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Ancestry Sisters<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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</div>Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5271506340286790281.post-85415207199398353502012-03-11T19:44:00.001-05:002012-03-23T21:09:40.602-05:00Everybody has a story..........<div class="mvm uiP fsm" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Let us help you discover yours!
Ancestry Sisters are your Go-To source for writing your family
history. We love the hunt, & are
ready to help you uncover your roots! Our u</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: -webkit-auto;">nique personal experience even includes the discovery of our Mayflower Ancestors and uncovering the birth parents of our adopted grandmother in the year 1900!</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
<div class="mvm uiP fsm" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In addition to our own stories, we have researched and built trees for dozens of other families. Now, we want to use our top notch skills to help you uncover your roots.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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</div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ancestry Sisters has the technical expertise to do complex genealogical research on your family, and we have access to many subscription websites to aide in this task. Here is a small sample of the many different records and reports we can gather for you:</span></div>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Detailed Family Trees - Pedigree Charts, Descendant Charts, Relationship Charts</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Genealogy Reports - Register Report, Ahnentafel Reports</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Census Records</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Town Records</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Vital Records - Birth, Marriage, Death</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Naturalization Records</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Probate and Wills</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Military Records - WW2, WW1, Civil War, War of 1812, Revolutionary War </span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Church Records</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cemetery Records & Photos</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Newspapers - Obituaries</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">City Directories</span></li>
<li><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Other - Orphanage Records, Mental Hospital records, and more.</span></li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="background-color: white;"><br /></i></span></div>
<div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our own personal research has made us knowledgeable in the following Nationalities: </span></div>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
<ul><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
<li> French Canadians</li>
<li> Irish</li>
<li> Mayflower Passengers</li>
<li> Germans</li>
<li> Bohemians</li>
</span></ul>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
<div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We've also established strong contacts and are very knowledgeable in the areas listed below:</span></div>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
<ul><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
<li>Chicago</li>
<li>Illinois</li>
<li>Missouri</li>
<li>Indiana</li>
<li>Ohio</li>
<li>Nebraska</li>
<li>Iowa</li>
<li>Connecticut</li>
<li>Seymour, Derby and Ansonia, Connecticut</li>
<li>New York</li>
<li>Massachusetts</li>
<li>California</li>
<li>Arkansas</li>
<li>Ireland</li>
<li>England</li>
<li>Canada....just to name a few</li>
</span></ul>
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</span><br />
<div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong><u style="background-color: white;"><br /></u></strong></span></div>
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</span><br />
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</div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
<div>
To begin your journey, please contact us at: <a href="mailto:ancestrysisters@gmail.com">ancestrysisters@gmail.com</a></div>
</span><br />
<div>
</div>
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<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><u style="background-color: white;"><br /></u></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><u style="background-color: white;">Ancestry Sisters is a Member of the following Genealogical organizations:</u></span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Connecticut Irish-American Historical Society</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Connecticut Ancestry Society, Inc</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Illiana Genealogical & Historical Society</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Illinois State Genealogical Society</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="background-color: white;"><br /></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="background-color: white;"><br /></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="background-color: white;">Like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter & Pinterest, and visit us at <a href="http://www.ancestrysisters.com/">www.ancestrysisters.com</a></i></span></div>
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</div>Ancestry Sisters Genealogyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01035891246457374919noreply@blogger.com0