It's done!!!!

I know I haven't been posting much on here the last several days, but I have a really good excuse! My grandma's third photo album, the one with the most pictures of all three, is finally scanned, identified, and every single individual picture separated (digitally) and labeled. In total, there were 838 pictures!!! As my wife will tell you, I haven't been much use around the house the last week as I've been pushing (slowly but steadily) to get this monumental project done (well, monumental in my mind at least). It's been fascinating to see the places my great-grandparents went, the people they were friends with, and some of the things they did. In a future post, I'll talk about some of the things I learned about my great-grandmother by doing this project (it was a lot!) and throw some of the pictures on here so you can see what I've been up to. But first, let me breathe one big sigh of relief that a major project is finally done!

*SIGH*

Ok. On to the next project!!

Treasure Chest Thursday - overload!

It has been a crazy week, genealogy-wise. I already wrote about finding info on Heinrich Joseph, my great-great-grandfather's brother. I had fun sharing that info with my cousin, Jim Joseph, who's also researching the Joseph family. Hopefully this weekend I'll have time to update my file with the info. Jim also sent me a gedcom of his family file on the Josephs, so I have that to go through as well.

Then, I was recently contacted by Eileen Bremner, whose husband is a relative on my Shute side. She sent me almost three dozen pictures of the Shutes, including an old map of Duanesburg, NY, showing the family names of people who lived in the town and where, a page from the Shute family bible (which I didn't know existed!), and many headstones. On top of that, she also sent me a gedcom of the Shute family info that she had collected, so I have THAT to go through as well!

And just last night, I officially began the ProGen 9 class, a free group that studies Elizabeth Shown Mills' book Professional Genealogy. It's overseen by a certified genealogist (Jay Fonkert for our group), and administered by Elizabeth O'Neal, who does a great job of taking care of all the housekeeping duties. Angela McGhie runs the whole ProGen program, creates all the assignments and everything. My group has about 15 people in it, mostly from the eastern US (Elizabeth and I seemed to be the only west coasters) and they're all as geeky about genealogy as I am! Talk about heaven! :D I'm way excited to be in this group, and learn how to step up my research and reporting skills. Best of all, it goes on for 18 months, and it covers EVERYTHING about being a professional genealogist. What more could I ask for?

All in all, it's been a fantastic week for genealogy. It leaves me with one burning question though - how do you incorporate other people's research into your own? The old me would have just dumped it in, no questions asked. But that combines info and notes in a way that leaves it impossible to tell what was mine and what I received from elsewhere. What strategies do you use when inputting info from other researchers into your file?

A new branch for the Josephs!

I was on the FamilySearch Labs website yesterday (eventually, at least. I think it was down for a bit). On a whim (or perhaps, more than a whim) I thought I'd do a search for my 3rd-great-grandfather, Ludwig Joseph and see what I could find. There weren't all that many hits, so I thought I'd scrool through and see what they showed me. Imagine my surprise when one of the hits listed Ludwig and his wife, Justine Witt! I opened the record, and it turned out to be a death record of Heinrich Joseph, son of Ludwig and Justine. My semi-distant-cousin Jim Joseph had told me there was a Henry Joseph in that family (as well as some other siblings I haven't been able to find records of yet), and this was proof! I love it when historical documents and family stories tell the same story.

Excited with my new find, I went off to Ancestry.com and found Henry Joseph living with his family in Chicago, Illinois. Best of all, his son Albert was living with him. This same Albert was living with Tina (Joseph) Levick in 1920, but had only been identified as a lodger. I now know that Albert was her nephew, son of Tina's brother Heinrich. Albert worked as a smelter in Montana in the 1920 census, and was a handyman at a steel mill in Chicago in 1930. It's puzzled me for years who that Albert was, and now I know!

Now I need to go back and see if I can round out the info on Henry/Heinrich and his family. I've got his wife Emilie and at least one son Albert. He was living next to an Edward Joseph and his family in 1930, and Edward does happen to be the perfect age to be a son of Henry. So this Joseph family, which stymied me for SO LONG at least seems to be coming out of the woodwork. Can't wait to see what else I can find!

Tombstone Tuesday: John Frederick Gibson

Today's spotlight focuses on my great-grandfather, John Frederick Gibson. Fred was born 21 Jan 1884 in Saint John, New Brunswick to John and Catherine (Cain) Gibson. John and Catherine were both children of Irish immigrants and were married in Cathedral, a Catholic church in New Brunswick (pictured at left) a few years before in 1879. Fred had an older sister, Annie, an older brother named Thomas, and a younger brother named David. One other child was born to the family, but I haven't been able to find records of him/her, only a mention in a census record of Catherine bearing five children with four surviving. All the children but David were born in Saint John. When Fred was very young, perhaps only 1 or 2 years old, John and Catherine moved the family to Helena, Montana, where David was later born. To the right is a photo of Bridge St. in Helena, taken about the time of John Gibson's arrival to Montana.

Fred lived and grew up in Montana with his family, including his grandfather Dennis Cain (who joined them in Montana in 1891), who lived with them until his death in 1906. Fred's mother was Catholic, and attended the local Catholic church. Fred's father John, who had been attending the Church of England while living in Canada, would wait outside the church and go home with Catherine afterwards. Catherine died in 1907 from pneumonia, and Fred's father John died in 1914.

Fred worked for the railroad for a good part of his life, as did his brothers David and Thomas, and his father-in-law, Samuel Joseph. Fred lived for a while with his sister Annie, who had married William Condon, until he met and married Augusta (Joseph) Staffan, widow of Charles Staffan, on 13 June 1923. They had a son, whom they named Frederick Joseph Gibson (my grandfather). Augusta died in 1931, following a hysterectomy. Fred Jr. stayed with his aunt Pat Walsh for a brief time while Fred Sr took care of things after Augusta's death.

Fred married Emma Kitzel about 1932 (you can see their picture at the top of this post). She was a clerk at the railroad where Fred worked. They later joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1951, and stayed active in the church for about five years, until Emma's death in 1955. Following Emma's death, Fred married Ethel Lindberg, a Catholic, and began attending the Catholic church with her. According to his son, Fred attended just about every church around.

Fred passed away on 5 August 1967 at the age of 83 in Butte, Montana. He is buried in the Mount Moriah Cemetery in Butte.

Wordless Wednesday: My awesome Great-Grandma Rosie

This is my favorite picture of my great-grandmother, Rosie (Sitzman) Wagner. I'm not sure when it was taken, perhaps when she was in her 40s or 50s, but I love the fun-loving, zest for life look on her face. She passed away when I was five, so I barely remember her, and most of what I remember was from one visit, seeing her sitting on the couch with a big afghan on the back of it in her old home. I wish I'd had the chance to know what she was like when this picture was taken. But at least I have pictures like this one, that I can show to my kids and (future) grandkids.

Madness Monday - genealogy in general

Today's madness doesn't involve an ancestor, or a hard-to-read census page, or someone who apparently got married at the age of 13, or anything I normally would gripe about. Today I've got two things that have been driving me mad.

Number one - Geni.com. I uploaded my file there some time ago, thinking it would help me connect with other researchers, and as another backup (I practice at least triple redundancy with my backups now). After a couple weeks, I started getting some 'merge requests'. At first, this was exciting. Finding people who shared my ancestors! Yay! But then I realized - these requests were for people waaaay back in the undocumented part of my file (yes, I fell into the 'download everyone on the internet' trap at one point in my research, and I'm still trying to separate what's accurate from what isn't). For several months I just combined everyone that I thought matched (and most of them did, from what I could tell). But then a few months ago, I got tired of merging all these people who I wasn't even sure were my family any more. So I stopped. Then yesterday, I logged into Geni, just to see how many of these merge requests were pending, and it was over 170! These matches take 3-4 minutes each to do (maybe it's my computer that's slow?) so we're talking several hours of work just to merge these people. I know there are many genealogists who use Geni, perhaps as their sole genealogy database, that my tree is tied to. Now I'm stuck with a dilemma - do I delete my tree completely? Do I let it sit there unused and unmerged? Or do I 'trim' the branches of the unverified families and add them in later as I verify/correct the info? The last one seems like the best way to go, so I might end up going that route, but with all the time it would take to go family by family...ugh. So yeah, I haven't made up my mind on that one.

The other issue I'm having is the funding for my future genealogical eandeavors - I really want to improve my skills (research, writing, networking, the whole she-bang), as well as join a few professional societies - APG (both local and national), BCG, NEHGS, and start subscribing to a few genealogical publications - Family Tree Magazine seems good and affordable, and the more pricey and professional ones like The Genealogist and the NEHGS Register sound very interesting too. I'd also like to renew my Ancestry.com subscription, and maybe try the DNA testing for my paternal and maternal lines. The only problem is - the only way I can afford these things is by selling my truck! Seriously, how do professional genealogists pay for all of this? Unless they make a lot more money than I think they do, or don't care about credit card debt, I don't see how they can afford it. If you have any ideas, tips, tricks, discount coupons, or any other suggestions on how to afford moving towards more professional genealogy research, I'm all ears. Till then, I'll just keep pulling my hair out. :)

Follow Friday: My Grandpa

Today I'd like to blog about one of the best genealogical resources I've come across over the last decade of my research - my grandfather, Fred Gibson. He has one of the sharpest memories I've ever seen - he can rattle off 16-digit account numbers, give you his aunt's address from 75 years ago, or name 3 or 4 generations of descendants of his wife's stepfather's first wife's half-sister - all of which I have seen him do! He remembers the funniest old songs and breaks into singing whenever something reminds him of a song. He and my grandma Blossom have been married 62 years (it'll be 63 in November), raised five kids, have 13 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and they stay a part of the lives of each and everyone one of us. I was named after him (we share the same middle name) and I'm proud to 'follow' my grandpa.