The Best State Genealogical Society Ever!

Week 14. State and National Societies: Last week we paid tribute to local genealogical and historical societies. This week we’re going to think bigger. For which state, provincial or national society are you most thankful? What makes this society special? How do the publications and events of this group assist in your family history research?

I am one of the luckiest people alive!  I live just about 10 minutes from the headquarters of The Ohio Genealogical Society, one of the largest societies in the United States!!

The Ohio Genealogical Society had its beginnings in 1955, the year I was born.  Several local residents of Mansfield, Richland County (my hometown) met to form its humble beginnings.  Within a short time, even my parents became part of the the group and were among the workhorse group that began gathering cemetery information, personal genealogies, etc.

It has evolved, for sure!  There is even a chapter in Florida. 

Each year, it offers a top-notch state conference, bringing in some of the best of the best as speakers.  I have been a frequent speaker at these conferences, and have learned far more than I've ever taught.  The exhibit hall is worth going to, expecially if one is not able to afford to go to the larger national conferences.

The libary is in its new home.  This lovely building was completed just a couple of years ago in Bellville, Ohio - just a stone's throw from where I live.  It is truly state-of-the-art.  There is ample room to spread out and research, peruse its stacks, take advantage of the many classes and workshops that are held there, and be helped by the wonderful volunteers that man the information desk.

I am indeed fortunate, for I hear of many people from around the United States that would love to come to this library.  At the annual Summer Workshop, we even had an attendee from Switzerland! 

We are now getting ready for the conference, which be held in the Cleveland area this year.  Hundreds will be there.  Many will research at the Western Reserve Historical Society nearby. 

And why is there such an abundance of information and opportunity in our state?  Because Ohio was always on the way to somewhere!

It will be wonderful - again!

Love my little Kentucky library!

Week #8 – Genealogy Libraries Week 8 – Genealogy Libraries: Genealogy libraries (and dedicated departments in regular libraries) are true treasures in the family history community. Tell us about your favorite genealogy library. What or who makes it special?

I LOVE the Minnie Winder Room of the Genealogy Department of the Ashland, Boyd Co., Kentucky library!!!  http://www.thebookplace.org/genealogy

Each time my sisters and I go "genealogizing", our pathway takes us there.  Though our destinations make take us elsewhere, we always make a special point to stop in Ashland, for we never walk away emptyhanded. 

Their collection covers a tri-state area, including eastern Kentucky, southern Ohio, West Virginia.  There are also collections covering parts of Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

We have grown with this genealogy department since it was in a smaller room "up the hall a piece" into the modern room that houses it now.  The staff is phenomenal.  The collection is phenomenal. 

Now we all know the bounty of resources available in Salt Lake City, Allen County, Indiana, New England Genealogy and Historical Society, etc.  But sometimes, you just have to go local.  We have found many useful items and sources that didn't seem to be located anywhere else.

Love those little libraries!

Those wonderful historical documents!

Week 7 – Historical Documents: Which historical document in your possession are you happy to have? How did you acquire this item? What does it reveal about your ancestors?

The challenge for last week's "52 Weeks of Abundant Genealogy" kind of got pushed to the wayside, for I was involved in preparing to teach six classes at the 16th Annual Family History Jamboree in Dayton, Ohio.  I thought about it all week, but I truly ran out of time.

But, I must respond to this one!

One of my ancestors is Asbury Alburt Moore.  He was born and raised in Grayson Co., Virginia, and moved to Ironton, Lawrence Co., Ohio with his family and most of the neighborhood in the mid-1800's. 

He fought in the Civil War.

My mom spent many years trying to find out where Asbury, her great-grandfather was buried.  He died at the National Military Home in Dayton, but that was really all she knew.

I sent for his pension file many years ago.  The day it arrived from the National Archives, it was raining cats and dogs.  The file was so large I had to carry it into the house using both arms.  I didn't care about the rest of the mail, but I didn't want that pension file to get wet!

I spent the next week digging through that file.  I didn't care what else in the house got done.  My kids fought.  I had hair growing on my dishes in the sink.  The laundry began to stack up.

I didn't care.

Asbury had been married to a woman named Catherine.  They had a large family, then it looks like they may have divorced.  This was all news to me, for the pension file listed a new wife and a whole new family.

Asbury had been injured in the Civil War when he slipped on the ice under a wagon in Tennessee.  A load of wood had fallen into his lap.  The next several years were spent in applying for an "invalid" pension.  I thought it mean "invalid" pension. 

Years were spent writing letters back and forth to the government.  Character references were sought, each one saying, "Yep, he was a character.  One of the most dishonest and ill-natured men ever."

Good grief. 

Finally, the government gave him his answer.  No.  How much of an invalid do you think you are?  You had a whole bunch of kids after your injury in the War.  You weren't that much of an invalid!

There are two different death certificates for Asbury.  One states he was divorced.  Another states he was married.  This new wife was quite a bit younger than he was, and I believe when he became older and infirm, she placed him in the Military Home.  When he died and had a tiny bit of money and belongings, she showed up again.

The pension file opened up a whole new world about the characterization of Asbury Moore.  Sometimes we like to think of our ancestors as heroes and very genteel in their nature.  Some are not.

To my delight, I learned just a couple of weeks ago where Asbury Moore is buried.  Someone placed a BEAUTIFUL photo of his headstone on Ancestry.com.  He is buried in Soldier's Circle in Greenlawn Cemetery, Portsmouth, Scioto, Ohio.

Sunbonnet Sister

Week 6 – Family Heirlooms: For which family heirloom are you most thankful? How did you acquire this treasure and what does it mean to you and your family?

I'm not quite sure how I ended up with my mom's bonnet.

When my mother or her mother got ready to do their outside work, on went the bonnet.

It was a homemade bonnet, and if I looked around hard enough I could probably find the pattern they used to cut out their bonnets.  They all came out looking pretty much the same.

The bonnet mom used the most is on the right.  The others were made for various events, like Pioneer Day.

A closeup.

Mom would spend hours and hours in the garden, so she needed the protection from the heat.  She would be out there very early in the morning, before the rays of the sun would beat down on her.  She would return in the evening, after the sun was no longer a threat.

I can still picture her bent over the half-acre of vegetables that were the envy of the neighborhood.  Once, after my dad had made a fresh run to Canada when the smelt were running, Mom decided to make more room in the freezer in readiness for the new catch of fish.  She removed several packages of smelt, and just like the Native Americans, she would put a small fish into each hill of corn, beans, etc.

Little did she know that every cat in the neighborhood would find their way to her garden and try to get those little smelts!

It didn't matter.  Mom was from the hills of Kentucky and knew how to raise food, no matter what disaster befell.  She had that garden going again, just like all of the rest of the gardens she had planted before. 

All while wearing her bonnet.

Women don't wear bonnets and hats too much anymore.  But, my sisters do.  And, so do I!

Me and Mr. Kerry! 



The Meanest Man Who Ever Lived

I have accepted the challenge given by Amy Johnson Crow:  http://www.nostorytoosmall.com/posts/challenge-52-ancestors-in-52-weeks/

She has challenged us to write about 52 ancestors this year, and I have jumped at the opportunity.

My father's grandfather, Ambrose Clemens, was known as the one of the meanest men who ever lived.  That was the reputation that followed him long after he died. 

His talent was well-known.  If someone told him they wanted a room built on to their house, or even a new house built, he would ask them how big they wanted it, how many rooms, etc.  Then, he would calculate it in his head.  He would secure the materials and get to work.

When he was finished, there would barely be a splinter left over.

People in Carter County, Kentucky still talk about how he was so talented as a builder.  He probably would have been a wonderful engineer.

They also still talk about how mean he was.

Since I never met him, I wanted to try to figure out why he was so surly.  I have no pictures.  I heard he looked like Albert Einstein.

I began to look through my genealogy files for any clues relating to Ambrose's meanness.  This is the only thing I could really find:

1.  His father, Francis, had to farm out his children because of the family's poverty, just as his own father, Benjamin had done to him.

2.  His father, Francis, had married three times.  Ambrose was the next-to-the last child in quite a large family.  He just may have been another mouth to feed.

3.  His grandfather, Benjamin, had been taken to court for cruelty to his wife, adultery, and beating his children.

4.  Ambrose married Mary Ann Brown, and soon after his own children started coming in close succession.  The first three were born in 1885, 1886, and 1887.  Five years passed before the fourth and final baby was born.  They were:
     Etta Bee - born 1885
     Richard Lee - born 1886 (my grandfather)
     Ollie Orie - born 1887
     Minnie Dorie - born 1892

Notice the 5-year gap between the last two children.

5.  Ollie Orie died in Sep 1893, and just two months later, mother Mary Ann died.

Ambrose was now a single father with three very young children. 

Ambrose continues to be found on censuses as a boarder, but never owning his own home or land.  The children were farmed out to others, as he had been, and as his own father had been.

Life was not real good to Ambrose, but he went on.  The children that lived turned out real fine, and they were kind.  I enjoyed going to Aunt Etta Bee's and Aunt Minnie's.  When my family moved from West Virginia to Ohio, they were stranded for several days in Portsmouth, Ohio.  Aunt Minnie took them in without a thought and fed them well. 

Sometimes we have to look at the whole picture of our ancestors.  It's more than just a bunch of names and dates.  It's "family history".

This has been reposted, as I have accepted the challenge given by Amy Johnson Crow:  http://www.nostorytoosmall.com/posts/challenge-52-ancestors-in-52-weeks/

Free Offline Genealogy Tools

Week 4 – Free Offline Genealogy Tools: For which free offline genealogy tool are you most grateful? How did you find this tool and how has it benefitted your genealogy? Describe to others how to access this tool and spread the genealogy love.

This particular challenge takes me back to the days when I was a young girl getting my start in genealogy by watching my parents.

They did it the old-fashioned way - they still remember relatives born in the 1800's, and had first-hand knowledge of their stories, their recollections, their pictures, etc.  I would sit and listen and try to imagine myself living in their lifetime.  It seemed so far away...

My parents and I spent hours in courthouses, cemeteries and libraries.  My spelling and my handwriting was better than theirs, for I had received more education than they ever had the opportunity to obtain.  I would emerge from the dungeons of the courthouses covered in grit - and I LOVED it!  Some of the grit was the same grit ancestors had touched!!  I would run my hand over documents where their signatures were still visible, and wonder what their hands may have looked like.

But, nothing beats a cemetery.  As I state in the opening pages of my blog, I was in cemeteries when my mother was still pregnant with me.  My favorite picture is one where she is standing sideways on a bridge after a July 4th picnic.  She is getting ready for some cemetery transcribing just four days before I was born!

There we both are - Ida Stevens Clemens and me, Peggy.  I was born just four days later.

Once, when I was about 13 years old, my parents, my girlfriend and an older gentleman were in a cemetery on a Sunday afternoon.  Alice and I stayed together copying information, dad and mom were off on their own, and so was Brother Steele.  While all of my other friends were at the beach of the movies, I was in a cemetery.

My mother wore a wig.  Remember that.

Mom was down on her knees pulling weeds and trying to discover what was written on a sunken tombstone when she came face to face with a snake!  She jumped up and started doing this war-hoop dance and yelping.  Dad saw what was happening and came running with his brush - the kind you NEVER, ever use on a tombstone now.

Dad began beating this snake like it was an anaconda, when in fact it was about as long as one's arm.  The thing is, on the first strike, the snake got stuck in the wire bristles of the brush.  When he saw what had happened, he flung the brush upwards.  My mother looked up to see a snake headed straight down toward her.

My mother ran out from under her wig. 



But on any given day, turn me loose in a library.  Nothing beats a rainy day all cozied up in the corner of a library.  This is one of the first places I head to when on a genealogy trip.  I have hunkered down and read stories of ancestors, their neighborhoods and their neighbors that have taken me back in time and all over the world.  I don't want a tour of the library - just let me discover it all on my own...

Paid Genealogy Tools

Week 2 – Paid Online Genealogy Tools: Which paid genealogy tool do you appreciate the most? What special features put it at the top of your list? How can it help others with their genealogy research?

Without a doubt, it is Ancestry.com and Fold3.com!

I could go on and on about the merits of belonging to such a site, but I would prefer to mention a recent success I had.

Asbury Alburt Moore always intriqued me.  He must have intriqued my mother, too.  I believe she met him only one time, for he died when she was six years old.  She was his great-granddaughter, and was a Civil War veteran.

She frequently mentioned that one of her grandfathers had been a member of Morgan's Raiders of Civil War fame.  That was the legend.  However, I could never find any evidence of this.

Asbury was born and married in Grayson County, Virginia.  I had no trouble finding his marriage record, nor in following him on the census as he eventually moved with other family members and neighbors into southern Ohio.

Then, I lost him.  Through Fold3.com, I found his pension and his eventual death at the National Military Home in Dayton, Ohio.  For years, he tried to obtain the money that he was entitled to as a veteran of the Civil War, particularly that of being an invalid due to war injuries.  He fell on the ice in Tennessee, slipped under a wagon where a load of wood fell into his lap. 

His pensions record showed a completely different wife and children than what I had recorded! 

He died, never receiving the disability part of his pension.  Basically, the government told him he couldn't have been too disabled from the wood falling into his lap, for he had a wife and seven more children!  How disabled do you think you are?

Both mom, and then I tried in vain to locate his tombstone for years and years.  Then, just a couple of weeks ago I signed into Ancestry.com and typed in his name. 

The first thing the came up was a photo of his tombstone!!!

Asbury Moore tombstone.

It was as clear and beautiful as any picture I've ever seen!  Another photo showed the beautiful area where it is located.

Soldier's Circle, Greenlawn Cemetery, Portsmouth, Scioto, Ohio

Belonging to these two sites has saved me hours of research and travel time, for they take me back in time and transport me to areas that are beneficial in the discovery of my ancestors.  I offer many thanks to the fellow genealogist (and probably family member!) that posted these pictures.

It is a wonderful time to be alive and have the available of modern technology to further our research.  Yep, some things cost money, but it would have cost me a lot more to have sent away for the penion file, and to traipse around looking for a tombstone.  Now, this information is right at my fingertips.

Literally!