The Ultimate Family History Journey sweepstakes...

I was browsing through ancestry.com message board posts earlier and when I clicked back to my home page, I noticed the ad on the right:

Clicking on the image took me to enter the sweepstakes.  You can enter once each day until April 8, 2011.

Here's what you have a chance to win (and I sure do hope I am a winner!):

If you win the grand prize, you will get:

• $20,000 in travel money
• Up to 8 hours of consultation time with an expert genealogist
• Help from up to 5 experts in fields relevant to your family history
• A yearlong Ancestry.com World Deluxe membership for you and 5 family members

20 First Prize winners will get an annual Ancestry.com World Deluxe membership

So, if I were you, I would be going there every day until the 8th April to sign up for your chance to win!

It's been awhile since I've gotten a chance to write a post here.  Working full time sometimes has the downside of not having enough time for my genealogy addiction.

Today I was thinking I would check the stats and see some of the searches that have brought people to my blog in the last 30 days.  There's only a few but it's still pretty neat to see that people are being directed here through searching for things.

Here are the search keywords from the last 30 days or so:

hillary vestal longton kansas - I wish I knew who this person doing the search was, as this is my great-great-grandfather and perhaps we are somehow related.

mygenresearch.blogspot.com - Wonder if this one was typed in the search bar instead of the address bar instead?

tackling brick wall - I've managed to do this a few times since August when I got back into my genealogy research again.

to my great great grandfather - I wonder who your great great grandfather was?  One that we share as a common ancestor perhaps?

1900 US Federal Census handwriting...

I've been catching up on my source citations in my rootsmagic database, and I am struggling to figure out what the occupation of my 2nd great-grandfather Henry Moes is for the 1900 US Federal Census. 

The image I found on ancestry.com is below:

Year: 1900; Census Place: Chicago Ward 34, Cook, Illinois; Roll: T623_290; Page: 5A; Enumeration District: 1115.


Anyone out there who thinks they know what the occupation is, I would be really grateful for the help!  

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - My Very Best 2010 Research

This post is in answer to Randy Seaver's posting on his Genea-Musings blog.

From his blog post:

It's Saturday Night again (I know, you just celebrated New Year's Eve - are you home for the night?) -- time for some Genealogy Fun (what else is there?)!!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

1)  Decide which of your (many?) genealogy research adventures was your "very best" (your definition). 

2)  Tell us about it in a blog post of your own, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Status report or comment on Facebook. 

I think mine would definitely have to be finally finding the marriage date of my great-grandparents John A. Blom and Jeanette Moes.  The Blom/Moes lines have always seemed to elude me ever since I started researching my family tree around 1996 and I had always gotten stuck trying to get past my great-grandparents. 

This past August I recently got back into researching my family with a passion, and after listening to hours and hours of podcast episodes of Genealogy Gems and The Genealogy Guys, I tried going about my research a little differently, using ideas heard throughout the shows I had been listening to.

I initially had guessed that my great-grandparents had been married between 1920 and 1930 based on the 1920 and 1930 US Federal Census Records I had found for each of my great-grandparents.  I had been browsing newspaper articles and on archives.com, had found an article in April of 1926 that had listed my great-grandmother Jeanette Moes under her maiden name.  Well, my grandfather was born on July 4, 1930.  I found my great-grandparents living together in the 1930 census with my Great Aunt Lois, so I knew by 1930 they were married. While browsing further newspaper articles though, I found a birth announcement for my grandfather's oldest sister, Lois from October of 1926.

Using this information I had successfully narrowed down the marriage date to being between April and October of 1926 but I still didn't have an exact date.  Until I found an index online of the Lake County, Indiana Marriage Indexes.  The index only listed up to 1920 but something compelled me to check anyways just in case, and wouldn't you know it... I found them!  Under both bride and groom listings there before my eyes on my laptop screen was the names, date of marriage, date of application, date the license was filed, the book and page numbers of the applications.  So, $3.00 plus a mailed request later, I was able to get my hands on the documents that confirmed that my great-grandparents were married on April 15, 1926 in Lake County, Indiana. 

What I realized after I reviewed the marriage license applications and the marriage certificate and re-visited the newspaper article mentioning my great-grandmother in April of 1926?  Great-Grandma was about 3 months pregnant with my Great Aunt Lois when they got married.  The "miscellaneous" shower mentioned in that April news article must have been in reference to both a bridal and baby shower unless I am mistaken on that.  

I think the above case is my best research of 2010 because I had to use several different sources to investigate and narrow down the exact date that my great-grandparents were married.  It was so exciting when I finally found them in the marriage index, and I'm sure my husband thought I was crazy when I did my little genealogy happy dance the day the marriage documents had finally arrived in the mail to confirm what I had found in the marriage index and proving just how useful the research techniques I had learned from the podcast episodes were. 

Mailbox Monday - The importance of reading directions!

I recently sent off for copies of my own parents' birth certificates and marriage certificate so that I would have them in my growing collection of records. 

Today, I got a letter back from the Indiana State Department of Health requesting a copy of my birth certificate in order to receive my father's birth certificate.  Apparently, I would have known I needed this if I had read the instructions a little better.

Oops!

I'm sure we've all made a mistake like this so I don't feel bad about it, just frustrated that I get to wait even longer to get that document in my hands.  So I guess this post is just my way of reminding folks that if they are dealing with other states than they reside in to make sure to fully research what is required when requesting vital records so you won't have to wait longer and waste time and stamps.

Tombstone Tuesday - Jack Blom

This post is pretty much a Tombstone Tuesday and Mystery Monday post all rolled into one.  

I believe the above image is the gravestone of my Uncle Jack Blom.  According to information from another of my uncles, my Uncle Jack was born in July of 1958 and a few years ago they had found him in the Social Security Death Index as having died in November of 1997.  

The mystery part of the post is that in the late eighties, my Uncle Jack moved to Illinois to live with one of his brothers.  He was supposed to appear in court one morning and instead hitch-hiked out to California.  No one really heard from him after that.  It was thought that he had died in a fire in California, however, the above image was found at findagrave.com listed in a Houston, Texas cemetery.  

If indeed he died in California, it leaves me to wonder just how he ended up being buried in Texas or if the above image is even the same person that was my Uncle Jack...

Monday Mailbox

So my husband checked the mail this morning and a couple of documents I had been waiting on have finally arrived!

The first document was the death certificate for my great-great grandfather John A. Blom. 

A few posts back, I posted a copy of my great-great grandfather's obituary and looking over the death certificate it looks like a great deal of that information is confirmed by this.  More importantly, I now have an exact date of birth rather than just the year of birth for him.  Next up on my todo list for my great-great grandfather is a copy of his birth certificate and his SS-5.  Eventually I also want to track down academic records for him from Northwestern University and I imagine there will be quite a few church records to track down as well.  

The other documents I received in the second envelope were the marriage license applications for both great-great-grandparents, John A. Blom and Jeanette Moes, as well as their marriage certificate: 

 

So now, after looking over the applications, I am wondering what my 3rd great-grandfather Henry Moes was a Foreman of.  I am also wondering what a Hod Carrier (sp) is as that is the occupation of my other 3rd great-grandfather Arie Blom.   

Isn't it funny how answering questions in genealogy generally leads to more questions?