Upcoming Presentation at Luxembourg Fest 2025

 Luxembourg Fest 2025

Several years ago, after learning I had ancestors in Iowa who emigrated from Luxembourg, I joined the Luxembourg American Cultural Society.  Joining Cultural Societies is always highly recommended as a way to learn more about the country your ancestor emigrated from and as a way to possibly help with your research.  A few years later (2021) while traveling across the country I made a plan to stop and visit the Luxembourg American Cultural Society & Center in Belgium, Wisconsin.  What a treat this was!  I met some wonderful people and was able to do some research.  Maintaining my membership over the years was important to me and I continue to hope that one day I will be able to take advantage of one of the wonderful tours to Luxembourg they sponsor. 

Recently, I became aware of some long sought after records in German for my family on FamilySearch and LAC was able to help me get them translated. (See Blog post The Birth of John Bentz).  What a treasure trove of information I was able to find and continue to find!

An opportunity arose for me to present at Luxembourg Fest 2025 and help others who are beginning their journey of researching their ancestors.  As genealogists we are always excited to share our discoveries.  Ever the teacher, I also enjoy helping others on their journey.  

My co-presenter is from Luxembourg.  Jean will be presenting on records available in Luxembourg.  I should be able to learn so much more about the records available from his presentation.  What an amazing opportunity and honor this is for me to be one of LAC's Presenters, learn more about records that might be available to me for my research and experience my Luxembourg heritage at this festival!

If you have any corrections or additions or stories to share, I look forward to hearing them.

Enjoy the journey,

Debby

Women's History Month Presentation

 I am pleased to announce my next presentation, 

in honor of Women's History Month, 

at

Hallockville Museum Farm 

in 

Riverhead, New York 

on 

Sunday, March 30th at 2:00pm

In celebration of Women’s History Month, we will have a presentation about the life of an East End farm wife and mother between the years of 1880 and 1910. Author Debby Warner Anderson will explain how the discovery of a shoebox of letters written by her great grandmother Carrie Warner of Baiting Hollow launched Debby on a journey through local history, family genealogy and a woman’s life on Long Island around the turn of the 19th century.

Sunday, March 30 at 2 p.m.

Free but registration is required. Click here: https://secure.lglforms.com/form_engine/s/6YBlrqcBknR-G93r0iE6dQ

Hope to see you there!

Immigration, Naturalization and Ship Travel Presentation

Hal Bookbinder presented two topics for the San Diego Genealogical Society monthly meeting today. Hal’s areas of interest include immigration, immigrant travel, citizenship, Jewish history, and safe computing.

Hal’s first presentation was entitled Ships of Our Ancestors. During Hal’s presentation he first took us through the methods of travel our ancestors used to get from their villages to railway stations. He showed us the railway maps throughout Europe in the 19^th century. Once our ancestors got to the major ports of departure he then told us about the types of ships and the major Shipping Companies our ancestors would have traveled on, the lengths of the voyages based on the type of ship and what life would have been like as they sailed to America. Hal showed us many great pictures to help us follow the information he was presenting.

Hal’s second presentation was entitled U.S. Immigration and Naturalization. Hal talked about the Citizenship and Naturalization Process for our ancestors and how the requirements have changed over the years since the 1790s. Using some examples from his own family research Hal was able to demonstrate several examples of citizenship paperwork. Hal reminded us when we are obtaining copies of Naturalization records we should be sure to get the entire file and not just a copy of the Naturalization record. It was interesting to note that in 1907 if a woman had been born in the United States but married a man who was foreign born and not a citizen she lost her citizenship. Hal had a great slide of Customs Passenger Lists 1820-1891 and an Immigration Passenger List for 1891-1954. This was a compilation of the information that is available during these specific time periods, a valuable list to have when searching for information.

• I have not been able to locate any of my ancestors on ship passenger lists but after Hal’s talk I decided to give it a try once again. I learned my German ancestors probably left Bremen (Bremerhaven) or Hamburg, Germany to come to America. I found the following listing and I believe I found my maternal 2x great grandfather’s name on a passenger list finally:

Transcription:
#119, Jacob Hamman, 25 years old, male, occupation-shoemaker, from Preussen (the German spelling for Prussia), destination New York, part of the vessel on the voyage-below deck
Jacob Hamman arrived in New York, New York on board the ship ‘Atlantic’ on 25 April 1859 from Bremerhaven, Germany. That fits! (See post My First Naturalization Papers-Jacob Hamman)

Another speaker presentation with valuable tips helps me find information I previously was unable to locate. 

If you have any corrections, additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.
Enjoy the journey,
Debby

"You Can’t Not Try These" Curt Witcher Presents

Saturday, January 12th at the San Diego Genealogical Society Annual Meeting the guest presenter for the day was Curt Witcher. 

Curt is the Allen County Public Library’s Senior Manager for Special Collections and the general curator for the Race and Fine Book Collection, managing The Genealogical Center and supervising the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection.  I found Curt to be a very knowledgeable, engaging and humorous presenter with many examples of information.  Curt discussed many sources of records you probably never thought to look for.  I wanted to capture some of the highlights of information that resonated with me that Curt shared and try some of the techniques out on my own research.

Curt presented 4 sessions:

Session 1 was entitled Doing Effective Genealogical Research in Libraries.  Curt reminded us that “ Successful genealogical research requires that one have meaningful strategies for finding, collecting, organizing, and evaluating data.  The soundness of one’s strategies and the consistent manner in which those strategies are applied will in very large part determine one’s research success.”

• Curt discussed the 5 types of Libraries: Academic, Private, Public, State and Virtual.  These will contain information about our ancestors and/or what was happening during their lives that adds to their stories. 
• A technique to try when ‘searching’ on a new site is to first type in “Humpty Dumpty” and “Smith”.  Using this simple technique will demonstrate how the search engine for that site works.  Remember that not all search engines work in the same manner.  This will allow you to figure out the best way to search for the particular information you are looking for.

• I felt the following chart that Curt presented was of great value to help me know where the best place to start searching for a particular record would be:

I will definitely keep this chart for reference when I am doing additional research.

• Curt also reminded us not to just search for Surnames but to also search for a geographic area, ethnicity, religion or an occupation.  We limit ourselves in our searching if we are only looking for a Surname.  This was a common theme throughout all his presentations and a valuable reminder.

I have ancestors that lived in Iowa, so, I started by searching the University of Iowa website and found the following:

Well, bummer about the ‘very little information’ but I didn’t let that deter me.  I found the following which I thought was VERY interesting since my first ancestors in Iowa were farmers and since I love maps:

Unfortunately, these maps were a little too late for me but as I went through the rabbit hole I also found photos of many of the early settlers.  Unfortunately, mine aren’t there, for now anyway, but imagine if this is the only place you could find a photo.

Session 2 was entitled Mining the Mother Lode: Using Periodical Literature for Genealogical Research.  In this presentation Curt was able to show examples of valuable information we are missing if we are not using PERSI (The PERiodical Source Index).  As Curt told us “PERSI is the largest subject index to genealogical, historical, and ethnic periodical publications published largely in North America and the British Isles.”  WOW!  Such an amazing index and I have never used it, I’m ashamed to say.  You can use http://search.findmy past.com/search/periodical-source-index to get started.

• Curt also gave us some hints about the ‘search’ on PERSI and said it’s better to use either the ‘who’ OR the ‘where’ but not a good idea to use them together.  You can add a keyword like ‘vital records’ to help narrow your search.  Curt reminded us that our ancestors may not be named but the richness of information may be in the sources cited for articles.  These will be a treasure trove of ideas for further searching.

When I went in to PERSI and searched ‘Iowa’ I had 30, 860 results.  WOW!  When I added the county ‘Plymouth’ to the search I found the following:

WOW!  This could be a wealth of information about my early settlers.  PERSI is definitely worth using!

Session 3 was entitled Using Government Documents for Genealogical Research.  Curt told us about the amazing records that can be found in government documents if we take the time to search.  He reminded us that the federal government is the largest publisher in the world and asked us why we aren’t using this source on a regular basis for research.  We also need to know how to search for documents.

• The Superintendent of Documents Classification System assigns each document a SuDoc number that refers to the government department or agency that issued the document.  Curt informed us that records will not often be found within the Department of the federal government where you might think they would be, so, we need to look in several areas.  He listed the following as some of the most important department designations that might be most helpful for us: D- Department of Defense, T- Department of the Treasury, W- Department of War and Y- Congress.
• Curt talked about the 3 main classification systems used for records:  SuDoc used by the federal government, letters used by the Library of Congress and the Dewey Decimal System numbers used by libraries.  A good reminder when researching different types of records.
• Two Indices you can use when searching for federal records are CIS U.S. Serial Set Index at  http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwss.html and Cumulative Subject Index to the Monthly Catalog of the United States Government Publications, 1900-1971 at www.archives.gov/research/alic/reference/admin-history/publication-indexes.html .  When searching look Guides to Historical Documents.

I decided to try Iowa.gov and put in Plymouth County where my ancestors lived and found the following sources of information I can investigate for information:

Session 4 was entitled More Than Surname Surfing: Best Practices for Using the Internet for Genealogists.  Curt reminded us that “The Internet can be most effectively utilized if one employs search strategies that complement sound historical research methodology and assist one in finding all the data. not just what which is conveniently available.” 

• My biggest takeaway from this session, because I am not regularly using them, was to use websites for the various libraries:  local city or county public library, state library of the state, state archives, state historical societies, state genealogical societies and US GenWeb site.
• www.LinkPendium.com has more than ten million genealogy links by location and surname.

I went to the Iowa State Historical Society and searched for ‘Remsen, Iowa’.  I found the following mention of a book for the church I know my ancestors attended.  I wonder if I can find my ancestors in this book?

I also found the following that might have information on my Hamman/Hammond line:

General reminders from Curt-

• Only about 5% of the available information on our ancestors is currently on-line.

• When you go to a Library, Archive, etc. remember “Asking questions is an ART as well as a procedure.”  He emphasized his point with The Wooden-Match-Stick-Test (explain what you can in less time then it would take a wooden match stick being held in your hand to burn down) where brevity and clarity are so important when interacting with librarians, archivists, etc.
• Curt told us frequently “You can’t not use these!” additional places for records.  How true he is!  I will post this on my computer to remind me to look at these other sources of data besides the common frequently used on-line sites.

I haven’t done much searching on-line at library sites but am now anxious to start searching many of these sites.  After Curt told us the importance of PERSI I now have it Bookmarked as a favorite on my computer.  He opened up so many more possible sources of information that I had never thought to search!  Now I just need the time to search all the leads I found.  Let me know of a new place you decided to search and what you found.

If you have any corrections, additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.
Enjoy the journey,
Debby

(Problems with Open Live Writer.  Please excuse image clarity issues)

Presentation “Carrie’s Letters: Bringing Ancestral Letters to Life”

(you can click on an image to enlarge it)

Yesterday, I had the amazing privilege of being the presenter for the San Diego Genealogical Society at their monthly meeting.  It was a great honor to present Carrie’s Letters: Brining Ancestral Letters to Life for the Society I also belong to. 

I began with how my father was given a box of letters, which I realized he had about 8 years ago, that were written by my paternal great-grandmother Carrie Terry Warner.  My presentation was about how a box of letters can become so much more interesting when you transcribe them and investigate the events the author of the letters is referring to. 

While I worked at transcribing the letters I felt at times like a little girl sitting at Carrie’s feet while she told me ‘stories’ about herself and those around her.  In addition to learning information about Carrie and John and their family I was also able to learn so much about the happenings in Baiting Hollow, N.Y. from 1885-1910.  After I transcribed the letters I set out to find out more about the family members and events mentioned in the letters.  I was frequently able to find newspaper articles about events she told her sister Ella Terry Billard about.  I was surprised to see that without telephones and computers the account Carrie relayed about an event like ‘the train depot robbery’ in nearby Riverhead, N.Y. was so accurate.


These are some things that were mentioned in the letters that I was able to find:

• copies of the books Carrie had read on Google Books (Lena Rivers and Marvels of the New West)
• copies of magazines on line that Carrie referred to and being able to purchase them to see what Carrie read               (The Delineator and Mayflower Seed Catalog)
• information on my paternal Great-Grandfather’s service as ‘Postmaster’ in Baiting Hollow, N.Y.
• the actual land deed for my great-grandfather John B. Warner’s first land purchase

I was able to share about my paternal grandfather’s birth and learned that it was his older brother Terry Warner who was actually the one who named him.

I was pleased with the interaction of members who shared information and or experiences they have had with letters as well.  Some members when I explained a dilemma I’d had in understanding something in the letters like the term ‘fools cap’ knew exactly what is was.  This reinforced what Paula Stuart-Warren discussed in her workshop at Southern California Genealogy Jamboree about researchers working together and not by yourself.

A special THANK-YOU to The San Diego Genealogical Society for the opportunity to be a presenter and share my passion for Carrie’s Letters.  See the following blog posts for additional information on Carrie’s Letters;
I also want to thank fellow blogger, member of SDGS and friend Diane Gould Hall for the photos!

I tried videotaping the presentation. If I am successful in downloading the presentation and the quality is good I will let you know how to access it if you are interested in viewing it.

Enjoy the journey,

Debby