Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Alternate Explanation
The puzzle regarding the relationship of Agnes "Nan" Ross to other passengers on the voyage in 1926 seems to have been resolved. Thanks to James (Ross) who suggested that, rather than being the niece of someone else onboard, the relationship indicated that she was the niece of her contact in Canada (George Blades) and that the presence of the Millers on the same trip was merely co-incidental. Ah well, that one will go on the back burner for now. We still have lots of other puzzles/brick walls to deal with.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
The Gathering of the Clan
When I began my research, I concentrated on my mother's family because it was the one I knew best. I relied on oral history as relayed mostly by my mother. Many of the stories I had heard all my life but now I was taking the time to write them down, sort out the details, and put them into some type of framework so they would be preserved in a meaningful way.
When we were young, that side of the family got together at least twice a year ~ once at Christmas and once in the summer for the famous Family Picnic. I recall one time when we were at Lowbanks Park on the shores of Lake Erie. It was the custom to set the tables up end to end and, as a result, they stretched quite a distance. Each family brought food and everyone shared and grazed up and down the tables. A passer-by in the park commented, “I guess you need more than one salt and pepper shaker at this table!”
These picnics were a great opportunity to reconnect and enjoy each other’s company. There was lots of food and lots of laughter and there were always lots of children at various ages and stages. Everyone watched out for them all. Robert Ross, my grandfather, while surveying the horde was heard to say, “Hivens a’mighty! I’ve stairted a breedin’ fairm!” [Robert and Maggie’s 8 children who survived infancy spawned 20 grandchildren who, in turn, produced 43 great-grandchildren]. But once he and my grandmother were both gone, it became more and more difficult to “gather the clan”. As often happens, some moved away and most of us were busy with the stuff of life. A couple of attempts were made to revive the tradition but eventually, it faded again.
By 2002, I was into family history research in a big way and thought I would try to get as many of the clan together as possible one more time. So, out went the invitation……
…….and what a great response!
Many who lived close by signed up to attend and many from “away” sent messages and stories about their family memories. Messages arrived via email and snail mail from Scotland, England, California, Alberta, and British Columbia. A few days before the event, I got a call from a cousin who asked if he should bring the family Bible.
Family Bible!!??
There’s a family Bible??
Who knew??
"Absolutely!”I said.
That’s a genealogist’s dream!
We gathered all the bits and pieces together along with photographs that relatives had squirreled away and put them on display. There were an amazing number of resources ~ each family group with its own collection. When put together, they made a wonderful display and a LOT of time was spent poring over them.
Stories were shared and memories recalled with lots of laughs all ‘round. [This is a family that knows how to have a good time!]. Through pictures and anecdotes, we gathered the thoughts and remembrances of even the youngest members present so that we could continue the story.
After this gathering in 2003, I put together a book for each family member who requested one. It included the handmade "tree" mentioned before (one page per family group) plus copies of the remembrances that had been gathered from "rellies" around the world (about 70 pages in total). When I think back on it now, the amount of work was tremendous but fulfilling. The problem with that format, though, is that now it is outdated and, as later research revealed, horribly full of errors.......but that was then and this is now.
I have learned a great deal about my family since those early days but I have learned much more about the power of the internet and programmes that make genealogical research easier. So much thanks needs to go to the huge numbers of people worldwide who transcribe old documents, census records, birth, death, and marriage registrations, etc. Having done some census transcription myself, I know it is an eye-blurring, bum-numbing venture but it's one way to give back to help others in their search. The number of resources now available online is astounding. I can't even imagine how one would have gone about this process in "the olden days". Once I linked into this enormous network, I discovered a whole "new" family on my father's side ~ most of whom had always been a mystery to me ~ as they had emigrated to this country many years before "my" Ross clan.
More about them next time...........
When we were young, that side of the family got together at least twice a year ~ once at Christmas and once in the summer for the famous Family Picnic. I recall one time when we were at Lowbanks Park on the shores of Lake Erie. It was the custom to set the tables up end to end and, as a result, they stretched quite a distance. Each family brought food and everyone shared and grazed up and down the tables. A passer-by in the park commented, “I guess you need more than one salt and pepper shaker at this table!”
These picnics were a great opportunity to reconnect and enjoy each other’s company. There was lots of food and lots of laughter and there were always lots of children at various ages and stages. Everyone watched out for them all. Robert Ross, my grandfather, while surveying the horde was heard to say, “Hivens a’mighty! I’ve stairted a breedin’ fairm!” [Robert and Maggie’s 8 children who survived infancy spawned 20 grandchildren who, in turn, produced 43 great-grandchildren]. But once he and my grandmother were both gone, it became more and more difficult to “gather the clan”. As often happens, some moved away and most of us were busy with the stuff of life. A couple of attempts were made to revive the tradition but eventually, it faded again.
By 2002, I was into family history research in a big way and thought I would try to get as many of the clan together as possible one more time. So, out went the invitation……
…….and what a great response!
Many who lived close by signed up to attend and many from “away” sent messages and stories about their family memories. Messages arrived via email and snail mail from Scotland, England, California, Alberta, and British Columbia. A few days before the event, I got a call from a cousin who asked if he should bring the family Bible.
Family Bible!!??
There’s a family Bible??
Who knew??
"Absolutely!”I said.
That’s a genealogist’s dream!
We gathered all the bits and pieces together along with photographs that relatives had squirreled away and put them on display. There were an amazing number of resources ~ each family group with its own collection. When put together, they made a wonderful display and a LOT of time was spent poring over them.
Stories were shared and memories recalled with lots of laughs all ‘round. [This is a family that knows how to have a good time!]. Through pictures and anecdotes, we gathered the thoughts and remembrances of even the youngest members present so that we could continue the story.
After this gathering in 2003, I put together a book for each family member who requested one. It included the handmade "tree" mentioned before (one page per family group) plus copies of the remembrances that had been gathered from "rellies" around the world (about 70 pages in total). When I think back on it now, the amount of work was tremendous but fulfilling. The problem with that format, though, is that now it is outdated and, as later research revealed, horribly full of errors.......but that was then and this is now.
I have learned a great deal about my family since those early days but I have learned much more about the power of the internet and programmes that make genealogical research easier. So much thanks needs to go to the huge numbers of people worldwide who transcribe old documents, census records, birth, death, and marriage registrations, etc. Having done some census transcription myself, I know it is an eye-blurring, bum-numbing venture but it's one way to give back to help others in their search. The number of resources now available online is astounding. I can't even imagine how one would have gone about this process in "the olden days". Once I linked into this enormous network, I discovered a whole "new" family on my father's side ~ most of whom had always been a mystery to me ~ as they had emigrated to this country many years before "my" Ross clan.
More about them next time...........
Sunday, May 17, 2009
In the beginning, there was a request.........
It has been suggested, since genealogical research takes up so much of my time, that I commit my work to a blog. Perhaps others will be interested in the findings or methods used. In my mind, it seems quite a daunting proposition but it's worth a try!
When we were growing up, our extended family played a big part in our lives. Not necessarily on a daily basis but several times a year we would visit grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins, get together for picnics and Christmas parties, etc. especially on my mother's side of the family. The Canadian branch of the Ross clan was (and is) very large but everyone knew everyone else in the immediate group. As far as we knew, these were the only relatives we had in Canada (with the exception of one of my grandmother's brothers and one of her cousins).
Robert and Maggie Ross had emigrated to Canada in 1927 with 6 of their surviving 8 children (there had been 11 in all!). The two older children, Nan and Bob, had come over separately from Scotland in 1926 ahead of the rest and had stayed with Maggie's brother, George Blades and his wife, Jessie in Hamilton. Nan had just turned 18 and Bob was only 16 when they left their family and sailed across the Atlantic to a new life in an unknown country. It would be many months before the whole family was back together again. I think of my own children and wonder if I would have been able to let them do that.
My mother, the youngest of the children, remembers nothing of Scotland or the voyage across as she was only 3 years old and I'm sad that we did not think to ask the older ones about their memories before they passed away. Such a lot of history gone and so many gaps to fill in.
Which brings me to the request mentioned in the title. Conversation amongst the "oldsters" (i.e., my father, mother, and brothers) often included names of family members outside our walls. The "Remember When" stories recounted funny things that were said and done, wise sayings, and memories of days and people gone by. It didn't dawn on me that my children didn't know who we were talking about until one day my daughter, Emily, said, that she had no idea who her relatives were/are. Names came up and stories were told but they didn't mean to her what they obviously meant to the older generation. "Can you put them on a piece of paper so that I can see how they all fit together?" she asked.
........and that was the beginning. What began as an attempt to answer Emily's question has resulted in an exciting (some might say all-consuming) quest for family ties that have reached back and out much further than I ever thought they would or could. Initially, I told her that there wasn't a piece of paper in the world big enough to accommodate the relatives that I knew and now, 5 years hence, I know there isn't. We have almost 2700 souls on our tree!
So far, I haven't mentioned my father's family. Not because they don't factor in but because they (I thought) were a much smaller group and very tight-lipped. Even while growing up, when adult conversations wash over young ears, there were so many instances when talk was hushed. In my memory, rooms were often dark and quiet. The MacDonalds and Wrights that I knew were fine people but our visits with then were very different from the laughing and raucous uproar that usually accompanied a meeting of the Ross clan.
There you have my starting points. I put to paper all that I "knew" about who was who and checked in with my mom and her sister, Bett to fill in some of the Ross family blanks. As there were no living Wrights or MacDonalds that I felt I could ask, my mom gave me details that she could remembered. My sister-in-law, Pat, in Ottawa was on the hunt for the MacDonald side as well and she managed to uncover some of the early history of the family in Ontario and traced some of the lines back to Nova Scotia, England and Scotland.
If you haven't already noticed, the names we seek are oh so common (Ross, Blades, Wright, MacDonald/McDonald, and later Scott, Cole, McArdle, and Patterson) making searches difficult. Many times we have asked, "Is that 'our' Samuel? William? Elizabeth?" In the Wright tree, we have had to resort to naming them Sam I, Sam II, and Sam III just to keep them straight in our minds. Not much different on the Ross side where there are no fewer than 4 men named William Black Ross. But genealogy is a puzzle and, as with jigsaw puzzles where many of the pieces look as if they will fit, it's often a matter of trial and error mixed with a good dose of common sense that leads to a breakthrough........and when that breakthrough comes, what a feeling of accomplishment!!
When I first began my search, I knew nothing about researching families. I had no idea what resources were available and actually hand-produced a family tree from scratch using the programme, Publisher. Every person was fitted into a box with name, date and place of birth (if known), and date and place of death (if known/applicable). Yes, I used red for girls and blue for boys (I'm so very visual) and drew lines between the boxes to denote marriages and offspring. One page per family unit. Yikes! As I think back on it now, I realize how much work that was and how unnecessary. It was not, however, futile. By going through that monumental exercise, I gained a better understanding of the various branches and how they all connected.
Through a Google search, I found and purchased a tree-builder programme called Great Family which did produce a more professional looking tree but it didn't really do what I wanted it to so I was soon looking for something more suited to my needs. About this time, I began to find others who were engaged in family searches of their own and soon we were exchanging success stories and road blocks and sources and software. What a boon! A whole world opened up to me ~ mailing lists, Rootsweb, Yahoo Groups, Ancestry, Genes Reunited.....the list goes on and on. There are 68 websites bookmarked in my Genealogy folder alone! And each one has offered up at least one tidbit of information which leads to another and then another.
That's the problem with genealogy........it's never done. I suffer from that researcher's affliction, G.A.D.D., Genealogist's Attention Deficit Disorder. When I sit down at the computer to complete a tree task, I try very hard to stick to the one branch or family that I'm working on at the time. On average, that lasts about 10 minutes. Picture it......a search using the programme, Ancestry, results in successfully finding the birth/marriage/or death record of the person you were looking for. Hurrah!! Success!! Then, on the same page, you notice another name that seems to ring a bell somewhere in the recesses of your mind (mine are getting deeper all the time!). Well, while you're here, you might as well check it out. No sense wasting the opportunity. You might forget and not be able to find it next time......(the excuses are endless). In no time at all, you have wandered well away from your original intent and have to retrace your steps to see where you started. That's why I always have a pad and pen beside me when researching. When I find myself veering off, I write down the name of the person that was the beginning of my search so that I can come back to it later. Works well when I remember to write it down. Ah well, that's when I blame my other condition ~ Old Timer's Disease. Like finding Easter eggs you hid yourself, all discoveries are exciting..........but I digress.
Back to my contacts.......I wish that I had been more careful in the beginning to document what I found where and who introduced me to whom. Even now, when I get on a roll, I forget to make note of where the information came from and date the entry. When I look back over data that I collected early on, I have to think carefully about where it came from but other seekers are always welcome. This searching for roots would be an impossible task without them. I've discovered that many people have various bits of information about my families. None of us has the market cornered and we all help each other fill in the blanks. Care must be taken, though, to ensure that information that is given and received is accurate. Too many wild goose chases have resulted from assuming that a piece of information is correct. For example, all the research seemed to indicate that we stemmed from a long line of Ag. Labs (agricultural labourers) and the like ~ salt of the earth folks ~ but somewhere, someone mentioned that our Blades family might be connected to Sir George R. Blades, Lord Mayor of London in 1926. Wow! Wouldn't that be exciting! For months, a few of us hunted and searched and emailed to find the missing link. Alas, nothing to date. Guess we weren't named in the will.
As I mentioned above, I thought that my mother's immediate family (plus 2) were our only relatives in Canada. We knew of many others in "the old country" but believed that just this one band had made the trek to the New World. Not so! There are several other related branches here in Ontario. They're alive and well and willing to share their stories! What a find! The part that puzzles me is that my grandparents must have known about these others ~ they are fairly closely related to her ~ but I never heard mention of them and neither had my mother or aunt.
Which brings me to another point. My research has taught me many things but one of the most important is about asking the questions. Case in point: My Aunt Nan [sic] came to Canada from Scotland in 1926. We knew that she landed at Halifax and travelled from there to Hamilton to the home of her uncle, George Blades where she lived for a time while she worked as a domestic in a home in Hamilton. In 2008, the Canadian passenger lists from 1865-1935 became available on Ancestry.ca. I found Nan (Agnes Kyle Ross), age 18 arriving aboard the Athenia into Halifax on 11 April 1926. Great! Print, file, and check that document off the list. But wait.........a further look at that list indicated that Agnes was the niece of someone else on board. Really!?! Who was she traveling with? Normally on these lists, family groups are written together but in Nan's case, the names immediately above and below didn't seem to be connected to her. So, I studied the other names on the page and noticed that only one couple, Robert and Catherine Miller from Larkhall, Scotland were destined for Hamilton, Ontario as well. Their contact in Hamilton was Catherine Miller's brother, William Hamilton. When I mentioned this to my mother, it meant nothing to her but when I told my aunt, her sister, she said immediately, "Oh, yes. Larkhall is where our mother's family was from." Arghh! I had been researching the family for 4 years by that time and not once had I heard of Larkhall! The moral of the story: Always ask the questions. The problem with that moral: We don't always know which questions to ask.
Since I am so totally enthralled by the process of discovering my roots, I think others should be as well.......not so, I have found! When 2 genealogists meet, it won't be long before the conversation gravitates toward who has found what and where one might look to find more. Often, others in the room visibly glaze and since I have gone on much longer than originally planned, I'm sure you are glazing, too. So, for now, I will stop.
When we were growing up, our extended family played a big part in our lives. Not necessarily on a daily basis but several times a year we would visit grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins, get together for picnics and Christmas parties, etc. especially on my mother's side of the family. The Canadian branch of the Ross clan was (and is) very large but everyone knew everyone else in the immediate group. As far as we knew, these were the only relatives we had in Canada (with the exception of one of my grandmother's brothers and one of her cousins).
Robert and Maggie Ross had emigrated to Canada in 1927 with 6 of their surviving 8 children (there had been 11 in all!). The two older children, Nan and Bob, had come over separately from Scotland in 1926 ahead of the rest and had stayed with Maggie's brother, George Blades and his wife, Jessie in Hamilton. Nan had just turned 18 and Bob was only 16 when they left their family and sailed across the Atlantic to a new life in an unknown country. It would be many months before the whole family was back together again. I think of my own children and wonder if I would have been able to let them do that.
My mother, the youngest of the children, remembers nothing of Scotland or the voyage across as she was only 3 years old and I'm sad that we did not think to ask the older ones about their memories before they passed away. Such a lot of history gone and so many gaps to fill in.
Which brings me to the request mentioned in the title. Conversation amongst the "oldsters" (i.e., my father, mother, and brothers) often included names of family members outside our walls. The "Remember When" stories recounted funny things that were said and done, wise sayings, and memories of days and people gone by. It didn't dawn on me that my children didn't know who we were talking about until one day my daughter, Emily, said, that she had no idea who her relatives were/are. Names came up and stories were told but they didn't mean to her what they obviously meant to the older generation. "Can you put them on a piece of paper so that I can see how they all fit together?" she asked.
........and that was the beginning. What began as an attempt to answer Emily's question has resulted in an exciting (some might say all-consuming) quest for family ties that have reached back and out much further than I ever thought they would or could. Initially, I told her that there wasn't a piece of paper in the world big enough to accommodate the relatives that I knew and now, 5 years hence, I know there isn't. We have almost 2700 souls on our tree!
So far, I haven't mentioned my father's family. Not because they don't factor in but because they (I thought) were a much smaller group and very tight-lipped. Even while growing up, when adult conversations wash over young ears, there were so many instances when talk was hushed. In my memory, rooms were often dark and quiet. The MacDonalds and Wrights that I knew were fine people but our visits with then were very different from the laughing and raucous uproar that usually accompanied a meeting of the Ross clan.
There you have my starting points. I put to paper all that I "knew" about who was who and checked in with my mom and her sister, Bett to fill in some of the Ross family blanks. As there were no living Wrights or MacDonalds that I felt I could ask, my mom gave me details that she could remembered. My sister-in-law, Pat, in Ottawa was on the hunt for the MacDonald side as well and she managed to uncover some of the early history of the family in Ontario and traced some of the lines back to Nova Scotia, England and Scotland.
If you haven't already noticed, the names we seek are oh so common (Ross, Blades, Wright, MacDonald/McDonald, and later Scott, Cole, McArdle, and Patterson) making searches difficult. Many times we have asked, "Is that 'our' Samuel? William? Elizabeth?" In the Wright tree, we have had to resort to naming them Sam I, Sam II, and Sam III just to keep them straight in our minds. Not much different on the Ross side where there are no fewer than 4 men named William Black Ross. But genealogy is a puzzle and, as with jigsaw puzzles where many of the pieces look as if they will fit, it's often a matter of trial and error mixed with a good dose of common sense that leads to a breakthrough........and when that breakthrough comes, what a feeling of accomplishment!!
When I first began my search, I knew nothing about researching families. I had no idea what resources were available and actually hand-produced a family tree from scratch using the programme, Publisher. Every person was fitted into a box with name, date and place of birth (if known), and date and place of death (if known/applicable). Yes, I used red for girls and blue for boys (I'm so very visual) and drew lines between the boxes to denote marriages and offspring. One page per family unit. Yikes! As I think back on it now, I realize how much work that was and how unnecessary. It was not, however, futile. By going through that monumental exercise, I gained a better understanding of the various branches and how they all connected.
Through a Google search, I found and purchased a tree-builder programme called Great Family which did produce a more professional looking tree but it didn't really do what I wanted it to so I was soon looking for something more suited to my needs. About this time, I began to find others who were engaged in family searches of their own and soon we were exchanging success stories and road blocks and sources and software. What a boon! A whole world opened up to me ~ mailing lists, Rootsweb, Yahoo Groups, Ancestry, Genes Reunited.....the list goes on and on. There are 68 websites bookmarked in my Genealogy folder alone! And each one has offered up at least one tidbit of information which leads to another and then another.
That's the problem with genealogy........it's never done. I suffer from that researcher's affliction, G.A.D.D., Genealogist's Attention Deficit Disorder. When I sit down at the computer to complete a tree task, I try very hard to stick to the one branch or family that I'm working on at the time. On average, that lasts about 10 minutes. Picture it......a search using the programme, Ancestry, results in successfully finding the birth/marriage/or death record of the person you were looking for. Hurrah!! Success!! Then, on the same page, you notice another name that seems to ring a bell somewhere in the recesses of your mind (mine are getting deeper all the time!). Well, while you're here, you might as well check it out. No sense wasting the opportunity. You might forget and not be able to find it next time......(the excuses are endless). In no time at all, you have wandered well away from your original intent and have to retrace your steps to see where you started. That's why I always have a pad and pen beside me when researching. When I find myself veering off, I write down the name of the person that was the beginning of my search so that I can come back to it later. Works well when I remember to write it down. Ah well, that's when I blame my other condition ~ Old Timer's Disease. Like finding Easter eggs you hid yourself, all discoveries are exciting..........but I digress.
Back to my contacts.......I wish that I had been more careful in the beginning to document what I found where and who introduced me to whom. Even now, when I get on a roll, I forget to make note of where the information came from and date the entry. When I look back over data that I collected early on, I have to think carefully about where it came from but other seekers are always welcome. This searching for roots would be an impossible task without them. I've discovered that many people have various bits of information about my families. None of us has the market cornered and we all help each other fill in the blanks. Care must be taken, though, to ensure that information that is given and received is accurate. Too many wild goose chases have resulted from assuming that a piece of information is correct. For example, all the research seemed to indicate that we stemmed from a long line of Ag. Labs (agricultural labourers) and the like ~ salt of the earth folks ~ but somewhere, someone mentioned that our Blades family might be connected to Sir George R. Blades, Lord Mayor of London in 1926. Wow! Wouldn't that be exciting! For months, a few of us hunted and searched and emailed to find the missing link. Alas, nothing to date. Guess we weren't named in the will.
As I mentioned above, I thought that my mother's immediate family (plus 2) were our only relatives in Canada. We knew of many others in "the old country" but believed that just this one band had made the trek to the New World. Not so! There are several other related branches here in Ontario. They're alive and well and willing to share their stories! What a find! The part that puzzles me is that my grandparents must have known about these others ~ they are fairly closely related to her ~ but I never heard mention of them and neither had my mother or aunt.
Which brings me to another point. My research has taught me many things but one of the most important is about asking the questions. Case in point: My Aunt Nan [sic] came to Canada from Scotland in 1926. We knew that she landed at Halifax and travelled from there to Hamilton to the home of her uncle, George Blades where she lived for a time while she worked as a domestic in a home in Hamilton. In 2008, the Canadian passenger lists from 1865-1935 became available on Ancestry.ca. I found Nan (Agnes Kyle Ross), age 18 arriving aboard the Athenia into Halifax on 11 April 1926. Great! Print, file, and check that document off the list. But wait.........a further look at that list indicated that Agnes was the niece of someone else on board. Really!?! Who was she traveling with? Normally on these lists, family groups are written together but in Nan's case, the names immediately above and below didn't seem to be connected to her. So, I studied the other names on the page and noticed that only one couple, Robert and Catherine Miller from Larkhall, Scotland were destined for Hamilton, Ontario as well. Their contact in Hamilton was Catherine Miller's brother, William Hamilton. When I mentioned this to my mother, it meant nothing to her but when I told my aunt, her sister, she said immediately, "Oh, yes. Larkhall is where our mother's family was from." Arghh! I had been researching the family for 4 years by that time and not once had I heard of Larkhall! The moral of the story: Always ask the questions. The problem with that moral: We don't always know which questions to ask.
Since I am so totally enthralled by the process of discovering my roots, I think others should be as well
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