Current Plat Book for St. Louis County, Minnesota

Paula Stuart-Warren  Maps, Minnesota  Leave a comment

The 2012 editions of the St. Louis County Minnesota Land Atlas and Plat Books are now available. This county is in Northeastern Minnesota and runs north to the Canadian border. Duluth, Hibbing, Hermantown, Chisholm, Ely, Eveleth, and the famous Embarass are some of the cities in this beautiful county. It also includes parts of Superior National Forest, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, and Voyageurs National Park. The southeast part of the county borders Lake Superior.

Because of the vast land that this county covers, there are two parts, one for the northern half and another for the southern half. The books show detailed land ownership and property size, along with roads, lakes, section boundaries, and other reference data.

For purchase details in today’s Duluth News-Tribune click here. Or visit the county website here.

Spell it out. Pls. Thx.

Paula Stuart-Warren  Abbreviations, Writing  6 Comments

While working on some family history research today while writing an article I was frustrated by abbreviations that I find online and in books. So, here comes my soapbox for the day. Please spell out the words. Isn’t your family history important enough to do that? If someone is looking for ancestors in a specific state but your abbreviation makes them think it’s the wrong state, you may have just missed out on meeting the person who has the family bible.

  • NE is the postal abbreviation for Nebraska, not Nevada 
  • AK is the postal abbreviation for Alaska, not Arkansas
  • Do you mean city or county when you state “cty” and this does cause geographic angst.
  • Do you and whoever reads your material in the future know the difference between ms, mss, Miss? [In my world, mss is an abbreviation for manuscript; ms is the postal abbreviation for the state of Mississippi, not Massachusetts; and Miss is a designation for a a non-married female]
  • In the rest of my world, b mean born, not baptized. Bap could mean baptized or the person is a Baptist.
  • Did you mean buried when you said b 8 May 1901? Or did that mean born? Heck, I think those are very different things. 
  • Does bp mean birthplace, baptized, or that an ancestor owned stock in a certain fuel company?
  • Does an M or m mean married, male or maybe mad at you?
  • b by MD? Born by Maryland? A doctor was at the birth? Is MD an abbreviation for someone’s name such as Mary Dill, Marvin Dougherty? 
  • Is Margt an abbreviation for Margaret, Margaretta, or Margaretha? 
  • What about M. Jos. Lecompte? Marie Josephine? Monsieur Joseph? 

All this said, if you are transcribing something you definitely need to do that the way something was written. In that case, what you see is what you get. You might add an interpretation in brackets if you have some other knowledge that makes this reliable. [Margaretta?].

You could put a key to abbreviations on your website or in your book or you could avoid abbreviations whenever possible. It’s only a few more keystrokes.

FYI, it’s not TMI to spell out words. BTW, it’s just helping each other. FWIW, remind me if I don’t explain an abbreviation. 1ce you do it, it’s easy.  2day is OK.

Yes, I do abbreviate words at time, but I am going to strive to be a better non-abbreviator in 2012. 2013? Who knows. ROTFL.

FamilySearch keeps growing by giant steps

Paula Stuart-Warren  Databases, FamilySearch  Leave a comment

Today’s press release from FamilySearch relates that “FamilySearch added 31 million new, free records online this past week for Argentina, Canada, Colombia, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Hungary, Italy, Micronesia, New Zealand, Peru, Philippines, Portugal, Russia, and the U.S. What a bonus for those with California roots—over 24 million California birth records were added from 1905 to 1995. Search these and 2.5 billion other records now for free at FamilySearch.org.”

When you arrive at the main page, scroll down to “Browse by Location” and click on a country name. That opens up a long list of digitized records and many indexes that are free for anyone to use. You may need to sign in to view some. It doesn’t cost anything to become a registered user. While there you might consider signing up to help index some of the records that are images only!

I keep wondering about statistics of the FamilySearch website and I found what I needed on the bottom of this page: https://www.familysearch.org/news. It doesn’t say when the statistics were last updated, but they are still fascinating. The  date the FamilySearch website made its debut was 24 May 1999. I remember that well.

Number of names in searchable databases:  Over 1 billion
Number of hits since launch:  Over 15 billion
Number of visitors since launch:  Over 150 million
Number of pages viewed since launch:  Over 5 billion
Number of hits per day:  Over 10 million
Number of visitors per day:  Over 50,000
Number of pages viewed per day:  Over 1 million
Number of registered users:  Over 1 million

FGS Radio March 3d: Technology & Marketing

Paula Stuart-Warren  Federation of Genealogical Societies, FGS, FGS Radio  Leave a comment

Join us for the next episode of FGS Radio – My Society, an Internet radio show on Blog talk Radio presented by the Federation of Genealogical Societies. The Saturday, March 3d show is “Technology & Marketing Workshop for Genealogy Societies.”

This week’s host is Thomas MacEntee and he will answer your questions about the latest in technology and marketing for your genealogy society. Call in your questions during the show at  +1 (619) 638-8565 or email
your questions ahead of time to [email protected] or join in the helpful online chat room during the show. Afterwards, there’ll be a list of resources discussed during the show on the FGS Voice website (http://voice.fgs.org).

The Delaware Genealogical Society, an FGS Member Society, is the featured organization in the weekly Society Spotlight.

Tune in to FGS Radio – My Society each week to learn more about genealogy societies and join in a discussion of the issues impacting the genealogical community.

Click this link to set a reminder or to tune in at 2:00 EST, 1:00 CST, Noon MST, and 11:00 PST. http://www.blogtalkradio.com/mysociety/2012/03/03/technology-marketing-workshop-for-genealogy-societies 

Last post for Black History Month

Paula Stuart-Warren  African American, Newspaper Indexes, Newspapers  Leave a comment

By chance this morning I came across a wonderful Minnesota Black Newspaper Index. It was compiled in 2002 by Brendan Henehan. He wrote: “This is an informal index of newspapers that I have compiled over the past several years. It is not meant to be an exhaustive listing of topics. I have looked at each of the newspapers listed in the Newspaper Key of this index, quickly scanning them for topics of interest to me. You’ll notice particular passions of mine: baseball, media and the law. Yet I have tried to be general in my interests as well. Each of the papers listed in the key are available at the Minnesota Historical Society except for the New York Age, which is available at the University of Minnesota’s Wilson Library.”

He indexed 15 newspaper titles and the index is on the Minnesota Historical Society’s website. The index includes a key to the newspaper titles that are abbreviated in the index.

I found several items I want to check based on my own research and lecture interests:

Adams, J. Q.: Founder of St. Paul Afro-American League, AP 11-9-1889 p1 c2
Advertisement:  Wanted: 10 good colored families for N. Dakota TCG 1-17-1920 p1 c3
WPA: Transient camp in Mendota has 108 Black men MSP 3-6-1936 p1 c6
WP:A Twin Cities survey of Blacks TCH 4-4-1936 p1 c5
Bundrant, J. W:. Forms Black World War I unit TCS 4-14-1917 p2 c2
Carey, Talmadge: To wed Theresa Ray 8-8 at St. Peter Claver MSP 8-10-1945 p7 c3
Carey, Talmadge: Photo of wedding to Theresa Ray MSP 8-24-1945 p3 c3
Carter, Charles: Former slave dies, came to Mpls in 1883 TCL 8-24-1940 p2 c5
Goins, Homer Former St. Paul officer dies at 42 TCH 8-27-1932 p4 c1
Goins, Homer Obituary of former St. Paul police officer TCH 9-3-1932 p1 c2

And that’s just the beginning of the articles that interest me!

University of Iowa yearbooks now online

Paula Stuart-Warren  Iowa, Yearbooks  Leave a comment

Do you have an ancestor who attended the University of Iowa? The Iowa City institution has recently completed a project to digitize the Hawkeye yearbooks from 1892-1992. One hundred year’s worth of great information for genealogists. Access this great resource here: http://digital.lib.uiowa.edu/yearbooks. The website warns that the year book was a project of the junior class and reflects the year of graduation, not the year of publication. Confusing? Yes.

This is part of the greater Iowa Digital Library project.

New Romanian Genealogical Society

Paula Stuart-Warren  Genealogical Societies  2 Comments

This was written by my friend, Vicki Albu.

I am a product of the American “melting pot.” Through genealogy I have discovered Irish, German, Norwegian, hillbilly, and Mormon Pioneer ancestors. Few ethnic traditions survived the four-plus generations that most of my family have been in this country. For years my genealogy “brick wall” has been my Romanian great-grandfather, Ilie Moisescu, who was born in 1875 in what was then Austria-Hungary, and emigrated to the U.S. in 1911. The Twin Cities and especially South St. Paul were popular destinations for Romanian immigrants in the early 20th century, and there are many people of Romanian descent who still live in this area. But I rarely encounter anyone involved in Romanian genealogy, and I know of only one or two Romanian family history organizations in the U.S., if not in the world. Befriended by Romanians who came to this country in the 1990s, my interest grew stronger. I became almost obsessed with my Romanian heritage, and developed a fondness for eggplant, visinata, and sarmale (popular Romanian foods). In 2009, we formed the Heritage Organization of Romanian Americans in Minnesota (www.hora-mn.org) to educate others about Romanian culture and traditions.

At my friends’ urgings, and upon reflection of my tough grandmother’s advice that if you want something done you will need to do it yourself, I decided to form a Romanian Genealogy Society in Minnesota. On November 18, 2011 we held the first meeting of the Romanian Genealogy Society, attended by sixteen people who braved our first seasonal Minnesota snowstorm. I was thrilled at the turnout, because I had known so few people to be researching Romanian ancestors. Officers are Vicki Young Albu, president; Dorrene Dragos Hern, secretary; and Peggy Corniea, treasurer. Our next membership meeting was at the Minnesota Genealogical Society (MGS) on February 18, and we’ve issued our first newsletter.

We are in the process of becoming an official branch group of MGS, and will participate in the Central & East European Family History Conference at Inver Hills Community College on April 27-28, 2012, with three planned presentations on Romanian research. I am getting almost daily e-mails from people all over the U.S., Canada and Romania, asking about the Romanian Genealogy Society! Things are moving so fast; I am learning so much, and I don’t know why I waited this long to “just do it.” If you have any questions or to sign up for a mailing list, please contact Vicki Young Albu by e-mail at [email protected]. Membership dues for the RGS are $20.00 per calendar year per household, beginning in 2012. We welcome photos and stories about all Romanian-American families, especially those with connections to Minnesota and the Midwest.

Follow the RGS news on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RomanianGenealogySociety

Research in the 1940 census is 36 days away!

Paula Stuart-Warren  census  2 Comments

April 2, 2012 is the date the 1940 U.S. census images will be released online. The census forms are released 72 years after they were taken. I am looking forward to looking at the households of several relatives and am trying to be patient. Patience is not one of my good qualities!

To see a short video that will help you prepare for the research click here. Connie Potter, an archivist from the National Archives makes a short presentation to help you get ready for April 2d. The census won’t yet be indexed, but you can narrow down the area to search by using known addresses, addresses obtained from old city directories or telephone books, or old family letters from the time period that might be around your home.I have a list of addresses from city directories and have begin to narrow down the area to search by using the census enumeration maps.

Wish it were fully indexed? I do too, that’s why I signed up to help index this important research resource. Archives.com, brightsolid, and FamilySearch are partnering to promote this volunteer indexing project. Please join me and other family historians in this endeavor by signing up here. Our indexing results will be FREE and online.

I just know that two neat parts of the 1940 census will help my research tremendously. First, it identifies who supplied the information for the household. Second, it lists where someone was living in 1935. Oh, I hope the latter part solves some location issues.

For more on the 1940 census, visit these websites:

Social Security Death Index access is threatened. We need to react!

Paula Stuart-Warren  RPAC, SSDI  1 Comment

I was planning to wax (maybe eloquently) about the recent political mess regarding access to the Social Security Death Index (SSDI). That’s what we genealogists call it but the Social Security Administration (SSA) calls it the Death Master File. I use the SSDI frequently in my research. It helps me in research cases for county, state, and federal court cases, in cases of locating missing heirs, to help Indian tribes with enrollment issues, to clear land titles, and many other issues including researching my own family history. It has become more important to me in recent years as I am trying to locate more relatives or their descendants in relation to hereditary medical issues. I don’t want to lose this resource.

I wish all banks, the IRS, state tax departments, credit card companies, insurance providers, and other businesses would check this long-time easily available resource to see if someone is illegitimately using a deceased person’s Social Security number. The SSA is part of the federal government and so is the IRS. But the IRS hasn’t used the FREE SSDI to check if all Social Security numbers used on tax returns are legitimate! Yes, you read that correctly. SSDI access is being threatened due to fraudulent tax returns. Duh, the IRS should have been checking the numbers. We all need to sign a petition to keep the SSDI accessible and to have the IRS use it.

My words stop here other than to give you three vital tasks:

  • I suggest you read the words of a colleague and friend, Polly Kimmitt, CG, President of the Massachusetts Genealogical Council:  http://pk-pollyblog.blogspot.com/. Her eloquent entry about the SSDI and the genealogical community is dated February 6th and says it better than I could.
  • Then check out the Records Preservation and Access section of the Federation of Genealogical Societies website for more details. RPAC is a committee of the Federation of Genealogical Societies, National Genealogical Society, and the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies. It is supported by other major genealogical organizations. http://fgs.org/
  • Lastly vote on the issue  http://wh.gov/khE  and then contact all your congressional reps to let them know your feelings on the subject. Together we can get this addressed.

Heck, there’s one more thing for you to do! Share this info and links with fellow family historians and everyone else. We need lots of signatures by March.

p.s. I signed the petition as #1429

California African American Genealogical Society 35th Anniversary Conference

Paula Stuart-Warren  Conferences/Institutes, Seminars  Leave a comment

Next Saturday, 18 February 2012, I will be the speaker for the California African American Genealogical Society’s seminar in Los Angeles. I have several friends who are members of the CAAGS and I look forward to making new friends. I will be presenting these four lectures with both a general outlook and with some specific African American research angles.

  • Tho’ They Were Poor, They May Have Been Rich in Records
  • Genealogy & the Internet: Make it Work for You”
  • Railroad Records & Railroad History: Methods for Tracking”
  • Southern Records

Please join us for a fun and educational day. For registration information: www.caags.org/caagsflyer.pdf.
To learn more about CAAGS:  http://www.caags.org/