Family and FriendsGenealogy

The rewards of genealogy

Last night, suffering from a long day and a pinch of insomnia, and frustrated with modern, medical science’s ability to put me to sleep, I posted an entry that wasn’t exactly an advertisement for genealogy. As it happens, I enjoy it immensely – whatever the reasons may be. If I may, I’d like to bore you with one family member in particular I’ve been studying who…
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Family and FriendsGenealogy

The meaning of roots

I’ve been doing a lot work on my family tree this week. I found a few new possible branches, but mostly I’ve been cleaning up, and there’s a lot of it left to do. I do most of my research online, and one set of data lives there. Another set, my master copy, lives on my hard drive, mirrored on a second, AND backed up to a remote server. Yes, I’m that paranoid. You may see…
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Genealogy

Rods and cones

Call it generational bias. Blame it on the way history is taught in school (with one exception, in my case). The world before 1960 seems black and white. I hear it in the stories older generations tell. It’s not, of course. The world isn’t just filled with gray, it’s filled with all the colors of the spectrum. I’ve been fooling around with a birthday gift the last few days…
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Kitchen Sink

They came on a truck

A few months ago life presented us with a rare opportunity. My aunt was moving to a smaller place and couldn’t keep all of her furniture. We got a call, asking us if we wanted it – otherwise she would have to sell it or give it away. Normally Cheryl would answer a question like this with an unqualified and unequivocal: “No, we’ve already got too much stuff.” It became…
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