Have You Read the September 2024 Issue of the National Genealogical Society Quarterly?

The September 2024 issue of the National Genealogical Society Quarterly (NGSQ), Volume 112, No. 3, is available online in the members-only section of the website.

The NGSQ is published four times per year in March, June, September, and December.

CONTENTS

FEATURE ARTICLES

• "Same Name, Many Men: Joseph Reynolds in Early Greene County, Tennessee," by Donna G. White-Dropkin, CG
• "Uncovering the Jesse Wood Family of Amherst and Nelson Counties, Virginia," by Deborah R. Harvey, CG
• "A Family for Susanna Stonum of Richmond County, Virginia," by Kimball G. Carter, CG

EDITORS’ CORNER

• Time Travelers

SIDELIGHTS

• A Sweet "Seatsation"

REVIEWS

• Usner, Daniel H. Native American Women and the Burdens of Southern History. Reviewed by Darcie Hind Posz, CG, FASG
• Brown, Darius M. At the Feet of the Elders: A Journey into a Lowcountry Family History. Reviewed by Nancy A. Peters, CG, CGL
• Curran, Robert Emmett. American Catholics and the Quest for Equality
  in the Civil War Era. Reviewed by David M. Morehouse, JD, BCL, MSc, CG
• Bell, Caryn Cossé. Creole New Orleans in the Revolutionary Atlantic, 1775–1877. Reviewed by Christophe Landry, PhD
• Webster, Rachel Jamison. Benjamin Banneker and Us: Eleven Generations
  of an American Family. Reviewed by Jari C. Honora, CG
• Roberts, Gary Boyd. The Royal Descents of 900 Immigrants to the American Colonies, Quebec, or the United States who were Themselves Notable or Left Descendants Notable in American History, 3 vols., 2nd ed. Reviewed by David M. Morehouse, JD, BCL, MSc, CG
• Roulston, William J. Researching Scots-Irish Ancestors: The Essential Genealogical Guide to Early Modern Ulster, 1600–1800. 2nd ed. Reviewed by Mary Wiley Campbell, CG
• Ryskamp, George R., Peggy Ryskamp, and H. Leandro Soria. Mastering Spanish Handwriting and Documents: 1520–1820. Reviewed by Maria Wittwer, CG, AG
• La Marca, Jeffry P. Simple Citations for Genealogical Sources. Reviewed by Eva Holmes, CG, AG
• Benes, Peter. Fruits of the Tree of Life: New Discoveries. Reviewed by Bryna O’Sullivan
• Tabor, Nick. Africatown: America’s Last Slave Ship and the Community It Created. Reviewed by Jim Ellis, PhD
• Christensen, Liv Birgit and Margaret H. Strand. Exploring Norwegian Genealogy. Reviewed by J. H. Fonkert, CG
• Sperry, Kip. Genealogical Research in Ohio. Reviewed by J. H. Fonkert, CG

 SEPTEMBER 2024 #iReadtheQ QUIZ

1. Who were Henry Reynolds’s documented wives?
2. In 1857 Ellender (Reynolds) Reeves tried to perfect her title on land in Gasconade County, Missouri. Who offered a supporting affidavit?
3. Who was the father of Joseph Reynolds who married Leah White in 1808?
4. Who did Joseph Reynolds and Leah White’s son Joseph marry? In what year?
5. What is the significance of the potential sibling gaps between Jane Wood (born 1771) and Richard Wood (born 1781)?
6. What specific types of records were used to hypothesize Jesse Wood’s parental relationships?
7. Which family members' names suggest a pattern of naming after Jesse Wood’s maternal relatives?
8. What challenges did multiple relationships among test takers present in the analysis of shared DNA segments?
9. Which parish records first show Susanna Stonum associated with her husband William?
10. What geographical feature divided the land of William and Susanna Stonum from William Norris’s land?
11. Who did George Cammel (Campbell) marry?
12. How is Suckey Norris Davenport related to Susanna (Norris) Stonum?
13. How does Daniel Usner’s book challenge past narratives about Native American women during periods of conflict and enslavement?
14. What type of sources does Brown use to enrich the narrative of his family’s history in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina?

Remember, we'll email answers to the quiz to NGS members in November and invite you to join us in the #iReadtheQ and Genealogy Methods community on FORUM. (If you need assistance with FORUM, visit the Help/FAQs page.)

 

Is There a Llolf in Your Family Tree?

 

The Llolf

By Juliana Szucs

By now, you’ve likely heard a lot about artificial intelligence (AI) and its many uses as well as its potential drawbacks. The other day I happened across a YouTube video that morphed various animals and creatures like dragons into composites of sorts. Just for fun I looked for a way to try it for free and found a link to create one on Canva. It took me all of two minutes to combine two of my favorite animals, a llama and a wolf, into what I guess you could call a Llolf. It occurred to me that when we use online tools and resources to build our family tree, we could be inadvertently doing the same thing with our ancestors.

Many popular websites now use forms of AI to suggest new records and ancestors. You have this person in your tree and a website like Ancestry might suggest a match to a record or to a person in someone else’s tree. But as with my composite Llolf, you may be combining two different animals of the human variety. So how do we go about making sure we don’t take our family history down the wrong path?

Does the Timeline Make Sense?

Create a timeline based on everything you know about a person. Is the record created in the place where your ancestor lived at that time? Are there inconsistencies? For example, did your great-great-grandmother really give birth at age six?  Is someone somehow appearing as living in records years after he or she is known to have died?

Research the Whole Family and Then Some

Use a whole family approach to research. Conduct lineal research on direct ancestors as well as on siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and the whole clan. Then go beyond and make a list of people beyond your family who were associated with them: your ancestor’s FAN club (friends, associates, and neighbors). All can be useful in identifying the correct person in the records. 

Use the Genealogical Proof Standard, or ECARC            

The Genealogical Proof Standard (or GPS) describes the standards recommended by the Board for Certification of Genealogists for reaching a sound conclusion in genealogical research. So, then what’s an ECARC? Just a simple mnemonic that helps me remember the steps to making my research as solid as possible.

·       E is for Exhaustive Search. Go beyond suggested records and do manual searches to make sure there are not other candidates that look like your ancestor on paper.

·      C is to Cite Your Sources. Know the provenance of the records you are using and—as we talked about in the recent blog post Family History Jumpstart: Get to Know the Records—know why and how they were created.

·      A is for Analyze Your Findings. Again. we want to make sure the timeline makes sense. Does everything in the record match up with what you know about your ancestor?

·       R is for Resolving Conflicting Evidence. If the answer to the previous question is no, can you explain why it doesn’t match up without rearranging the boundaries of space and time? Read the records and examine original documents or images where they are available to ensure everything is correct.

·       C is for Writing Your Conclusion. And trust me, this one is a biggie. I’ve been writing about family history for more than twenty-six years now, and you can believe me when I say that if you ever want to find a hole in a theory you’ve been holding, just write about it. The act of putting your rationale for a conclusion into writing will show you exactly where you need to shore up your research.

Sure, creating hybrids of animals can be fun, but in family history research, they can cost you time and energy spent researching the wrong family. And while their family story may be an interesting diversion, it’s probably not nearly as fascinating to you as your own people’s stories.

Native American Heritage Month

In 1990, a congressional resolution designated November as National American Indian Heritage Month, a time to celebrate and honor the culture and traditions of America’s Indigenous Peoples. This is a good time for family historians to uncover the stories of Native American ancestry. But where do we start? 

• Document any oral history that may have been passed down and ask multiple relatives what stories they’ve heard. Look for common threads in the stories that are shared with you.
• Use traditional research methods, tracing the family with census, vital, religious, military, and other records to trace your family lineage and identify potential Native American ancestors and their specific tribes.
• Research the history of relevant locations, including tribal nations, forced removals, and original settlements, to provide context for your family's story. Knowing the history is critical to successful research.
• Investigate your entire family, including collateral relatives. Family structure can be key in ancestor identification, and records of extended family members may contain additional clues.
• Explore records created through US government interactions with Native American tribes, such as Indian census records and the Dawes Rolls, available on genealogy websites like FamilySearch and Ancestry, as well as the National Archives. 
• Examine religious records. Your native ancestors’ first interaction with Europeans may have been missionaries. Again, knowing the area's history may tip you off to what religious records might include your relative. 
• Remember that spelling wasn’t always important to our forebears. Watch for and search using similar names or variants in collections that may have recorded your ancestor. 
• Dig deep into local records, including manuscript collections, storekeepers' account books, and residents' diaries, for details to enrich your family history. Seek out American Indian-specific collections, such as allotments, removal records, school records, and interactions with the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and other entities.

For more tips and resources for tracing your Native American ancestry, see the following:

• The National Archives and Records Administration
• Bureau of Indian Affairs 
• National Parks Service
• FamilySearch
• Cyndi’s List
• Free PDF for Researching Your American Indian Ancestors on Ancestry
• NGS Culture Conversation with Filmmaker Alicia Hawkins, November 2023 (free)

Articles in the NGS Magazine archive (free benefit for NGS members):

Deeben, John. “Trail of Tears, Part I: Census Rolls Relating to Indian Removals,” NGS Magazine, Jul/Aug/Sep 2013, vol. 39‐3, page 38.

Deeben, John. “Trail of Tears, Part II: Emigration Lists & Reservation Applications,” NGS Magazine, Oct/Nov/Dec 2013, vol. 39‐4, page 37.

Muhn, Judy Nimer. “Researching Children in Indian Boarding Schools,” NGS Magazine, Jan/Feb/Mar 2022, vol. 48‐1, page 22.

Stuart‐Warren, Paula. “Researching Your American Indian Ancestry,” NGS Magazine, vol. Jan/Feb/Mar 2005, vol 31‐1, page 43