Who are the members of your family? 52 Questions W3

This week I will focus on the following question -

Who are the members of your family?

Good follow-up questions that easily go with this question are:
Are you married? [Where? When? And to Whom?]
Did you have any children? [What are their names? Why did you choose your children's names?]

Who is your oldest living relative?
What is the most enjoyable memory of time spent with your family?
What traditions are still practiced in your family?

This question is where you begin building your tree. The first two questions were about you. The rest of the 50 questions focus on your relations and links to other members of your family tree.

Your immediate family includes the father, mother, and children. Your extended family includes the grandparents and their children, the aunts and uncles, and their children, the cousins. Direct ancestors are your parents, grandparents, great grandparents, great great grandparents, etc. Direct ancestors are not aunts, uncles, or cousins. This weeks question pertains to your immediate and extended family which includes your direct ancestors.

Printed Pedigree Charts come in all shapes and sizes. They are handy for tracking your direct ancestors.

Some are offer places to enter more details and pictures.

Some can look intimidating but are very functional.

They all serve to show you in a visual way what direct ancestors you have information about and who you do not. Most of the genealogy websites have similar Pedigree Charts. However they also allow you to easily view your extended family members.

FamilySearch offers three different tree views starting with the landscape tree.

FamilySearch later released their popular fan chart.

The newest FamilySearch chart is the decendency tree. This tree shows not only direct ancestors but also their descendants.

Ancestry also offers a landscape pedigree chart.

There is also the ancestry decendency chart. Both ancestry trees allow you to upload images as well as link people to Facebook and display their current profile pictures.

There are so many different websites that offer tree views of your family. It would be impossible to show them all. The above are the pages I see and use the most.

I use Legacy as a personal database where I am the only on who enters data. There is a pedigree view.

As well as an immediate family view.

It also go beyond a pedigree view so you can add sources and other information about each individual.

It is important that as you gather information about your relatives that you not only record the information but also record where you got the information. We will discuss this at a later date. Make sure to at least write down the information that you gather and a note as to how you got the information. You can also try out a database like legacy for free if you want.

Feedback - 

My second week of family Facebook posts produced much more responses than I imagined. I did go back and answer the first weeks question for myself. I received 15 total responses between the two questions. That is over 375% growth over last week. I think I will follow this pattern and see if the responses continue to build.

The Roots of Family Traditions and the Stories We Should Tell

I was driving my 17 year old to work and we were running a little late. She had taken a shower and dried her hair but planned on putting on her makeup in the car. This is a custom I have seen her do many times as we have rushed to different events. This time however, we were riding in my little truck. I have grown to love my truck. It has taken me on many adventures as well as many more routine trips. In a couple more years it will officially be a classic. The classic features of my truck include windows rolled by hand and an enthusiastically uncharged air conditioning. As the temperature rises I have  I have become accustomed to riding everywhere with the window down.

As my daughter struggled to apply her makeup she patiently asked that I roll the window up. As I complied she began to paint. As we got a couple miles into our drive she asked why it was so hot in the cab of the truck. It was then that in dawned on her that windows were down to control the temperature and not for my simple pleasure. As I thought about this, my wife is always asking me to roll up the window in our new car. The wind from driving with the window down in pleasurable to me but distracting to her. My daughter was asking me to do the same without realizing why I had the window down. I did not realize that I have been driving my whole life with the window down. It was only recently, to me, that we have had a car with air conditioning. Where my daughter has come to expect the convenience.

I am not trying to wax nostalgic but only illustrate that customs and traditions are passed down from generation, sometime out of necessity. Some customs become traditions with out us realizing it and others without our intent. It reminds me of a story I heard once. I can't remember if I heard it in a cooking class at school or a talk in church. Snopes tells me it may be an urban legend, but it still rings true to me.

The story goes something like, a young bride is cooking her first Thanksgiving dinner. She is using the new set of pans and dishes to make every delicacy the has enjoyed as well as a couple recipes from her new husband's family. They invited each of their parents to join them for the feast and well as her grandmother. As they sat down to feast, the young husband brings in the turkey to carve it in front of the guests only to be surprised that the legs of the turkey have already been cut off. He asks his lovely bride why the legs have already been detached and she replies, "That's how my mother always did it". Her mother quickly adds, "It helps to keep the breast meat from overcooking and becoming dry. That is how my mother taught me to do it too." Satisfied with the answer the groom begins to carve the rest of the beautifully prepared bird when the grandmother says, "I only cut off the legs because it wouldn't fit in the pan I always cooked it in."

I am not sure why I remember this story but It has always stuck with me. Both for good and bad, traditions and customs are passed down family lines. Snopes says that a similar story ran in a Canadian edition of Reader's Digest:

"When my friend Dale opens a can, she always turns it upside down to open it from the bottom. One day her young son asked her why. "I don't really know," she said. "My mom always did it that way." She decided to call her mom and ask. "When we brought the cans up from the cellar, the tops were always dusty," her mother explained. "I couldn't be bothered to clean them, so I turned them upside down and opened the bottom."

Food is a great way to see things passed down through families. These traditions and family favorites can be cultural as well as traditional. My son is serving a mission in Australia. He arrived there in October with is summertime there. In November he was invited to an American families home for dinner. When he arrived they ate a traditional thanksgiving feast. When he related the experience at church the following Sunday only the American's in the congregation truly understood the dinner. The majority of people had only seen and heard of American Thanksgiving. They had never experienced it themselves.

My grandma 'B' always made us fried Spam with Kraft macaroni and cheese. She would put a squirt of ketchup on the plate to dip Spam and in the bowl to stir in with the mac and cheese. I was a teen before I new that this was only considered a delicacy to my grandparents and their grand kids. My grandfather ate many cans of Spam during the great depression years. It was something he could not only afford but could keep without the cost of ice or refrigeration to keep it from going bad. When I was young I even saw him use it as fish bate but that story is for another time.

It is true that corned beef and cabbage is as Irish as spaghetti is Italian.  Both meals are traditional but the custom of corned beef can only be traced to our Irish American ancestors. An article from History.com conveys more accurately the story behind the custom:

"The new wave of immigrants brought their own food traditions, including soda bread and Irish stew. Pork was the preferred meat, since it was cheap in Ireland and ubiquitous on the dinner table. The favored cut was Irish bacon, a lean, smoked pork loin similar to Canadian bacon. But in the United States, pork was prohibitively expensive for most newly arrived Irish families, so they began cooking beef—the staple meat in the American diet—instead.

So how did pork and potatoes become corned beef and cabbage? Irish immigrants to America lived alongside other “undesirable” European ethnic groups that often faced discrimination in their new home, including Jews and Italians. Members of the Irish working class in New York City frequented Jewish delis and lunch carts, and it was there that they first tasted corned beef. Cured and cooked much like Irish bacon, it was seen as a tasty and cheaper alternative to pork. And while potatoes were certainly available in the United States, cabbage offered a more cost-effective alternative to cash-strapped Irish families. Cooked in the same pot, the spiced, salty beef flavored the plain cabbage, creating a simple, hearty dish that couldn’t be easier to prepare."

I remember eating corned beef and cabbage as a child. Far from our Irish roots the cost of the dish was one my family could afford. My dear mother prepared it is a heavy broth with mostly cabbage and spices and thinly sliced corned beef chopped into tiny pieces. It wasn't until I was married and my mother-in-law made corned beef and cabbage that I realized it wasn't traditionally a soup. We also ate beet greens, grilled tuna and cheese, chipped beef on toast [or SOS], broken bread cereal, and fried turnips. I cannot say for sure at the food we ate was because of our own financial status or because these were traditional foods that my parents ate as children.

I know that my parents made cheese fondue. One of my all time favorites where bread, fruit, and meats are dipped into cheese. This traditional food became a fad in the 70s but this is one recipe I make sure I have on occasion. I do not feel as nostalgic about the beet greens or chipped beef on toast but I need to get that turnip recipe from my mom. I also stopped eating mac & cheese with ketchup.

When writing stories about our families do not assume that your children understand what you are talking about or why you did the things you did. I have heard my parents talk about life before television or my grandpa's first ever ride in a car. To our descendants they take these kind of events as everyday things. Much like the new generation of Family Historians who don't leave home to work on their Family History because "everything's on the Internet". To sound like my parents, I remember life before the Internet..... These details in stories add texture and meaning. Hawaiians may appreciate a good Spam sandwich but when I bought two cans last year and fried one up the other stayed in the cupboard for several months.

The stories I tell my kids about my ancestors are those I can remember best. Those stories have color and texture that help me to remember them. Genealogy and Family History needs this to keep people interested past the dates and dashes. Do not let your database strain out all of the facts and figures only to lose the flavor and traditions of your family.

Where were you born? 52 Questions W2

This week I will focus on the following question

- Where were you born? 

Good follow-up questions that easily go with this question are:
When were you born?
In a hospital or at home?
How did your family come to live in this place?
Who else in your family was born in the same place?
Did your parents or siblings like to tell any funny or embarrassing baby stories about you?

The second of the big three data points used in Genealogy and Family History. Location is a unique identified for a person and their family. This question goes hand in hand with who am I? In order to learn about our families we need to know where each person was born. Of these big three genealogical questions it is the last one we can answer for ourselves. I have never had a person tell me where they themselves died and were buried.

Place of birth alone with most locations is time dependent. I have ancestors buried Amite (pronounced A-meat), Mississippi. However, when they were born Mississippi was not a state. It was a territory of France before becoming a state. The area in which they were born was slit in half  when the state boundaries were drawn and the family living in the south end of the area found themselves in Louisiana. Throughout the years modern day Greensburg in St. Helena Parish, Louisiana and the surrounding area has been in three different parishes because of new county boundaries.

It is important to document where people were born at the time of their birth. My relatives from the south could have records in several different places. This part of the world was also part of three different countries and two different religious structures. in some instances there could be records of my ancestors in Cuba, France, and Spain.

As the United States pushed further west and my pioneer ancestors settled in Utah, the boundaries here even began to change. Many of my ancestors who were born in Utah were not born in the united states because Utah did not become a state until 1896.

There is software available called AniMap. The FamilySearch Wiki says:

ANIMAP is a software program that shows the county in which a city/town in the United States was located in any specific year. Many cities and towns have been located in more than one county, or even state, at different points in time. It is essential to know the county and state in which a town was located at the time of a birth, marriage or death to know where the record is located. 

I have used AniMap many times in trying to learn about and study the different locations of my ancestors. I first learned about AniMap from Geoff Rasmussen at Legacy Familytree.

A very similar source for information is the Atlas of historical county boundaries. This website is free to use and allows you to find basically the same information but it seems a little easier to use than AniMap. To quote from the website:

A project of the William M. Scholl Center for American History and Culture at The Newberry Library in Chicago, the Atlas of Historical County Boundaries is a powerful historical research and reference tool in electronic form. The Atlas presents in maps and text complete data about the creation and all subsequent changes (dated to the day) in the size, shape, and location of every county in the fifty United States and the District of Columbia. It also includes non-county areas, unsuccessful authorizations for new counties, changes in county names and organization, and the temporary attachments of non-county areas and unorganized counties to fully functioning counties. The principal sources for these data are the most authoritative available: the session laws of the colonies, territories, and states that created and changed the counties.

Another important aspect of where you were born is how did your family get to this place. This key information can lead you to the next branches of your family tree. My grandmother was born in Reno, Nevada. Something that didn't really click with me when I was younger. I always thought she was born and raised in Utah.

Wilberta Annette Merrian Bartholomew (1922-2001)
[My mother looks so much like her it is scary.]

When the 1940 census was finally released I found her at the age of 17 living with her parents Wilbert and Henrietta. She is also enumerated with her younger brother and sister. The thing I found most interesting is that the family had a lodger at the time who was also enumerated with them.

Click to view larger version

If you can tell the name of the 27 year old lodger is Bartholomew, Dale who was born in Salt Lake City, Utah. Yep, that's my grandpa! The cradle robber! This census was enumerated on 19 April 1940 and they were married 3 October 1940.

A. Dale Bartholomew (1913-2002)
Carpenter and fisherman [and cradle robber]

I have a 17 year old daughter at home this year. I made sure we did not take on any lodgers. I think I would of had to by a gun or something if I were Wilbert.

It was a different time. They were married for 61 years and had four children. They died just over a year apart from each other. They were major influences and care givers in my life.  I love and miss them very much.

Feedback - Security and Success?

Well my first posts to my family face book pages were relatively successful. I posted the first question: What is the name you were given at birth? I received four responses. Compared to the one response I got from my initial posts I made that had the whole questionnaire I received 400% more responses.  I am hoping that if I stay consistent that things will grow and others may go back and respond to my previous posts.

I had one cousin that raised a question about privacy concerns. She said;

I don't mind answering your questions related to genealogy however, I'm a bit hesitant to give answers here on Facebook. It just doesn't seem very secure. Some of these questions are similar to those secret security questions for online account validation. So we need a secure way to exchange information and also some reassurance that the data you collect will be kept & used securely too.

It is sad that we live in the world which we do. She is right, much of the data that I am trying to collect from living members of my family is very similar to data that can be used for secret questions for online account validations. I am not sure how to truly get around this issue while trying to use social media to gather information. It is however only an issue when discussing living people. I quickly gave her an option of printing the entire questionnaire and mailing it to me. I also assured her that the information is kept on my private Legacy database and that I will not publish information to the internet.

I do not believe that the questions in themselves are harmful to post to a private group on the Internet. However, when there is a will, there is a way. I am surprised how many full names, birth dates, email addresses, phone numbers, and other private data that is opening shared on Facebook. An accumulation of this information can open yourself to security issues. Please be careful. I have thought about this with regard to my blog and the information I have posted here. We all need to be very careful with information we share about living people.

Let me know what you think about the question of the week. Would you add any information? Are you worried about security issues?

What is the name you were given at birth? 52 Questions W1

This week I will focus on the following question -

What is the name you were given at birth?

Good follow-up questions that easily go with this question are:
Were you named after a relative or family friend?
Why was your name chosen?
Have you ever had a nickname?
Who gave it to you and why?
What do you know about your family surname?

All family history and genealogy begins with you. When we find the links in our family chain we must begin with ourselves. The same goes for a Family History Questionnaire. The person answering should begin with themselves. Naturally the first question should then be, "What is your name?"

A more accurate question may be, "What is the name you were given at birth?" This question can elicit more than a simple response. Peoples names can change over time, especially women's names. People also have nicknames that can be given in many different ways.

My given name is Mathew A Trotter. The 'A' is just an initial. My father also has just a letter for his middle name. His letter is the first letter of his father's name. My letter is the first letter of my mother's father's name. My initials are M.A.T., this is why my first name only has one 'T'. I have signed my name as Mat, Mathew, and Mathew A. I have also been called Matt and Matthew. In college I rushed a fraternity and they called me Mathias. I had a job during college and the checks were made out to Matthias Trotler. To this day I have many friends that still call me Mathias.

My wife goes by her middle name, Rachel. Her fist name begins with an 'M'. I have received mail addressed to M. R. Trotter that was intended for me instead of my wife. We have a son we call bear. When he was a baby he would curl up in our arms to fall asleep. He would snore and it sounded like a little growl, like a cub. So we called him our bear.

My grandpa used to call my dad Homer. It had something to do with a T.V. show or something. Once the Simpsons came on he stopped using the term. My youngest brother does not remember our dad being called Homer. Until my mother's father died I did not know he was know by his middle name instead of his first name.

My grandpa's name is Richard. My uncle is also names Richard but has gone by Dick for most of his like. According to this Mental Floss article,

"The name Richard is very old and was popular during the Middle Ages. In the 12th and 13th centuries everything was written by hand and Richard nicknames like Rich and Rick were common just to save time. Rhyming nicknames were also common and eventually Rick gave way to Dick and Hick, while Rich became Hitch. Dick, of course, is the only rhyming nickname that stuck over time. And boy did it stick. At one point in England, the name Dick was so popular that the phrase "every Tom, Dick, or Harry" was used to describe Everyman."

These are all personal examples of nicknames and other name changes. My third great-grandmother was named Eliza Metcalf. When she was a baby she met Eliza Snow who was a very well know Latter-day Saint. She was a plural wife of both Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. Her brother was also the fifth president of the LDS church. Eliza Snow's middle name is Rocxy. When she held my great-grandmother she said, "Oh you are named after me." Ever since then her parents called her Eliza Roxey Metcalf.

All names are important when tracking down sources. I have found that a lot of census records contain nicknames of family members. It is important that we keep track of them and know what the possibilities are.

As I have stated in previous posts, I am a Legacy user. In Legacy you can track and source all of the different variations of the names you find.

My relative in the screenshot above had the nickname of Jody. As you can see I have also found information about him under the name John. The 'S' in the column on the right shows I have a source for this name. When I click the books icon in the lower left corner I can see what source is attached to this name.

The 1920 Census list the head of household as John Bartholomew. However his wife's name is Annie, and his children's names are Lila, Dale, Fawn, Arvilla, and Norma. I know my grandfather's family well enough to know that this is his father, mother and siblings.

For some reason the census enumerator entered his name as John. There are many reason's why this may have happened. I do not thin that John has ever been used as a nickname for Joseph. This is clearly a communication or other error. None the less this is a great example of how nicknames can be used to find sources for your family records. Annie is a nickname for Anna, my great-grandmother's first name. Both Dale and Faun are middle names that both my grandfather and his sister go by their middle names.

I hope this weeks questions lead to great sources for you. Let me know if you have any successes.

Family History Questionnaire in 52 Weeks?

I really don't remember the first time I came across the suggestion to send out a questionnaire to members of my family to gather information. I do know that I decided this would be a good idea and I went about putting together one from suggestions on the Internet. I surely did not come up with the idea myself and I did not come up with the questions myself.

Looking back I was more interested in gathering good information than I was at citing who I got the idea or question ideas from. On November 20th last year I made posts in my family groups on Facebook that said:

Many of us will be enjoying dinners and other festive occasions with our relatives during the next few weeks. I would suggest this is a great time to compare notes with the relatives.

Please fill out the first part of this document and send it to me.

I have put together a questionnaire for members of the family. It is in two parts. The first part is a sketch of you and your parents and grandparents. The second part fills in the sketch.

The posts included a link to a word document I put together with the questions.

Looking back I tried to figure out who I got the idea from. I came across a blog called The Art of Genealogy where blogger Karen Hadden discussed 10 great sources for interview questions. I do not recall reading her blog but she and I may have had the same inspiration. Google led me to a pdf link to a list of interview questions that was apparently compiled by Tracey Carrington Converse. The same list is discussed in Karen' blog I mentioned above. Texas A&M has a page on their Family and Consumer Sciences website that also have very similar questions that the copyright at the bottom of the page says were written in 2015 by Virginia Allee. The UCLA center for oral history also has a page with similar questions.

I am in quite the company for using these questions. There are by no means the end all of questions but they seemed to be effective. Of the 42 people that Facebook counted as seeing the post, I received one back. ONE!

I have seen several bloggers post about their 52 ancestors in 52 weeks. Although I did not take this challenge to post about my ancestors I thought It was a good goal to do one a week so I thought I would turn the table and start collecting information about ancestors each week. I am going to post one question a week and see if I can create a dialogue about the questions and our families. I will use the list I have compiled as well as others that may come based on events or holidays that week. I will share them here as well to spark your own thoughts and perhaps questions. you can answer them or comment about them if you wish. The idea is to spark memories and record responses.

It looks like others have tried to participate in similar ways. The Teach Me Genealogy blog started on January 1, 2014 at week one with, "How Did You Get Your Name?" It looks like she made it to week 22. It also looks like the Geneabloggers had weekly blog prompts starting in January 2011 with similar topics. Their week one started with, "Did your family have any New Year’s traditions? How was the New Year celebrated during your childhood? Have you kept these traditions in the present day?!" Just like the original questionnaire I mentioned, I do not think I am the first person to have this idea. I just want to try and get my family members to discuss our family so we can learn more about each other and out ancestors. I hope I can get past the first few weeks.

What is in a name?

Nearly four years ago we were blessed with the birth of our youngest daughter. She was born five years after our then youngest and 16 years after our oldest. We call her our bonus because she is a true prize. Like most parents we came to a point where we were discussing names for our new baby girl.

Our oldest daughter we named after a prominent character from the book series The Work and the Glory by Gerald N. Lund. For those of you who may not know, the nine-part series chronicles the early growth of the LDS Church and ending in 1847 when the pioneers settle in the Salt Lake Valley. The story line includes both fictional and actual events. The release of the last two books coincided with the birth of our oldest daughter. My wife first suggested the name but one night and while I was reading I came to the same conclusion. We loved the classic pioneer name Lydia and the values the character from the book held. Her middle name is my grandma's maiden name - one that is closely tied to our family.

When we were discussing what to name our oldest daughter, another name in the running was one of the character's names from the T.V. show Party of Five. I admit my interest in the name Julia was partially because I liked the nickname they used for the character -- Jewels. When my second daughter was born this name came into play again because it also ended in the letters IA, like my oldest daughter's. We soon knew this was the name that we wanted. Her middle name is my wife's first name as well as a great grandmother among others.

When my youngest daughter was born we struggled finding a name that we really liked. We wanted a classic name to go along with her sisters but none of them really spoke to us. I googled,"names that end in IA" and got a list that included; Alexia, Alivia, Alexandria, Asia, Cynthia, Georgia, Leia, Malia, Virginia, Nadia, Portia, Octavia, and Gloria. The funny thing was that my grandmother's name was Gloria but it didn't seem to fit. I also had a relative named Octavia, which sparked a genealogical interest in me. How many relatives do I have whose names end in IA?

A quick search in my Legacy database gave me a list of more than 350 females with the letters IA in their given name. I sorted out those that ended in IA; Octavia, Gloria, Maria, Livinia, Sophia, Aqualina, Celia, Julia, Anthonia, Lydia, Leticia, Olivia, Victoria, Cornelia, Amelia, Angelia, Pamelia, Berthia, Patricia, Cordelia, Clestia, Lorania. Nellia, Armedia, Elviria, Euphemia, Letia, Eugenia, Mahalia, Lelia, Loucia, and Idoshia. That does not include the names that sound like they end in IA like Keziah or Mariah. Two of these names we had already used, one my sister-in-law used for their daughter and a few were other cousins or their children's names. Some we admittedly did not even consider because they were too obscure or odd.

I could not believe how many female relative had names that ended in IA. But a name did not jump out at us from the list. We decided to look at a group of names that end in A. Wow! I was blown away. My mother, sister, both daughters, both grandmothers, three of four great-grandmothers, and five out of eight of my great-great-grandmothers all have names that end in the letter A.

According to statistics from the Social Security Administration, names that end in the letter A make up 25%-40% of all female names. This is a trend that began in the 1930's when female names that end in E declined in popularity just as names that end with A began to become more popular.

Similar statistics for the letter A can be found in a different configuration below. A link to the source of this and more information can be found here.

year	letter	contains	initial	final	sex
1880	a	74.52002	10.25793	34.5587	F
1881	a	73.86439	10.22783	34.34397	F
1882	a	73.31201	10.20028	33.87668	F
1883	a	73.29374	10.35594	34.1251	F
1884	a	72.94415	10.32692	33.85469	F
1885	a	72.65341	10.09883	34.12724	F
1886	a	72.16987	9.973432	33.97055	F
1887	a	72.07258	10.16358	33.52605	F
1888	a	71.66794	9.925096	33.27642	F
1889	a	71.06888	9.917304	32.87136	F
1890	a	70.78339	9.770562	32.7312	F
1891	a	70.30779	9.684985	32.66175	F
1892	a	69.73444	9.53251	32.17799	F
1893	a	69.17856	9.464226	31.85475	F
1894	a	69.04433	9.412709	31.68418	F
1895	a	68.74601	9.29714	31.24714	F
1896	a	68.50438	9.25009	30.92736	F
1897	a	68.29945	9.079808	30.80602	F
1898	a	68.03982	8.914025	30.58677	F
1899	a	67.89158	8.990529	30.3455	F
1900	a	67.57361	8.794808	29.99073	F
1901	a	67.55282	8.859448	30.15931	F
1902	a	67.26472	8.862499	29.46694	F
1903	a	66.96046	8.790949	29.44147	F
1904	a	66.61752	8.773223	29.1246	F
1905	a	66.4471	8.823449	28.82948	F
1906	a	66.28841	8.949821	28.36317	F
1907	a	66.07694	8.770894	28.35465	F
1908	a	65.85693	8.744709	28.05043	F
1909	a	65.44659	8.565487	27.69376	F
1910	a	65.54522	8.597112	27.3392	F
1911	a	65.33518	8.50459	27.05126	F
1912	a	65.0141	8.441961	26.72905	F
1913	a	64.89015	8.346371	26.59693	F
1914	a	64.69564	8.318866	26.23658	F
1915	a	64.42025	8.249278	26.15908	F
1916	a	64.43673	8.102422	26.06758	F
1917	a	64.30105	8.029007	25.87358	F
1918	a	64.13086	7.814209	25.7134	F
1919	a	63.80567	7.658949	25.53694	F
1920	a	63.77343	7.514951	25.23755	F
1921	a	63.90863	7.428988	25.28748	F
1922	a	63.81817	7.302301	25.26306	F
1923	a	63.40946	7.144894	25.1091	F
1924	a	63.32793	7.029301	25.27369	F
1925	a	63.14525	6.938364	25.42985	F
1926	a	63.03616	6.866805	25.4158	F
1927	a	63.0742	6.623449	25.50903	F
1928	a	63.25977	6.531078	25.64643	F
1929	a	63.40437	6.381267	25.48332	F
1930	a	64.10109	6.265058	25.61394	F
1931	a	65.06745	6.193562	25.78578	F
1932	a	65.91598	6.111032	26.13958	F
1933	a	66.72413	6.004704	26.21639	F
1934	a	66.98664	5.849401	26.19668	F
1935	a	66.55249	5.702531	26.0573	F
1936	a	67.86346	5.65234	26.26164	F
1937	a	69.39654	5.49249	27.44675	F
1938	a	70.30747	5.322434	27.94419	F
1939	a	70.71503	5.103105	28.30608	F
1940	a	71.15364	4.909787	29.09582	F
1941	a	71.96129	4.594606	29.50641	F
1942	a	72.93857	4.34592	29.59836	F
1943	a	73.34266	4.168121	29.82674	F
1944	a	73.27979	4.031697	30.11592	F
1945	a	73.71489	3.993885	30.55909	F
1946	a	74.12495	3.840462	30.95404	F
1947	a	75.0905	3.661339	33.23117	F
1948	a	75.61626	3.598272	33.98351	F
1949	a	75.96036	3.516051	33.82277	F
1950	a	76.14923	3.537081	33.65552	F
1951	a	76.22307	3.490477	33.78995	F
1952	a	75.93782	3.494524	33.69351	F
1953	a	76.05362	3.520718	34.28271	F
1954	a	75.46679	3.460659	34.23176	F
1955	a	74.60811	3.522066	34.28779	F
1956	a	73.82887	3.677775	34.12489	F
1957	a	72.71391	3.714535	33.71853	F
1958	a	71.81864	3.926097	33.10452	F
1959	a	71.82456	4.162689	33.79188	F
1960	a	71.45237	4.396511	34.18437	F
1961	a	71.38987	4.481171	34.42071	F
1962	a	71.04506	4.629981	34.70586	F
1963	a	71.07125	4.920509	35.46933	F
1964	a	71.01789	5.356587	35.47587	F
1965	a	70.94085	5.873634	36.26026	F
1966	a	69.89726	6.037679	36.41239	F
1967	a	69.76717	6.626788	36.63929	F
1968	a	69.25942	6.764074	36.54414	F
1969	a	68.98531	7.034294	36.2349	F
1970	a	69.15822	7.653253	35.89144	F
1971	a	69.16791	8.393432	36.37819	F
1972	a	68.65932	8.569965	36.66013	F
1973	a	69.24464	9.14052	36.75871	F
1974	a	69.51673	9.788963	36.66867	F
1975	a	70.65961	10.81685	36.92111	F
1976	a	71.84192	10.99666	36.98978	F
1977	a	72.0654	10.8712	37.34323	F
1978	a	72.393	11.08134	37.48599	F
1979	a	73.2616	12.00301	38.15735	F
1980	a	73.576	12.08846	37.82477	F
1981	a	74.31998	12.24014	37.7197	F
1982	a	74.83111	12.37926	36.93488	F
1983	a	75.70983	13.36083	36.3424	F
1984	a	76.58066	13.59029	36.32794	F
1985	a	77.38397	14.09718	36.29746	F
1986	a	78.01985	14.53631	36.43987	F
1987	a	78.84387	14.98302	37.24889	F
1988	a	79.16256	14.5784	37.24228	F
1989	a	79.52662	14.59811	37.5996	F
1990	a	79.73598	14.53891	37.88208	F
1991	a	79.79202	14.37685	37.93236	F
1992	a	79.94197	13.9194	37.86326	F
1993	a	80.18098	14.03269	37.64151	F
1994	a	80.23309	14.1828	37.42792	F
1995	a	80.30071	14.13233	37.44394	F
1996	a	80.53618	14.18185	37.38367	F
1997	a	80.93557	14.53033	37.58975	F
1998	a	81.28899	14.78679	37.51978	F
1999	a	81.01342	14.62272	37.39282	F
2000	a	81.06005	14.92776	37.23858	F
2001	a	81.20947	15.49007	37.44748	F
2002	a	81.10929	16.14537	37.95363	F
2003	a	81.00319	16.2188	38.5146	F
2004	a	80.93975	16.25751	38.75734	F
2005	a	81.1341	16.54111	39.44685	F
2006	a	81.1969	17.0129	39.72795	F
2007	a	80.89849	17.47492	39.2715	F
2008	a	80.29398	17.31019	38.40526	F
2009	a	79.85439	17.49569	38.2201	F
2010	a	79.04827	17.58943	38.12531	F
2011	a	78.37639	17.75527	37.46902	F
2012	a	78.17938	18.09132	37.2413	F

It was hard to think that we had inadvertently named both of my daughters with names that ended in A. But this made me even more convinced that I was on the right path for my third daughter. We settled on the name Eliza. Her middle name is both my grandmother's and my wife's grandmother's middle name.

Relatives in FamilySearch with multiple spouses can be easily identified.

The FamilySearch Blog this week released a list of newly certified partner products for the month of May. According to the post:

“Certified” means the product is compatible with FamilySearch.org and has features that conform to our strict standards of quality. FamilySearch works with a variety of partners to help provide you with as many ways as possible to find, add, and share about your family members.

The list of new partner products includes Familienbuch, Fast Photo Game, Match Game, Multiple Parents, Multiple Spouses, and RootsBid. Two of the apps that stood out for me are Multiple Parents and Multiple Spouses. Both apps are similar in their function. The apps search the first 32 ancestors of the person whose FamilySearch ID is entered.

The Multiple Spouses app shows those relatives who have more than one spouse. The description for the app says, "This is aimed towards patrons who are looking for 'step-ancestors' of whom they can search for their ancestors." With my Mormon heritage this app could come in handy, but I believe the bigger impact may be for those who are unaware of spouses their relatives may have.

The Multiple Parents App can come in handy finding errors in lines as well as adoptive relationships. The above Annie James has another set of parents with the Bartholomew surname. Annie James married Joseph Smith Bartholomew and somehow someone has combined another record that appears to be incorrect that shows her with an additional set of parents. I have another relative who was adopted by a family when he was left orphaned while crossing the plains. In some documents he has his birth father's surname and in others he uses his adoptive family name. This app would help highlight relatives with unique or erroneous relationships within Family Tree.

Both apps are by Debbie Holtzendorff, her linkedin profile says she is an LDS Church Tech Service Missionary for FamilySearch. Debbie, along with Harold G. Lee have developed several apps and have published them on their website woodenvillage.org. These apps include: Record Hints for Your Relatives, Relationship Finder for Family Tree, Automated Research Indicators for Your Relatives, Missing Parents, Pick an Ancestor, Descendants with No Children, Research Indicators for Descendants, Duplicate Ancestors, Ancestor Memories, and Ordinances Needed for Your Relatives.

It is exciting to see the work that is being done to help FamilySearch users parse data and use unique ways to find research opportunities for our relatives. I will review these apps and information I have found using them in later posts. Until then please try all of the above apps and let me know what you think of their functionality and how you have applied them to your research.

Dot the i and cross the t in cryptic

This post is related to this blog but the focus is on me and my recent experiences and not on genealogy or family history directly. I will forgive you for not reading this post if you forgive me for posting it.

The last three and a half months have been a roller coaster of emotion, trials, and success. It has been a time of change and growth like I have not experienced in the last ten years. I am grateful for the changes in my life but it was not easy to go through. I have been told that I have been too cryptic in my social media posts and that people don't understand what I am trying to say. I suppose this is true but to explain I have to tell the whole story. 

For the last 14 years I have worked for a marketing company as their computer guy. I hired on to do web development and site management, but after two years had worked my way into management and was in charge of all the computers, servers, and network. My business card said Mat Trotter, Computer Guy. When I started at the company there were 13-15 people and we worked in a small office building Layton, Utah. As the business started to grow we moved into the former Iomega corporate headquarters in Roy, Utah.  At the peak there were over 40 employees. I feel like I had a huge role in helping the company to grow and expand as well as diversify the products that they offered as well as their reach into the niche markets they explored.

In September of 2014 we lost a contract with our largest  client. The Christmas season was the smallest in over a decade. I knew the company was hurting and that layoffs might be a possibility. On Thursday February 5th, 2015, I was called into the boardroom with the owners of the company and was laid off. I did not think I would be a casualty of the lost contract. I thought I was in a great position to help to find new clients and contracts. Needless to say, I was caught completely off guard. They had me sign an agreement that I would continue to work for them up to 60 hours a month for the next three months in order to get a severance package. Considering the 14 years I worked there the severance I received was less than you would expect. However, they paid out a month of vacation time and offered to pay almost 60% of my COBRA insurance for the three months of what they called the "transition" period.

That following weekend was a blur. I only remember coming home and telling my wife and the tears that followed. I sent a text to my LDS bishop and then my wife sat down our four oldest children who are living at home and told them what had happened. The first of the following week I met with a lawyer to go over the transition contract and I opened my file with the Utah Job Service. I met with a former vendor about the possibility of working for him and I worked for my former company.

I had already paid and was planning on attending Rootstech in Salt Lake City and my wife was covering the conference for our local paper, the Standard-Examiner. So February 12-14, 2015 we attended the conference. I had blogger credentials and was allowed access to areas not all conference goers could enjoy. However, my focus was changed and I spent most of the conference trying to network with vendors and and people who worked for FamilySearch. I figured I didn't have a job so why not look into the possibility of working in the industry that my hobbies align with. You can read other posts on this blog about some of my experiences at Rootstech. What those posts don't say is that I felt like there was not an immediate opportunity for me at any of the places I was interested in, especially FamilySearch.

The following Sunday I counseled with my bishop and he recommended that I go to the LDS Employment Center in downtown Ogden, Utah where I live. Through the training I attended there and the Accelerated Job Search (AJS) program I joined, I had a game plan that set the pattern for the next three months of my life. As part of AJS I agreed to meet on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings at 8:30 in the Ogden offices with other members of the program. On Tuesday we met in Layton with the members of thier AJS program and on Thursday we all met in Centerville with all of the AJS members from the three different areas. It was a great way to network and learn about job openings, other possibilities and ideas from people who were all having the same experience. I also agreed to follow The Daily 15-10-2 Approach where I identify 15 new resources, make 10 contacts, and hold 2 face-to-face meetings or interviews each day.

Over the following three months I only missed four meetings and that was because I had job interviews. I applied for a 104 different jobs and had 23 interviews. I received 26 rejection letters from my efforts but only heard back from a fraction of those who interviewed me. This was a frustrating and humbling experience. I was embarrassed because I didn't have a job but it was through no fault of my own. It seemed as though because I was unemployed I was damaged goods. To many being laid off is equivalent to being fired. I would explain that I was still doing work for the company and that the layoff was because of a lost contract but I could tell it did not matter to them.

On Tuesday May 5th, 2015, three months from the day I was laid off, my LDS ward was given an opportunity for four people to volunteer at the Ogden cannery. They were making beef stew and I volunteered to work from 10 am - 4 pm. After I arrived I had the opportunity to load newly washed potatoes onto a dicing machine. The 230 pounds of potatoes were then added to 300 pounds of beef and other ingredients into a large machine that put the food into cans. Just as the first batch of potatoes were mixed into the machine something happened and the machine broke possible putting shards of metal into the batch. So the whole batch could not be used. They ended up shutting down the line and we spent 2 1/2 hours deep cleaning the plant. Although I worked I felt my efforts had all been thrown away. You are not allowed to have phones in the plant because they can be easily ruined. When I got out to my car I check my messages and email and had two rejection letters from two different companies where I had had multiple interviews. I felt the lowest I had since the day I was laid off.

Wednesday May 6th, 2015, I woke up and didn't feel like going to AJS at 8:30 am. My loving wife encouraged me out the door and I arrived a few minutes late. There were three other AJS members and two employment missionaries in the room. I proceeded to hear that all three of the other members were expecting to receive job offers later that day. I was so discouraged. As I left the meeting I felt like crying. 

Just before arriving home I received a call from a lady who said that she wanted to schedule an interview for me. I was planning on taking my oldest daughter to Colorado Springs and back over the following two days so she could receive a scholarship award from the Exchange Club. She had to be in attendance to receive the award. I told the lady I could not come in either Thursday or Friday but could I come in the following week. She said that would not work so we agreed to schedule an interview that afternoon at 1 pm. She said I would be interviewing for an IT Manager position and that they were located in the Church Office Building in Salt Lake City. She said that security would have an id badge for me in the lobby and to take the elevator to the appropriate floor. "Get off the elevator and follow the picture of Christ in a red robe, turn left and you will find us," she said.

When I arrived and found them, I was taken into an office and interviewed by a person who was leaving for a different position within the Church. Then I had a 55 minute interview with the manager over the open position. Some of his questions were very different than any I had answered in interviews before. He asked me about the callings or positions I have held in my ward. He asked me what was my favorite calling, I told him Scoutmaster. He asked me what my hobbies were and I told him scouting and genealogy. Then he asked me what my dream job would be. I told him about my experience at Rootstech and how I had tried to find a job at FamilySearch. He said, "this position would be great for you then." I asked him why he said that and he replied, "this position is for FamilySearch, didn't you know?" I told him that I didn't know what job I was interviewing for and that I have applied for several with the church. (A huge no-no I have been taught about in the employment workshop.) He reached into his drawer and pulled out my resume. Then he said, "Oh, I remember. You never applied for this position. I received your resume from a coworker and added to the pile of applicants. I really liked it so I had them call you in."

I really don't remember what else happened. I was so shocked. As I left the building I called my wife and I was overcome with emotion. I could not believe what had transpired and I told her that I thought I would get the job. I was so overcome with the feeling of the holy spirit that I just felt so hopeful that this is where I needed to be. 

My trip to Colorado Springs went as planned and on Monday morning I reported what had happened in my AJS meeting. After I arrived home I received a call with a job offer. I started just over a week ago and I am enjoying the experience so far.

I apologize for the long slightly off topic post and the somewhat cryptic social media messages. I went from feeling so ashamed to so overjoyed. I did not want to tell more than I needed to but I also did not want to seem boastful. This was a true trial for me. An experience I am glad I had but one I would not ask for. I have felt Heavenly father nudge me in a different direction. A nudge I needed. I was so comfortable at my last job I stopped seeking for more. I was complacent. I am so happy for this opportunity. I never would have imagined I would be working for FamilySearch six month ago. I am excited for what the future may bring. I am so thankful for the LDS employment center and the help and guidance they have given me. I am also grateful for the people who were in AJS with me. I consider them my friends. I am so glad my bishop counseled me to go to the center. 

One last note...It is a tradition that after you get a new job that you take donuts to the following AJS meeting. When I arrived that morning three of us walked in with donuts and I had also missed donuts on Friday when I was in Colorado Springs. That AJS program really works!