Family Tree Magazine US

The latest issue of Family Tree US magazine is now available free online for Campaspe Library members via our subscription to Libby eMagazines. 

Inside this month's issue : 

• Tree Talk - We asked where your family was during the 1940s. Here’s how you responded.
• Fascinating Photo Find - One researcher sees himself as part of an ancestral community in a whole new way.
• Life Begins at ‘40 • Follow your relatives through the 1940s (and up to the soon-to-be-released 1950 census) with these records.
• Out of focus • These 12 underused sources will help you find family photos.
• Find Your U.S. Ancestors
• Old Norse • Over the North Sea and through the fjords—back to Old Norge we go! This guide to Norwegian genealogy will help you trace your kin, Viking or not.
• In the Dark • Age has darkened this tintype, but digital enhancements and clothing clues shed light on its subjects.
• Finding Newspapers with Chronicling America • Chronicling America is a free portal to finding and exploring historical US newspapers. A project of the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities, the database’s goal is to grant access to newsprint that represents the diverse stories and viewpoints of the American past.
• Saving Recipe Cards
• Surname Variant Chart • If you’re not having luck finding records of your ancestors, consider the possibility that their name was mistranscribed or misindexed in online databases.
• SURNAMES AND ETHNICITY • Every culture has its own naming traditions, and your surname can give you clues about your paternal line’s ancestral origins. 
• And more
  

Populations Past

The new website Populations Past allows users to create and view maps of different demographic measures and related socio-economic indicators every 10 years between 1851 and 1911. These include fertility, childhood mortality, marriage, migration status, household compositions, age-structure, occupational status and population density. Brief explanations of each measure are included, indicating how they are calculated and explaining how they relate to other measures. Users can zoom in to a particular area on the map, and compare side by side maps of different times or measures. When large areas are viewed at once the data are displayed in Registration Districts (RDs), but the display changes to Registration Sub-Districts (RSDs) when the users are zoomed in.

The Resources tab on the website contains a handy User Guide, as well as several podcasts of interviews with census experts created in partnership with Year 8 students from South Wales, resources for teachers, an image gallery and a number of links to online National RSD Maps.

The website is hosted by the University of Cambridge and Populations Past and its associated research project, An Atlas of Victorian Fertility Decline, have been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Isaac Newton Trust (Cambridge).

#52Ancestors - Week 9 - Females

Throughout history, the lives of women have in many ways been dependent on men.  In Britain before 1857 wives were under the economic and legal control of their husbands, and divorce was almost impossible. It required a very expensive private act of Parliament costing perhaps £200, of the sort only the richest could possibly afford.  

Traditionally a female went from the household of her father to that of her husband, and until a series of four laws called the Married Women's Property Act passed Parliament from 1870 to 1882, a wealthy married women usually had no control of their own property and a working class woman's wages were also the property of her husband.

Until more modern times, work opportunities for women were severely limited and many professions were limited to males only.  Few universities allowed women to study, and in the first professions that did allow women, such as teaching, women were paid significantly less that their male counterparts, and were often expected to leave when they married.

This makes tracing our female ancestors especially challenging.  Women were far less likely to leave a variety of records behind - things like land, occupation and trade, voting, education and tax records.  Even when formally mentioned, a married woman would often be referred to by her husband's name - I have a newspaper article from 1930 which refers to a great-aunt as 'Mrs Wilfred Penney', not by her given name of Edna.

Really Useful Podcasts - Episode 6

The Family History Federation has now launched Episode 6 of its new series of Really Useful Podcasts.

 
This new episode focuses on Newspapers.  The website describes it : 

"Joe is joined by Mish Holman, professional genealogist who is particularly interested in theatre ancestors and census enumerators, Margaret Roberts, speaker, editor of the Playing Pasts online sports history magazine and Publicity Officer for the FHS of Cheshire, Paul Chiddicks, blogger and Family Tree Magazine’s ‘Dear Paul’ and Natalie Pithers, professional family historian, blogger and host of the YouTube/Podcast series #TwiceRemoved.

Newspapers are a superb yet under-used resource for family history. We discuss the kinds of information you can find within them ranging from accidents to awards and how to go about searching for genealogy gold."

Any long term readers of this blog will know how much I LOVE newspapers, especially the magnificent and free Australian newspaper site Trove.  From family notices to court reports, sporting achievements to business advertisements, stories of shark attacks and vagrancy, destitute widows and shipping arrivals, I have found so many wonderful things in the newspapers about members of my family.

As more and more newspapers are digitised and added to the collection, I keep finding snippets that add to my family history.  Thanks to newspapers I discovered that my great uncle Alfred Pummeroy, a jockey, was fined for incompetence.  While searching death notices I discovered my great grandfather James Nicholas Clark and great great grandfather John Clark were both members of Masonic Lodges.

So take some time searching old newspapers - you never know what you might find.

Where has my Germanic Ancestry Gone?

I have been looking at my Ancestry DNA results lately, and have been struck again by the unexpected disappearance of my German ethnicity estimate.

When I first received my DNA test results several years ago, my ethnicity estimate was 65% England, 22% Ireland and Scotland, 8% Germanic Europe, 2% Ghana, 2% Sweden and 1% Norway.

In 2019 an update to results showed small changes.  I was now showing 78% England, 10% Ireland and Scotland, 5% Sweden, 3% Germanic Europe, 2% Norway, 1% Mali and 1% Ghana.

My Germanic heritage has now disappeared completely.  In 2022, I seem to have swapped it for a totally unexpected 9% Norwegian heritage - to date I have exactly 0 Norwegian ancestors in my tree.  At the same time, 33% Scottish seems rather high for the one great great grandparent who is the basis of the only Scottish line in my ancestry, while my Irish great grandparent only shows 2%.  My English ancestry was always high, as my father's entire family comes from Essex and Suffolk for generations back, and my mother's family has significant English heritage as well, so I would probably expect a higher number than the 54% I have now.

The key is to remember that these numbers are estimates only.  DNA ethnicity is by no means an exact science.  These estimates are pretty good at the continental level, distinguishing between Europe, Asia and Africa, for example, in their estimates. Once they get below the continental level, to a regional or country level, all of them start to run into issues: country boundaries have changed; entire populations have moved; people from one area have invaded and intermarried with people from another.  All this makes accurate ethnicity estimates a challenge.  

This is all very well - but I would still love to know where my Germanic heritage has vanished to.  And why I suddenly seem to be part Viking.

#52Ancestors - Week 8 - Courting

Courting is an aspect of our ancestors' lives it is often difficult to trace but so rewarding to uncover - how did they meet, court and decide to marry?  What prompted them to choose each other as life partners?  In the past marriage was usually for life - divorce was difficult to achieve and incurred a great deal of social stigma, especially for women, and remarriage after a divorce was also problematic.  So choosing a spouse was a major decision, not easily undone.

For women especially, marriage was a huge step.  The laws in Britain were based on the idea that women would get married and that their husbands would take care of them. Before the passing of the 1882 Married Property Act, when a woman got married her wealth was passed to her husband. If a woman worked after marriage, her earnings also belonged to her husband.

The idea was that  women should stay dependent on a man: first as a daughter and later as a wife. Once married, it was extremely difficult for a woman to obtain a divorce. The Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857 gave men the right to divorce their wives on the grounds of adultery. However, married women were not able to obtain a divorce if they discovered that their husbands had been unfaithful. Once divorced, their children became the property of their father, and the mother could be prevented from seeing or contacting her children if the father so decreed.

I know very little about the courting of my ancestors other than my own parents.  Three of my grandparents passed away before I was old enough to ask questions, and my parents knew very little as it was a subject that was not discussed.  I have only written records and the occasional newspaper report to help flesh out these aspects of my ancestors' lives, along with some knowledge of the etiquette and attitudes of the times.

Family Tree UK Magazine

The latest issue of Family Tree UK magazine is now available free online for Campaspe Library members via our subscription to Libby eMagazines.  

Articles and stories in the March issue of Family Tree include:

• Accredited Genealogists Ireland elects its tenth president

• ‘Vast’ Roman trading settlement uncovered by archaeologists in Northamptonshire

• 3 million New Zealand electoral roll records added to FamilySearch

• RootsTech 2022: first keynote speakers announced

• Expert help for family history newbies

• A new way to organise your digital photos 

• Explore 1921 Criminal Records

• Pinpoint ancestors’ homes from the 1911 census on historic maps

• 72,000 London landowner and occupier records added to TheGenealogist

• Call for Coronation memories

• Researching Your Irish Family History

• Laundresses & Washerwomen : A Short History

• Settlers in Canada