MISSING LINKS: A Weekly Newsletter for Genealogists Vol. 3, No. 5, 30 January 1998 Copyright 1996-98 Julia M. Case and Myra Vanderpool Gormley Editor-at-Fault: Julia M. Case Co-Editor-to-Blame: Myra Vanderpool Gormley, CG ***************************************************************** MEMBER OF THE WEEK: Our special thanks this week go long-time Prodigy member, JAMES DRUMM, for his enthusiastic participation in many areas of Prodigy Classic's Genealogy BB, especially in the Colonial America topic. ***************************************************************** WELDING LINKS: MAPPING YOUR ANCESTORS by Myra Vanderpool Gormley, CG Pssst! Want to descry some professional tricks about finding your ancestors? Discover how to use cartographic resources? Learn what the excitement in dull, dry, land records is all about? Now you can find out -- in the privacy of your own home. "Maps! Maps! Maps!" are instructional videos featuring Ronald E. Grim, Ph.D., a specialist in cartographic history at the Library of Congress. In a series of four lectures that fill two VHS tape cassettes (3 1/2 hours of instruction) he covers the subject in depth. You will never look at maps the same way again. The videos, lavishly illustrated with 200 maps from the Library of Congress, contain the following lessons: Lecture 1: Getting Started: Using Cartographic Resources in Genealogical Research (How Can Maps Help Me and Where Do I Find Them?) Lecture 2: The Rural Neighborhood and Map Resources (General Land Office Surveys and County Land Ownership Maps and Atlases) Lecture 3: The Urban Neighborhood and Map Resources (Fire Insurance Maps and Bird's-eye Views) Lecture 4: German Immigration and Settlement in America (as documented in period maps and atlases) Grim has a B.A. in history and geography, an M.A. and Ph.D. in historical geography. He has worked at the National Archives and Library of Congress and is the author of several reference books and numerous articles. The videotapes were recorded as Grim stood at a lectern and delivered these talks to a live audience. They are not glitzy Hollywood productions, but the information presented is excellent and many of the subjects are addressed in great detail. The videotapes were produced by the Family History Society of Arizona, P.O. Box 63094, Phoenix, AZ, 85082-3094, which handles all the orders. They can be purchased for $38 postpaid. This includes four lectures on two video cassettes plus printed lecture handouts. Discounts are available if you buy multiple copies. Profits from the sale of the videos are divided equally between the Family History Society of Arizona, Inc. and Philip Lee Phillips Society, a support group of friends for the Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress -- both nonprofit organizations. For further information e-mail Linda Swain (lindaswain@aol.com). ***************************************************************** PRODIGY CLASSIC BB ARCHIVES: Today the Genealogy (and Food) BB ARCHIVES went live on Prodigy Classic. Go To/Jump BB ARCHIVES ***************************************************************** BRIT BITS: Since last heard from ("November is a Good Time to Go," in ML 2:49), Sherry Irvine has completed revisions to "Your English Ancestry" and has been elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. The first part of her list of "City of London Churches," appeared in ML 2:35 and the second in ML 2:42. CITY OF LONDON CHURCHES by Sherry Irvine, FSA (Scot) The list of City of London churches continues. To appear, the church had to be in existence in 1538 or built since that date. The order is alphabetical (except for the occasional correction of an earlier omission), with brief notes on the ultimate fate of the building and of the parish. *St. Alban Wood Street -- burnt in the Great Fire, rebuilt by Wren, destroyed by bombing in December 1940 but the tower survived and has been restored. (If you are saving this list, insert this entry in proper alphabetical order.) *St. Botolph Aldersgate -- built in the 13th century, repaired in 1627, slightly damaged in the Great Fire; condition deteriorated and it was pulled down in 1790, another church built on the site. *St. Botolph Aldgate -- rebuilt in the reign of Henry VIII, survived the Great Fire but pulled down and rebuilt about 1744. *St. Botolph Billingsgate -- burnt in the Great Fire, not rebuilt and afterwards the parish was united with St. George Botolph Lane *St. Botolph Bishopsgate -- probably a church on this site before William the Conqueror; the church was in bad condition by the 1700s and was rebuilt; restoration work was done again in 1912 and 1947. *St. Bride's Fleet Street -- Samuel Pepys was baptized in this church in 1633; it was destroyed in the Great Fire and rebuilt by Wren (considered one of his finest works); reduced to a shell by German bombs and later restored. *St. Christopher le Stocks -- it was on the bank of the Walbrook and St. Christopher was the patron saint of ferrymen; located near the city stocks; burnt in the Great Fire, rebuilt by Wren, demolished in 1781 and parish united with St. Margaret Lothbury. *St. Clement Eastcheap -- burnt in the Great Fire and rebuilt by Wren, modernized in 1872, bombed in the Blitz, later reopened. *St. Dionis Backchurch -- burnt in the Great Fire, rebuilt by Wren, demolished in 1878, parish united with All Hallows Lombard Street. *St. Dunstan in the East -- almost completely destroyed in the Great Fire, pulled down and rebuilt in the early 1800s, reduced to a shell in World War II; the bells are in California. *St. Dunstan-in-the-West -- escaped the Great Fire, demolished and replaced in 1830, suffered some damage by flying bomb in World War II, restored. *St. Edmund the King and Martyr -- burnt in the Great Fire, and rebuilt, when the parish of St. Nicholas Acon was united with it. *St. Ethelburga the Virgin -- one of the few surviving medieval places of worship. *St. Faith under St. Paul's -- from the 1300s the parishioners worshipped in the crypt of St. Paul's; after the Great Fire joined to St. Augustine Watling Street ***************************************************************** WEB LINKS: AUSTRALIA. "First Families 2001" is a database and collection of stories about the people of Australia, past and present. It welcomes contributions from everyone. Your first family is the earliest person in your family known to have lived in Australia. You may choose to submit information on the earliest generation of each branch of your family. Please visit: http://www.vicnet.net.au/~family CARRIKER: Visit http://pages.prodigy.com/CARRIKER DOGGETT: Visit http://www.doggettfam.org/ KELLY CLAN OF COUNTY ARMAGH, NORTHERN IRELAND. Please visit: http://www.kelly-clan.com REVOLUTIONARY WAR DATABASE. Ancestry has posted 50 volumes of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Lineage Books in the Ancestry Library. Each volume contains approximately 15,000 names. To search for your Revolutionary War ancestors in this database, look under the 10-Day Free Trial Databases section at: http://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/search.asp ROUTES TO ROOTS specializes in tracing Jewish roots in Poland, Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus. http://www.routestoroots.com/ LYCOMING COUNTY (PA) GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY: http://members.aol.com/LCGSgen/lcgs.htm ***************************************************************** TIME LINKS: Thanks to the Internet, we can chat online in real time with friends from all over the world. Finding a mutually convenient time for all parties can be a challenge. WHAT TIME IS IT? by Karl Machamer (karl_mach1@prodigy.net) TIME is determined by the deg:min:sec of longitude where you are located. People at the east end of a State, are at a different "True Local Time" (TLT) than those on the west end of the same State. TIME is determined by degrees of longitude (each degree is further broken down into 60 mins and then into 60 secs). To keep things simple: each degree of longitude = 4 minutes of TIME. 4 mins (time) x 15 degrees (longitude) = 1 hour (time differential). In the USA, we use established "Standard Time" (STD) (i.e., Eastern, Central, Mountain, and Pacific) for everyone to refer to. For example, without that STD, a TV show could be broadcast by using TLT, but the TLT might be 9:17 p.m. in Wisconsin and everyone would have to adjust. I might have to tune in at 11:43 p.m. TLT to catch the beginning of that broadcast. Thus the need for a STD, which we have already adjusted to without even knowing it. It is rare that where we live is actually on the Time STD meridian, but because we all set our clocks to that STD, we all tune in at the same TIME. The Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) meridian = ZERO Degrees longitude, is widely used as a reference point (in time). For each 15 degrees West Longitude we subtract 1 hour from GMT. That means, the EST meridian being at 75 degrees West, is 5 hours from GMT. Let's say a Field HQ tells its ships, planes, and ground forces to begin an operation at 11:59 p.m. The problem is that they are scattered all over the globe. To avoid confusion, it is standard practice to issue that TIME in terms of GMT. That way each operational unit only has to refer its starting time to GMT (not to HQ, which might well be on the move itself). Now, we are talking about the INTERNET here and people all over the world might be tuning into a Real Audio broadcast of an event or even to an IRC Chat guest. If we all referred to GMT, people all over the world would be looking at the same reference all the time, whereas if we used our local time STD, they would have to figure out WHERE we are, and adjust accordingly. Since there are thousands of Internet events daily, it makes sense to use GMT. I know that I am five hours from GMT; others might know they are two hours from EST. If we all start thinking in terms of GMT, the Internet, and the world as a whole, would be better off. We live in a shrinking world; we travel around the globe in a matter of hours. It makes sense to use a single reference point -- that being ZERO degrees meridian or GMT. Here is a conversion chart: Meridian Time Differential ********** ******** ****************************** 0 deg 12am GMT midnight reference (tomorrow) 75 deg WL 7pm EST minus 5 hours (today) 90 deg WL 6pm CST " 6 " " 105 deg WL 5pm MST " 7 " " 120 deg WL 4pm PST " 8 " " (WL = West Longitude) The above changes by one hour when your local time is using Daylight Savings Time. GMT = Greenwich (England) Mean Time, and is typically stated in a four-digit / 24-hour clock format. All hours after NOON have 12 added to them; therefore, you can see: 0001 (1 minute after midnight) 0010 (10 minutes after midnight) 0100 ( 1:00 am) 1000 (10:00 am) 1200 (12:00 pm - noon) 1700 ( 5:00 pm) 2100 ( 9:00 pm) 2359 (11:59 pm) ***************************************************************** FAMILY TRADITIONS: REDCOATS AND PINK COINS by Nancy West Filkins Some of my roots come from the Port Jefferson area of Long Island, New York, (HULSE, CLARK, HALLOCK, HALSEY, BREWSTER, among others) and this story was handed down from my great-grandmother, Frances Hulse THOMPSON. It explains the origin of several pink- tinted silver coins, which went elsewhere in the family but that I had heard of. An unidentified female ancestor on Long Island was working at her farm when the "Redcoats" rode in and began confiscating livestock and other property. The woman's husband or father was not there (we don't know why), and she had to think on her feet. Over her fireplace was hanging a pot full of hot red dye and, to keep the British from taking her silver coins, she threw them into the pot. Sure enough, when the house was searched, the soldiers never thought to look in the pot; hence, the coins were saved. If any of your readers have heard this tradition or have seen or possibly have the coins in their possession, possibly we descend from the same woman who threw them in the pot. ***************************************************************** NOURSE LINKS: Jim Taylor writes: "My mother left me a reprint of a book compiled and published in 1897 by Maria Catharine Nourse Lyle. It is a history of James Nourse and his descendants. Mr. Nourse arrived in Hampton, Virginia in May 1769. In the acknowledgements she thanks people from Washington, Virginia, Kentucky, California, Texas, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee. It contains hundreds of names, places of birth, weddings, and deaths. If anyone has any need of information that might be in this book, I would be happy to [check it] for them." ***************************************************************** SUCCESSFUL LINKS: PREPARATION MET OPPORTUNITY. by Sheila Brannon I have had wonderful luck (LUCK: where preparation meets opportunity) in finding some of my most elusive family and I would like to share the good news. MONTGOMERYS FROM WHITFIELD COUNTY, GEORGIA For more than 20 years I did my research "the old-fashioned way." I looked at miles of census film, talked with family, etc. About two years ago I joined the Internet and made a homepage . I included lots of genealogy and descendancy charts. One of my biggest stone walls was the MONTGOMERY family. There were seven children in my great-grandmother's family. She was the youngest and about all I knew of the others was their names as recorded on an old Bible page. A few months ago a woman was helping one of her cousins who is not yet on the Internet by doing a surname search for her. She was looking for Montgomery and found her way to my page. She sent me an e-mail saying that a lot of my names were the same as the ones her cousin was researching. In less than a day we confirmed that we were indeed related. Our cousin's great-grandfather was the oldest brother of the family. Since then we have swapped a lot of information. The only other lead on any of the family members was for another one of the sisters. Some of her family was last located in the bootheel of Missouri in the 1930s. I used a software program with phone search capabilities and chose any people with the correct surname who lived in the bootheel area. I sent two letters out. One came back as no forwarding address, but the other hit the mark. A woman called me four days after I had mailed the letters to tell me that I did indeed have the right family and there are a great number of them scattered all over the U.S. She directed me to the family historian and before the night was over we had reestablished another connection. Now we know where almost all of the descendants are for three of the seven children. Modern technology is a wonderful gift to the world of genealogy. ***************************************************************** SUCCESSFUL LINKS: FAMILY FOUND by Annette DeBose I was able to locate a missing branch of the DEBOSE family in Texas by matching ZIP codes from the Social Security Death Index (SSDI) and a search using Yahoo!'s 411 People Search. The oldest son of Amos DEBOSE, Jake, had four children. Emory was the only son. I found Emory DEBOSE on the SSDI, b. 2/23/1896 d. 11/1983, last residence ZIP 76705. While pulling up DEBOSE in Texas using 411 People Search for known relatives, my husband noticed an Emory J. DEBOSE, III with a ZIP code of 76704. This was too much of a coincidence to pass up. I mailed a letter, briefly describing the family history as I knew it and asked that he contact us, even if the answer was negative. This week we received a call from Emory. It took a while because he had moved, but the letter had been forwarded. Yes, everything I had assumed was true. The original Emory was his grandfather. He is coming to our town on business next weekend and we have already made plans to meet. This was a "broken" branch on my tree, because all the children were known to be deceased and I did not have married names for the daughters. I will now be able to mend this branch and see it bear fruit. ***************************************************************** TECHNICAL LINKS: HTML HELP ON PRODIGY: Barbara Strand's site, "DocB's WebDesign Clinic," is dedicated to providing easy-to-understand Web design tutorials. For a step-by-step guide to building a non-boring home page, visit: http://pages.prodigy.net/psycheb/design.htm To find "HTML Help" on PRODIGY INTERNET, visit: http://science.prodigy.net/computing/html_help/index.htm To find "HTML Help" on PRODIGY CLASSIC, GoTo/Jump HTML Help NEWSGROUPS ON PRODIGY INTERNET: Confused about how to subscribe to a newsgroup? All you need to know to get started is at: http://www.prodigy.net/newsgroups/start.htm UNINSTALLING USING WINDOWS 95: If you download a program you later decide not to keep, here is a quick and easy way to uninstall it in Win 95. Right click on your Start menu in the lower left corner, then click on "Explore." Left click on "My Computer" in the left frame (near the top), then on "Control Panel" in the right frame, then on "Add/Remove Programs." Select the Install/Uninstall tab, highlight the program you wish to delete, then click on "Add/Remove." Confirm your choice when prompted and you're finished. ***************************************************************** HUMOROUS LINKS: This combines elements of several versions received from the following contributors. Thanks to Earl Ross ; Jo White Linn ; Joey Van Us , who found it on Prodigy Classic's Comedy Bulletin Board where it was posted by Douglas Jacobson (zabd29a@prodigy.com); and Charles Hansen (MXPH25A@prodigy.com) who received it from Patricia Bauer, who received it from the SWITZERLAND-L@rootsweb.com mailing list, to which it had been posted by Duane S Baumgartner . THE VAN GOGH FAMILY TREE After much careful research it has been discovered that the artist Vincent Van Gogh had many relatives. Among them were: His obnoxious brother........................Please Gogh His dizzy aunt...............................Verti Gogh His brother at the Bay of Pigs ............. No Gogh His uncle the Israeli astronaut ............ Itza Gogh His cousin who's a priest ................. Alter E. Gogh The grandfather from Yugoslavia..............U Gogh The brother who bleached his clothes white...Hue Gogh The cousin from Illinois.......... ..........Chica Gogh His magician Uncle...........................Where diddyGogh His Mexican cousin...........................Amee Gogh The Mexican cousin's American half-brother...Green Gogh The nephew who drove a stagecoach ...........WellsfarGogh The ballroom dancing aunt....................Tan Gogh The birdlover uncle..........................Flamin Gogh His nephew the psychoanalyst.................E Gogh The fruit loving cousin......................Man Gogh An aunt who taught positive thinking.........Wayto Gogh The little bouncy nephew.....................Po Gogh A sister who loved disco.....................Go Gogh And his niece who travels in a van...........Winnie Bay Gogh ***************************************************************** INTERNET RELAY CHAT (IRC): United Kingdom Genealogy Chat meetings When: Sundays and Tuesdays at 9pm UK time (9pm GMT) Where: Server : irc.IIGS.org port : 6667 or 7000 Channel : #iigs-UKgen Time Conversion at http://www.iigs.org/cgi/ircthemes/ircthemes To learn how to join visit http://www.iigs.org/irc/index.htm or contact Graham Hart , Laura Cook , or Holly Fee-Timm ***************************************************************** PRODIGY CHAT LINKS: (PC = Prodigy Classic; PI = Prodigy Internet) PC SCHEDULE: (All start at 10 p.m. ET in the Genealogy Chat Area, unless otherwise noted.) N.B. The Saturday sessions are UNHOSTED. Sat 01/31 NEW ENGLAND Research (3 p.m. ET in the Parlor) NY/NJ/PA Research (3 p.m. ET in the Root Cellar) DEL/MD/VA/WV Research (4 p.m. ET in the Family Room) SOUTHERN STATES Research (4 p.m. ET in the Attic) ENGLISH Research (5 p.m. ET in the Parlor) GERMAN Research (5 p.m. ET in the Family Room) IRISH Research (8 p.m. ET in the Root Cellar) ITALIAN Research (8 p.m. ET in the Attic) WEST COAST Research (9 p.m. ET in the Parlor) MIDWEST Research (9 p.m. ET in the Root Cellar) AFRICAN-AMERICAN Research (9 p.m. in the Family Room) NATIVE-AMERICAN Research (9 p.m. in the Attic) Sun 02/01 ADOPTION Research/General Genealogy (Joanie Brink/Team) Mon 02/02 Beginning/General Genealogy (Julie/Team) (9 p.m. ET) Tue 02/03 Beginning/General Genealogy (Betty Goodhall/Team) Wed 02/04 NORWEGIAN/OH/IL/General Genealogy (Earl Ross/Team) Thu 02/05 JEWISH/E. EUROPEAN Genealogy (Mary Mokotoff/Team) Fri 02/06 TGIF; Beginning/General Genealogy (Myra/Team) PI SCHEDULE: (Room Name: cultures.genealogy) Mon 02/02 Beginning/General Genealogy (Myra) (9 p.m. ET) Wed 02/04 SURNAME ORIGINS/MEANINGS (Myra/Julie) (4 p.m. ET) Fri 02/06 TGIF; Beginning/General Genealogy (Julie) (9 p.m. ET) ***************************************************************** MISSING LINKS is available gratis to anyone who has an internet e-mail address. If you have friends or family members who are interested in genealogical research, please let them know about MISSING LINKS and that all they need to do is e-mail a request to Julie_Case@prodigy.com ***************************************************************** BACK ISSUES OF MISSING LINKS are available for download from the Genealogy File Library on Prodigy Classic (GO TO/Jump FILE LIBRARIES, select GENEALOGY, select MISSING LINKS) and on Prodigy Internet (click the FILES option on the left of the main Genealogy screen). If you are not a Prodigy member and would like to have a lovely free trial, you can download Prodigy Internet software at http://www.prodigy.com/ or Prodigy Classic software at http://www.prodigy.com/classic If you have questions or problems or if you would prefer to request Prodigy software be sent to you on CD or diskette, please call Customer Service at 1-800-213-0992 or 1-800-PRODIGY. ***************************************************************** CALL FOR PAPERS: If you have a delightful, amusing, amazing, cautionary, or otherwise wonderful and educational tale of genealogical research that you would like to share with the readers of MISSING LINKS in the "SUCCESSFUL LINKS" section of the newsletter or if you would like to recognize a particularly helpful librarian, archivist, town or county clerk with a "VIRTUAL BOUQUET," please send your story for consideration for publication to Julie_Case@prodigy.com