MISSING LINKS: A Weekly Newsletter for Genealogists Vol. 3, No. 6, 6 February 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 to DORIS FLOYD for her enthusiastic participation on Prodigy Classic's Genealogy Bulletin Board. Thanks, Doris! ***************************************************************** WELDING LINKS: SHARING THE LOOT by Myra Vanderpool Gormley, CG There is an up side and a down side to writing about genealogical subjects. On the up side is being one of the first to receive the latest news of events, products and happenings in the field. The down side is being buried under the avalanche of information that flows faster than snow down the mountainside into my office via letters, flyers, books, CDs, phone, fax and e-mail. Coming from a long line of organizationally impaired ancestors the result is not a pretty sight: overflowing desks, bulging filing cabinets, teeming book shelves, piles of floppy disks, CDs and less-than-neat stacks of assorted material heaped about the floor. Paperless society, indeed! However, I take comfort in the fact that I am not alone in my clutter. Most genealogists can relate to the problem. There probably are a few neat-freaks out there who have their genealogical files perfectly organized and keep them that way, but I don't want to know about them. A number of items worthy of sharing with "Missing Links" readers recently surfaced on my desk and before they are lost and gone forever, I want to let you know about them: -- BLACK DUTCH. The so-called "Black Dutch" have long been an enigma in American genealogy. Their descendants are widely reported, yet no authoritative definition exists for this intriguing term. Many claims are made about the origins of the Black Dutch, but are any valid? Clues to this genealogical mystery were sought by contacting their descendants. Read the 20-page report of the survey in James Pylant's "In Search of the Black Dutch," in "American Genealogy Magazine," Volume 12, No. 1, available from Datatrace Systems, P.O. Box 1587, Stephenville, TX 76401 ($7.50 for single issue; $22.50 annual subscription). -- TOMBSTONE TRANSCRIPTION PROJECT. We all like to find information about our ancestors on the Web, but what have you contributed? Pam Reid started this project to record and share compiled tombstones inscriptions. They will be donated to the USGenWeb Project Archives for posting on the World Wide Web. Read about the project and check the registry of cemeteries currently being recorded at: -- "THE CD ROM REVIEW" (Vol. 1, Jan. 1998) by John F. Whitaker features reviews/comments on (1) The Family Archive Viewer vs. 4.0; (2) CD 132 Military Records: Selected New York Revolutionary War Records; (3) CD 186 Family History: Virginia Genealogies #2, 1600-1800s; (4) View Point: Why Isn't My Name on That "Blankety Blank CD?"; and (5) Editorial: Remember to use them wisely. To receive this free publication, send an e-mail message to with "subscribe" as the subject. -- GENEALOGY SCHOLARSHIPS. Broderbund Software is offering 10 scholarships this year to individuals pursuing credentials as accredited or certified genealogists, or formal education at a recognized institution for genealogical instruction. Deadline for applications is 18 May. Details of the application process can be found at -- MAILING LISTS. Learn how to use mailing lists in your genealogical research. A good way to get your feet wet, virtually, is by joining GEN-NEWBIE-L list. Send e-mail to GEN-NEWBIE-L-request@rootsweb.com and in the body of your message type only "subscribe" (without the quotes). On the Web, visit the GEN-NEWBIE-L Home Page at: Is there a mailing list for your surnames of interest? Check Vicki's Home Page Cyndi's List Genealogy Resources on the Internet PRODIGY MEMBERS: Visit the Genealogy Web pages on PRODIGY to find hot links to the "Best Genealogical Sites on the Web." On PRODIGY INTERNET the URL, which can be used as your browser's START page, is From PRODIGY CLASSIC, click Guidelines & Genealogy Web Page Links box in the lower-left corner of the intro screen to the Genealogy Bulletin Board or GO TO/JUMP: http://antares.prodigy.com/igroups/terranov/geneacoi/geneacoi.htm ***************************************************************** WEB LINKS: NATIONAL SOCIETY DAUGHTERS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION (NSDAR): The President General's Message is now available at "What's New?" on the NSDAR Website . Please spread the word to all the Daughters you know who have Internet access. [Message from: Emilie Siarkiewicz , NSDAR Webmistress] With Valentine's Day just around the corner, perhaps there are friends or family members online you'd like to remember with a free greeting from one of these websites: BLUE MOUNTAIN ARTS ANIMATED ELECTRONIC GREETING CARDS from http://www.bluemountainarts.com/ CARTOON GREETINGS from http://www.toonogram.com/ ***************************************************************** BOOK LINKS: JEWISH ROOTS IN POLAND, by Miriam Weiner, CG, makes available to the public for the first time the inventories of records relating to the Jewish experience in Poland that are held in archives throughout Poland. Those with Polish roots, especially Jewish links, have long assumed that "all the records were lost" during the wars in Europe. Certified genealogist Miriam Weiner discovered that this is not true when she began exploring the repositories in Poland and the former USSR. The product of her research, JEWISH ROOTS IN POLAND, contains a town-by-town listing of documents throughout the Polish State Archives and inventory lists from the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw and the USC (vital records office) Warsaw Srodmiescie office, which holds Jewish documents for towns currently within Ukraine borders, but within Polish borders prior to 1939. It is available ($58 postpaid) from Routes To Roots Foundation, Inc., PO Box 2879, Clifton, NJ 07015-2879. Website: PIONEERS OF WEST VIRGINIA WITH SHREWSBURY, GRAHAM, HOWERTON, McKINNEY AND ALLIED FAMILIES, by Doris (Graham) Slaughter , contains 501 pages including 20 pages of pictures and 8 maps. The 10 allied families are: Akers, Bailey, Copley, Godfrey, Lusk, Mills, Sneed, Gadd, Walker, and Whitt, of Mercer, Wyoming, Raleigh, and Summers counties, West Virginia. It is available ($66 postpaid) from the author at 541 Slaughter Road, Benton, KY 42025. ***************************************************************** FAMILY TRADITIONS: ROYAL LINKS? by Elizabeth G Wokich I have been doing research on my family for about five years. My father was born in 1868 in New Brunswick and my mother in Northern Ireland. Neither became a citizen and clouded many records because of this. However, my mother always told me we came from kings and queens. This is what we all believed. After doing research in New Brunswick I came across the baptismal records of my father. I found that the family lived in Kings and Queens County in New Brunswick. She was right; she just failed to state that it was counties. So, we are no longer considered royalty! ***************************************************************** VIRTUAL BOUQUETS: Alvie L. Davidson and presents a virtual bouquet to KATHERINE LANKFORD for having gone the extra mile in helping researchers. Here is a copy of a message Katie posted on 30 January 1998 to the Roots-L mailing list under the subject "Easy Access to Family History Library Military Records." "Although I'm not LDS, it was my pleasure to serve as a librarian at a Family History Center for the past few years. I have indexed the National Archives Military Records by Family History Library FILM Number. At the main menu of the Family History Library catalog on CD, there is a place for entering a FILM/FICHE number if you happen to have it. With such a number entered, the correct record will be brought up. "The FILM Numbers shown below are "key-in" FILM numbers to take you to the beginning of the catalog card for the record, which is then arranged, usually by surname (A-H, i.e.). You choose the film number you need and order the film. You need to order the Index to Military Records before you order the records themselves. The Index gives you the Unit your ancestor is in. With that information, you can then access a number of other records, including photos. "The American Revolutionary War (War years: 1775-1783) (Ancestor born 1720-1763 as a rule): Revolutionary War Rolls 1775-1783 0830280 Revolutionary War prize cases: records of the Court of Appeals in cases of capture, 1776-1787 1534331 Revolutionary War pension and bounty-land warrant application file 0970001 Selected Records from Revolutionary War pension and bounty-land warrant application files 0840256 U.S. Revolutionary War bounty land warrants used in the U.S. Military District of Ohio and related papers, acts of 1788, 1803, 1806 1025141 Special Index to numbered records in the War Department collection of Revolutionary War records, 1775-1783 1292764 Numbered record books concerning military operation and service, pay and settlement of accounts, and supplies in the War Department collection of Revolutionary War records 1025091 Central treasury records of the Continental and Confederation governments relating to military affairs, 1775-1789 1605435 Miscellaneous numbered records (The Manuscript File) in the War Department collection of Revolutionary War records, 1775-1790s 1616635 General Index to compiled military records of Revolutionary soldiers 0882841 Compiled service records of soldiers who served in the American Army during the Revolutionary War 1485281 Index to compiled service records of American Naval personnel who served during the Revolutionary War 1004872 Compiled service records of American Naval personnel and members of the Depts. of the Quartermaster Gen'l and the Commissary Gen'l of military stores who served during the Revolutionary War 1004005 Virginia half-pay and other related Revolutionary War pension application files, ca. 1778-1875 1024434 Personal returns of the 7th, 8th, and 9th Massachusetts Regiments, 1779-1782 1445968 Index to compiled service records of volunteer soldiers who served during the Revolutionary War in organizations from: Connecticut................ 0499843 North Carolina............. 0821595 "The War of 1812 (War years: 1812-1815) (Ancestor born: 1762-1794, as a rule): Index to War of 1812 pension application files 0840431 War of 1812 Papers of the Department of State, 1789-1815 0929359 Index to compiled service records of volunteer soldiers who served during the War of 1812 in organizations from the Territory of Mississippi 0882819 Index to compiled service records of volunteer soldiers who served during the War of 1812 in organizations from the state of South Carolina 0882812 War of 1812, military bounty land warrants, 1815-1858 0983163 "The above records are National Archives records with their own designations (M-___, M-___). Family History Centers can order these films on loan for you, if you cannot get to a regional branch of the National Archives. "At the very least, perhaps the above listing will give an idea of what material is available for research. ." ***************************************************************** SUCCESSFUL LINKS: ITALIAN FAMILIES REUNITED by Ken Kittelberger About 1990, I started doing preliminary work on tracing my wife's line, CONCILIO, through her late father. Her one surviving aunt gave me brief data about names and dates, and a passing mention of their hometown in Italy. It was mainly about her father, with a brief mention of a brother and sister, with no details. In May 1991, our aunt died, and at her wake, I was told a story by a cousin. About a year before, it seems that he had visited our aunt (she was 92 at the time), and had asked her if she knew anything about the Concilio family in Dover, New Jersey, a town about 20 miles away. She replied, "Well, yes." She then told our cousin that as a newlywed, her father, Donato, had come to the United States in 1895, and stayed for a brief time with his brother Carmine. Soon, Donato and bride moved about 20 miles away and set up housekeeping and a shoemaker shop. Relations between the two brothers and their families apparently went fine for about 25 years or so. Sometime during this period, Donato loaned Carmine some money, and Carmine never paid him back. Apparently after repeated attempts to elicit repayment, Donato gave up. And from that moment on, Donato considered Carmine "dead," and there were no further contacts between the two families. During the years my wife was growing up (1940 to 1960), there was never any mention of this other family 20 miles away. Even for the next 30 years, when our aunt knew I was doing research on my own family history, and had expressed interest in the Concilios, there was no mention of it. I only knew that Donato had a brother and sister. One tiny, seemingly insignificant, bit of information our aunt had given me was that Donato's sister had remained in Italy, and had married a man named Luigi LANDI, and had one daughter. Of course, for the lack of anything different, I assumed that the other brother also stayed back in Italy. Now, back to our aunt's wake. My interest in the family history, and my efforts to gather information about our cousin's family, caused the "bug" to be passed to my cousin. He searched the phone books in the library, and sent a form letter to all the names he found. He received two immediate responses, both of which he copied and sent on to me. The first one was from Edith Concilio, the last surviving child of our missing family of Carmine's. She never married, or we never would have found her. During a visit to her, I gathered all the Carmine family information. She stated that she always wondered why the visits from Donato's family stopped, but she was just a young teenager at the time, so she was never brought in on the family problems. I showed her my documentation of the family, and she showed me what she had. Among Edith's letters, were several from Italy. One in particular, was signed by a Concetta Landi. Landi rang a bell. Aha, I had just made a discovery! The letter also had an address in Italy, but it was nearly 50 years old. On the off- chance that the Landi person might still be there (in spite of the war, etc.) I wrote a letter. Wonder of wonders, the 80-year old granddaughter of Donato's sister still lived at the address. She was absolutely thrilled that contact with her American relatives had been reestablished after a break of 50 years! Several letters then crossed the Atlantic, mine in English, hers in Italian (I don't read or speak Italian). I soon had this "new" branch documented. Scroll forward to April 1995. One Sunday, I received a phone call in Italian-accented English from an employee of Alitalia Airlines in New York City, asking if I could meet Concetta Landi at the Baltimore airport on Wednesday. I was flabbergasted. I exclaimed, is this an 85-year old woman? "Oh no," the airline person replied, "she's a young person on her honeymoon with her husband." Well, of course I said yes. We made plans, and we were hoping they could spend a couple of hours with us prior to what I assumed would be their honeymoon visiting Washington during cherry blossom time. I borrowed an Italian-English dictionary, and she walked off the plane carrying one as well. I mentioned words like Hertz, Avis, hotel, etc. Again assuming that they would get a car, and follow me to our house for lunch, then proceed to their hotel in DC. I soon comprehended that I was the rental car, and I was also the hotel. For the next 2-1/2 days, we played host, and we all learned Italian and English together. Someday soon, we'll get a chance to visit the old homestead in Italy to be guided on our tours by our new-found relatives. Genealogy often brings families together, and in our case it was through a chance question, an insignificant mention of a name, a chance notice of that same name years later, an improbable chance that an address was still valid (it no longer is), and a honeymoon spent with American relatives. I never cease to be amazed. ***************************************************************** SUCCESSFUL LINKS: PERSISTENCE PAYS BIG DIVIDENDS by Donna Carlock Portner Decades ago I discovered the name of a great-grandmother on my father's side. For years I researched and gradually discovered little tidbits but nothing substantial. Last year I ordered a copy of the 1870 census for Jennings County, Indiana. I read through it and found nothing. The week before I had to send it back (through the Family History Center) I decided to read through it once more just to be sure, this time township by township and name by name. Three hours later, not having found anything, I called my husband and told him I'd be home shortly. Beginning to rewind the film, I decided to finish the last three or so pages since I had gone as far as I had. Holding my splitting head, I glanced down and SAW HER NAME AS A CHILD. I yelled with glee even though there was no one to share my excitement. I proceeded to find all of her siblings and her father's and mother's given names. Later that summer I went to the family reunion in southern Indiana (the first time in 20 years) and discovered biographical information about my great-great-grandfather. He had a large home and was a wealthy landowner whose home was a stop on the Underground Railroad. [Editor's note: The Underground Railroad was a system of cooperation among certain active antislavery people in the United States, by which fugitive slaves were secretly helped to reach the North or Canada.] We drove to the site of his home, discovered the owner was home and he took us through the house. As we were talking, his mother mentioned a LEWIS family cemetery about a mile down the road. We stopped there and found it overgrown and neglected. We climbed up the little hill, stepping high through the grass and weeds and hit paydirt. There was his tombstone, BOTH of his wives, all his children, who had died in infancy or childhood, and his wives' families. The wonderful things about the tombstones were the women had their maiden names included and who they were daughters of. Many of the names were worn away but still good enough to make rubbings, which will be this next summer's project. Had we not decided to do a little touring of the old homestead, we would never have discovered all the wonderful information and history, which, incidentally, is now being recorded in a book about the Underground Railroad. I know that no discovery I make in future will ever be as exciting or providential as this one was. ***************************************************************** HUMOROUS LINKS: THE VAN GOGH FAMILY TREE (addenda) After much careful research, Tom Scott has discovered additional relatives of the artist Vincent Van Gogh (see ML 3:5 for the preliminary list). His race car driving brother.............Indy Gogh* His sister with the blues................Indi Gogh* His precision machinist uncle............Go No-Gogh His Spanish dancing niece................Fandan Gogh His five o'clock commuting nephew........Stopn Gogh His well connected sister................Leg Gogh His spendthrift cousin...................EzCome Ez Gogh His jolly aunt...........................Merry Gogh His longshoreman brother.................Car Gogh His niece who married Mr. Kidder.........Mar Gogh His sister Therefore, aka................Er Gogh *Indy and Indi are twin brother and sister. P.S. My wife says I should put this sudden burst of creative energy to something useful, like vacuuming her carpets. ***************************************************************** 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 02/07 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 02/08 ADOPTION Research/General Genealogy (Joanie Brink/Team) Mon 02/09 BEGINNING/General Genealogy (Julie/Team) (9 p.m. ET) Tue 02/10 NEWBIES CHAT HOUR (Pat Hohne) (9 p.m. ET) Tue 02/10 CA/General Genealogy (Margaret Posehn/Team) Wed 02/11 NEW ENGLAND/General Genealogy (Linda Edelstein/Team) Thu 02/12 FIND LOST FRIENDS & KIN (Alvie Davidson/Team) Fri 02/13 TGIF; General Genealogy (Myra/Team) (9 p.m.) PI SCHEDULE: (Room Name: cultures.genealogy) Mon 02/09 BEGINNING/General Genealogy (Myra) (9 p.m. ET) Wed 02/11 SURNAME ORIGINS/MEANINGS (Myra/Julie) (5 p.m. ET) Fri 02/13 TGIF; 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