I've GOT to get organized -- DONE!

   Yes! Hallelujah!
   And, it only took three months.
   Five file drawers full of research notes are now in proper order. Notes are in color-coded folders. All notes for which sources could be even remotely identified are entered in my List of Sources Searched (LSS) database.
   I didn't plan on this step, but any obituaries or documents such as birth records, death records etc. have been scanned and the original records put into sheet protectors and sorted by family into three-ring binders. Prints of the documents are in the notes folders.

   Some final statistics: 108 ancestral names and 8,045 sources in my LSS.
   This project has been a humbling experience. My file drawers are a sea of green folders. Those are the ones with the notes that have not been entered into my RootsMagic. I enjoy research and I think I'm pretty good at finding information. But . . . that doesn't make me a good genealogist.
   That's one of the next projects -- entering that mass of data into my RootsMagic, turning the green folders into blue folders (sources entered). That may take years!
   I'll also review my families in RM. Some of the sources are from previous generations of database programs tracing back to PAF. They need to be corrected to EE style.
   I also need to send for official birth, marriage and death records to replace my abstracts and transcriptions.

   The other next project is pictures. We have hundreds, maybe thousands of albums, prints and slides from our families. They need to be culled, organized, scanned etc. A new CanoScan 8800F scanner sits on my desk and archival supplies are in-house from Gaylord to make a good start. I have to give a tip of the hat to Gaylord. I've had two orders with them recently and their service was exceptional -- delivery in 2-3 days.
   I think I'll focus on pictures for a while.
   Although . . . there is that roll of microfilm on order of Montgomery County, Ohio, tax records.
   What can I say, I'm addicted.

I've GOT to get organized -- Update

   It has been a little over two months since I started this project. My guess is I'm a little shy of half way. I have five deep file drawers of research notes and I'm into the third drawer.
   I've changed my mind about how to deal with newspaper clippings, primarily obituaries. I'm scanning them and making a printout, but I'm not attaching them to the printout and keeping them with the research notes. Instead they are going into clear plastic sleeves and filed in three-ring binders with other records pertaining to that family.
   One of the interesting items I found that I didn't know I had was a deed from 1868 for a cemetery lot in Calvary Cemetery in Chicago purchased by my 3rd great grandmother Margaret Harbison. She was a widow and her husband, John Harbison, and other family members, are buried there.

   I must admit, a lot of my sources are not well documented. Some are from when I was just starting and others are from when I should have known better.
   So, just in case there are a few new genealogists out there who haven't heard this sermon from Genealogy 101, let me repeat it. If you follow these rules, you will thank yourself and save yourself an immense amount of time later.

   When taking notes:
   Never, ever, ever put information about more than one ancestral family on the same sheet. Ultimately, you will have to sort your information by families. Having more than one ancestral family on a sheet will require, at minimum, a photo copy.
   Never, ever, ever put information from more than one source on the same sheet. You may need to sort your notes by places or record types and breaking this rule will lead to more time-consuming photo copies.
   Never, ever, ever write on the back of a sheet. When you analyze your data and you lay those notes out on your desk, part of the information will be hidden and perhaps overlooked. More photo copies.

   And last, but not least:
   Always, always, always record where the information came from -- IN DETAIL.
 
   Oh, I wish I had followed these rules years ago. My current organizational effort would be so much easier. 

Black Sheep Sunday - 'Shifty' Gill

   While going through some old notes (part of the "I've GOT to get organized" project) I ran across a letter from Mrs. Edward (Virginia) Gill of Newport Beach, California, dated 24 Aug 1971. She was a subscriber to my "Gill Gazette" which was published for one year.
   Her letter included a transcript of a wanted poster she found in Tombstone, Arizona.

Aug., 1899

$1000 REWARD

for

Bascom "Shifty" Gill

WANTED for stealing stage coach and 2 strong boxes with $12,000 payload in boullion and coin consigned to Ranchers-Miners Trust Co., Phoenix, Arizona.

23 years of age, blond hair, 5' 8 1/2", 160 lbs.  Wears black hat, shirt, vest, and pants.

Sheriff, Joe Kilgren

Douglas, Ariz.

Mrs. Gill asks, "Will anybody claim him?"

Preserving Heirlooms

   The May Family History Workshop presented by the Kentucky Historical Society and the Kentucky Genealogical Society will focus on preserving your family's heirlooms.

   Louise Jones, KHS director of special collections and library, and Trevor Jones, KHS director of museum collections and exhibitions, will discuss techniques for handling, storing and preserving artifacts and paper materials.

   The "second Saturday" workshop will be from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. May 14 at the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History at 100 W. Broadway in Frankfort, Kentucky.  The seminar is free and open to the public.

   A box lunch (sandwich, chips, cookie and drink) is available for $6, payable at the door. You must register before noon on Friday, May 13, to reserve a lunch.  To register, contact the library's reference desk by email or by calling 502-564-1792, ext. 4460.  You can also bring your own lunch or go out to several near-by restaurants.

   Following each workshop, the Kentucky Technology in Genealogy Users Group offers a free program to help support family history researchers' use and understanding of technology.

   After the workshop, plan to stick around for a little research. The library will be open until 5 p.m.

Tech Tuesday - HathiTrust Digital Library

   While searching for source information about the "Wisconsin Helper" on a research note in my Gill family folders, I was directed by WorldCat to HathiTrust Digital Library.
   That was a new one for me.
   I found that the "Wisconsin Helper" had been digitized and could be searched, but was not available for full view because of the copyright.

   I was curious! What was this library? A news release from Indiana University had a brief history of the trust.

"The HathiTrust was created in 2008 through a partnership with the 12-university consortium known as the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), the 11 university libraries of the University of California system and the University of Virginia. Since that time HathiTrust has grown to encompass the research libraries of more than 50 institutions. HathiTrust was built to enable libraries a means to archive and provide access to their digital content, whether scanned volumes, special collections or born-digital materials. Preserving materials for the long term has long been a mission and driving force of leading research libraries. Their collections, accumulated over centuries, represent a treasury of cultural heritage and investment in the broad public good of promoting scholarship and advancing knowledge. The representation of these resources in digital form provides expanded opportunities for innovative use in research, teaching and learning, but must be done with careful attention to effective solutions for the curation and long-term preservation of digital assets."

   Statistics on the home page says the trust holds 8,577,950 total volumes, 4,701,131 book titles, 209,874 serial titles amounting to 3,002,282,500 pages and 384 terabytes. And only three years old.

   Even though I'm not supposed to be doing research right now (you remember the "I've GOT to get organized" project), I had to give the library a spin.
   You can do a Catalog Search, or a Full Text Search or set up your own Collection. I didn't want to take the time to try setting up a collection, so I decided to dive in to a full-text search. As I discovered a bit later, there is an advanced search for the catalog but not for full text (coming in the future).
   Hmmm. OK.

    Gill. Search is very fast. Returned 880,669 hits, 263,073 in items available for full view. A few too many to look through in . . . what . . . two years.
   William Gill. -- 707,645 total, 229,770 full view. Default must be AND or I'd have gotten more hits.
   "William Gill" -- in quotes -- 6,872 total, 3,421 full view. Still too many.
   "William Gill" & "New Brunswick" -- no good -- use AND or OR or a minus sign (-) to remove words as search terms.
   "William Gill" AND "New Brunswick" -- 2,610 total, 1,266 full view.
   "William Gill" AND "New Brunswick" AND Brockway -- 719 total, 250 full view. I might wade through those some day. Maybe add "-Jersey" to eliminate New Brunswick, New Jersey.
   One more: "William Gill" AND "New Brunswick" AND "Anna Brockway" -- 5 total, 1 full view.

   That's drilling down. 
   The full view was from New Jersey so no help, but one of the "search-only" books I had to find -- Early families of "the Mackadavy" : settlers before, during, and following the Loyalist period, Magaguadavic Valley, Parish of St. George, Southwestern New Brunswick, Canada. Two clicks took me back to WorldCat which told me the closest library owning the book was Allen County -- 210 miles away.
   OK. I'll buy it. It was published in 2004 so it should be available. Well, maybe. Amazon didn't have it. A Google search found one website that said it's out of print and another that said it was $35. The latter site had the author's email address so I fired off an email for clarification. Email bounced. No such address. Not a good sign. This will require some additional research.

   Pages from full-view books can be read on the HathiTrust website. The PDFs also can be downloaded if you are on the domain of a partner institution. Alternatives are to check Google Books, Internet Archive or elsewhere for a downloadable PDF.
   HathiTrust has been added to my Google bookmarks.

I've GOT to get organized -- Update

   Progress has been very slow. I've been revisiting the Brockway folders, entering all the notes into the List of Sources Searched.
   The last two folders contained ancient correspondence. Some of you might remember hand-written letters, carbon copies of typewritten letters, hand-printed pedigree charts and family group sheets.  (How did we survive not getting a response for three weeks or three months?)
    Just to prove that this disorganization I'm fighting is nothing new, I quote from a letter I wrote on April 6, 1986 -- just a few days over 25 years ago. I quote:

"I'm about to go berserk here. Some of my notes on this problem are missing from where they should be in my files. (I think I had them out when I wrote to you 2 March and apparently I didn't put them away.) One of these days I'm going to give up all my other responsibilities and get my genealogy in order.  I promise!"

   It's taken 25 years, but a promise is a promise.

Sunday's Obituary - Fred A. Brockway

   I'm not sure how I came to have these two obituaries of Fred A. Brockway. I have no record of him in my RootsMagic, but then there is a lot of data on my paper family group sheets for the Brockway family that has never been entered into the computer. Several Ancestry Trees indicate this Fred A. Brockway is the son of Andrew S. and Jennie A. (Bristol) Brockway. If the ancestral lines are correct, there is a good chance he is a distant cousin.

B-2
The State Journal [Lansing, Michigan]
Sun., Aug 19, 1979

BROCKWAY, FRED A.
2815 Northwind Dr.
East Lansing
Formerly of Flint and Harrison

Mr. Brockway, age 94, died at a local hospital Aug. 17, 1979. He had been a resident of the Lansing area for 4½ years coming from Harrison. He was a Life Member of Flint Lodge No. 23, F. & A. M.; Life Member of Elf Khurafeh Temple of Saginaw, member of the Genessee Valley Commandry No. 5, K. T. and a member of Kishma Grotto No. 77. Surviving are: 1 sister, Leila B. Thompson of Lansing;; 3 nieces, Mrs. Betty Bissell of St. Augustine, Fla., Mrs. Joan Andrews and Mrs. Marilyn Johnson, both of Lansing; 2 nephews, Paul Collier of Harrison and Tyrus Poxson of Creed, Colo. Holt Lodge No. 572, F. & A. M. will provide the service at 1:00 P.M. Monday in the Estes-Leadley Holt Chapel, with interment in North Cemetery. Pall Bearers will be provided by Holt Lodge No. 572, F. & A. M.













Towne Courier [East Lansing, Michigan]
Vol. 18 No. 33
Page 5A   August 22, 1979

Fred Brockway, 94
   Fred A. Brockway, 94, of 2815 Northwind Drive, East Lansing, died Friday, Aug. 17, at a local hospital. He had been a resident of the Lansing area for four years coming from Harrison.
   Mr. Brockway was a life member of Flint Lodge No. 23, F&AM; a life member of Elf Khurafeh Temple of Saginaw, and a member of the Genessee Valley Commandry No. 5, K.T. and Kishma Grotto No. 77.
   Surviving are his sister, Leila B. Thompson of Lansing; three nieces and two nephews.
   Services were conducted Monday, Aug. 20, in the Estes-Leadley Holt Chapel with the Holt Lodge No. 572 F&AM officiating. Burial was in North Cemetery.