A #genchat Learning Experience

So, as I was putting together my list of films to request at the Family History Library during RootsTech, I was trying to narrow down the list. The FHL has a number of directories for my Great Grandmother's hometown of Harburg in Bavaria, Germany, on microfilm currently located at the vault and not in the library proper. After last night's ‪#‎genchat‬ about re-evaluating sources you already have, I realized that I ALREADY HAVE THIS INFORMATION. It is in a book on the housing history of the town I got when I visited in 2006.

Cover of Harburg Hauserchronik

It's in German, grouped by house, and lists the ownership history of each house in town. And it has an index of names. Duh! There are more relatives in this town than those from the one house I focused on, and a first quick scan tells me that the owners of the 1575 German bible I have were my great grandmother's next door neighbors!!! *facepalm*

I think I have my source for re-evaluation for challenge #2, discovered while working on one of my SMART goals for challenge #1. It won't be close to done before the next chat though (or perhaps even this year!!).

Let the discoveries continue to steamroll!

More Swedish Connections

A Swedish cousin of a cousin (we share cousins, but aren't cousins) sent me two links to Swedish family trees. The couple these both link to are my 5th great grandparents, Anders Spångberg and Stina Beata Birath - if the trees are correct, there may be a paper trail back to 10th and 11th great grandparents on two lines!!

http://www.skoghallsfk.se/Tomas/slakt/1914.htm

http://ingvarj.se/slakt2/family.php?famid=F385

Crossing the Pond - Italy!

I did a quick stroll through Family Search this evening and found they have posted images of records from the hometown of my great-grandfather Francesco Giordano (Frank Jordan), Omignano - I found my first Italian record, of my great grandfather's birth! (His is the last record on the page, the last for 1887.)

https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1971-28331-2765-67

His parents are Giuseppe Giordano and Rosalia Cammarota. Now I need to learn some Italian....

Update 10/22/2013: Marriage record for Frank's parents, Giuseppe Giordano and Rosalia Cammarota: https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1942-28331-2028-14

Update 10/31/2013: And Giuseppe and Rosalia were kissing cousins!!! His grandparents were her great-grandparents, making them 1st cousins 1x removed. This is the first set of married cousins I've found in my direct line. So now one set of 4th great grandparents double as a set of 5th great grandparents.

Cousin Connection - Sweden!

I believe I have found a fourth cousin in Sweden on Ancestry.com!!! She signed up for Ancestry this past August. Working my way forward from siblings of direct ancestors this evening led me to a connection in her online tree.  Our shared 3rd great grandparents are Adolph Fredric Boquist and Brita Stina Andersdotter who lived in Gällaryd, Jönköping, Sweden.

Update 11/18/2012: She wrote back!! Woo-hoo, cousin connection!!!

Progress in Sweden - Twins!

Today (er - yesterday?) was a good day for family history research. I found a bunch of Swedish church records on Ancestry.com (not indexed, so much eyeballing required), with which I connected up some cousins with the rest of the tree, traced back another generation to my 3rd great grandparents, and discovered that my 2nd great grandmother was a twin like me!

Update 5/31/2012: I haven't exhausted this new source yet - I'm back another generation to a set of 4th great grandparents!

Update 6/2/2012: More twins - my 2nd great grandmother (the twin) married a man who's father was a twin! From my Swedish great grandmother, I have found my 2x great grandparents, both sets of 3x great grandparents, 3 of the 4 sets of 4th great grandparents, and one set of 5th great grandparents. A week ago I only had names and birth dates of the 2x great grandparents - much progress has been made!

1940 Census Release

Woo-hoo! I found Daddy in the 1940 census! And my grandfather is on line 29 for the supplemental questions. Yay for release of images on the NARA 1940 Census web site!

German Language Class - Learning more than words!

Guten Tag!

So, last month, I signed up for a German language class with the intention of learning some German to help with reading genealogical records and for another potential future visit to Germany.  After I met our instructor, a German-born retired teacher in his 70s (who couldn't quite give up his teaching, as evidenced by this class!), and explained why I was taking the class, he was interested in hearing about my German ancestors.  Excellent!

First, I asked about the term "Pfründnerin" that was listed as the occupation of my 3x great grandmother Maria Margaretha Bauer at her death.  He did a little research and found that these were people who lived in a Pfründenhaus, a church-run home for the elderly and invalids.  They also took in widows and orphans, often as workers, and at the time, Maria was a widow.

After that first success, I told him about the Harburg bible and brought printouts of some of the bible pages as well as the loose papers from the bible to class:

Loose Papers from the Harburg Bible

I also sent him the link to the German bible page on my web site so he could see some more of the bible itself.  My teacher said this of the bible:  

It is an original full Luther-Bible, which came out for the first time in 1534, printed by Hans Lufft of Wittenberg. He reprinted it several times afterwards until 1584, selling something like 100,000 copies within these 50 years, a truly astronomical figure for those times. 

 That agrees with much of what the folks at the Smithsonian had to say as well.  :)