Saturday, May 8, 2010

Saturday Night Fun - Matrilineal line

I came across a couple tweets tonight about  an exercise from Randy Seavers who's blog is here

Here is our mission!

1) List your matrilineal line - your mother, her mother, etc. back to the first identifiable mother. Note: this line is how your mitochondrial DNA was passed to you!

2) Tell us if you have had your mitochondrial DNA tested, and if so, which Haplogroup you are in.


What a great activity on the eve of Mothers day!

Diane (1949 - living) - Married Scott Neil- Kingston, Ontario
Jane Ann Shanks (1923 - 1992) Married James Cahill  - Scotland
Betsy Gaff (1894 - 1986) Married John Shanks - Scotland
Ann (I only have a name at this point)

I don't have much information about this part of my family.  Finding information in Scotland seems to be an expensive adventure!

I haven't had a DNA test done.



Happy Mothers day to all the mothers out there!

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Open Doors Hamilton

Today was a day where local areas of interest were open to the public free of charge.  It was a great opportunity to visit some places you might not otherwise go to see.
I was able to go to three things today.  A baby in tow and rain hindered going anywhere else but still it was a great day.

Here are the places we went too.

Janes Walk.  Check out this site for an explanation of what Janes walk is.  Maybe there is one in your area on Sunday, or maybe you can set one up in your town next year!
This walk was of Victoria Park.  Here are a couple plaques that describe part of what we learned about.  I will post the rest on my Familyhistoryfun - Wentworth Site soon!



Erland Lee Museum

Check out the link above for more details, but basically was the Lee family home until purchased by the Womens institue.  The first ever meeting was held here in 1897.  I need to research more about this because my family lived in this area, and there are some names on this plaque that might be related to me. Surnames NEIL and DEAN.  What an exciting find!



Battlefield House Museum

This is where the battle of Stoney Creek took place during the war of 1812, in 1813.   IT was interesting to hear some of the stories about the Gage family and that time period.  I wasn't able to go up to the monument because it wasn't stroller friendly, but maybe another time!





This is the first time I've been to an open doors event.  Are there ones in your area? I'd love to see a blog about it if there is!

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Tombstone Tuesday - Thanks to Kindness of others!

I wasn't going to post today, but then I was lucky enough to have someone stop by a gravesite and take some pictures for me.  So nice!

 *This ones are bit difficult to read, but you can on some of the others he took*

They are both in the Trinity Union Cemetery in Glanford, Wentworth County. 

Note the different spellings of the last name.

This first one is
Wilber Hendershott (July 12 1851 - July 30 1916) and his wife Elizabeth Matilda Neil (Dec 17 1857-June 2 1925)
Elizabeth M. Neil is my GG Grandfathers sister.




This second one is Wilbers parents
Philip Hendershot (1827 - 1906) and his wife Catharine Olphiant (1832 - 1908)



Some of the dates are a bit off, from what I have, so I will need to investigate that at some point.


Happy Tuesday!

Sunday, April 25, 2010

52 weeks to better genealogy - Week 17

This is the assignment... From Geneabloggers and Wee Tree
Get out your family photos and label them. You’ve seen them a million tines because they’re YOUR photos, but what happens when they’re passed down to others? Will those people know the names of everyone in the pictures? Take some time and label your photos with pertinent information. If you’re working with old photos, take consideration with their age and condition. Devise an archival-friendly labeling system. For digital photos, you can use computer programs to tag the images with names or other identifying information. If that’s too confusing, you can at least save and/or re-name digital photos with details of your choosing. Don’t let another generation slip by without documenting your photos. Your ancestors will thank you. If you have a genealogy blog, share with your readers your system for identifying photos, and even share a photo if you like.

When I read this, I thought, OMG, I so need to do this.
I don't have time to actually complete it right now, but it will be on my mind when I look at my pictures in the future.

For the pictures I have on my computer that are "genealogy" related, (that is, not the hundreds I have of my new daughter), I have been getting good at labelling them.  This is how I have been labelling them so far.

LASTNAME_Firstname_Locationifknown_date if known

So far it seems to be working well for me, but I probably should do this for all the "recent' photos I have of my family as well.

So I didn't actually do any work for this weeks challenge, but here is a picture of my daughter...just because.
I'll label it Swinging fun! :)



Scanning Sunday

Here is a picture with my grandfather in it.  I wish I knew where, or when exactly it was taken, but I don't know exactly.  I do know he was part of the Canadian Dental corp in WWII, so I wonder if this is that group of guys?  In any event they all look they hare pretty happy here. :)
My grandpa, James Cahill, is the one is the back row, on the far right.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Wentworth County website

For those that are interested in Wentworth County, Ontario Canada check out my new site

Familyhistoryfun.webs.com

I just started it, so its under construction, but my plan is to add all the links and information I can find about this area.  I hope that people will use the forum provided to chat with others about their research, and submit pictures of relavent things.

Any feedback/constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated!

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Displaying genealogy - Part 2

I gave my thought about how to display some genealogy as mentioned in my previous post, and I remembered about PICNIK...a great photo editing site I haven't used in a long time.

So here are some things I did quickly.  Maybe they are something I could get printed off and framed?  I am sure with some more time invested I could get them looking pretty good.  My only concern would be about how they would print off, would the resolution be ok? They always look so much better on the computer!