Research Group Review - 8 July 2015

The CVGS Research Group met on Wednesday, 8 July 2015 in the Chula Vista City Hall Building A Executive Board Room 103A.  There were 13 in attendance.

In the first hour, Randy discussed:

*  Uploading a family tree to MyHeritage, searching databases there, and receiving Record Matches for family tree profiles.

*  The BLM General Land Office website at https://www.glorecords.blm.gov/.  In addition to the Federal Land patents, they now have a map showing the Section, Township and Range location of the land.

*  Ancestry.com has a new LifeStory feature that adds Historical Insights to your Ancestry Member Tree profiles.

*  The BYU/FamilySearch Relative Finder website (www.RelativeFinder.org) uses the FamilySearch Family Tree to find famous cousins for you, such as Signers of the Declaration of Independence, or Famous Writers.

In the second hour, the attendees reviewed their recent genealogy research and questions:

*  Karen Y found a list of Martyland wills that included an entry for "Henry Hooper QS."  She wondered what "QS" was.  We Googled it and think it means "Queen's Service" or similar.  Karen also was searching for her LeCompte family in Maryland and found a web page that described Ghost Walks in Cambridge, Maryland that included her ancestor's house.

*  Karen S. found a 40 page list of house owners in her grandfathers intestate estate papers.  

*  Hazel's great-grandfather was a fine violinist, and she found records of his purchases of violins.

*  Diane G. has been corresponding with and helping find information for two people in Australia.  One of them is looking for her father who was a sailor from Puerto Rico.  The other person shares an English ancestor with Diane; Diane's relative went to Canada, while the other's relative went to Australia.  Diane found her grandfather in the 1921 census for Saskatchewan, and she is working on obtaining a death certificate.

*  Arlene read Linda Stufflebean's blog post about finding photograph images on the website of the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, on DeadFred, TinEye and the Library of Congress.  

*  Sam's Harden family lived in virginia, Kentucky and Texas.  He found a Confederate general named Harden had a wife with the maiden name of Todd, and was related to Mary (Todd) Lincoln.  The general died in the Civil War.

*  Jane joined Ancestry.com using the AARP discount.  Through her Ancestry tree, she received a message from her cousin Jack, whose grandmother's sister was also Jane's grandfather's sister.  She will meet Jack in Troy, N.Y. in August, and he will be her tour guide.  Jack sent a connection to her father's cousin, Albert DelVecchio, and talked to him on the phone.  Albert said that Jane's grandfather was like "Sergeant Bilko" on TV. Jane has found lots of helpful information on the Troy Irish Genealogical Society (TIGS) website.

*  Shirley is the administrator for the Wright surname on Family Tree DNA.  She had a 4th cousin contact with Johnson Wright information.  However, there is no Y match for the contact, he may be adopted.

*  Diane D. found more information on the Michael family in online family trees that goes back to 1686.  Her cousin in New York will send more information.

The August 12th meeting of the CVGS Research Group will meet in the Conference Room of the Chula Vista Civic Center Branch Library at 12 noon.