Genealogy Place Names - A

Silly me I thought it would be a good idea to create a ‘Place Usage Report’ in Family Tree Maker. I didn’t limit the report to direct line ancestors and what I ended up with was 4,434 pages of places mentioned in that huge tree. What to do with that massive document? Since the report is alphabetical I decided to go at it one letter at a time.

I want to share information with my family on, not only, our ancestors but the places where they lived – feeling that those places helped to shape their lives. With hundreds of choices among the ‘As’ how do I choose? I decided to keep it simple. I picked the town (or place – it could be a castle, county, etc.) that came first in the ‘As’ with a direct line ancestor. Then I picked the last place with an ‘A’.

This is how that turned out (my first random choice landed a big fish!):

Aachen, North Rhine, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany (AKA – Aix-la-Chapelle) and dear Grandpapa Charlemagne. 

Aachen Cathedral with Palatine Chapel

According to Wikipedia – “Charlemagne spent most winters in Aachen between 792 and his death in 814.”  This makes me want to stop there on my next trip to Europe – the last time I was in Germany was when I was 4, so I’d say it’s about time for another visit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aachen
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne 

Check out the links with a ‘control/click’. 

Part 2

Ayrshire, Scotland 

Eglinton Castle, Ayrshire

John Beatty 1672-1720 and Lady Margaret Montgomery 1436-1461

John and Margaret lived in Ayrshire in different centuries – but one represents my mother’s family the other represents my father’s family; which means my parents' ancestors lived in the same small county centuries before they met and married. 

John Beatty arrived in New York in 1691 and almost immediately married Susannah Asfordby, who had arrived with her parents from England in 1674 at the age of five. He just as quickly became a prominent resident of Ulster County, New York and the village of Marbletown. Some sources say he was born in Ireland and others say Ayrshire, Scotland. I somehow hear him with a Scottish brogue. These days it is a ferry boat ride from Ayrshire to Northern Ireland so he may have lived in Aryshire and disembarked for America from Ireland. Hm, I may need a trip to Ayrshire to get to the bottom of this puzzle.

Lady Margaret Montgomery had 18 hints awaiting and her father 23 on the ancestry.com tree. More questions than answers here but then that is part of the hunt. Right?  I can already see the value in the exercise. I’m learning more than my children, no doubt! I wonder what ‘B’ has in store? Please check out this link to Ayrshire:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayrshire

Photos:  Aachen Cathedral with Palatine Chapel, Photo by CEphoto, Uwe Aranas via Wikipedia Commons
Eglinton castle ruins, Eglinton Country Park, Kilwinning, North Ayrshire, Scotland. A view from the old stables/offices side. Rosser1954 at English Wikipedia

Nature or Nurture

 A ship like the Gellert with interiors showing 1st, 2nd, and steerage accommodations. The Gellert is the ship taken to America from Hamburg, Germany by the Timmerman family 30 Oct 1888.

(Photos courtesy of http://www.norwayheritage.com/)

I’ve been playing with the idea of blogging about what I remember and how I feel; or more specifically, moving beyond the cold facts to a blend of subjective and objective genealogy. It will be my memories of the family added to the more objective facts presented on ancestry.com. This genealogy website gives us encouragement in offering a ‘Lifestory’ feature that gives a head-start in bringing our ancestors to life on the page. This Lifestory can be edited, rearranged, and enhanced by personal memories and I've mostly ignored it. Now I hope to put this wonderful feature to use. 

A caveat – my ancestry.com tree is far from perfect. It is a worksheet, a fluid work in progress. Where I’ve done the field work I’m pretty certain it is correct. I’m a big fan of ancestry.com and other genealogical websites and all the documentation they have available – but computerized mistakes have a way of spreading like weeds and becoming part of the genealogical landscape. I’m open to suggestions, corrections, and ideas and in the end I have to go where my gut leads. Will my ramblings be of interest to blog readers or genealogist? That remains . . . as they say.

Yesterday I started with a look at my ex-husband’s family. They are, obviously, not related to me but they are related to three of my children.  Since they are my ex’s family deep emotions are stirred while looking at their tree. It is a large eastern Nebraska family. My children’s great grandfather was an immigrant from Holstein, Germany. He arrived with his parents at age 10 in 1888. Their great grandmother was also from Germany and was born at sea – arriving with her family in 1882. Just think of her mother – leaving her home to travel to a foreign land at the end of her pregnancy and delivering that baby while on the ocean! These families didn’t stop on the east coast, they made their way to Nebraska where there were German speaking farming communities and social clubs that helped them feel at home. These families worked hard to learn English and fit into the American culture, but they were welcomed here in their native tongue. When I went to college in Nebraska I found there was still a fondness for polka – although two world wars had pretty much killed the German language in America.

But wait, my ex-husband’s maternal family is not only NOT related to me! They are genetically not related to him and therefore not related to my children. He was adopted. Do I spend time pursuing a step or adopted family? I knew these people, most not well, but others who have affected my ex, my self, and my children by their love and life experience. Their very existence and life stories were woven into the fabric of our lives. Blended families are a frequent fact these days and how much time you may wish to spend on researching their roots really depends on what significance they hold in your lives. 

As I come back to my genealogy and start with fresh eyes, I can see that my mother-in-law and her family touched my life beginning at age 18 and my life would never be the same. God’s little elves, weaving together the strands of my life at a mad speed, picked up those threads before I could take a breath and the Timmerman, Able, and Steinhauer families were a part of my life’s tapestry.

Tell me, please. Do you research step and adopted families as part of your line?