Today when we want to know what is happening with somebody, we check their social media accounts.  If you aren’t connected to a person, it can be a bit challenging to find out what is going on in their life.    Local Items   Back in the day, it was common to print items  in small town newspapers about people from different neighborhoods.  In this case, you could check up on anyone.  However, you were

This week’s challenge was “Oops.”  The first thing that came to my mind was all the short pregnancies.  What I mean by that is all the people who married and had a baby six to seven months later.  I have seen that in many different families in many different people’s genealogies.   It’s Not New   Many people think pregnancies out of wedlock are a modern phenomena, but in reality they have always occurred.  One

An Early Education If the census record is correct, Andrew McCracken was was attending school and could read/write at age 4.  Andrew went on to the be director for Johnson School in Crawford County, where his children went to school.   Rocky Vale   Andrew passed his passion for education on to his son Joe, who became the director of Rocky Vale from 1922 until all his kids finished grade school.  Joe expected his kids

Researching the McCracken family seems to always be a matter of looking where you don’t expect.  This is true of both Lemuel and his wife Louisiana.  They just never seem to be where you expect them to be or they have records that don’t quite match their names although they are definitely for the right people.   Lee County, Iowa   Lemuel showed up alone in Lee County, Iowa.  I found him there in the

  The challenge for Week 2 is a “favorite photo.”  I have no clue how to pick a favorite photo.  So, I asked others and I ended up with this 5-generation photo.   Shown in the photo are Judge Sharpless Klinefelter, his daughter Blanche Klinefelter Thomson,  her son Alexander Thomson, his son James V. Thomson, and his children.  Judge lived to be 100 years of age and this was taken during the last year of