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 limited by the other person’s connection to the person that wrote the local items. So, if someone in your family wrote the local items or was tightly connected to the person who wrote them, your family would show up in the newspaper a lot. On the other hand, if you weren’t connected, you might never show up.
Local Items For Genealogy
Items written in the newspaper are a far cry from a primary source for genealogy. However, they can be invaluable in your research. They have helped me find people that weren’t where they were expected, learn about schools and churches that are long gone, find unknown family members etc. But more than anything, they bring these characters in my genealogy to life with details and stories that go beyond basic facts.
Ten Specific Stories
The following are a few of the things that I learned about by read reading local items or other small articles in newspapers. Some were exciting new information that led to additional research, while others were just fun tidbits of information.
- My gg-grandfather Lemuel McCracken’s birth date is April 12, 1831. Records showed April 1831, but no day had been found until an article that talked about his birthday party.
- My husband’s grandmother Minnie (Kutzner) Helm had two half sisters that she knew, but apparently never told her daughters about.
- My ggg-grandfather Abel John Pellett voted for General Harrison in 1836 and 1840.
- At age 16, my g-uncle Oren Thomas was run over by a wagon when the team of horses ran away. They thought at first that the injuries might be fatal. He survived and died at age 70.
- My husband’s g-grandparents Herbert & Blanche (Klinefelter) Thomson met in Colorado at a train station in the early 1930’s. Blanche lived in Pennsylvania and Herbert lived in Nebraska. So, it must have been meant to be.
- The Jury family arrived in Fort Scott, Kansas from Oxford, Canada in November 1869, staying at the Western House Hotel in Fort Scott.
- John Peelle, brother to my ggg-grandfather William Peelle, was quite a story teller. He would get up at the Old Settlers Picnic in Indiana and tell stories of picking cotton in North Carolina, swapping pants with another man at a log rolling, marrying his wife, and witches in “North Caroliner.”
- Williamsburg, Indiana was named after my gggg-grandfather William Johnson.
- In 1916, my grandpa Joe McCracken decided to move into Farlington. He had a sale (selling cattle, farm implements, etc.) as he was quitting farming (which he returned only a few years later).
- My gg-grandmother Mary (Portwood) Conner was seriously hurt when she was thrown from a horse she was riding (she was 40 years old at the time).