Meaning of a term on old genealogy records

Peter's Question:

I’m hoping that you can answer my query. My Great Great Grandfather – James Baron was employed as a “blogger” in 1880. My family is from the North West of England –Lancashire. Would you know what the job was? I can’t find any references to the term except for the current Internet/web use

Olive Tree Answer: Hi Peter,

Unless one of your future descendants is a time traveller who has failed to obey the rules of The Continuum, then the Blogger term means something other than the current definition.

When was James born, to whom was he married, where in Lancashire did he live and where did you find this Blogger term?

e.g. On a census, on a marriage license. a city directory listing? Mentioned in a book? I suspect this is a case of either a transcription error or misreading old handwriting. If I could see the original document where you spotted this word, it would be helpful. You might want to take a look at the tutorials on reading old handwriting on my OliveTreeGenealogy Blog

Be creative in your Genealogy search techniques

Howard's Question:

I need help making out a name That might be misspelled in The 1910 Census for Salem (Rockingham County) New Hampshire. There appears a Listing For a John HOSELLIN and wife Celista and family for that year. However I can't find that family name in any earlier or later census for New Hampshire. My guess is that this has been misspelled and garbled in The handwriting. Are there any guesses or records of how this name was meant to be written? Since this
family had resided there for generations. Thanks for any advice.

Olive Tree Answer: Hi Howard, When you are stuck reading a very garbled name, and are trying to find the family in earlier records, here is what I do:

First I make sure I have viewed the image to see if I can read the handwriting any better than the indexer/transcriber did. If not, I search for the family in earlier census *but* I do not use the surname!

So in your case, when you go to that 1910 census you see some great clues - approximate years of birth for John and Celista, plus locations. You also get a list of children and a grandchild and daughter-in-law, with approximate years of birth and locations.

I looked at the image on Ancestry.com and it is very hard to read.

If I were you, I would pick either John or his wife Celista or one of the easier to read names of their children - and search for them in 1900 census. You won't find the children any earlier, as the first birth year is 1888 and the 1890 census is mostly missing.

I did find the family in the Ancestry.com 1900 census records by using my no surname search. I tried John with wife Celista but that didn't pan out. I tried Celista born in Massachusetts 1851 plus/minus 2 years but again no hits. So I went to the children. I started with Alonzo but nothing, tried Pearl and again nothing. I had narrowed my search to New Hampshire since the children were all born in that state. But when I got nowhere, I opened my search to all of USA.

Once again I used a child's name, I opted for looking for Pearl born 1889 +/-2, in New Hampshire, with a father John. Bingo - there is the family living in Haverill City, Essex Co. Massachusetts. Father is recorded as John Haseltine, mother Celesta (note the variant spelling of her first name). There are many children so you should have some fun ahead of you.

Help to Find a Biological Grandfather

Kathi's question: [edited]

I am searching for my biological grandmother. I am the daughter of a man that was adopted in 1934. My father passed away when I was pretty young. For the past couple of years I have been looking for any information about his adoption. I have found my biological grandfathers family but cannot come up with too much of my grandmothers. Here's what I know...
Her name is/was Gearldine Marie Leach. She was born on June 18, between 1913 and 1916 in Vinton County, Ohio. She married a Chester Napper in October of 1934. I sent away for the marriage license to confirm this marriage. I found a 1920 census with Gearldine but the last name was misspelled as Loach. Found out she had a sister, Pearline...brothers Arthur Ishmel and George Dewey both younger. Her fathers name was Leo and her mothers maiden name was Morris. There is not trace of her after the marriage in 1934. I don't know where to search now.

Olive Tree Answer: Hi Kathi, You've already discovered quite a bit, good going! Here are a few more items for you to add to your research and to follow up on -

First, you say that you found Geraldine/Gearldine in the 1920 census but her name was "misspelled as Loach". That is an error in transcribing. If you look at the actual census image (as I did) you can see that the surname is LEACH. Don't be too quick to believe an index or a transcribed version of an event. We all make mistakes and human error is very common when indexing or transcribing records. Also to be fair in this case, the image shows that the "e" in LEACH is rather like a blog of ink, so it is easy to see how the surname could be misrecorded as Loach. But even if it WERE written on the image as LOACH that would not be a reason to discard it, as spelling was not always exact.

Moving on, I think you need to find all the siblings in the 1930 census. I use
Ancestry.com for this. You could try Heritage Quest if you have access. You found George living with his grandparents, so perhaps the others were split up and placed elsewhere. Remember to use wildcards to search, be creative with spelling and don't restrict yourself too much. Use only a first name and date of birth. Try only a date of birth and location of birth. Be creative

I believe I may have found your Leo's death - there is an Arthur Leo Leach born 31 July 1886 in Vinton Ohio who died 18 Feb 1952 in Zanesville Ohio. His parents were Enoch and Martha. I found this online in Family Search Labs Ohio Deaths 1908-1953.

Ancestry.com has Ohio Births, Marriages & Deaths, you may want to try using their search engine. Try finding an obituary or burial record for him in local Zanesville newspapers. Don't let the name "Arthur Leo" throw you off track, people often used first or middle names interchangeably. Given his naming of a son Arthur Ishmael, and the year and location of birth, my money is on this being your Leo.

Lastly I found a death for Chester A. Napper in the SSDI (Social Security Death Indexes) online. He was born 1 Nov. 1911 and died 14 May 1984 in Hamden, Vinton Ohio. He is also in the 1930 census for Wilkesville, Vinton Ohio. You should try tracking Chester since you say he married your grandmother. He may never have left the area, so have a look around for him. By finding him, or by finding your grandmother's siblings, you may find her.

When in Doubt Check the Original Record

Carrie asked .

My mother's father Ralph Gorman was 19 at the time of my mother's birth (1928) and is listed on the birth certificate as a taxidermist from Minnesota. My mother was born in Shawano/Mattoon, township of Almon, Wisconsin. Her mother was born in Minnesota in 1909. No other family members know any details either. So not knowing his parents or siblings, my brick wall seems permanent

.

Lorine Answers: Cariie, you asked a sensitive question so I've edited quite a bit of it for privacy reasons. A check of census records from 1910 on reveals no Ralph Gorman who fits your description. Variant spellings of Gorman did not pull anyone up that fits either.

So, I suggest you need to question if the name Ralph Gorman is correct. That leads to the question - did you consult an original birth registration for your mother or did you use a transcribed version? Because when in doubt you should always go back to the orginal to verify that the transcriber was correct. Perhaps his name was not Gorman but something similiar. Perhaps he had a middle name that he used interchangeably with Ralph. Perhaps his age is wrong ( there are Ralph Gormans of various ages in the census records). There are lots of possibilities for error and if you have been searching for 3 years with no results, it might be time to turn to the original and verify your facts. You may want to read "I Found My Great Great Grandfather Online -- Now What!!??? (Verifying Records Found On Webpages)" which explains about different "generations" of records and why it is so important to go back to the original record.

Cannot Find Ancestor Arriving USA from Germany

On 12 Dec 2008 Tony wrote: I am searching the ship on which my ancestors arrived in the New World. I believe my GGG grandfather ADALBERT KARL, spouse KATHARINA MULTRUS and their four children ROSA, JOHN, JOSEPH, and ALBERT from HRADZEN, BOHEMIA, AUSTRIA near PILSEN departed BREMEN in 1859. They do not show up in any incoming passenger lists in America. To no avail I have searched the Steve Morse site using the following wildcards: ada* ade* cat* kat* ros* joh* jos* alb* and surname kar* car* har* and ear*. This leads me to believe they did not enter through the U.S.

Here is a summary of the records I have searched to date:

a) Every U.S. arrival site - including the Steve Morse site - for every combination I can think of.
b) All of the websites of pre-1865 passsenger lists for Canadian Arrivals on the Olive Tree Genealogy site.
c) The "Germans To America" Series.
d) "German Immigrants: Lists of Passengers Bound from Bremen to New York, 1855-1862"
e) The Leo Baca Book "Czech Immigration Passenger Lists, Volumes 1-9 "
f) I have requested citizenship records of Adalbert Karl in the hope that they would reveal the date and place of entry into the U.S. but Immigration wrote me that there is no record. He was naturalized in 1866 according to the local county records, but these shed no light on his date or mode of entry to the U.S..
g) I have written to the Ship List and other genealogy listservs in the hope of finding a morsel of information that I could follow up on. I posted on the Ancestry.com message boards and received a response from a gentleman apparently writing from the Czech Republic who informed me,

"Accordings to the proceeding protocoll of Regional Office of Plzen asked on 1859 Adalbert Karl from Hradzen (Hradec u Stoda) for issuing of emigrant passport to USA .."

I am willing to accept that the absence of data means that my ancestors must have entered through Canada on some impossible-to-trace ship. My questions are this: what would be the typical route for a family from Austria, departing Bremen for America in 1859? Assuming they departed Bremen, would they have stopped in the British Isles? And would there be a record of this arrival or departure? And then, would they typically have arrived at Quebec if they were bound for Dayton? Once at Quebec, would their voyage to the wrong Dayton be via the U.S. or Canada?

MY ANSWER: Hello Tony

You have done a great job of writing up your research and asking for help. I think the fact that your ancestor applied for a passport to the USA in 1859 is a strong clue indicating that he did not come through Canada but did in fact arrive on a ship which landed in America.

I believe I have found your Adalbert on the ships list "Republic" arriving NY 7 Nov. 1859 from Bremen. His origin is given as Bohemia, Czechoslovakia and he is 51 years old.

I'm familiar with the New York ships passenger lists and they can be very difficult to read. Some passengers have no first name in the index. Some have only an initial.

I found Adalbert by searching without any names at all and only using his date of birth (which was the only thing missing from your excellent query below) and his year of arrival.

He is misindexed on Ancestry as "Balbert Kar" Had you searched with wildcards on surname for "kar*" and no first name, he should have shown up. But sometimes the Ancestry search glitches and a result will not appear one time, but will appear the next!

In any case, with "Balbert" are the following individuals who appear to be your family

Adalbert b ca 1852
Catharine b ca 1818
Johann b ca 1842
Joseph b ca 1849
Rosalia b ca 1840

To view the passenger list yourself you will have to use Ancestry.com

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Lorine's Note: I sent Tony this information in private email and he very kindly replied with this message:

Dear Lorine,

I am speechless. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

In my posting I forgot to include the dates of birth of the family members. They all match exactly, including the age of Adlbert. It must be them! I was resigned to the fact that I would never find them, and I never would have dreamt of searching the site as you did. That was incredibly resourceful. Again, I can't thank you enough. I can't wait to obtain a copy of the passenger list.

Grazie!
Tony