Good Times Searching the Deutsche Zeitung

Someone sent me newspaper clippings from the New Jersey Deutsche Zeitung- "German Times."  These articles are invaluable to my research.  More in later posts.

So much is available online now that I did not realize that Deutsche Zeitung is digitized and available at GenealogyBank.  Years 1880-1898 are digitized and searchable.  These years cover a lot of my lines in Newark, New Jersey.  The problem is that the newspaper is written in German (naturally) and the elaborate typeface is hard to read, especially when smeared.  German was one of my minors as an undergrad [useful after all], so I jumped right in.

Searching for "Lutter" in English newspapers produces hits for "butter" and "letter."  Searching this German paper produces results for "Mutter."  [German for "mother."]  By limiting the date, I managed to find the announcement of the nuptials of my great great grandparents, Herman Lutter and Clara Uhl.

Married 24 January 1888 in Newark by Reverend William Rieb.

The names of the witnesses can be compared against the actual marriage return filed with the state of New Jersey.

It looks like the witnesses were Henriette Ebbede [or Ebbecke?] and Pauline Freemann for the bride, Clara Uhl.  Note that Pauline's signature has only one N in Freemann.  The N has a line over it, a short-hand way of noting a double consonant.  The witnesses for the groom were Alex Lutter and Henry Uhl.  Henry Uhl was the brother of Clara Uhl.  I am happy to see this other version of the witnesses because I was not sure if the name was Alex Lutter on the marriage return.  I do not know who this person is.  I find no trace of Alex Lutter in Newark.  He possibly shows up in Chicago, gets married, and has a few children.

The moral of the story is to collect as much information as you can about an event.  Don't just look for the birth, death, and marriage certificates.  Dig up the local newspaper and look for an announcement.  Look for the church record.

Jumping Over the Border

Tonight I attended a presentation at the Morris County Library hosted by the Morris Area Genealogical Society.  The topic was Researching Common Surnames and the speaker was Vince Smith.  Most of us who study American ancestry have common surnames to deal with:  Smith, Miller, Jones, Johnson.  I have all of these surnames in different branches of my tree.  The offered tip is to narrow your search as much as possible by limiting the time period and geographical area.  There may be thousands of men named John Miller in New Jersey, but very few John Millers in a particular town born in a certain year.

Another helpful tidbit for those of us researching people in the New England states:  check Canadian records.  New Brunswick is next door to Maine.  A free index is online for you to check for records of life events.

If you had ancestors in the New England states, you may wish to check Canadian records as well.
Google Maps

Thank you, Mr Smith, for a wonderful and informative presentation.

October is Family History Month

October is National Family History Month!  You'll find more seminars and activities to assist you in your research at this time of year, so take advantage and aim to work on your genealogy every day.