Book Review: The Rosie Project

"The Rosie Project" by Graeme Simsion is a funny book about a man's quest to find a compatible woman to marry.

The relationship of Don and Rosie is intensified by their joint project to uncover the identify of Rosie's biological father, an endeavor in line with Don's technical skills as a professor of genetics.  Their pool of candidates are the male students who graduated medical school with Rosie's mother.  Their collection methods are underhanded and mostly done without the knowledge of the people whose DNA is captured.

In the end, the biological father was identified when the obvious was not overlooked anymore.  The man who raised Rosie was her biological father, as determined by a blood drawn in a fight.

Those of us without such nerve and access to DNA labs can use commercial companies such as Family Tree DNA and 23andMe to find biological relatives.

Five-Generation Places of Birth Family Tree

Thanks to J Paul Hawthorne at Geneaspy for this idea of a family tree focused on places of birth.

At a glance, you can visualize by color the locations where your ancestors were born.  This reveals migratory patterns and where records can be found.

My father's tree has one outlier:  my paternal grandfather, Clifford Lutter (1915-1980), was born in Pennsylvania.  This was because his father, Howard Lutter (1889-1959), a musician, was performing in Philadelphia at this time.  Their usual residence was Newark, Essex County, New Jersey.

My mother's tree is more challenging.  By the time we go five generations back, we are not in the United States.  I listed her paternal grandparents as born in Slovakia.  The area of origin is within the current borders of the country of Slovakia.  They were from central Europe where governmental control and political borders changed often.  They spoke German.

Previous ideas for focused family trees were:

Causes of Death

Cemeteries

You can use this type of family tree format for any feature you would like to showcase, such as number of children or place of death.

Family Tree Repair: Hyser and Preston

While working on a branch of my Hyser family, I noticed that online family trees had a different year and place of death for Adelaide Hyser, wife of Sherwood Preston.  Adelaide was a sister of my father's 3rd great grandfather, Louman Hyser (1826-1895).

In the 1855 New York State census, Adelaide and husband lived in Catskill, Greene County, with two children.  In the 1860 federal census, Adelaide was living with her father and three children, minus the husband, in Catskill.  Adelaide relocated to Jersey City after the 1870 census.

My source for Adelaide's death was from a compiled genealogy of the Rockefeller family.  In this work, Adelaide died in Jersey City, [Hudson County], New Jersey on February 6, 1907.

Online trees had the year of death as 1908.  Places included Jersey City, Union Hill in Morris County, and Union Hill in Hudson County.

The source for this date and these places of death was from an application by Irving Sherwood Preston (a great grandson of Adelaide) to join the Sons of the American Revolution under the patriot Simon Rockefeller.  In viewing the actual application [database at Ancestry.com], you can see that the date given for Adelaide's death was February 6, 1908, but no place of death was given.

The compiled genealogy and the SAR application are both derivative sources with questionable reliability.  I needed the actual death certificate.  Fortunately, I copied many years of Preston deaths because I am a Preston descendant on my mother's side of the family.  The last Preston in my line was Anna Preston (1890-1921).  I have not found a relation between my great grandmother Anna Preston and Adelaide Hyser's husband Sherwood Preston.

According to the death certificate, Adelaide M Preston, daughter of Peter Hyzer and Ella [Fritz], died in Jersey City on February 6, 1908.

Her obituary appeared in the newspaper Jersey Journal, viewable at GenealogyBank.com (pay site).  A textual search for "Preston" did not yield this result.  I searched by date.

Burial was in Catskill.  Adelaide's father, brother, and other family members were buried at Catskill Village Cemetery.  I don't see a grave listing for Adelaide online.