Twelve year anniversary at FindAGrave.
I added almost 600 memorials since last year. The mobile app enables fast and easy creations of memorials and additions of pictures.
This website is a free resource crucial to your genealogy hunt.
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Twelve Years at FindAGrave
Twelve year anniversary at FindAGrave.
I added almost 600 memorials since last year. The mobile app enables fast and easy creations of memorials and additions of pictures.
This website is a free resource crucial to your genealogy hunt.
Saturday, November 28, 2015
Online Index to New Jersey Vital Records 1901-1903 Coming Soon
New Jersey indexes of vital records from the early 1900s will be coming online.
This is great news from a group called Reclaim the Records.
The covered years and types of records:
---Birth Index 1901, 1902, and 1903
---Marriage Index, Grooms, 1901, 1902, 1903
---Marriage Index, Brides, 1901-1914
---Death Index 1901, 1902, and 1903
According to their announcement, Reclaim the Records purchased copies of the microfilm rolls from the New Jersey State Archives. The images will be digitized soon and posted online for free at Internet Archive.
These are indexes and not the actual certificates of birth, marriage, and death. You will still need to request a copy (for a fee) from the Archives or someone who does research on site.
Before a trip to the Archives, I use the online indexes so I can jump directly into the rolls of certificates. Adding years 1901-1903 will be a great help.
Why these years? Well, New Jersey has had funny ways of organizing their vital records over the centuries. A proper discussion requires more than a paragraph, so for now, I'll just write that it can be confusing. Below is an example from the Index of Births covering June 1, 1878 through June 30, 1890, just so you get an idea of what we're dealing with.
[You can search online indexes of events prior to 1901 online at Family Search, Ancestry, and the State Archives index (Google it- the URL keeps changing). Remember that these online indexes are not records unto themselves. The dates are wrong sometimes.]
Around 1900, New Jersey decided to organize its vital records using a different system: Year by year, from January 1 through December 31, in order of date received. In 1904, the birth and death certificates are organized by year, then surname, eliminating the need for a yearly index. To find a birth or death, you search the actual certificates for a surname year by year. [1923 is the final year of births currently housed at the Archives. The death certificates now reach to 1955, but the alphabetical organization gave way to dates starting in 1949.]
Marriages are different because there are two parties, usually with different surnames. When marriage certificates became organized by surname ahead of date, the groom's surname was used; hence, an index of brides was needed. This is why the Index of Brides extends into 1914 while the other indexes are only from 1901-1903. [The Index of Brides at the Archives extends into 1938.]
This is great news from a group called Reclaim the Records.
The covered years and types of records:
---Birth Index 1901, 1902, and 1903
---Marriage Index, Grooms, 1901, 1902, 1903
---Marriage Index, Brides, 1901-1914
---Death Index 1901, 1902, and 1903
According to their announcement, Reclaim the Records purchased copies of the microfilm rolls from the New Jersey State Archives. The images will be digitized soon and posted online for free at Internet Archive.
These are indexes and not the actual certificates of birth, marriage, and death. You will still need to request a copy (for a fee) from the Archives or someone who does research on site.
Before a trip to the Archives, I use the online indexes so I can jump directly into the rolls of certificates. Adding years 1901-1903 will be a great help.
Why these years? Well, New Jersey has had funny ways of organizing their vital records over the centuries. A proper discussion requires more than a paragraph, so for now, I'll just write that it can be confusing. Below is an example from the Index of Births covering June 1, 1878 through June 30, 1890, just so you get an idea of what we're dealing with.
[You can search online indexes of events prior to 1901 online at Family Search, Ancestry, and the State Archives index (Google it- the URL keeps changing). Remember that these online indexes are not records unto themselves. The dates are wrong sometimes.]
Around 1900, New Jersey decided to organize its vital records using a different system: Year by year, from January 1 through December 31, in order of date received. In 1904, the birth and death certificates are organized by year, then surname, eliminating the need for a yearly index. To find a birth or death, you search the actual certificates for a surname year by year. [1923 is the final year of births currently housed at the Archives. The death certificates now reach to 1955, but the alphabetical organization gave way to dates starting in 1949.]
Marriages are different because there are two parties, usually with different surnames. When marriage certificates became organized by surname ahead of date, the groom's surname was used; hence, an index of brides was needed. This is why the Index of Brides extends into 1914 while the other indexes are only from 1901-1903. [The Index of Brides at the Archives extends into 1938.]
 |
| 1903 Index of Births, New Jersey |
 |
| 1901-1903 Index of Brides, New Jersey |
 |
| 1902 Index of Deaths, New Jersey |
 |
| 1903 Index of Deaths, New Jersey |
 |
| 1910-1914 Index of Brides, New Jersey |
Sunday, November 22, 2015
Additional version of life events: Midwife's Records
Family Search digitized microfilm containing the records of Anna Weyel, a midwife in Bayonne, New Jersey. (Thanks to the JC Geney blog for bringing attention to this latest addition.)
The records are a log of births for the years 1884 through 1917.
This midwife signed her name as the attendant on the birth certificates of my great grandfather, Frank ODonnel (1888-1959) and his six siblings. (Or maybe just five of them.) Frank was the oldest, born in 1888. Katharine was the youngest, born in 1904. Parents were Patrick ODonnell (1856-1931) and Delia Joyce (1862-1929).
The records of the midwife coincide with the information on the birth certificates except for James, born in 1892. James' birth certificate gives a date of June 3, while the midwifery records list him as June 14. James wrote June 3 as his birthdate on his World War I draft registration.
The main person of interest was the fourth child of Patrick ODonnell and Delia Joyce, Marguerite, born in October of 1894. I found a birth certificate for Maggie ODonnell, born 18 October 1894 in Bayonne, but her parents were listed as James ODonnell and Ellen Gallagher. Back at the New Jersey State Archives, I carefully searched for a birth certificate in the indexes for a child of Patrick and Delia, born in between James born in 1892 and Joseph ("William" in birth records) born in 1897. I found no such record. I also searched the births filed under "O" in Bayonne for this time period.
The midwife's records are consistent with the birth certificate for Maggie ODonnell: born 18 October 1894 to James ODonnell and Ellen Gallagher at 16 RR Av [Railroad Avenue]. Two years earlier, James ODonnell, son of Patrick and Delia, was born at 14 Railroad Avenue.
Was Maggie the biological daughter of a relative, given to Patrick and Delia to raise as Marguerite? I doubt it. Marguerite's children tested their DNA. They share the anticipated amount of identical DNA for first cousins, once removed, with my mother and her brother, including a long segment on their X chromosomes.
Maybe the midwife mixed up the records. She had been busy. Two days earlier, she delivered a set of twins and a single. She delivered another baby the same day Maggie was born.
Maybe the midwife mixed up the records. She had been busy. Two days earlier, she delivered a set of twins and a single. She delivered another baby the same day Maggie was born.
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