Family History Books for the Holidays

Want to give someone you love a meaningful gift this year? A photo book about some aspect of your family history is sure to be a hit.

Because time is running short, narrow your focus to something the recipient will enjoy. This doesn’t need to be an epic, cover-all-bases book. Just find a little piece of your family’s past that you’d like to preserve and share.

Imagine creating a book about your mother’s years as a teacher, your grandfather’s wartime service, or the quilts your grandmother made. How about photos taken at a favorite family vacation spot through the years?

The holidays themselves can provide inspiration. Your sisters or daughters might love a book of their favorite Christmas cookie recipes, with notes about where they came from. Or dig up those old childhood photos with Santa to surprise your siblings.

You’ll find lots of other photo book ideas and how-to directions in my article, “An Open Book,” in the October/November 2017 issue of Family Tree Magazine. Recently, I’ve noticed that many of the book publishing sites I mention in the article have announced sales and discounts for holiday orders.

Is creating a larger family history book one of your goals for next year? If so, a narrative book or a multi-generation family history such as the ones produced by MyCanvas might offer the perfect format. The article covers these options as well, including a step-by-step tutorial.

If you’re not already a subscriber, look for Family Tree Magazine at large bookstores or your local library, or order a print or digital copy. There’s lots of other great content inside I’m sure you’ll enjoy—like tracing Italian roots, family tree software and websites, finding US ancestors before 1850 (also written by yours truly), working with a pro, preserving family Bibles, and a DNA testing strategy.  

Now I’m going to take my own advice and get started on a book for my mother-in-law while there’s still time left!

--Shelley

Finding Ohio War of 1812 Soldiers: Tuesday's Tip

Do you have an male ancestor who was born between 1762-1799, and might have been living in Ohio by 1814? If so, you may want to check the Roster of Ohio Soldiers in the War of 1812 to see if he served in the Ohio Militia during that conflict.

The Roster, compiled by the Adjutant General of Ohio in 1916, is a unique resource for identifying a potential War of 1812 soldier. Required by an act of the state’s General Assembly in 1915, the compilation includes the names of 1759 officers and 24,521 enlisted men.

Militia companies in the War of 1812 were organized by the name of the captain or lieutenant, rather than by a regiment number (as was customary during the Civil War). Most militia units were raised within a particular county, so if you find your ancestor’s name, you might also discover what county he lived in. Or if you know the county but are dealing with a common name, you can see if there's a potential match.

Here’s a sample listing of a unit I'm interested in. This is Capt. William Kendall’s Company, a cavalry unit from Scioto County: (by the way, that’s pronounced “sci” as in “sci-fi”)

Image from: Adjutant General of Ohio, Roster of Ohio Soldiers in the War of 1812
(1916; reprint, Westminster, Maryland: Heritage Books, 2007), p. 148.

The Roster of Ohio Soldiers in the War of 1812 has been reprinted in handy paperback size by Heritage Books. I have it, and like being able to browse through it in print. Most libraries with a large genealogical collection, including main county libraries in Ohio, should have it or the original hardback edition on their shelves. But for those with a subscription, it’s also available as a searchable database on Ancestry.com, with images of every page. It's nice that there are multiple ways to access the information.

Dorene Paul, the Graveyard Rabbit of Sandusky Bay, gave another good tip on finding more about the War of 1812 in Ohio in her recent post, “Battle of Lake Erie Bicentennial,” so I recommend you hop over and read it. And if you’re wondering where I got those birth years of 1762-1799 for the soldiers, I need to give full credit to Family Tree Magazine, which posted this cool graphic on its Facebook page awhile back:

That kind of gets you thinking, doesn’t it? Especially since military records can be fantastic sources of information. Could you have an ancestor who served in the Ohio Militia from 1812-1814? If so, good luck with your search!

--Shelley

Related posts:

200 Years Ago Today: The War of 1812 Begins

OGS 2013 Conference: Day Two

Wordless Wednesday: Summer Reading

Easter Morning 1967

The Ballenger Family, Easter morning, March 26, 1967

I love this picture of my family. My Mom always made me a new dress for Easter every year, out of the same material she made her own dress, so that we would have matching dresses. We went to the First Congregational Church and then to one of my grandparents’ houses for Easter dinner. This picture was taken at my Grandma and Grandpa Ballenger’s house on Kenwick Rd. on the east side of Columbus. Of course, the highlight of the day for me was finding the basket the Easter Bunny had hidden, full of candy and treats. Sweet memories all around.

Happy Easter to you, my dear readers!

--Shelley

A Kiss for Daddy

Home from work on a summer evening in 1962

Happy Father's Day to my Dad, and to all the Dads who've cherished those small, sweet kisses.

Special Mother's Day Edition

Happy Mother’s Day to two of the most important and loving women in my life:

My Mom

And my other Mom (aka mother-in-law)

Thank you both!

Using LibraryThing for Genealogy

I love books. Besides reading for pleasure—something I don’t have nearly as much time as I’d like for—I have a growing collection of genealogy books. I’ve got hefty reference volumes, guides to particular states and time periods, books on German and Irish research, citation and standards manuals, family histories, and books on writing and editing. Now I don’t know about you, but my memory isn’t up to maintaining a running inventory of what I do or don’t have. How do I keep track of it all? LibraryThing.

LibraryThing allows each member to create his or her own personal library catalog. Here in one place, easily accessed from any computer or smartphone anywhere, I can see all my books at a glance. It came in especially handy in September in the Exhibit Hall of the FGS Conference, as I pondered whether I had already purchased a couple of books (or had I just thought about buying them before?) All I had to do was pull the website up on my phone and check my catalog.

Using LibraryThing is simple. You’ll need to create an account with a user name and password to get started. Once you’re in, just go to the “Add Books” tab and enter a title, author, or ISBN number. In most cases the book will pop up in the right-hand column, and you just select it. You can search for the book in the Library of Congress, Amazon.com, or LibraryThing’s own Overcat directory. You can also tag the book with descriptive keywords. My tags include citations, family histories, history, maps, methodology, photography, resources, standards, technology, and writing, among others.

Best of all, LibraryThing (www.librarything.com) is free for accounts with up to 200 books. If your library exceeds that, you can choose an amount to contribute for a yearly or lifetime unlimited membership. You have the option of making your profile public or keeping it private.

There’s also a social networking aspect to LibraryThing, which I admit I haven’t used to its fullest. But it can be fun to see who has some of the same books as you do, and you might spot a title you want to check out on someone else’s list. You can make connections with other members, read or write book reviews, find recommendations, join groups, participate in forums, and more.

I’ve found that one key to using LibraryThing effectively is keeping it up-to-date. After spending the initial time to enter my books and tag them, I realized I had to make it a habit to do the same with each new purchase. So whenever I get a new book, I lay it beside my computer to remind me to enter it into my catalog. It doesn’t move until it’s in there. Works for me.

Now we’ll see if Santa delivers any new titles to add…

(Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with LibraryThing in any way. I just like using their free service and think others might, too.) 


Related Posts:
Social History Resources for Genealogists
My Favorite Genealogy Calculators 
Free Cemetery Databases

From Little House to my house

This morning I read a wonderful review of a new book that I'm going to add to my book wish list. The Wilder Life, written by Wendy McClure, chronicles her experiences as a fan of the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder. The review, by Colette Bancroft, Book Editor for the St. Petersburg Times, describes how McClure, a 30-something children’s book editor, becomes immersed in her quest for “la vida Laura.” In the process, she discovers much about pioneer times, modern times (including “all manner of enthusiasts”), and herself. Bancroft concludes, “If you’re a fan of the Ingalls family saga, The Wilder Life is a trip worth taking.” (You can find read the full review here) 

I never read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books as a child. But as a mom, I read each one of them aloud to my daughter at bedtime, long after she was old enough to read them herself. It was a cozy time, sitting on her bed night after night, often continuing way past bedtime. Because we didn't read them back-to-back, it took us about three years to finish all nine books, from Little House in the Big Woods through The First Four Years. I’ll always treasure that shared experience of discovery. Many times after we stopped for the night, the chapters I had just read stayed with me, as I pondered Laura’s experiences, the extraordinary difficulties her family faced and the small happinesses of pioneer life.

So I’m thinking about dropping a hint that McClure’s book would make a nice Mother’s Day gift. What about you? Do you have a memory about reading the Little House books?