Tuesday's Tip: The FACEBOOK of our Ancestors

I am sure you have heard the complaints about Facebook….”Why would anyone waste time on that….I am a private person, I don’t want anyone knowing my business….what happened to privacy”. I hear these complaints (and many others) a lot from some of my older relatives and friends who are not fans of Facebook.


I was surprised to learn that many of our ancestors were fans of what would have been the equivalent of Facebook for the late 1800’s and early 1900’s……the newspaper.


Each day the newspaper would publish “status updates” on the specific social activities of their citizens in the community.


Tell me these don’t sound like status updates?

Morning Herald, Uniontown, PA  1939

Portsmouth Herald, Portsmouth, NY 1917

Utica Herald-Dispatch, Utica, NY 1902

My research indicates that these sort of “getting your name in the paper” events were common place….which is great for ancestry research. It appears that most comments had a "Social or Society column, which published interesting pits of information about families and what they were up to.  I find these to be a great source of information on my ancestors.


Probably the most popular items I have seen published in the local papers are regarding citizens visiting friends and relatives out of town, celebration of promotions, anniversaries, attending funerals, parties or other special occasions.


It does beg the question. Why did our ancestors submit this information to the local papers?


My theory revolves around a number of things.


One the communities were smaller and close knit, so there was less concern about crime. If you were going to be out of town for a week, you didn’t worry about having it published in the paper. This would be unheard of today. Also, in this time period, very few people had telephones and people used to just “stop by” to socialize with their friends, neighbors and relatives. By putting a note in the paper about your upcoming travels, it was actually being conscientious by letting anyone who might stop by know not to come and visit you while you were away.


Two, it did make someone feel a little important having their name in the paper. The personal need to feel “a little like a celebrity” was active in society even at the turn of the century.


The more research I do about my ancestors and the times they lived in the more I have come to realized they were a lot like each of us today….just trying to make each day worth living and hoping for a great future for their children and being a little famous.

Tuesday's Tip - A Love of Obituaries

I still remember my grandmother getting the paper and the first thing she turned to was the obituary page.  She wanted to see if it contained anyone she knew.

I use obituaries in a similar way, to learn more about the family members that I wished I had known.

For my family research, obituaries have been invaluable.  I use a wide variety of documents such as: census records, passenger lists, birth certificates, naturalization records, etc. in my research.  Perhaps none are better than obituaries.

Why do I love obituaries so much?  Nothing seems to connect the dots and help you find missing relatives better than a well written obituary.

Here is a perfect example from my maternal Great-Grandfather, George Gula.

• Date of birth:  March 18, 1889
• Birthplace:  Wolowitz, Austria (This was an amazing hint, since I didn't know where he was born)
• Occupation:  Hempfield Foundry in Greensburg
• Church:  St. John's Byzantine Church (not only do you learn about his faith, but the church could be an additional source of information)
• Children:  This can help you find living children's names, plus the spouses and married names of his daughters.  Also, it tells you where they were living at the time, which can be invaluable when trying to track them down.
• Siblings:  I didn't realize that George had a sister and that she lived in Connecticut.

What a wealth of information!

Where are the best places to look for obituaries?  

I have had a lot of success on Ancestry.com.  However, not by searching in the Ancestry.com "obituary" section.  I search under the "Newspaper & Publications" section. Ancestry.com has a nice selection of newspapers and look for a local newspaper for my ancestor.  I choose a local newspaper (if they have it) and search for my ancestors name or sometimes just surname.  Sometimes, I will use the keyword of “died” or “obituary” to narrow down the results.

When researching my Maine family roots, I have had a lot of luck with GenealogyBank.com to find obituaries.  They have a huge selection of newspapers from every state.  

When I have known exactly when and where my Maine ancestors died, I have turned to the Maine State Library.  They have a service where they will lookup obituaries for you.  The state of Maine State Library has a number of newspapers in their archive from all over the state and for a fee of $5 they will find the obituary or death notice (no charge if they don't find the obituary) for you.  I have had a great experience working with them. Usually, they will email me and let me know if they were able to find the full obituary (which is probably worth the fee) or if it is just a death notice (which may not be). You can use this website to request an obituary from the Maine State Library.

For me, obituaries have been a critical source of information.  They can take a little work to track down, but the hard works usually pays off.