I remembered some discussion on the Ouachita County list about an African American family named Freeman recently - and think I remembered some questions about Mittie Freeman - so decided to forward this issue of The Electronic Genealogist to the list. It was coincidental, but Mittie Freeman's story as told in the Federal Writers' Project of 1936-38 was one of the things I found on the LOC's American Memory pages (see below). Fascinating site. Most genealogists researching in the USA are likely to find documents, photos, or other records related to their research here. TEG is a free newsletter, and I try to find the not so well known sites relevant to genealogy. This may be my best find yet - but then, it's a new newsletter. I hope to do better... :>) Enjoy. trapper John Lancaster, author of The Electronic Genealogist The New FREE Weekly Genealogy Site Review Email Letter http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~jclancaster/teg/index.html Email: mailto:jclanc@swbell.net > > Welcome to the sixth edition of The Electric Genealogist. > > Genealogy is about memory, especially the later generations of a family tree, and it is sometimes great fun to tie events of the time to our family histories. Just incidentally, in the process of researching events, we also sometimes uncover data about our families. Today's website, the Library of Congress' American Memory pages, is an excellent place to fill in some background and detail on your family's times and locations. You'll find it at: > > http://memory.loc.gov/ > > What a wonderful site for a history buff or for a genealogist! Being a bit of both, I decided to try it out on my own name first, so I typed "Lancaster" into the search slot and let it rip. Well, they listed some 500 results, which I thought was pretty exciting. But, of course, the Lancaster name is tacked all over American history - it's a common name for towns, counties, even ships. Still, I browsed a bit of it, looking at old photos from the turn of the century, documents going back into the 1700's, and so on. Fascinating. But I wanted a better test to tell you folks about. > > So I typed in "Ouachita Arkansas" (without the quotes) and started browsing. Now Ouachita county, Arkansas is where my dad - and much of his very extended family, grew up, so I was hoping to get some direct hits on that subject. > > But I got diverted. One of the first things I ran into was the Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project of 1936-38. I'm not of African American heritage - though I'm sure that, like most of us, I've probably my fair share of African blood, as well as Indian, several varieties of European, etc. But these tales are fascinating. They're not particularly good stories, but they provide a feel for the times that you really can't get anywhere else - and they give it from the slaves' perspective, in their own words. Wonderful stuff. > > If you read these stories, be sure to read Mittie Freeman's story - especially her cure for "rheumatiz", using poke-berry juice and "'bout half a bottle of good whiskey" (not "old cheap corn likker"). > > But I had this column to write, so moved on back to the search list and browsed further. The first 87 items dealt largely with legal affairs of the state legislature, the US Congress, and the Journals of the Confederate Congress. A brief spate of other references, then back to legislative listings. Dull, perhaps, but valid information about the times. > > Rather than conduct another search. well, I did do a fast search on one William Moss - an ancestor who has been particularly hard for us to pin down. Lo and behold, the first item up was an act in the House for the relief of William Moss and Matthew Moss of Tennessee - right state, I'll have to check to see if it's the right person - on Tuesday, January 11, 1853. (That's just about the time that my William Moss disappeared, so perhaps he didn't get that relief.:>) > > But rather than go into more searches, I decided to check another link from the site's home page, the currently featured collection "Touring Turn-of-the-Century America". Now that's a blast. Tons of subjects, lots of photographs. Looking for a photo of a ship of the era? This is a good place to look. Or for photos on just about any other subject. When looking at the photos, a small one comes up. Click that for a larger version then, if you want to see more, check around that for links to an even larger file. Great stuff. > > Finally, the site also boasts a "learning page", designed to help teachers use the site in teaching history. You may wish to browse through that page to orient yourself to the site. > > Check this one out, folks, and pass it along to your friends. It's got something for everybody doing genealogy research in the USA. > > Enjoy. > > The Electronic Genealogist (TEG) is a Copyrighted email > letter provided freely for your use. You may pass it > along to others so long as the full original email is > forwarded. > > Copyright (C) 2002 by John C. Lancaster > All Rights Reserved. > > Visit TEG's archives at: > http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/pubarchive.php?trapper > > TEG is sent only to people who subscribed to receive it. To subscribe to or unsubscribe from TEG, go to: > http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~jclancaster/teg/index.html > > __________ > To unsubscribe: http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com/unsubscribe.php?trapper+jclanc@swbell .net > This newsletter is hosted by http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com >