> Sometimes you can't even trust "momma". > > [email protected] Sometimes you can't trust a birth certificate either. My maternal grandfather was born in March 21st, 1864 according the Quaker Monthly Meeting records of the meeting to which the family belonged. This is the date my grandfather used as his birthday throughout his 88 years of life. His birth certificate from the state, however, says he was born on March 20th, 1864. So either he was born straddling midnight or the town doctor who most likely wasn't present on the farm at the birth, and who didn't submit his records to the state more than once or twice monthly, just forgot and made an error. Joan [email protected]

> I use GEDitCOM. It works very well under OS X. > > Chris Smolinski <[email protected]> thanks had a look hugh W -- new computer = new blog http://mac-on-intel.blogspot.com/ daily blogs with new photos http://snaps2006.blogspot.com/ http://slim2005.blogspot.com/ family history http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ Hugh Watkins <[email protected]>

> I am attending a genealogy conference for the first time and > wondered if anyone had any suggestions on what to bring, what to > leave at home, what to pack, etc. > > [email protected] pens pencils and a big notebook cellphone digicameras or tape recorder but respect copyright which conference and subjects? Hugh W -- new computer = new blog http://mac-on-intel.blogspot.com/ daily blogs with new photos http://snaps2006.blogspot.com/ http://slim2005.blogspot.com/ family history http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ Hugh Watkins <[email protected]>

> Is it possible to create a list of surnames that would all have the > same soundex. I'm trying to cover various spelling of Searle or > Searles and thought that this may help! > > Mark soundex is aging technology there are newer and better algorithms http://www.google.dk/search?hl=da&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=soundex+algorithm&spell=1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundex The Celko Improved Soundex algorithm was introduced by Joe Celko in his book "SQL For Smarties: Advanced SQL Programming." As a response to deficiencies in the Soundex algorithm, Lawrence Philips developed the Metaphone algorithm for the same purpose. Philips later developed an improvement to Metaphone, which he called Double-Metaphone. Double-Metaphone includes a much larger encoding rule set than its predecessor, handles a subset of non-Latin characters, and returns a primary and a secondary encoding to account for different pronunciations of a single word in English. Daitch-Mokotoff Soundex (D-M Soundex) was developed by genealogist Gary Mokotoff and later improved by genealogist Randy Daitch because of problems they encountered while trying to apply the Russell Soundex to Jews with Germanic or Slavic surnames (such as Moskowitz vs. Moskovitz or Levine vs. Lewin). D-M Soundex is sometimes referred to as "Jewish Soundex" or "Eastern European Soundex" (ref:Avayotnu.com), although the authors discourage the use of these nicknames. The D-M Soundex algorithm can return as many as 32 individual phonetic encodings for a single name. Results of D-M Soundex are returned in an all-numeric format between 100000 and 999999. This algorithm is much more complex than Russell Soundex. Hugh W -- new computer = new blog http://mac-on-intel.blogspot.com/ daily blogs with new photos http://snaps2006.blogspot.com/ http://slim2005.blogspot.com/ family history http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ Hugh Watkins <[email protected]>

Fred Frederick wrote: >Dave Hinz <[email protected]> wrote: > >>singhals <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>>META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. > > I just have to jump in here and add that I, too, have done something > quite similar to Dave's adventure: I found a man who had the surname > of interest and whose wife had my late sister's given name. Too, > the man was born in NC as was the man I sought. > > For about a year, in every spare moment I tracked this man, > recording the most minute detail of his life, positive he was my > GrGrandfather. > > Well, one day a fellow researcher found a record that my Grandfather > had lived in a certain place in 1930. Come to find out, it was my > real grandfather. Also about this time Y-DNA proved I was _not_ a > member of the first, well-researched and documented family, so I > handed over all my papers to the descendants of the man I had so > completely documented and began anew. Unfortunately for me, my real > family did not leave much of a paper trail. > > So---when do we stop the search? this is a hobby it is up to us to enjoy it in our own way for example by making web pages and helping other people or transcribing records my web presence means my cousins find me so problems solve themselves there is only one rule NEVER ASSUME ANYTHING but all ancestor trails come to an end later or sooner so get on with another branch Hugh W -- new computer = new blog http://mac-on-intel.blogspot.com/ daily blogs with new photos http://snaps2006.blogspot.com/ http://slim2005.blogspot.com/ family history http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ Hugh Watkins <[email protected]>

> I use GEDitCOM. It works very well under OS X. > > Chris Smolinski <[email protected]> I am really unhappy with Reunion it does not read well on the big screen and the fonts do not auto adjust like FTM 2006 when you resize a window the family view is poor except for the parent buttons no marriages and no details of children some windows have one fixed size TOO SMALL as if designed to be printed out to make a card index no hyperlinks in trees . . as soon as I get WinXp SP 2 running on the Mac I will return to FTM 2006 Hugh W -- new computer = new blog http://mac-on-intel.blogspot.com/ daily blogs with new photos http://snaps2006.blogspot.com/ http://slim2005.blogspot.com/ family history http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ Hugh Watkins <[email protected]>

> META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. > > All right, let's say, just for the sake of having somewhere to > start, that Absence of proof is not proof of absence. > > At what stage can one legitimately claim that absence of evidence is > proof of the absence of proof? > > I mean, at what stage are we allowed to be reasonable about it? > > [email protected] If there is no proof any conclusion is permanent (as in a woman's hairdo). I can prove my line from 1650 to 1790 (until someone turns up proof that does not currently exist and probably never existed). I merely note links which are only proven logically. Hugh [email protected] (J. Hugh Sullivan)

singhals wrote: > META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. > > All right, let's say, just for the sake of having somewhere to > start, that Absence of proof is not proof of absence. > > At what stage can one legitimately claim that absence of evidence is > proof of the absence of proof? > > I mean, at what stage are we allowed to be reasonable about it? In strict logic there is no such stage, because it is impossible to prove a negative. On a somewhat more concrete level, evidence is not the same thing as proof. Although evidence IS necessary to make a proof possible, a proof cannot be used conversely to synthesize evidence. Proof is the conclusion drawn from analysis and correlation of a number of discrete facts, which we collectively refer to as evidence. The evidence must be pretty weak, I suspect, before any researcher will beg us to "be reasonable" about our standards of proof. Such a plea should always be taken with a grain of salt. There is still a greater hazard -- back of this one, as it were. The discovery of one additional pair of ancestors hardly concludes the process of tracing the pedigree. If one generation in a line is hypothesized from a dubious collection of evidence, then doubts must extend to the whole length and breadth of the pedigree behind that generation. We may never legitimately determine that the evidence is absolutely against the original identification, but we may also never legitimately argue for its validity -- nor, by extension, for the validity of the entire lineage. > How many long-shots add up to enough? When you're down to begging > total strangers to let you paw through their attic just in case > their ancestor (a) kept a diary (b) knew your ancestor and (c) > mentioned your ancestor's parents in their diary -- is absence of > proof good enough to prove there's no evidence? In this instance, you might have evidence to show that the strangers are descended from people who might have known your ancestors, but that evidence extends no farther. You approach them expressly to beg of them the opportunity to paw through their attic in hopes of finding other evidence bearing upon two points: whether their ancestors knew yours, and the names of your ancestor's parents. The content and uses of the information differ to such a degree that you cannot legitimately claim that you used the same evidence to locate your newfound source as you found in the source itself. The moral is that evidence inheres in many things, and has many uses. Any statement of a factual problem demands as well a clear statement of the evidence bearing upon that problem and no others. If a thorough search of any particular source produces no facts that have evidentiary bearing on the problem, you are entitled to say that the source contains no evidence. But the statement has value (if a null value) only as to that source and that problem. It does not mean either that there is no evidence still to be found bearing on your problem, or that the source contains no evidence at all. > Is 35 years of > personal searching, plus another 52 years combined efforts of two > lawyers, two professional genealogists and four other interested > family members enough to say "mama-said" is as good as it gets > proof-wise? > > Cheryl Singhals <[email protected]> No. What did you, the lawyers, hired genealogists, and interested family members look up in all that time? Compile a list of authorities and add notes for each authority detailing what characteristics were sought in each authority or set of records. Preface it with a description of the mama-said. Austin W. Spencer "Austin W. Spencer" <[email protected]>

> I am attending a genealogy conference for the first time and > wondered if anyone had any suggestions on what to bring, what to > leave at home, what to pack, etc. > > [email protected] Comfortable clothes (you'll be sitting a lot). Comfortable shoes, especially if there is a large display area. A PDA or watch with reminder alarm(s) - so you don't get lost in the books/maps/whatever in the display area and miss a session ;-) A spiral bound notebook with pockets, or some pocket folders (depending on how you organize information). If there's a conference guide book (usually large and heavy), you may want to make notes about scheduled sessions of interest (subject, place, time, presenter) and just carry one day's info with you. A backpack - you can have your notebook(s), pens, pencils, highlighters, PDA, phone (off during the sessions), water bottle, etc and still have your hands free to open doors and examine items in the display area. And it's a place to put the "stuff" you buy... Take fewer clothes and more money - there WILL be items you want to purchase ;-) If there are time conflicts for sessions you want to attend (I found a couple of instances of 3 at the same time at the NGA conference in Nashville last year), check whether tapes are (or will be) available for any of those sessions. If the presenters have sessions at earlier times, sit in on them and see whose presentation style works best for you. John John <[email protected]>

HI: I'm researching the murder of my great-great-grandfather, Charles Brown. He was lynched in September 1879 near Woodville, Mississippi. I have documented his death in 3 ways: U.S. Mortality Census for 1880; his wife was a widow according to the 1880 Census; and a newspaper article reporting the lynching. He was building a house for Wilbert Phares, son of a renowned doctor in Woodville, David Lewis Phares. He arrived at the Phares house and started arguing with Wilbert's wife Mary and reportedly threatened her with a hatchet. Wilbert and a worker, Louis Swift, subdued him and held him at the house for the sheriff. Neighbors came to the house that night, took him away and hanged him. I am exploring the circumstances of Charles' death, and I want to find out as much as I can about his life. I just returned from a research trip to MS this week, but as I expected I couldn't find out much at the state archives. My question to the list is whether I'm on the right track and are checking as many sources of information available. Should I check circuit court records in Wilkinson Co., MS? I have the names of the mayor and sheriff in Sept. 1879. I'd also like to find out the newspaper's sources for its article (they only said "this is what we were able to find out." What records should I check in East Feliciana Parish, where he lived? The local paper reprinted the MS article. I am also thinking of checking LA deeds (because he was a carpenter and owned $100 in property according to the 1870 Census), churches that may have existed at the time, and would like to find out where he is buried. I do understand that the lynching of a black man in 1879 in MS is very likely not to be prosecuted, but I still am pressing on and researching anyway. (I was told that I wouldn't be able to document his death, and I did.) Thanks for all help. Kberry [email protected]

> META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. > > All right, let's say, just for the sake of having somewhere to > start, that Absence of proof is not proof of absence. > > At what stage can one legitimately claim that absence of evidence is > proof of the absence of proof? > > I mean, at what stage are we allowed to be reasonable about it? > > ... > > Cheryl Singhals Well, sooner or later you may conclude that what evidence you have is "good enough". You just have to remember that it is not absolutely proven and you might in future in the light of new evidence have to change your mind. I suppose you are really asking how one can judge that the "good enough" point has been reached. There is no simple answer to that (sorry), although other replies might elaborate some ideas. Regards Peter Peter J Seymour <[email protected]>

> Best Available Evidence. Technically, I don't have primary > documentation for my own place and date of birth, but given that my > mom was there, "momma said" is good enough in this case. If that's > all that's available, enter it and note the surety of the source in > the notes. > > Dave Hinz <[email protected]> That's why, when assigning surety numbers in Legacy, I give a mother's statement of the date of birth of her child a level of 3, because she was there. Any evidence on a certificate is likely to be derived from what she said anyway. -- Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa http://people.tribe.net/hayesstw E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk [email protected]

> > proof good enough to prove there's no evidence? Is 35 years of > > personal searching, plus another 52 years combined efforts of two > > lawyers, two professional genealogists and four other interested > > family members enough to say "mama-said" is as good as it gets > > proof-wise? > > Best Available Evidence. Technically, I don't have primary > documentation for my own place and date of birth, but given that my > mom was there, "momma said" is good enough in this case. If that's > all that's available, enter it and note the surety of the source in > the notes. > > Dave Hinz Sometimes you can't even trust "momma". I was born on the 13th according to "momma" and a birth certificate. As a kid I thought it would be great if I was born on Friday the 13th and could celebrate my 13th birthday with 13 friends on Friday the 13th. When I asked "Momma" she said, "No you were born on a Thursday." So much for my great plans. Several years ago when I downloaded the great DAYS calendar program I decided to check it out. I found I WAS born on Friday the 13th . . . . . . . . or was it Thursday the 12th, or did she just not want to host a party for 13 giggling girls? <grin> Celia "Celia Mitschelen" <[email protected]>

Fred Frederick wrote: >Dave Hinz <[email protected]> wrote: > >>singhals <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>>META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. I'm not sure whether I mis-stated or you gentlemen mis-read, but the issue isn't whether I've got evidence of the right person. The issue is, there IS no evidence with the right name on it. Cheryl singhals <[email protected]>

Dave Hinz <[email protected]> wrote: > singhals <[email protected]> wrote: > > META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. I just have to jump in here and add that I, too, have done something quite similar to Dave's adventure: I found a man who had the surname of interest and whose wife had my late sister's given name. Too, the man was born in NC as was the man I sought. For about a year, in every spare moment I tracked this man, recording the most minute detail of his life, positive he was my GrGrandfather. Well, one day a fellow researcher found a record that my Grandfather had lived in a certain place in 1930. Come to find out, it was my real grandfather. Also about this time Y-DNA proved I was _not_ a member of the first, well-researched and documented family, so I handed over all my papers to the descendants of the man I had so completely documented and began anew. Unfortunately for me, my real family did not leave much of a paper trail. So---when do we stop the search? Fred "Fred Frederick" <[email protected]>

singhals <[email protected]> wrote: > META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. > > All right, let's say, just for the sake of having somewhere to > start, that Absence of proof is not proof of absence. > > At what stage can one legitimately claim that absence of evidence is > proof of the absence of proof? My brain hurts. I've read that 4 times and it's not helping. > I mean, at what stage are we allowed to be reasonable about it? > How many long-shots add up to enough? More than you'd think. I traced a line of one Norwegian fellow back maybe a dozen generations (easy over there, winters are long and they're good record keepers). Why? Because he had the right name, lived in the right place, had the right wife (I thought), was on the right census, was the right age, went to the right church....slam dunk, right? Nope. He'd moved there from across the lake, when my ancestor was busy doing other things yet to be determined. So when I finally found the conflicting information and it was solid, I had to detach him from my tree. Kept the info though with a note of "not mine and here's how I know this" so someone generations from now knows I've seen him and doesn't think they've discovered something new that has already been disproven. (that line ended up getting used by someone else, I recognized a name from it in someone's query and was able to hand them a whole chunk of completed, cited, annotated tree. They were pleased.) > When you're down to begging > total strangers to let you paw through their attic just in case > their ancestor (a) kept a diary (b) knew your ancestor and (c) > mentioned your ancestor's parents in their diary -- is absence of > proof good enough to prove there's no evidence? Is 35 years of > personal searching, plus another 52 years combined efforts of two > lawyers, two professional genealogists and four other interested > family members enough to say "mama-said" is as good as it gets > proof-wise? Best Available Evidence. Technically, I don't have primary documentation for my own place and date of birth, but given that my mom was there, "momma said" is good enough in this case. If that's all that's available, enter it and note the surety of the source in the notes. Dave Hinz Dave Hinz <[email protected]>

> > Is it possible to create a list of surnames that would all have the > > same soundex. I'm trying to cover various spelling of Searle or > > Searles and thought that this may help! > > > > Mark > > Sorry, I read too fast and didn't grasp what you were trying to > achieve when I sent my first posting through. Mea culpa. > > Michele's reply to you about the Soundex calculator at RootsWeb is > much more apropos. It yields 14 variations of the two names. > > Again, apologies! > > LGO <[email protected]> Many thanks for the suggestions! It seems I've got a lot of variations to consider! -- Mark Searle Arncliffe, Sydney http://www.members.optusnet.com.au/~onenamestudy/ons-p/index.htm "Mark" <[email protected]>

> I am attending a genealogy conference for the first time and > wondered if anyone had any suggestions on what to bring, what to > leave at home, what to pack, etc. > > [email protected] <[email protected]> Richard, I would first find out from the event planners whether a laptop, recording device and/or camera is permitted. When permitted, my personal first choice is a recording device, but I will say that not often is that permitted as tapes of the sessions are often sold by the event planners/speakers. With that decision made, I would then take just pencil/pen for making any necessary notes on the handouts that are distributed. That works for me. Fred "Fred Frederick" <[email protected]>

META discussion of theory -- names not needed, no lookups needed. All right, let's say, just for the sake of having somewhere to start, that Absence of proof is not proof of absence. At what stage can one legitimately claim that absence of evidence is proof of the absence of proof? I mean, at what stage are we allowed to be reasonable about it? How many long-shots add up to enough? When you're down to begging total strangers to let you paw through their attic just in case their ancestor (a) kept a diary (b) knew your ancestor and (c) mentioned your ancestor's parents in their diary -- is absence of proof good enough to prove there's no evidence? Is 35 years of personal searching, plus another 52 years combined efforts of two lawyers, two professional genealogists and four other interested family members enough to say "mama-said" is as good as it gets proof-wise? Cheryl singhals <[email protected]>

I use GEDitCOM. It works very well under OS X. -- Chris Smolinski Black Cat Systems http://www.blackcatsystems.com/ Chris Smolinski <[email protected]>