Hi Steve - I read a lot of the other emails offering advice about this, so I'll add my two cents. Your brother's friend should do the usual thing in (valid, documented) genealogy research: Start with himself and work backward. If he does not want to download a genealogy program and work from his own computer, he can put the info on one of the private trees on Ancestry..., and get advice and assistance from you (and/or us?). [The lack of formatting once notes are saved in Ancestry records makes me crazy. Do notes offline with proper formats, scan them to an image, then include with the documentation.] I just did something similar a few evenings ago for the paternal ancestors of my future great-grandchild..., and I'm already back to the 1900 US census (which, of course, lists month and year of birth, as well as year of immigration and citizenship status, which are hopefully correct, and that can be matched with the decades after 1900 to see if years of immigration are at least approximately the same). This is in Minnesota, so we have indices for birth, marriage, and death records online (actual records can easily be obtained from there), both state and national census data (document images, indices), so some index records (from official sources which are usually more correct than some transcriptions from people who have no idea what they're doing). With just those cursory bits of info I've been able to find out the father's family has ancestors from Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. I have no idea how to find German records, but thanks to Listers in Sweden and Denmark, by t! he time I acquire the local and state images of the documents for which I've already found index data, and hopefully find more specific info for locations of origin, I should be able to find records in their databases if I can't manage on my own, just as I have for so many Norwegian records. In doing a WWI draft registration check, I got the name and date of birth of what must be a relative who was living nearby at the time, and he had a Swedish location for his next of kin (only slightly misspelled). An actual location! :-D I looked it up and sure enough, it exists! That same individual, thanks to matching birth dates, is found on a Naturalization index card in Illinois. True, I have a lot more to document before I try to find records across the pond (slowing down to do the documentation takes more time than the finding in indices), but with a good foundation I have a chance of finding accurate data this way - and, who knows? If I'm really, really, really lucky, perhaps a location for a different person with the same location-turned-US surname where I can prove a relationship in other than surname will be in some of those US records..., so I won't be on a wild goose chase by the time I get to finding records across the pond. Pretty good for just checking indices and a very few census documents in about three hours in one evening: a whole century+ of info on four generations of people! You should be able to do the same from where you are, too..., yes? :-) Once you have basic American info verified, there's always the Norway List.... :-D Everyone seems to have their own little sub-specialty for nosing out information in various locations and indices and we have been known to find info that was impossible to find in the past, so we might get lucky again. :-D Just be sure to put the Fatland name in the Subject line. Best Wishes, Bev PS: I did a double-take on your Subject title because it's so close to the name Flateland..., but I know where the latter came from in Aust-Agder. A man with that name (and variant spellings in Norwegian records) married one of my father's sisters. ----- Original Message ----- From: Steve via <norway@rootsweb.com> To: norway@rootsweb.com Cc: Sent: Friday, March 13, 2015 12:10 AM Subject: [NOR] Fatland family location Hi, I ate with a friend of my brother’s tonight by the name of Fatland. I’ve know his father and grandfather all my life, and never had a clue that his family is Norwegian. I told him I would put out a question to the group to see if anyone can give him any hints about where his ancestors came from or whether there are any Fatlands still in Norway. His understanding is the his great-great-grandfather came from Noway to MN and then lived in IA before they came to SD. Thanks! Steve Natvig Kimball, SD. ---
RE: Fatland family research: Thanks to everyone that has responded so far. I just got a response from Guy Fatland's daughter on facebook. She is tied up with grandchildren today, but will send me her email when she gets home tomorrow. I will forward everything you all have posted, and I will forward what ever information she has, probably by Sunday. Thanks again! Steve -----Original Message----- From: Bev Anderson via Sent: Friday, March 13, 2015 3:45 PM To: norway@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [NOR] Fatland family location Hi Steve - I read a lot of the other emails offering advice about this, so I'll add my two cents. Your brother's friend should do the usual thing in (valid, documented) genealogy research: Start with himself and work backward. If he does not want to download a genealogy program and work from his own computer, he can put the info on one of the private trees on Ancestry..., and get advice and assistance from you (and/or us?). [The lack of formatting once notes are saved in Ancestry records makes me crazy. Do notes offline with proper formats, scan them to an image, then include with the documentation.] I just did something similar a few evenings ago for the paternal ancestors of my future great-grandchild..., and I'm already back to the 1900 US census (which, of course, lists month and year of birth, as well as year of immigration and citizenship status, which are hopefully correct, and that can be matched with the decades after 1900 to see if years of immigration are at least approximately the same). This is in Minnesota, so we have indices for birth, marriage, and death records online (actual records can easily be obtained from there), both state and national census data (document images, indices), so some index records (from official sources which are usually more correct than some transcriptions from people who have no idea what they're doing). With just those cursory bits of info I've been able to find out the father's family has ancestors from Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. I have no idea how to find German records, but thanks to Listers in Sweden and Denmark, by the time I acquire the local and state images of the documents for which I've already found index data, and hopefully find more specific info for locations of origin, I should be able to find records in their databases if I can't manage on my own, just as I have for so many Norwegian records. In doing a WWI draft registration check, I got the name and date of birth of what must be a relative who was living nearby at the time, and he had a Swedish location for his next of kin (only slightly misspelled). An actual location! :-D I looked it up and sure enough, it exists! That same individual, thanks to matching birth dates, is found on a Naturalization index card in Illinois. True, I have a lot more to document before I try to find records across the pond (slowing down to do the documentation takes more time than the finding in indices), but with a good foundation I have a chance of finding accurate data this way - and, who knows? If I'm really, really, really lucky, perhaps a location for a different person with the same location-turned-US surname where I can prove a relationship in other than surname will be in some of those US records..., so I won't be on a wild goose chase by the time I get to finding records across the pond. Pretty good for just checking indices and a very few census documents in about three hours in one evening: a whole century+ of info on four generations of people! You should be able to do the same from where you are, too..., yes? :-) Once you have basic American info verified, there's always the Norway List.... :-D Everyone seems to have their own little sub-specialty for nosing out information in various locations and indices and we have been known to find info that was impossible to find in the past, so we might get lucky again. :-D Just be sure to put the Fatland name in the Subject line. Best Wishes, Bev PS: I did a double-take on your Subject title because it's so close to the name Flateland..., but I know where the latter came from in Aust-Agder. A man with that name (and variant spellings in Norwegian records) married one of my father's sisters. ----- Original Message ----- From: Steve via <norway@rootsweb.com> To: norway@rootsweb.com Cc: Sent: Friday, March 13, 2015 12:10 AM Subject: [NOR] Fatland family location Hi, I ate with a friend of my brother’s tonight by the name of Fatland. I’ve know his father and grandfather all my life, and never had a clue that his family is Norwegian. I told him I would put out a question to the group to see if anyone can give him any hints about where his ancestors came from or whether there are any Fatlands still in Norway. His understanding is the his great-great-grandfather came from Noway to MN and then lived in IA before they came to SD. Thanks! Steve Natvig Kimball, SD. --- Norwaylist Archiveshttp://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index?list=norway RESUBSCRIBE UNSUB http://lists.rootsweb.ancestry.com/index/intl/NOR/NORWAY.html guidelines http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~norway/guidelines.htm ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to NORWAY-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. http://www.avast.com