Hi LaRae, Thank you so very much for the articles. It is a gentle reminder that "Inside every woman there lies a special, quite place...a place called Motherhood" and without them we would not be. Happy Mothers Days to all the mothers out there. Kathy in CA TimeTrvlrO@aol.com wrote: > Good Morning, > Thank you for the kind comments on this series of articles. We spend most of > our time following our surnames back one generation after another, so it was > good to stop for a while and consider the Mothers in our Family Tree. It has > encouraged me to revisit several maternal lines I had put on the back > burner...hope it has done the same for you! > Have a great day, > LaRae > > Seven Steps for Researching Female Ancestors > by Sharon DeBartolo Carmack, CGRS, FUGA > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Seven Steps for Researching Female Ancestors > > 1. Start your search by focusing on the woman herself, obtaining all the > records you can which she created or which were created about her. > > 2. Next, broaden your research scope to her immediate family. > > 3. Now broaden your research even more and look at her neighbors, friends, > and relatives. Look carefully at records created by relatives and friends. > Women of the past generally spent more time in the company of other women > than with men. Perhaps a female friend or relative left information about > your female ancestor in a surviving letter or diary. > > 4. Also look at her husband's associates: classmates, business partners, > friends. Some of these people could be your female ancestor's relatives. > > 5. Leave no record unturned. Check all possible types of records for the > time and place of your female ancestor. You never know which record will > reveal a clue or piece of information. > > 6. Traditional genealogical records will only take you so far. Expand your > horizons and read women's social histories -- these fill in the gaps left by > genealogical documents and help you augment the data. Social historians > research many of the same record sources as genealogists -- wills, court > records, land and tax records -- but historians focus on an entire community > rather than on specific individuals. This research yields information about > the typical daily life in a given community. You can find social histories > in public libraries, university libraries, and new and used bookstores. Here > are a couple of examples: > > Nancy (Donnally) Bane (1819-1903) was institutionalized in a state insane > asylum in Ohio during the 1860s. I learned this information from census > records and a special census enumeration. To learn what this experience must > have been like for Nancy, I read a social history called Women of the Asylum: > Voices from Behind the Walls, 1840-1945. It had firsthand accounts of women > like Nancy who were committed to asylums. > > Lucy (Stuart) Shough (1817-1887) was a housewife in Virginia. Genealogical > records on her are scarce. Just about everything I know about Lucy came from > census records, where her occupation is "keeping house." To learn about her > probable daily activities, I consulted a social history entitled Never Done: > A History of American Housework. This book details typical household chores > of the nineteenth century. > > Placing your female ancestors into historical perspective by reading social > histories of the time and circumstances can add a whole new dimension to your > research. There are social histories for nearly every type of woman (rich, > poor, white, black, Native American) and every time period conceivable. > > Women's periodicals from yesteryear are also worth investigating. Godey's > Lady's Book, a monthly women's magazine, was started in 1837 and had a > national circulation of 150,000 by 1860. Godey's featured articles on > fashion, homemaking, and health, as well as presenting fiction, poetry, and > recipes. The more emancipated woman of the 1860s might well have read the > weekly newsletter Revolution, which covered fashion, food, health, work, > unions, women in trades and professions, and notable women. > > 7. Don't get discouraged. Researching women takes time, patience, and > creativity. Every woman's life is important to research, document, and write > about. Your female ancestors wait silently for you to discover their > stories. By listening to their histories and the records, they will tell you > who they were and where to find them! > > ================================= > > A Recipe for Family History > by Alyssa Hickman Grove > > ------------------------------------------------------------------ > > Writer and historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich writes about the idea of tracing > "female inheritance through recipes." Its an interesting thought, although > she finds it has its flaws, as you'll see when you read her story, "Danish > Pancakes." However, family recipes certainly have a connection to family > history. A simple (and often-told) story about pot roast started me thinking > about this connection. In the story, a young bride is preparing pot roast > for dinner. Her husband watches as she carefully cuts each end off the roast > before putting it in the roasting pan and placing it in the oven. > > "Why did you cut the ends off the roast?" he asks. > > "I don't know," she replies, "that's just the way my mother taught me." The > next time the young woman talks to her mother, she asks about trimming the > ends off the pot roast. > > "I don't know why," her mother answers, "but that's how your grandmother > always did it." On a visit to her grandmother, the young woman asks about > the pot roast. > > "Oh," replies the grandmother, "I had to do that simply because my roasting > pan was too small to fit an entire roast." > > Grandma's answer explains the mysterious "cut off the ends" tradition. It > also raises the question, Why didn't Grandma have a larger pan? The answer > is probably simple enough -- perhaps she just never bothered to buy a larger > one. On the other hand, a family historian with an active imagination might > indulge in a slew of fanciful questions: Were Grandma and her husband too > poor to afford new pots and pans? Could they only afford a small home with a > tiny kitchen and scanty cupboard space? Had they been forced to jettison a > lot of household goods to travel to America or across the plains? > > Granted, these questions take a sizable leap from the starting point of the > pot roast story. But they do illustrate how details of a family's history > can be linked to what, and how, a family cooks. > > >From Cookbook to Novel > Handed-down recipes in a family often have stories associated with them which > add richness to a family history. These recipes and stories can make your > family history more vivid. Just ask Janice Woods Windle, the author of True > Women, a historical novel based on the lives of her ancestors. Windle > started out with the intention of compiling family recipes as a wedding gift > for her son and his bride-to-be in 1985. But as she pored over piles of > recipes, letters, and diaries, she pieced together a fascinating story. Not > long after presenting her son with the recipe book, she borrowed it from him > so she could use it while writing True Women, a novel chronicling the lives > of three generations of her family in Texas, from the fall of the Alamo to > the Second World War. > > Initially, Windle thought that her mother, a former schoolteacher and > historian, would be more involved in writing the family story. But her > mother kept urging her to write episodes, "And over the course of six years, > it just kind of escalated." Windle says she eventually chose the historical > novel format, rather than a traditional family history, so that she could > write dialogue and "capture the melody of the women's voices." > > Runaway Wedding Cake > True Women was published in 1993. Twelve years after getting the idea to > compile the recipe book, Windle finally had time to produce the True Women > Cookbook, published this year. The Cookbook is full of stories about Texas > history and about Windle's family and forebears, and features such recipes as > "Reverend Potter's Hellfire and Brimstone Chili," "Every-Sunday-After-Church > Chicken," and "Runaway Wedding Cake" (a cake prepared for an ancestor's > elopement). Windle says she discovered a lot about her relatives by looking > at their recipes: "Women write around the margins of a recipe, making notes, > mentioning events where the dish was served -- baptisms, family reunions, and > so forth -- so you can really track a woman's life through her recipes." > While she was researching her ancestors' cookbooks, Windle was struck by the > way the women had taken responsibility for their families' well-being. She > found notations such as "Peter is allergic to pecans" and "this soup > sustained Bettie through her long illness." > > When asked what advice she would give others who are interested in compiling > a family history or recipe book, Windle says she feels its important to > involve children in the process, to teach them about their lineage. She also > recommends recording stories that you've heard, then recording interviews > with family members. Taking along old photographs, Windle says, may help jog > an older relative's foggy memory. > > Bathtub Gravy > There are those who haven't felt compelled to pen a sweeping historical novel > inspired by the lives of their forebears, but simply wanted to preserve > family recipes for posterity; this is what my mother and her sister decided > to do. They conceived of compiling a family recipe book to give to each of > their families as a Christmas present. Thus began the arduous task of going > over their own recipes, as well as the recipes that my grandmother, who > passed away a few years ago, had left behind. The long and involved process > produced a welcome gift: Our families now have a cookbook that includes all > the family favorites, many of which have been handed down from my > great-grandmother to my grandmother, to my mother and aunt. > > My family's English heritage is evident in such recipes as Yorkshire pudding, > plum pudding, and mustard pickles. My great-grandmother passed along her > recipes for homemade bread, roast beef, and gravy (the gravy was always a > favorite, and the family joke was that it was made in the bathtub to make > sure there would be enough to meet the demand). > > My great-grandmother's parents were early settlers in Utah, and the necessity > of laying in provisions for the winter was reflected in Great-Grandma > Carrie's penchant for canning and preserving. My mother remembers the > delights contained in Carrie's fruit room: jars and jars of peaches, > cherries, and raspberries. Today my mother and aunt still use Carrie's > recipes for making home-canned peaches and chili sauce. > > An Heirloom in the Making > sometimes a family recipe book doesn't necessarily contain handed-down > recipes, but recipes that will be handed down to future generations. Ken and > Connie Bean married later in life, combining their families from their > previous marriages. When they created a family cookbook, they included > recipes that both sets of children had learned to love, and then personalized > the book with inspirational thoughts and quotations for their children to > pass down through the family. > > There are as many ways to preserve a collection of family recipes and > traditions as there are families. If you want to create an heirloom recipe > book, think about including these elements in it: > > --Original handwritten recipe cards > --Stories telling how certain recipes came into the family > --Anecdotes about which recipes were family favorites > --Photographs of ancestors > --Stories about ancestors > > Janice Woods Windle cherishes a steamed pudding recipe given to her by her > beloved grandmother-in-law, and talks about families becoming close through > the sharing of recipes. My mother puts it this way: "Food, what we eat, > what we cook, is the core in so many families." > > ==================================== > > >From the Ancestry.com Newsletter.... > > ARTICLES FOR TRACING THE MOMS IN YOUR FAMILY TREE > > "One Crimson Petticoat: Female Lines and Real Lives," by Yvonne P. Divak > Part 1 -- http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/news/articles/600.asp > Part 2 -- http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/news/articles/623.asp > Part 3 -- http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/news/articles/650.asp > Part 4 -- http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/news/articles/744.asp > > Seven Steps for Researching Female Ancestors > by Sharon DeBartolo Carmack, CGRS, FUGA > http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/ancmag/756.asp > > "A Recipe for Family History," by Alyssa Hickman Grove > http://www.ancestry.com/library/view/ancmag/712.asp > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------