(Nearly) Worldess Wednesday - Sulmona, Italy - Casillo

The young woman in my great-great aunt Amelia Casillo Berni.  The child is her son Frank.  Who are the other two people?  We have no idea.  I also have not yet researched the area of Sulmona yet.  I have ordered the FHC film for my ggg grandparents marriage (hopefully) and it may give Carolina Izzo's hometown, which may help clear up this photo.  If anyone knows Italian, can you translate what this card says?  The Google translation was jibberish:-(

Tombstone(less) Tuesday - Marie Strassheim Tross and Louise J. Tross

My great-great-great grandmother Marie Strassheim Tross (1841 - 1921) in Buffalo Cemetery, Buffalo, Erie, NY.  The tombstone belongs to to her granddaughter Louise J. Tross (1913 - 1937)

One more reason GeneaBloggers rocks

My recent post, Data Backup Weekend, was also an entry into the GeneaBloggers Data Backup Weekend Contest and, amazingly, I WON!  My prize is the Handy Backup Standard 6.4 by Novosoft LLC.  I am so excited to have this software, which will back up my computer on a monthly, weekly or daily (for those true OCD types) basis without my having to worry about it.  I am so excited to start playing with this new software and will let you all know what I think about it for the next Data Backup day:-)


Thank you GeneaBloggers and Novosoft LLC!

Volunteerism in the Genealogical World

Up until I went back to school in August, my favorite way to volunteer in the genealogy world was through Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness.  I began by going to cemeteries to take photographs of tombstones (or grave sites if there wasn't a headstone) for people.  This became a "date" day, once or twice a month, for my fiancé and I, where we would drive around Onondaga county and see who could find the most tombstones, walking up and down the rows in the cemeteries (see why he's a keeper?!?).  Eventually it progressed to my doing searches at the library, mostly for city directories and obituaries, and at the courthouse, where I never had much luck unfortunately.

I also volunteer for FamilySearch Indexing, mainly for the 1892 New York census.  I did not do nearly as many names as I had hoped, but I like knowing I was part of the group that got this project finished.  Just today I received an email from the president of the Western New York genealogy society, to which I belong, asking if I would be willing to to help transcribe or proof read the 1865 New York census, which they are putting online.  I jumped at the chance to be part of this project, as state census' are a tremendously helpful, but often overlooked, resource.  I am also excited to become an active member of the society, despite living too far away to make meetings.

I have received three main things from volunteering in the genealogy world.  First, I learnt about new resources and practiced finding them.  Prior to volunteering with RAOGK, I had no idea how useful city directories were.  This has helped in my research tremendously.  Second, I have gotten a lot of practice in deciphering handwriting.  Although I am still much better at seeing a name I am looking for in a document compared to transcribing unfamiliar handwriting, I will learn this skill and I will learn it much faster than if I just practiced with my ancestors handwriting.  Third, I have discovered a possible career.  I realized how much I love genealogy, not just researching my family, but other families as well.  This has lead me to get my masters degree in library science with the goal of working in a genealogy and local history library.  Eventually, I would like to become a certified genealogist and help people with their search that way, but it will be a few years before I get to that level.

I highly recommend volunteering in whatever capacity you are able.  It helps improve your research skills, introduces you to new people and record groups and builds up good genealogy karma, which will hopefully lead to more genealogy happy dances!

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Week #1

Amy Coffin at the We Tree blog is challenging bloggers to become better genealogists, with a new prompt each week through her 52 Weeks to Better Genealogy:


Week 1 is: Go to your local public library branch. Make a note of the genealogy books in the collection that may help you gain research knowledge. Don’t forget to check the shelves in both the non-fiction section and the reference section. If you do not already have a library card, take the time to get one. If you have a genealogy blog, write about what you find in your library’s genealogy collection.



As my library is part of a large county library system, I went to their website and started searching for genealogy books that I have not yet read.  I have requested the following, which will be delivered over the next few weeks as they become available:


Finding your Italian Ancestors: A Beginners Guide by Suzanne Russo Adams: I have a long list of microfilms to order from the FHC for my Italian ancestors.  This book will hopefully help me see where to take the search beyond the FHC.


In Search of your German Roots: A Complete Guide to Tracing your Ancestors in the Germanic Areas of Europe by Angus Baxter: One of my goals this year is to trace my German ancestry further, this book is highly rated to help me do just that.


Tracing your Pauper Ancestors: A Guide for Family Historians by Robert Burlison: This guide is for tracing your English ancestors who were affected by poverty.  As I have found some living in workhouses, this book will be very useful for finding additional records on them.


Genealogy by George G. Morgan: It's by George C. Morgan, how can I not read this?


Who Do You Think You Are?: The Essential Guide to Tracing your Family History by Megan Smolenyak: See above title, just replace author name:-)


Finding Anyone, Anywhere, Anywhen by Noel Montgomery Elliot: This should be useful in my goal to find living relatives this year.


Social Networking for Genealogists by Drew Smith: I have wanted to read this since it came out and my library has just recently bought it.


Google your Family Tree: Unlocking the Hidden Power of Google by Daniel M. Lynch: I need some assistance in setting up Google alerts for my ancestors.


The Oxford Guide to Library Research by Thomas Mann: There is a chapter in here on genealogy.  It should also be helpful for my current schooling.

Data Backup Weekend

Due to the holidays, instead of just one Data Backup Day, we have a whole Data Backup Weekend!  My data backup plan consists of:

• An external hard-drive, which I backup to monthly, more if I have added a lot of information in a day or week.
• I email myself a copy of my gedcom on a monthly basis, in case my computer and external hard-drive fail.
• I have a Geni family tree which has names, dates, events and photos.

What I need to do:

• I am currently transcribing all the documents I have into my genealogy program.  Following that I will need to scan them and link them in the program.  This will protect my paper resources, if anything should happen to my apartment.
• I need to upload my scanned photos to my newly created Flickr account in case something happens to my computer and external hard-drive.
• I need to scan more photos, as I would be devastated if I lost some of these.
• I need to start saving a copy of my blog monthly to my computer and hard-drive, in case Blogger has a problem and loses it.

I highly recommend you, too, have a data backup plan that you are following.  It would be horrible to lose all your work when there are such simple things to do.

SNGF - The Best 2009 Genealogy Moment

For this weeks SNGF (which I'm actually going on Saturday this week!) Randy asks:
1) "What was your best Genealogy Moment during 2009?" This could be a research find, a fabulous trip, a found family treasure, etc. Your choice!



My best genealogy moment was, beyond a doubt, going to Florida with my grandmother to visit two of my great aunts and their families.  I had an amazing time hearing stories, viewing and scanning photos and documents and getting to know my extended family (whose blogs I now follow!).  My favorite find, while there, was a tin-type of my ggg-grandmother Sophia and seeing the strong genes she had, which we passed to her granddaughter and all of her daughters, my Aunt Holly and myself.  It is amazing to see a photo of an ancestor, born almost a hundred and forty years before you, who you can see yourself in.