Appraising Bigotry

While demolishing a wall in a 200-year-old Northborough, Massachusetts, house, Betty Tetreault's son discovered a medallion bearing the initials of a despicable organization.

Tetreault brought the medallion, about the size of a silver dollar, to an appraiser at the Historical Society's Main Street building Friday night. In cut-out words it reads "in good standing," with the letters "KKK" in the middle.

"It's bizarre because this is a northern state," said Marie Nieber, who is also the chair woman of the town's Historical Commission. "Maybe someone tried to hide their past. Who knows? " [Link]

Census Bureau's Sins Enumerated

Margo Anderson and William Seltzer have found evidence that the U.S. Census Bureau handed over the names and addresses of Japanese-Americans living in and around Washington, D.C., to the Secret Service during World War II. The release occurred after Congress suspended the Bureau's legally mandated protection of confidentiality in 1942.

Anderson and Seltzer discovered in 2000 that the Census Bureau released block-by-block data during WW II that alerted officials to neighborhoods in California, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho and Arkansas where Japanese-Americans were living. "We had suggestive but not very conclusive evidence that they had also provided microdata for surveillance," Anderson says.

Anderson says that microdata would have been useful for what officials called the "mopping up" of potential Japanese-Americans who had eluded internment. [Link]

This Little Piggy Went to Court

Footballer Bastian Schweinsteiger successfully sued a Bavarian company for selling bratwurst under the name "Schweini." It means "piggy," and is the athlete's nickname.

Bastian's surname means "pig climber". How the 22-year-old's ancestors came by this moniker I am not sure. Perhaps scaling pigs is a job in Germany. Maybe it was once a popular hobby. Or perhaps it was just an isolated incident culminating in the punch line, "But you clamber on one pig . . . " [Link]

Ellis Island's Very Busy Day

April 17th will be the 100th anniversary of the busiest day in Ellis Island's history—a day when 11,747 people passed through the immigration station.

A usual day saw some 5,000 immigrants processed. It was the highpoint of 1907 when 1,285,349 immigrants entered the United States, with Ellis Island processing nearly 80 percent of those new arrivals. The country would not welcome as many immigrants again until 1990. [Link]

By way of comparison, on a typical day in 2006 [pdf] U. S. Customs and Border Protection processed 1.1 million passengers and pedestrians—240,737 arriving by air, 71,151 by ship—and 327,042 incoming privately owned vehicles.

CC Your Ancestors

Here's the perfect way to carry your ancestors with you while you research their lives: Nadine Jarvis's Carbon Copies.

Pencils made from the carbon of human cremains. 240 pencils can be made from an average body of ash - a lifetime supply of pencils for those left behind.

[via Neatorama]

Ace Ventura: Family Historian

Jim Carrey is set to star in a film called "Me Time," which—despite the following synopsis—will be a comedy.

[The story] revolves around a writer penning a book about his great-great-grandmother, a frontier woman. When his pregnant wife has to go on bed rest, leaving him to care for the house and their other child, his confidence is shaken as he reads his ancestor's diary, in which she describes raising a family, plowing the fields and taming the wild environs. [Link]

Where There's a Will, There's a Way to Keep It Secret

I've written before about Robert Brown's claim that he is the illegitimate child of the late Princess Margaret. Now Brown wants to take a peek at her will to see if it might prove his claim. Problem is, wills made by members of the Royal Family are not open to inspection by the public.

If individuals in general were allowed to claim the right to represent the public and seek judicial review, there would be "anarchy", counsel said. "This week Mr Brown; next week Mr White, Mr Pink, Mr Green."

This principle was established to avoid "busybodies, cranks and mischief-makers". Mr [Frank] Hinks said: "With all due respect, this applies to Mr Brown. He is suffering from a delusion." [Link]

Evidently very little respect is due Mr. Brown.

The Leather Man

I have a special fondness for stories of hermits and other lonely souls. The Journal News has an interesting piece about The Leather Man—a mysterious fellow clad in leather who walked a regular 365-mile circuit through Connecticut and New York for decades until his death in 1889.

His journey started sometime before the Civil War and his timing rarely varied, allowing locals to set their calendars by his arrival.

Except for some grunts and other unintelligible sounds, according to newspaper accounts, his trekking was done in silence. Legend holds that a Connecticut man once spoke to him in French, which seemed to mark the extent of any conversation.

His headstone reads "Jules Bourglay," but that name came from a 1884 newspaper article later retracted.

"I think he was a troubled man for whatever reason," said Steve Grant, a Hartford Courant reporter who spent a month in 1993 walking the Leather Man's route. "I think that has to be a given."

"But, at the same time, he clearly was a harmless person. People recognized that. When you come right down to it, in the end, we're not sure who he is." [Link]

Where Gravestones Go to Die

Numerous headstones have been found dumped in a field in Porterville, California, but a cemetery district official says there's no need to fret.

“We get people who come in every month, sometimes even police, and they ask about the headstones,” District Assistant Manager Fred Ruiz said. “We tell them that there isn't a controversy, and there isn't an old graveyard.”

What it is, cemetery officials said, is the result of years of discarded headstones from Monument Works, the city's oldest monument business, and other monument companies.

Louis R. Stephen Jr., the owner of the company established in 1899, said the headstones were ones that had mistakes or did not meet the individual family's preference. [Link]

The best part of this story is the full name of the business to blame: Porterville Monument Works and Swimming Pool Supplies.

One Prolific Painter

Art historians are trying to spot the face of Mary Alford in the works of Victorian painter William Powell Frith. Photographs of Mary—Frith's longtime mistress—were made public only yesterday.

An upmarket version of the picture book game Where's Wally? is to be found in checking masterpieces such as Derby Day and The Railway Station, using two grainy images of Mary which make their public debut today. One shows the dimpled, round-faced Mary on an undercover picnic with Frith; the second is a family group after the death of his first wife, when he finally made Mary what the Victorians called "a respectable woman".

The pictures have been revealed by an anonymous descendant of one of seven children Frith fathered illegitimately with Mary, while maintaining his official family, including another 12 children, a mile up the road. [Link]

Born to the Big Top

A member of a famous circus family wants to strike out on his own, but a 1967 franchise deal may prevent him from using the family name.

John Ringling North II, grandnephew of circus promoter John Ringling, wants to bill the show he bought in Hugo, Okla., as “John Ringling North II presents the Kelly Miller Circus.”

North’s attorney, Lamar Matthews, said customers are unlikely to confuse “a one-ring circus in Hugo, Okla., and the greatest show on earth.” [Link]

As an aside, did you know that there's a mailing list for "anyone with a genealogical interest in circus folk"? There is also a list devoted to high-wire artists that is somewhat less popular.

Etherington in the Ether

Paul Etherington (who has never been seen in the same room as Thomas Hamburger, Jr.) was featured on Monday's BBC radio program Tracing Your Roots. Until it's archived, you can listen to the interview here (Paul's segment begins five minutes in).

Paul Etherington’s family history research took a sudden intercontinental leap when he came across an inscription in a Yorkshire graveyard describing an ancestor’s son as “now in Port Natal.” Following the trail to South Africa, Paul discovered a whole new branch on the family tree and an extended family stretching across the world.

Size Matters Even After Death

Accused in the media of seeking special treatment, former U.S. Rep. James Hansen has withdrawn his request to have a headstone taller than the 36 inches allowed by the city of Farmington, Utah.

"I do not consider myself in any way special over any other citizen, but some of the positions I have held apparently are considered special by many people," Hansen said in a Feb. 23 letter seeking 8 additional inches on the headstone.

A Hansen admirer said it should be 20 feet high. [Link]

Woman's Face Proves She's No Place

Eunice Gray (aka Ermine McEntire) ran a "house of ill repute" in Fort Worth, Texas, in the early 1900s. Long after Gray's 1962 death, amateur genealogist Donna Donnell set out to investigate an intriguing rumor: Was Eunice the "Etta Place" who accompanied fugitives Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid to South America?

With a few keystrokes she found a surprising document that caused her heart to quicken. On the screen appeared a copy of an alphabetized passenger list of the S.S. Turrialba, which sailed from Colon, Panama, on May 11, 1911.

The 11th name on the manifest, penned in a delicate cursive, was a Eunice Gray. Age 30. Destination: Fort Worth, Texas.

Her investigation led Donnell to Mrs. D.S. O'Leary, Eunice Gray's niece.

Donnell found her answer the moment she spotted a framed photo on a wall in O'Leary's home. In the picture, taken during the 1920s, a young Ermine McEntire - Eunice Gray - is sporting a wide-brimmed hat. Another photo, circa 1896, pictures Gray wearing her high school graduation dress.

"Eunice isn't Etta Place," Donnell said with certainty. O'Leary compared photos of her aunt with one of Place and agreed. [Link]

Lawmakers Debate Use of Pit Bulls in Cemeteries

A bill granting South Carolinians access to relatives' graves on private property moved forward on Tuesday, despite some disagreement on the issue of immunity from liability for property owners.

Rep. Alan Clemmons, R-Myrtle Beach, said the S.C. Association of Realtors believes the immunity is necessary to balance property owners' rights. People should not be able to sue if they come in and trip over a gravestone, he said.

But the owner should not be allowed to release a pack of pit bulls while people are visiting and be held immune from damages, [Rep. Jim] Harrison said. [Link]

[Photo credit: Cuchlain by Cara Fealy Choate]

A Nguyen-Nguyen Situation

Anh Do explains in The Orange County Register why so many Vietnamese are named Nguyen (commonly pronounced win in the U.S.).

Most Vietnamese have the surname of one of 16 royal families who ruled their homeland. In chronological order, they are Thuc, Trung, Trieu, Mai, Khuc, Ly, Phung, Kieu, Ngo, Dinh, Le, Tran, Ho, Mac, Trinh and Nguyen, as in Nguyen Bao Dai, the dynasty's last emperor, who abdicated in 1945 and who reigned before communist forces took control of North Vietnam in 1945.

During his rule, officials gave loyal subjects his name, while many criminals made the switch to avoid prosecution, according to Wikipedia. Through the centuries, a family might have adopted a new identity when new royals ascended to the throne, their rise achieved by force or political manipulation. And since Nguyen was the most recent, it's more plentiful. So plentiful, in fact, that some estimates place nearly 40 percent of Vietnamese with owning the moniker. [Link]

Empty Wallet Full of History

Russell Martin Harris has donated to the Mormon church a wallet carried by his great-great-grandfather.

It was that ancestor, Martin Harris, who mortgaged his farm to get the $3,000 needed to print the first 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon, the central text of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Family folklore holds that the soft, caramel-brown wallet carried the cash to the printer, Russell Harris said.

Through the years, Russell Harris has shared that same story, showing off the wallet to small groups.

"Everybody wanted to open the billfold and see if the money was still there," Russell Harris said. "It was always empty." [Link]

Houdini Offed by Unhappy Mediums?

A relative of Harry Houdini wants the escape artist's body exhumed.

Houdini's great nephew George Hardeen believes the performer may have been killed by people who were angry because he debunked their claims that they could communicate with the dead.

If his bid to have Houdini's remains exhumed is successful, Hardeen plans to have a team of forensic investigators examine the body for evidence of foul play. [Link]

Find A Grave has photos of Harry's impressive gravesite in Queens.

There Was Jell-O in Her Genes

Elizabeth McNabb was 19 in 1974 when she began her search for her birth mother. Fourteen years and a court order later, she was given access to her original birth certificate in Salem, Ore. She soon after made contact with her birth mother, Barbara (Woodward) Piel, and learned that she was the product of an illicit affair.

McNabb's great-grandfather, she also learned, was Orator Francis Woodward, a Leroy, N.Y., entrepreneur who purchased a business making a flavored gelatin known as "Jell-O" from his neighbor for $450 in 1899.

Barbara Piel died in 2003, but it took until last week for McNabb to be granted her share of the multimillion-dollar Jell-O fortune.

On Friday, a unanimous New York Appellate Division, 4th Department, panel ruled that McNabb legally constitutes a "descendant" and "living child" of her mother, Barbara W. Piel, under trusts established by Piel's mother in 1926 and 1963.

McNabb -- an office manager who has with her husband cared for more than 160 emergency-care foster children -- now stands to split those two trusts with her two half-sisters. Her one-third share totals approximately $3.5 million. [Link]

The Tree That Owns Itself

I've abstracted tons of deeds, but never one like this. The Athens (Ga.) Weekly Banner of August 12, 1890, reported that one William Jackson had conveyed ownership of an oak tree to itself.

William Jackson was reportedly a professor at the University of Georgia; the nature of his military service and the source of the title colonel is unknown. Jackson cherished childhood memories of the tree and, desiring to protect it, he deeded to the tree ownership of itself and the surrounding land. By various accounts this transaction took place between 1820 and 1832. According to the newspaper article, the deed read:

I, W. H. Jackson, of the county of Clarke, of the one part, and the oak tree… of the county of Clarke, of the other part: Witnesseth, That the said W. H. Jackson for and in consideration of the great affection which he bears said tree, and his great desire to see it protected has conveyed, and by these presents do convey unto the said oak tree entire possession of itself and of all land within eight feet of it on all sides.

[Link, via Neatorama]

[Photo credit: the tree that owns itself by bpmuzik]

Child's Gravestone Gets Upgraded

While digging in a Stockton, California, vacant lot, Victor Rosasco turned up the headstone of a boy who died in 1857. He later had the job of repairing a nearby monument to California hero John Brown. Deciding that "the little guy deserves some recognition," he decided to incorporate the boy's stone into the monument.

The reaction of members of Stockton's Cultural Heritage Board - two wide eyes, one crinkled nose and one "Oh, my goodness!" - could have been predicted. They had come to a vacant lot in east downtown Saturday to honor Brown, known as California's Paul Revere, and to rededicate the monument, which fell apart in 2004 or 2005.

No mention of the "Son of Noah & Lucy Aun Burrows ... aged one year" existed, after all, when the marker was erected in 1969. [Link]

Still Trafficking in Human Misery

One family has found a way to continue benefiting from the slave trade. To mark the 200th anniversary of legislation ending the British Empire's involvement in the practice, unnamed individuals are putting up for auction a slave ship log book once owned by their ancestor, the ship's master. It could bring $6,000 or more.

It is unclear if the logbook owners, who [auction house] Bonhams say they believe are descendants of "master" Lewis, are aware of the criticism surrounding the slave ship log auction.

After the auction, one legal expert says, there theoretically could be legal ramifications for the owners.

"What comes to mind under common law approach is to bring an action that we refer to as unjust enrichment," says Mark Ellis, Executive Director of the International Bar Association. [Link]

I think we've finally found some people who are fully qualified to apologize for slavery.

Parents With Presidential Progeny

Bill Reagan thinks he's figured out a way to measure a president's success in office.

To accurately gauge the quality of an administration, we need a single standard that can be applied to any president, a means of measuring public respect outside of historical and partisan biases. I believe I have formed the mathematical equation that allows exactly that measurement:

Q=P^bn

Where Q is the quality, P is the president, and bn is the frequency of that president’s name appearing as a baby’s name.

This theory took root at a recent dinner outing where a mother at a nearby table issued a shrill, menacing demand: “Madison! RIGHT NOW!” While the woman behind the bellow was calling only one child, there is a particular tone in some parental admonishments that conveys its urgency across blood lines, and a moment later a small parade of Madisons filed past our table. Were these children each an homage to our fourth president, James Madison? [Link]

In a way, they were. The name appears to derive from a movie mermaid who was named for Madison Avenue, which was named for Madison Square, which was named for our fourth president.

I had a great-uncle dubbed "Theodore Roosevelt Dunham." I'm not sure if he was named for the president or for a mermaid of the same name.

One Last Check Before Leaving

Ralph Lung Kee Lee came to Canada when he was 12, and paid the $500 head tax all Chinese immigrants were then required to pay. Lee finally received an apology from the Canadian government and a $20,000 redress check on March 10—his 107th birthday, and five days before he died.

"It was almost like, 'I waited this long, here I am. I'm going to stay alive to get it,"' Lee's daughter Linda Ing said of her father, who received his apology and compensation 94 years after coming to Canada.

Lee had a fun and loving personality, Ing said, and he was quite tickled when he finally received his redress cheque.

"I said, 'You're going to be 107,"' Ing recalled telling her father the day before his birthday.

"He said, 'Me?' I said, 'You,"' Ing said in mock wide-eyed amazement. "'You're going to get your cheque.' And he just laughed." [Link]

Nova Scotia VRs Virtually Readable

Nova Scotia Historical Vital Statistics are now online. You'll find digitized birth (1864-1877), marriage (1864-1930), and death records (1864-1877 and 1908-1955). (Oddly enough, nobody died in Nova Scotia between 1878 and 1907.)

This is the best thing to come out of Nova Scotia since ... the last good thing to come out of Nova Scotia.

Find French Forebears For Free

The Drouin Collection will be free to view at Ancestry.com through the end of March.

The Drouin Collection represents the largest and most valuable French-Canadian family history resources available, including an impressive collection of Quebec vital records. The collection ranges from the beginning of European settlement to the 1940s, including the nearly 12 million records which marked the history of Quebec families over three centuries.

There's no name index, so you'd better have your high-school French teacher on speed dial. I was able to find the marriage record of my 3rd-great-grandparents Martial Laplante and Marie Parent in Van Buren, Maine, in about three minutes—but only because I already knew it was there.

Vowel Movement

New York Mets pitcher John Maine's grandfather must never have visited my home state—a place noticeably lacking "pizzazz."

Maine [...] said his father's family surname used to be Main, but that his grandfather added the "E" for pizzazz and mystique. Tom Glavine, part Irish, said some members of his family have dropped "E" for reasons of proper pronunciation. "Actually," Glavine said, "I think my family gave the 'E' to the Maines." [Link]

Levity in Brevity

St. Patrick's Day passed by without notice here at The Genealogue, so allow me to offer belatedly this story of the death of an Irish gentleman named (not surprisingly) Paddy.

His wife went to the newspaper to place his obituary. The newsman said the cost was $1 a word.

"I only have $2," Mrs. Paddy said. "Just print 'Paddy died.'"

The newsman decided that old Paddy deserved more. He gave her three extra words at no charge.

"A kind man you are," said Mrs. Paddy. "Print me husband's obituary this way: 'Paddy died. Boat for sale.'" [Link]

Her Claim to Fame Is Her Name

Author Emma Darwin lives in the long shadow of her great-great-grandfather, and in the somewhat shorter shadow of his wife, for whom she was named.

When I checked in for the writing course the administrator ran his finger down the clipboard list. 'No relation to Charles Darwin, then?' I've had a lifetime's training in family manners, so I smiled modestly. 'Well, yes, actually. He's my grandfather's grandfather.'

His finger began to tremble. 'No! But I've actually shaken your hand,' he gasped. 'Charles Darwin's descendant! Oh my God!' He began to hyperventilate and had to sit down. I stood there, trying to keep smiling.

In the odd, blank year between the champagne corks popping to celebrate the deal and my book actually hitting the bookshelves, I Googled myself occasionally, as most new authors do. But I don't think most new authors are consistently upstaged in the Google rankings by their own great-great-grandmother. [Link]

A Day in the Life of a Radio

April 1, 1930, was an important day in the life of my grandfather Edgar Dunham's radio. That was the day that radios were first counted in the census. Here it is, enumerated with the rest of the family:

On that same day, my grandfather recorded in his diary that he "took Radio Battery over to Geo. Forbes." (I would guess that the radio used a "wet cell" battery that had to be taken to town for recharging periodically.) George was a young auto mechanic in the nearest village, and (the census shows) lived a few doors down from Edgar's first cousin once removed, Charles A. Dunham. Boarding with Charles on April 1, 1930, was Edgar's girlfriend, Mae Coolidge, who attended the same school where Edgar spent half the day splitting wood.

Edgar and Mae would marry and live happily ever after. Of his radio, no further record has been found, suggesting that—like many people in my genealogical experience—it ceased to exist on April 2, 1930.