An article originally published by the New Orleans Advocate talks about law enforcement searching familial DNA databases looking for genetic leads to solve cases. Your relative’s DNA could turn you into a suspect. The article proposes it’s time for there to be ground rules for the searches before lives are ruined over imperfect technology. Innocent […]

Common 17th-19th century nicknames Abigail… Nabby, Abbie, Abby Anne… Nancy Catherine… Kate, Katy Elizabeth… Betty, Betsey Experience… Peddy Martha… Patty Mary… Molly, Polly Sarah… Sally Temperance… Tempy

Pulitzer Prize winning historian Bernard Bailyn writes, “If you have no personal memory, you would have no sense of your world. And similarly, if we have no public awareness, we’ve lost our understanding of how we got to be the way we are, and hence our understanding of who we are. History gives us context, […]

This Old Tree, October 2015

This Month column has two separate parts. Both stem from requests for help from people at the annual Maine Genealogical Society Meeting held in Brewer, Maine. Thelma Brooks question on her George Eye Ancestor Thelma is nearly ninety years old. She talked with Jay Bullard about her family tree and the gap she had was […]

President’s Message, October 2015

Labor Day has come and gone, fall must be here. The temperatures fluctuate so much, some days are like summer, others like late fall. Just like we prepare our homes for the upcoming winter we should get our genealogical items organized in order to know what we need to research next. Procrastination is an awful […]