Adoption and Genealogy: A History of Adoption in the U.S.

Mrs. Ella Watson, a government charwoman, with three grandchildren and her adopted daughter [reflected in the mirror]. Image from The Gordon Parks Archives in the Library of Congress.

Most of us probably have adoptees somewhere on our family trees. Do you know how to research them? It’s not the same as the adoption research people do nowadays to find their birth parents.

Formal, legal adoption wasn’t common in the U.S. until the late 1800s. (State adoption laws didn’t even exist until after Massachusetts passed the first one in 1851.) Before that,  if mom and dad couldn’t take care of a child, a relative, neighbor or friend took that child in, or the child was sent to a county orphanage or poor home. In even earlier days, orphaned or poverty-stricken children were also sold by their towns into indentures.

The Adoption History Project at the University of Oregon has a great timeline of adoption history in the U.S. Check it out to see what was going on when your family member was adopted.

To learn more about adoption and genealogy research, check out these links:

FamilySearch Wiki U.S. Adoption Research

All About Adoption Research by Maureen Taylor

RootsWeb’s Guide to Tracing Family Trees: Adoption

 

Preserving the Memories of Combat Veterans

If your family has a history of military service, you want to better understand the experience of war, or you want to help preserve someone’s memories

korea soldiers

American soliders in the Korean War. Fighting with the 2nd Inf. Div. north of the Chongchon River, Sfc. Major Cleveland, weapons squad leader, points out Communist-led North Korean position to his machine gun crew. November 20,1950. Pfc. James Cox. Wikimedia Commons Image.

of combat, you should check out Witness to War.

Witness to War aims to capture “the ‘foxhole view of combat as seen by the soldiers who experienced it.” They do oral history interviews with combat veterans, then preserve and share them through their website. They have already posted a lot of video interviews that are searchable by subject or name.

Their collection of photos, mostly snapshots taken by soldiers,  is sobering and powerful. There are a lot of battlefield and other very stark images.

Do you know anyone whose memories should be included in this site? They are currently interviewing soldiers in the Atlanta and Washington, D.C. areas. All content they collect will be donated to the (US) Library of Congress Veterans History Project.

 

Organize Digital Family Photos: Free Podcast Interview with Denise Levenick

organize digital family photosI love Denise Levenick’s “getting started” strategies for digital photo organization in the free May 2015 Family Tree Magazine podcast. I have thousands of digital photos on my computer–and that’s just from the past few years!

Denise Levenick is the author of The Family Curator blog and the book How to Archive Family Photos: A Step-by-Step Guide to Organize and Share Your Photos Digitally. Her approach is so practical and forgiving: start where you are. Start small. Take your time. Do a few at a time. Use a consistent and simple file naming and digital file organizing scheme!

Also in this podcast, Editor Diane Haddad chimes into the conversation with 25 keepsake family photo projects. Then host Lisa Louise Cooke wraps up the photo theme with her favorite strategies for navigating the Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Online Catalog.

Family History: Genealogy Made Easy PodcastAre you ready for some serious hard drive organization? We can help with that! In our free 2-part series, “Organize Your Genealogy Files,” Lisa shares the system she developed about a decade ago to keep her computer hard drive organized. Her system has withstood the test of time: she’s added thousands more files to her genealogy folders as well as folders that organize “the rest of her life.” Click here to go to these episodes of the Family History Made Easy Podcast, episodes 32-33. Genealogy Gems Premium members can also watch the 2-part Premium video series, “Hard Drive Organization.” You’ll learn similar principles but you can watch Lisa do all that digital organizing right on her computer screen!

Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!

The First Daily Newspaper in the US Wasn’t Exactly Objective

historical newspapers

A selection of American newspapers from 1885, with portraits of their publishers. Original image at the Library of Congress, no known restrictions. Digital image from Wikipedia (click to view).

The first daily newspaper in the US, The Pennsylvania Evening Post, appeared in Philadelphia on this day in 1783. It was short-lived as a daily, but gained traction as a semi-regular paper by 1775. How did publisher Benjamin Towne make it work? By not having a lick of journalistic objectivity, apparently.

“Towne was able to survive through the War for Independence by supporting the side in power,” says this post at FamousDaily.com. “In 1775 his Evening Post was vocal in opposition to the British; but when Philadelphia was occupied briefly by the British troops, Towne welcomed them with open arms. Then when the Patriots took back the city, Towne published a special ‘patriotic’ edition of his paper in honor of their return.”

What a great story! His success heralded more to come. According to a post at the U.S. Census website, “Americans’ hunger for news was such that by 1850, there were some 250 dailies. The number of newspapers peaked around a hundred years ago, when there were 2,600 dailies published across the nation, with a circulation of over 24 million.”

Available at http://genealogygems.com

Newspapers are one of the best places to learn more about our ancestors’ everyday lives, their vital events and happenings that affected them. Learn more in Lisa Louise Cooke’s book How to Find Your Family History in Newspapers. Here you’ll find inspiring stories about what’s IN newspapers, step-by-step instructions, worksheets and checklists, tons of free and worth-a-few bucks online resources, and a massive amount of location-specific websites for international and U.S. historical newspapers.

 

 

Getting the scoop from old newspapersWould you rather learn by watching? Genealogy Gems Premium members and subscribing genealogy societies can enjoy Lisa’s two-part video series, “Getting the Scoop on Your Ancestors in Newspapers.”  You’ll learn what key family history information may be found in historical newspapers; how to identify newspapers that likely covered your ancestors; websites that have digitized collections of newspapers; Lisa’s top search tips and cool tech tools; how to use Evernote in your newspaper research; and more about African-American Newspaper Research (bonus download!). Genealogy Gems for Societies Video Classes

Click here to learn more about Genealogy Gems Premium membership, and (NEW!) click here to see how your genealogy society can watch these and other Premium videos at their meetings!

 

New Genealogy Book Club Pick: WWI-Era Novel by NYT Bestseller

The new featured title of our genealogy book club has been announced. We’re guessing this NYT-bestselling British novelist will win your heart, if she didn’t already with her breakout first novel.

A smart young woman who’s traveled the world finds herself suddenly in a much more provincial setting: East Sussex, England. She spends the summer distracted by petty local politics, financial frustrations and the beginnings of a possible romance. Then the Great War begins–not so far from her new home.

That’s the premise of British author Helen Simonson’s new novel, The Summer Before the War, and our newest Genealogy Gems Book Club title. Those who have been waiting for Helen’s follow-up to her stunning debut, Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, won’t be disappointed. Her first book became a New York Times bestseller and has been translated into 21 languages. The Summer Before the War is another great read: light and charming, with a dash of romance and humor, a lovable heroine and a compelling historical setting. It’s so easy to read and love this book!

It’s the early 1900s, and main character Beatrice Nash has recently lost her father. The estate settlement lost her control over her own funds and freedom. She comes to a small English town as a Latin teacher and must mind her manners and local politics to keep her job. Beatrice meets a man and the appeal appears mutual, but he’s already engaged.

This isn’t just Beatrice’s story, though. You’ll meet an entire buy psoriasis medication online village full of charming and irascible and expatriate and unconventional and way-too-conventional and mysterious characters, including the local gentry and the local gypsies. They all have their own stories, which unfold as they begin to experience the first great shock of the 20th century close-up: World War I. First it’s the stunned refugees who take refuge in their village. Then locals begin enlisting. Eventually you’ll see the battlefront through their eyes, but not all of them may make it back to the town that to Beatrice is becoming home.

Genealogy Book Club Podcast Interview with Helen Simonson

genealogy book club Helen Simonson Summer before the war Major PettigrewDespite the awful realities her characters face, Helen Simonson somehow writes a novel that is easy and enjoyable to read. I ask her how she did that–and lots of other questions–in an exclusive interview coming this June on the Genealogy Gems podcasts. You’ll hear more about the idyllic setting she chose and her personal connection to it; how she researched the historical setting; and what it’s like to be an emigrant who longed to leave home and now misses it dearly.

Get Your Copy & Support the Free Podcast Featuring Author Interviews

So snatch up a copy from our links here (which support the free podcast–thank you!) or your local library. And let us know what you love about it!

Get the Kindle ebook – The Summer Before the War: A Novel

Get the print book – The Summer Before the War: A Novel

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