How did your parents meet? My Dad told me recently how he met Mom over 70 years ago at the University of New Hampshire. The students were going to Thanksgiving dinner. Since it was a special occasion, they had the men and women eat together. They each filed in separately, sat down—and there she was,... (Read More)
In this article, Scott Phillips asks our readers for help in deciphering the writing on the back of an old photo identifying his “Uncle L.”.. (Read More)
When Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white person on an Alabama bus 58 years ago, her act of defiance against racist laws sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott and accelerated the Civil Rights Movement, forever changing America. In a ceremony Wednesday in Washington, D.C., which was attended by dozens of... (Read More)
In this article, Mary Harrell-Sesniak writes about finding government records and newspaper descriptions of our ancestors’ inventions... (Read More)
I recently received an email from some GenealogyBank users, asking why they couldn’t find any newspaper articles about a tragic death that occurred in 1956: “We are having trouble finding information about a couple of deaths in our area. A couple, Wilbert Arvo Pernu and Dagmar Charlotte Bolborg Pernu, died by asphyxiation on 8... (Read More)
In this article, Scott Phillips discovers the name of an ancestor he never knew about – and turns to old newspapers to fill in his family tree... (Read More)
Americans have taken care of their vulnerable neighbors in different ways over the centuries. For example, in Colonial Philadelphia there was established an “Alms House & House of Employment,” often called the Alms House for short. It was located on Spruce Street. Back in Colonial and Early America, when families, the elderly, or those... (Read More)
Introduction: Mary Harrell-Sesniak is a genealogist, author and editor with a strong technology background. In this guest blog post, Mary writes about our ancestors’ petitions to the government, an often-overlooked source of family history information. From the establishment of companies, to divorces, to relief from tobacco weighing, the right to petition the government “for... (Read More)
Here’s a 19th century mystery concerning a certain Matthew Brayton, who disappeared as a small boy, was held an Indian captive for 34 years, then one day reappeared. But, was it really him? This is a gripping story about a young boy being kidnapped and then returning home as an adult. You will want... (Read More)
