{"id":51687,"date":"2019-07-24T10:49:03","date_gmt":"2019-07-24T14:49:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.genealogybank.com\/?p=51687"},"modified":"2020-01-30T11:24:00","modified_gmt":"2020-01-30T16:24:00","slug":"happy-birthday-to-isaac-garcelon-born-22-july-1788","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/happy-birthday-to-isaac-garcelon-born-22-july-1788.html","title":{"rendered":"Happy Birthday to Isaac Garcelon \u2013 Born 22 July 1788"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two days ago, in honor of Isaac Garcelon\u2019s<\/a> birthday, I decided to look in GenealogyBank to see what I could learn about him. While he was born in Lewiston, Maine, on 22 July 1788, he moved to New Brunswick, Canada, got married, and didn\u2019t look back. So, I wondered how easily I would find information about him in GenealogyBank\u2019s Historical Newspaper Archives<\/a>, a collection of U.S. newspapers.<\/p>\n

Bingo.
\nI instantly pulled up this article about a Garcelon family reunion.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Source: GenealogyBank, Weekly Eastern Argus (Portland, Maine), 26 October 1871, page 4<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Yes, that\u2019s him:<\/p>\n

\u201cIsaac Garcelon of St. Davids, New Brunswick, [aged] 81.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hmmm.
\nWhat is that last reference?<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026and one sister, Mrs. Hosea Fuller of Lewiston, aged 87, who was too infirm to be present.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That sounds like Salley (Garcelon) Fuller (1785-1871)<\/a>, who died just days later on 7 November 1871 in Lewiston, Maine. She was married to David Fuller (1777-1850)<\/a>, who died in Lewiston on 6 June 1850. So, why did the newspaper say that she was the wife of Hosea Fuller?<\/p>\n

The date of David\u2019s death is important \u2013 because the 1850 census was set to record everyone living in America as of June 1st of that year. In Lewiston, Maine, the Hosea Fuller family was enumerated on 16 August 1850 \u2013 more than two months after David Fuller\u2019s death.<\/p>\n

So, although David Fuller should have been recorded in that census, he was not listed \u2013 but Salley (Garcelon) Fuller, his widow and Hosea\u2019s mother, was. Here she is in the 1850 census, listed as living with her son, Hosea Fuller (1810-1880).<\/a> So, the newspaper\u2019s report that Hosea was her husband is not correct.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
Source: GenealogyBank, \u201cUnited States Census, 1850,\u201d database with images, GenealogyBank (https:\/\/genealogybank.com\/#), Sally Fuller, Lewiston, Lincoln, Maine, United States. (Original index: United States Census, 1850, FamilySearch, 2014.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And, here are mother and son again, in the 1870 census<\/a>, still living in Lewiston, Maine.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
Source: GenealogyBank, \u201cUnited States Census, 1870,\u201d database with images, GenealogyBank (https:\/\/genealogybank.com\/#), Sarah Fuller, Maine, United States. (Original index: United States Census, 1870, FamilySearch, 2014.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the 1850 census, Salley (Garcelon) Fuller is listed as 63 years old.
\nIn the 1860 census she is 75 years old, and in the 1870 census she is 85 years of age.<\/p>\n

Notice the spelling of Salley (Garcelon) Fuller\u2019s name in the 1850 census. It is clearly spelled the way we expect it to be spelled: Sally.<\/p>\n

It is also spelled that way in the 1860 census<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But, here in the 1870 census her name is spelled as \u201cSarah.\u201d
\nOther records, including her tombstone<\/a>, spell her first name as \u201cSalley.\u201d<\/p>\n

Be flexible.
\nNot all records agree.
\nSpellings vary.<\/p>\n

A reminder: Just because it is printed in a book \u2013 or in this case, a newspaper or a census \u2013 doesn\u2019t necessarily make it accurate. Remember, too, this corollary: \u201cA rose by any other name would smell as sweet.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this article, Thomas Jay Kemp uses newspaper and census records to research Isaac Garcelon and the Fuller family in the 19th century.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12713],"tags":[6976,12,2719,2020],"class_list":["post-51687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-genealogy-research-tips","tag-census-records","tag-genealogy","tag-genealogy-search-tips","tag-newspaper-archives"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/photo-0724-2019-featured-graphic-fuller-family.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}