Breathing new life into old photos since 2012.

Category: Genealogy Tips

Vindicating an Ancestor: My Recent Visit to the National Archives of Philadelphia

Liar, liar. Pants on fire.

Liar, liar. Pants on fire.

The newspapers at FultonHistory.com have a way of busting my bubble. Just when I get to thinking about how clean all of my perfect ancestors’ hands were, along comes a FultonHistory.com article to sully them. I call it “The Bad News Report”. So far, the bad news has been that an ancestor of mine hit somebody with a car. To date, I believe the investigations have found no fault, but it’s still unfortunate to read.

newspaperarticleMy most recent Fulton discovery turned up something a little more criminally culpable. “William P. Harrison,” an article from the first day of March, 1898, stated, “pleaded guilty to a fraud in a pension matter,” and was sentenced to one year in prison by “Judge Butler”.

My grandmother’s great-grandfather was named William P. Harrison, who served honorably in the Civil War before marrying his wife, Harriet, and fathering five children with her. He worked as a car inspector for the Pennsylvania Rail Road for most of his adult life. To the best of my knowledge, William was a model American citizen.  Continue reading

Genealogy Tip: Trouble Transcribing? Google the Legal Boilerplate

I have a tip for you today regarding the transcription of old documents—especially legal documents, like deeds and wills. This was inspired today by a tweet from requesting transcription assistance via the twittersphere. Here is the tweet:

https://twitter.com/BKlynAncestry/status/512337479698243584

Clicking through, the document is again reproduced at the Brooklyn Ancestry blog. Looking at a document like this, one might be tempted to think: “Wow. Look at this. It’s handwritten. Someone put a lot of care and original thought into this. It must be unique. How will I ever decipher it?” Don’t despair. Your document may not be as unique as it looks.  Continue reading