The Hoosier Genealogist
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INDIANA HISTORICAL SOCIETY • SPRING/SUMMER 2008 • $5 THE HOOSIER GENEALOGIST IN THIS ISSUE: BIOGRAPHY OF A NAVAL CHAPLAIN FEDERAL COURT RECORDS CITY DIRECTORIES INDIANA HISTORICAL SOCIETY Experience history in a whole new way… PRESENTED BY WITH SUPPORT FROM CLABBER GIRL Mr. Zwerner’s neighborhood Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. grocery store is buzzing about Wednesdays through Saturdays events of the war. Step back in Free Admission time as costumed interpreters Eugene and Marilyn Glick share details of everyday Hoosier Indiana History Center 450 West Ohio Street life during World War II. Help Indianapolis, Indiana 46202-3269 run the store, fill orders and talk (800) 447-1830 about war-time events. www.indianahistory.org TM INDIANA’S STORYTELLER : CONNECTING PEOPLE TO THE PAST T H E H O O S I E R GENEALOGIST INDiaNA HisTORical SOciETY • SPRING/SUmmER 2008 • VOL. 48, ISSUE 1 Since 1830, the Indiana Historical Administration John A. Herbst • President and CEO Society has been Indiana’s Storyteller™, Stephen L. Cox • Executive Vice President Jeff Matsuoka • Vice President, Business and Operations connecting people to the past by col- Susan P. Brown • Vice President, Human Resources lecting, preserving, interpreting, and Linda Pratt • Vice President, Development and Membership Jeanne Scheets • Vice President, Marketing and Public Relations disseminating the state’s history. A non- Board of Trustees profit membership organization, the IHS Michael A. Blickman William Brent Eckhart also publishes books and periodicals; Chair Daniel M. Ent Thomas G. Hoback Richard D. Feldman, MD sponsors teacher workshops; provides First Vice Chair Richard E. Ford Sarah Evans Barker Wanda Y. Fortune youth, adult, and family programming; Second Vice Chair Janis B. Funk James C. Shook Jr. Katharine M. Kruse provides support and assistance to local Treasurer P. Martin Lake Patricia D. Curran James H. Madison museums and historical groups; and Secretary James T. Morris George F. Rapp, MD maintains the nation’s premier research William E. Bartelt Margaret Cole Russell Frank M. Basile Jane W. Schlegel library and archives on the history of Mary Ann Bradley Jerry D. Semler Joseph E. Costanza Joseph A. Slash Indiana and the Old Northwest. Edgar Glenn Davis ETY I OC S CAL I The Hoosier Genealogist: Connections STOR Family historians seek connections I M. Teresa Baer • Managing Editor, Family History Publications between themselves and their ancestors. ANA H Rachel Popma • Assistant Editor, Family History Publications I Wendy L. Adams • Intern, Family History Publications IND THG: Connections weaves richly colored Kathleen M. Breen • Contributing Editor historic threads with rare source Stacy Simmer • Art Direction and Design material, family records, and expert Susan Sutton • Photography Coordinator David H. Turk • Photographer On the cover guidance to connect readers with their Sport Graphics • Printer ancestors’ lives. Thomas de La Hunt, chairman of the Perry Advisory Board Wanda Y. Fortune, Co-Chair, Indianapolis County Centennial Committee in 1916, Curt B. Witcher, Co-Chair, Fort Wayne Susan Miller Carter, Plainfield stands next to a paulownia tree. C. Lloyd Hosman, Knightstown Sharon Howell, Greenwood Page 34 Patricia K. Johnson, Elkhart The Hoosier Genealogist: Connections (ISSN 1054-2175) is published biannually and distributed as a benefit of membership by the Indiana Historical Society Press; editorial and executive offices, 450 West Ohio Street, Indianapolis, Indiana 46202-3269. Membership categories include student $20, Individual $40, Family/Dual $50, and Sustaining $100. Non-Profit U.S. postage paid at Indianapolis, Indiana; Permit Number 3864. Literary contributions: Guidelines con- taining information for contributions are available upon request or on the Indiana Historical Society Web site, www.indianahistory.org. THG: Connections accepts no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts submitted without return postage. The Press will refer requests from other publishers to the author. ©2008 Indiana Historical Society Press. All rights reserved. Printed on acid-free paper in the United States of America. Postmaster: Please send address changes to The Hoosier Genealogist: Connections, Indiana Historical Society Press, Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana History Center, 450 West Ohio Street, Indianapolis, Indiana 46202-3269. The Indiana Historical Society library is an associate member of the Federation of Genealogical Societies. The Indiana Historical Society Press is an associate member of the American Association of University Presses. Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana History Center 450 West Ohio Street Indianapolis, Indiana 46202-3269 www.indianahistory.org Phone: (317) 232-1882 Fax: (317) 233-0857 -Connections-GUTS.indd 1 5/14/08 8:42:25 AM Contents THE HOOSIER GENEALOGIST: CONNECTIONS SPRING/SUMMER 2008, VOLUME 48, ISSUE 1 20 Letter from the Editor 4 What Is History? Pulling Sources Together to Tell Meaningful Family Stories BY M. Teresa Baer Features 6 Minister, Educator, and Historian The Life of the Reverend Henry Bascom Hibben, 1826–1890 BY george C. hibben 12 Federal Court Records Researching Hoosier Family History at the National Archives-Great Lakes Region, Chicago, 1817–1859 BY Martin tuohY 6 50 -Connections-GUTS.indd 2 5/14/08 8:42:29 AM Departments Regional Sources and Stories Genealogy Across Indiana NORTHERN INDiana 38 Just a Country Girl Stories from an Early Twentieth Century 20 “Still With the Hoosiers” Hoosier Farm Family, Part 4 The Reminiscences of Solomon Ashley Dwinnell, BY Martha Brennan St. Joseph County, 1835–1836 transcribed, introduced, and with an epilogue BY Jim Brennan BY Rachel M. Popma 44 Online Publications CEntRAL INDiana Digitized Images and Every-Name Index for the First Order Book of the U.S. District Court for the 26 Legal Documents District of Indiana, 1817–1833 Abstracts of the Hamilton County Legal Documents in the Barnes Manuscripts Collection, BY Doria LYnch 1839, 1865–1871 transcribed BY WendY L. Adams Family Records and Rachel M. Popma 50 Elliott Family History 28 Decatur County History A 1908 History of the Elliott and Related Families A 1901 “History of the Greensburg of Jefferson County, Indiana Presbyterian Church” BY david mcclure elliott, BY mrs. S. A. Bonner, annotated BY ken hiXon transcribed BY WendY L. Adams 56 Notices SOUTHERN INDiana Indiana Historical Society Programs, Around Indiana, Around the Midwest, National News, 34 State Centennial Celebration International News, and Books Received Perry County Commemorates the Indiana State Centennial, 1916 From the Collections BY bethanY Natali 58 City Directories Using City Directories for Genealogical Research BY geneil breeZE -Connections-GUTS.indd 3 5/14/08 8:42:29 AM L E T T E R FROM THE EDITOR books and articles in such a way that What Is History? they tell stories about the people and places in them. “How did the authors Pulling Sources Together to Tell Meaningful Family Stories write up cohesive stories based on collections of facts and the ideas from M. T eres A BA er other authors?” I pestered the students. “They interpreted what happened,” Spring is here, and conference season has begun. Workers in the fields of one student said wisely. “Yes,” I agreed. genealogy and history are busy preparing papers to share with colleagues, research- The authors analyzed the material and ers, family historians, and history buffs across the country. I am no exception. This placed their collections of facts within year the ideas I will be sharing center around facts and stories—or maybe the stories the context of what they already knew are swirling around the many wagons of facts. The challenge seems to be how to about the time and place in which their sort through all the facts so that one can tell a coherent, interesting story. Research- stories occurred. Then, they decided ers have been working industriously, some of them for years, and they know there what had happened, how it had hap- are many stories to tell. They have laughed and nodded and looked incredulous and pened, and what it meant, and using this sympathized and cried over the many stories they have uncovered about their ances- analysis—this interpretation—they told tors or other historical subjects. Yet they just don’t know how to get those stories their stories. corralled, organized, and typed up. They don’t know what information they should So, interpretation and contextualiza- trust and what information may be dubious. They are not sure where the holes in the tion are parts of history, too. History is stories exist or which holes are important. They are puzzled about how to show the what happened, what we think hap- evidence they have, and concerned whether all their evidence will pass muster with pened, and how our thoughts about their families and with other genealogists and historians. what happened change over time. It is dynamic, and as researchers and writ- The whole thing has given them a victims tells us—and those reports will ers, we are a part of the history we are good case of writer’s block, and they vary, sometimes an incredible amount. writing. This puts a lot of responsibility are nearly afraid to sit down and start History is not just what happened. It is on our shoulders. We need to find out writing. But, since they are itching to what people think happened. what happened from the most reli- write it down, and since they want to I next asked the students what kind able sources. We need to find as much get it right, they will come to a session of reports about the accident they would information as we can in order to bring at a conference, library, or classroom, hear if they asked the witnesses several all the light available to bear on our and talk with me or another worker bee years or decades later to tell what had subject. We need to search for the biases about how to write history. happened. These later reports would in the material we read.