Pioneer Record Vol 27 Iss 2
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PIONEER RECORD Newsletter for the Midland Genealogical Society Volume 30 No. 2 www.rootsweb.com/~mimgs/ November 2009 In This Issue The Chronicles of America The Chronicles of America 1 By Gloria Kundinger The Presidents Letter 2 ―What is black, white, and ‗red‘ all found in the local area news. In over?‖ This was an old riddle from the late 1800s the local news was Editorial Comments 2 forty or fifty years ago. The answer, of usually listed in a column of one course, is a newspaper. Newspapers or two sentence paragraphs. It Membership News 2 have existed in the United States since told of steamship arrivals, visi- the early 1700s. By the 1800s, it was tors in town, a birth or death, the Books For Sale 3 not unusual to find a local weekly price of a bushel of potatoes or newspaper in many of the small towns wild blueberries being plentiful, LOM hours 3 that sprang up from the wilderness and other interesting tidbits. only five or ten years earlier. If the The Life of a U-Boat Commander 5 town grew to a large city, the newspa- If your relative resided in a vil- per usually evolved into a daily one. Coming Events 7 lage or small town near a larger Sometimes the town may have grown city you may find him mentioned New Books 7 large enough to have more than one in the paper of the larger city. It paper in existence during the same was common for the larger paper More than 400 years of London 8 time period. to print a column several times a Church Records month with the name of the vil- Looking Back in Midland County 9 Most genealogists would agree that a lage in its heading. There you newspaper is a very valuable aid in may find news of births, visitors MGS Officers & Society Informa- 10 their research. Newspapers give us a to area families, parties, showers, tion glimpse of past happenings in the lives weddings and who may have at- of our ancestors. Like family stories, tended from out-of-town, sons in Midland Genealogical Society they put ―flesh on the bones‖ of those the service, who was ill, and who Programs for 2009 - 2010 long gone. Looking through microfilm ―motored‖ to a larger city on Meetings are scheduled on the third of old newspapers is very time- business. These columns would Wednesday of the month unless oth- consuming. Yet much family informa- appear in the larger paper several erwise noted.. tion can be found by searching old times a month in the mid 1900s Programs for the meetings are as news. or sporadically whenever the ru- follows. ral reporter sent in the news. November 18, 2009 meeting 7:00 Library If your ancestor was a prominent per- Sometimes bad weather was a Lounge son in town or was involved in some determining factor as to when the “The Lively Family Massacre in Indiana”, other newsworthy event, a story about news arrived from an outlying video about an Indian attack on a family. him or her might be found on the front area in the late 1800s or early January 20, 2010 meeting 7:00 Library page of the local town paper. In the 1900s. Lounge late 1800s, the front page of small “Podcasting” town papers listed city and township In the mid to late 1900s the soci- February 17, 2010 meetng 7:00 Library election winners, farmers who were ety page of a larger city paper Lounge TBD granted their land patents, or citizen- gave much family information ship, and men chosen for jury duty. even if the family wasn‘t a March 17, 2010 meeting 7:00 Library News of less prominent citizens can be TBD (Continued on page 4) The Presidents Letter books on high quality paper and MEMBERSHIP NEWS have them hard bound for our For as long as I can recall we have genealogy collection. Some of Welcome to new-return member had a loaded treasury. We recently the current copies in use for Fran Hartnagle. We are glad to tried to have a seminar but we were these few years are already a bit have Fran back. We still have far from rich enough to sponsor a shabby. some members who have not multi-day, full function, statewide On a personal note: My paid their dues for 2009-2010. affair. What else could we do? Col- brother and I are planning a trip Please let me know if you do not lectively we need to come up with to Germany and Poland in plan to renew your membership. projects or purchases to aid geneal- April/May. We will be visiting It will save me phone calls. ogy in Midland County. The ceme- our ancestral homes in tery, obituary and current marriage Schleswig-Holstein (Kappeln Remember to support the NARA project required extensive labor but area) and northwest Poznan project with your monthly dona- the publishing of the resulting books (Posen). We will be making tion to the NARA jar at the meet- covered their cost within a few years two small diversions to photo- ings. of the printing. graph churches, etc in a few towns for friends. I would con- Linda Fisher, Membership Chair Projects to gather church records and sider other request if they were township records have been sug- close to our routes through gested. Both would again be labor Pommerania, eastern Branden- intensive, but not costly. Other socie- burg, West Prussia and Posen. ties and organizations are putting tombstone photos on the web; a good MGS President, Bob Mass project, but still not money intensive. A worthwhile small project that was discussed would be to reprint a few copies of our completed genealogy From The Editor… Please note the list of new books added to Please note that many of our research our collection. Pease come to the library facilities around the country now have and view our latest. When visiting the gene reduced hours for our precious re- room at the library, please remember to search time. Please remember to sign the register so that we can validate our check their web page or call ahead to existence there. It is a shame about the get their available times and days. MEMBERSHIP DUES 2009-2010 talks of closing libraries to make cuts on There is a new business in Niles, budgets. We still need our libraries. I do Michigan that sells genealogy prod- The collection of MGS member- ship dues for 2009-2010 has con- feel that libraries could be made self- ucts and services. Their website is cluded. The MGS Treasurer and supportive or supplemented with tax dol- www.mybiographystore.com. Membership chairs have been col- lars. Please note that the membership list lecting dues since August 2009. If I recently returned from a trip to Europe. was not included in this issue. It will your dues are not paid this will be the last Pioneer Record you will This was quite an experience. It was my be sent via email to all members with receive. Dues may be paid by first time in the air. I enjoyed seeing how an email address. Others will be mail to: Linda Fisher, Midland another part of the world lives. This trip mailed. If you fail to receive yours, Genealogical Society, 3772 N M- was of a religious nature and not for gene- please let me know. 30, Sanford, MI 48657. Dues for an individual are $14.00; for a fam- alogy. Walt Bennett ily they are $17.50. Editor Page 2 Changes at the LDS Family The Library subscribes to the library Library of Michigan Hours version of Ancestry.com, Foot- Research Center in The Library of Michigan hours are 10 am Salt Lake City note.com, Godfrey Library, FindMy- to 5 pm Monday—Saturday. Web site at Past.com and other fee-for-service "For those readers familiar with the www.michigan.gov/libraryofmichigan. For Internet sites. I took advantage of the information call 517-373-1580. Library, they have replaced their mi- Footnote.com site to copy naturaliza- crofilm printers with a computer net- They are closed Nov 26-29, Dec 24-27 and tion records for a number of people work based system that uses scan- Dec 31-Jan 3 for the holidays. in my family history. Rather than ners. Images can now be saved di- The Michigan Archives reference desk print them, I copied them to a flash rectly to a flash drive or printed. hours are 9am—1pm, Monday, Thursday, drive (and backed up the data on the Copying to a flash drive is free and 1pm—5pm, Tuesday, Wednesday, and laptop I brought along). For someone printed copies of the documents cost Friday. Their website is at who claims his ―genealogy is done,‖ www.michigan.gov/archivesofmi. For only five cents (10 cents for 11x14 I came home with 37 documents, more information call 517-373-1408. copies). Previously they cost 23 mostly from Footnote.com." cents. A 2GB flash drive can be pur- The Michigan Historical Museum hours By Gary Mokotoff, editor of the e- chased at the Library for only $9.00. are 9am– 4:30pm Monday—Friday, 10am- zine "Nu? What's New?" 4pm Saturday and 1pm-5pm Sunday, The network system also supports Their website is at www.michigan.gov/ printing from the Internet be it gene- museum. For more information call 517- alogically relevant material, e-mail 373-3559. or boarding p a s s e s. BOOKS FOR SALE The following books, published by the Midland Genealogical Society, are available for sale at any meeting, at the Midland Genealogy Room, Grace A.