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Thursday, December 3, 2015

Peru, Miami, Indiana, USA

Peru is a city located in Miami County, Indiana.  Peru is the county seat of Miami County.

This was were the Miami Indians resided prior to a treaty made in 1826.  Some still remain.  The wife of my 5th great grandfather Harriet SOULE was 20 years old when the Indians signed over the land.  Three years later Joseph HOLMAN established the area as Miamisport.  Harriet was 23 then.  Then William N. HOOD bought 210 acres and called the area Peru.  In 1834 Indiana Legislature approved it as an incorporated city, when Harriet was 28.

Frances SLOCUM (Maconaquah/Little Bear Woman)was the daughter of a Pennsylvania Quaker family.  She was kidnapped at a young age by Delaware Indians and brought to a Miami Indian couple who adopted her and raised her as their own.  She made a home near here on the the Mississinewa River.  Harriet was 41 when Frances died.  I wonder if they ever crossed paths.

Before any railroad was ever even here, Peru was connected to the rest of the world through the Wabash and Erie Canal.  It was in existence from 1832 to 1857.  This was during Harriet's lifetime.  It is possible she came here through the canal. Her first documented appearance in Indiana is in 1850 in Carroll County.  Her first documented residence in Miami County is 1860.  Prior to Indiana it appears she lived in Ohio.  So I'm not sure if she used this method of travel or not.

The first railroad company was incorporated in 1848 when Harriet was 40, it was called the Peru and Indianapolis Railroad.  It's rail lines were completed 8 years later when Harriet was 48.  An extension from the Pennsylvania lines west of Pittsburgh, called the Pan Handle, was completed in 1867.  This was when Harriet was 61.  Just 5 years before her death here.  I need to see if the Peru and Indianapolis railroad connected to anything in Ohio or if it went through Carroll County at all.  It is possible she traveled this railroad.

Peru's nickname is the "Circus Capital of the World."  This is because many famous circuses like the Ringling Brothers, Hagenbeck-Wallace, Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show and others, made Peru their winter headquarters.  The International circus Hall of Fame is located in Peru, and the city still has a daily Amateur Circus show during the 3rd week of July which ends with a Circus City Festival and Parade.  The first show was in 1958 with circus acts preformed on the Court House lawn.  I wonder if Karen J (ARMSTRONG) and Lloyd Rayburn ROBERSON saw this first act.  It was only 1 year after they were married here.  Peru is the only place that still manufactures steam calliopes (whistles for steam instruments such as the steam pipe organ cart that is in the parade).

Cole PORTER was born and raised in Peru.  He was a famous musician.  I can see his childhood home from my house.  It's now a fully functioning bed and breakfast called the Cole Porter Inn.  He was buried in the local Mount Hope Cemetery.  I wonder if Karen and Lloyd saw the funeral procession or the funeral it's self.  Cole died 7yrs after Karen and Lloyd got married.  That would be a neat story to pass down.  I'll have to ask Mom if she knows any of their descendants.

The movie "Little Big Top" was shot and directed in Peru.  Scenes show the "Mr. Weenie" restaurant and the Circus building.



Peru's page in my family history book (made using MyCanvas)

Relatives with events here (deceased only):

  • ARMSTRONG, Karen J 1942-2008 was married here on 17 Sep 1957: wife of 1st cousin 1x removed of my husband.  
  • CHANDLER, Christian Lee 2008-2008 born and died here: grand nephew of my husband.
  • ROBERSON, Lloyd Rayburn 1939-2006 was married here on 17 Sep 1957: 1st cousin 1x removed of my husband.     
  • SOULE, Harriet 1806-1872 died here 04 Feb 1872: wife of my 5th great grandfather.    
Resources:
  • Did Harriet SOULE live in the same area while it was named different?  The Indiana Territory existed her whole life, although there were many changes in status and counties.
  • Did Karen ARMSTRONG or Lloyd Rayburn ROBERSON have any memory of Cole PORTER'S funeral?  Who could I ask (they are both gone)?
  • What was the route of the Peru and Indianapolis Railroad?

Wow!  I can't believe how much happened here during the time periods this small list of relatives were alive.  Comparing the local history with the time frames these relatives lived really puts their lives into better perspective.  I am just amazed at the new perspective I have gained from doing this.  So many stories imagined and wondering questions raised.  It's almost as though I can feel pieces of their lives now.

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Saturday, November 28, 2015

Surname and Place Organization

Yesterday I worked on the CHANDLER page on this blog.  I completely revamped it to include: information about the surname, all desceaced relatives that have this surname, and resources I have found.  I think it's set up much better now.  My tree is always evolving so the more I dig the more this page will to.  I think doing surname pages are important because the further I seem to go back the more I run into the same or similar surnames across different lines.  I would like to see the connections that are there, and I think this would be the best way to do it.  It also would make it more obvious (in this alphabetical type list) if I have duplicates.

I decided I wanted to do the place pages in our family history book a bit differently.  So I decided to start working on those, starting from our current places and going back to the places my father-in-law lived.  My father-in-law's memorial page will be the first memorial page completed, since he is the closest deceased relative to my son.  I have created a places page that will link to each place's post.  I decided to add a list of all desceased relatives associated with each place, to the posts.  This helps me see easier what historical facts may have had the most impact on my family.  Helping me to write a better place story, with out having to go back and edit/add to so frequently.  I started working on one town and this is already proving to be way more useful.  I also think it will help me create a list of times and topics I am most interested in, when visiting genealogy and historical societies and libraries.  The first place I am working on is our current location: Peru, Howard County, Indiana, USA.  Not only am I more likely to get to their local societies and libraries but it also is associated with past relatives.  Be on the look out for a post soon.

Saturday, November 21, 2015

Floating Leaves

I should be working on preparing to host Thanksgiving dinner.  My back started hurting again though.  I took some Ibuprofen and figured I would do a little bit of work on genealogy while I was waiting on it to kick in.

I have been going through the descendants of Thomas Clinton CHANDLER Sr..  I want to make sure I get the info I have on them in before writing his story.  There are 2 reasons for this.  First I know as soon as I get done writing his story I will probably move on to the next ancestor.  I want to make sure there aren't any little leafs floating around in his descendants before I move on.  Second, I want all the name I have, in the system, because after I get done with his story then I can just print his descendant report for our family history book.  I think it would be a good thing to have because then my son can see who all of his cousins are (there are a lot).

While going through the descendants, I stumbled upon another infant death.  I have updated the CHANDLER page and the Memorials for Other Relatives page with the info.  I couldn't find this obit on Newspapers.com but it looks like one was made because the bio on Find a Grave reads like an obit.  For now there is just a screen clipping and link to his Find a Grave Memorial.  Usually this area is good about having their papers in Newspapers.com so I don't know if I will find one or not.  I am just trying to keep these pages updated as I find the information.

Now to look at brother-in-law 2/6 sibling-in-law 2/11 descendants.  Gotta make sure there are no leafs floating around and that my ancestry.com tree matches my familysearch.org tree.  Does anyone know of an automatic way to load the data between the 2 trees?  I spend a lot of time making sure the info in both are the same. I always want to make sure the data is saved in Family Search so I will still have access to it, should my fixed income ever prevent me from renewing my subscription.  However I find more, quicker on ancestry, so I renew as often as I can.  I wish ancestry would sell gift cards.  I don't know anyone that would pay that amount for me an ancestry subscription or dna test, but I might could get everyone to buy me a $20 gift card that would add up to the subscription or test amount.  I did it one year with a guitar, why not ancestry?  LOL

Ok. So Family Search is having internal server errors, so comparing what I have in both trees is out the window.  So I guess I will just see if there are any leaf hints popping up on descendants on ancestry.

I can't find my brother-in-law's obit.  Ugh this is so frustrating.  Oh well time to go to mother-in-law's for lunch.  Maybe she'll have it.

She said since he passed away in California, she didn't get an obit.  She has the memorial pamphlet from the funeral home though, she is going to look for it.  Mean while an uncle was visiting.  I got his first wife and kids' names to put in the tree.  So that is progress.  Done for today.  Gotta get working on Thanksgiving plans.


Tuesday, November 17, 2015

The Mystery of Martha

Today I finally got my FTM fixed.  I just deleted my trees and re- downloaded my tree from ancestry.  It fixed the problem, What ever it was.  Now what ever work I do trying to find my Martha's maiden name will sync.  Yea!  I really like the Family View report on FTM.  I really wanted to print James Alsia CHANDLER's family view report but it really bothered me that Martha had no maiden name and I really didn't want to print it like that.  I really wanted to print as many of these reports as I could for my family history book, before Thanksgiving.  Any way on to my Martha whom up until this point has been a brick wall.

Martha UNKNOWN DOUGLAS/DOUGLASS is my husband's 3rd Great Grandmother.  First I am going to make sure I have all of the facts saved from all of the sources I have found for her in ancestry.com.

1850 United States Federal Census
Martha Douglas, born abt 1814 in North Carolina, home in 1850: May, Rutherford, Tennessee.
She is married to Younger Douglas (45) and they are listed with the following children: Noah H Douglas (16), Eli Douglas (13), Priscilla C Douglas (12), Elenor C Douglas (10), Margaret E Douglas (6), and Nancy J Douglas (2).

1860 United States Federal Census
Martha Douglas born abt 1814 in South Carolina. Home in 1860 District 1, Lauderdale, Alabama.  Married to Younger Douglas (55) and they are listed with the following children: Percilla C Douglas (21), Ellender C Douglas (19), Margaret E Douglas (17), Nancy J Douglas (12), Hugh G Douglas (9), James B Douglas (6).

I can't seem to find her in the 1870 Census.

1880 United States Federal Census
Martha Douglas born abt 1814 in Alabama.  Home in 1880 Lauderdale, Alabama.  Widowed living with her son Hugh Douglas (22).  Father's birthplace is listed as Delaware and mother's birthplace is listed as England.

That is all I know right now for sure.  It has been rumored that she married in 1833.  It was rumored that she married in Fauguier, Virginia, USA.  I say they are rumors because I still haven't seen any sources to prove this.

She is consistent with reporting her age but her birthplace varies.  She could have been born in North or South Carolina or even Alabama.  This makes me curious for sure.  Since she isn't consistent in reporting her own birth place I am wondering how correct she is in reporting her parents'.  

I have already searched on Newpapers.com for her obit and found nothing.  I think I am going to see if I can find her 1870 Census first.  I am going to a search for her with her children and not her husband as he could have already passed prior to that.  I don't see anything on ancestry.com.  I need to go check Family Search.

I can't seem to fin the 1870 Census or her death or marriage record so I am going to go try and find more info on her other family members.  Maybe one of their death records will give me some info.

Ok.  Now looking at Younger Douglass' 1830 Census, either he had another spouse or Martha now has an alternate birth of 1801-1810 because he lists himself in the 20-29 male category and he lists 1 female in this age category.  Also Younger either had another son or maybe Noah H was born prior to the 1830 Census instead of 1835.  Nope!  There is definitely a 3rd older boy!  on the 1940 census there are 1 male under 5, 1 male 5-9, and 1 male 10-14.

Monday, November 16, 2015

Memorials for Other Relatives

Any good genealogist knows that researching other family members often gives key details of the lives of their direct ancestors.  While doing research on these other relatives, I found quite a few obituaries.  Now, I'm not going to do a memorial page for every single one of mine and my husbands relatives that have passed.  However, I did feel like I should share the information I found for future generations, or cousins who may want it.  So I thought this would be a good place to share their obituaries and Find a Grave Indexes.  Even thought they are not direct ancestors, I thought they deserved remembrance.

CHANDLER, Allison Michelle 24 May 1989 - 07 Oct 1989 niece of my husband.  Find a Grave Index.
Clipped from The Kokomo Tribune, 8 October 1989, Page 12 via Newspapers.com
CHANDLER, Christian Lee 09 Jan 2008 - 04 Mar 2008 grand nephew of my husband.  Find a Grave Index.
I couldn't find his obit in Newspapers.com so this is a screen clipping from Find a Grave Index.


CHANDLER, James Allen "Jim" 11 Feb 1960 - 12 Sep 2004 brother-in-law.  No obit no find a grave index.  Mom is looking for his memorial pamphlet.

CHANDLER, Jessica Ann 19 Apr 1974 - 19 Apr 1974 (still born) niece of my husband.  Find a Grave Index.
Clipped from The Kokomo Tribune, 21 April 1974, Page 3 via Newspapers.com
CHANDLER, Thomas Clinton III 27 Jun 1975 - 27 Jun 1975 nephew of my husband.  Find a Grave Index
Clipped from The Kokomo Tribune, 30 June 1975, Page 5 via Newspapers.com

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Genealogy Notes and Updates

I have the program, created by ancestry.com, Family Tree Maker 2014 (FTM).  I was hoping to do a few things on it today.  I wanted to update one of my places lists to post on here, and I wanted to work on my favorite report "Family View Report" which needs some work done on a couple of people for it to be ready to print.  Unfortunately my FTM will not sync.  It is having a Mapping Handling issue.  Ancestry.com has been notified, they have responded, and I have sent them screen clippings as requested.  I wish there was another way to view my people sorted by place, while they try to figure out this issue.  Hmmm, going to ancestry.com to make sure I didn't overlook another way to do this.  Nope!  It appears that FTM is the only way to sort people by location.  It is also the only way to get a report that has both the pedigree and the children of a specific person on one page.  Hmf!  I guess I will have to do something else.

On a lighter note, recently I was looking through Newpapers.com to see if there was anything cool to attach to my father-in-law's page.  I found all of my husbands' siblings birth announcements and a letter to the editor of the newspaper that my husband's brother wrote.  It gave a lot of insight into some of the struggles he has personally faced.  I know I can't share living people's info, so I won't.  It did give me some encouragement to continue onto the path of looking at more resources, because it's articles like that one, that will let me get a greater sense of the life my relatives and ancestors have lived.  Also there are some life events that some people just don't want to talk about, like the death of a child.  I found 3 obits for my husband's nieces and nephews who have passed.  This gave me the critical dates of the stories that everyone would just rather not talk about.  Hope this inspires you to check out newspapers for your family members, regardless of what service you use.

Since I can't do much in FTM, I think I am going to move onto MyCanvas.  This is a page ancestry.com created and Alexanders bought that allows you to make family history books.  You can either make it online and have it professionally printed in a nicely bound book, or you can't print each page yourself.  I need to work on the last page of my story to put into our family history binder.  Ok.  That page is done.

The last page of my story (as of now).
I am preparing to work on my father-in-law's memorial page.  I have my family history binder divided by surname sections.  I only thought it appropriate to give each surname their own page on here as well.  So I created the page CHANDLER first.  I plan on linking the posts that contain the Chandler surname there.  Also if I find any family specific resources I will share them there as well.  I don't have his memorial done yet, and it may take some time.  To remedy this I have put a "Coming Soon" section on the page.  So people can see who I am working on and anticipate the information being posted.

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Introducing The Leaves of Time

Hello everyone!  I am so excited to start my newest blogging adventure!  I really love researching genealogy and the history that goes along with it.  My old blog was overrun with my genealogy adventures.  I felt it was time to dedicate a blog solely to genealogy.  This way I can organize it quite a bit better, making it easier for all of you to follow.  I also feel I can share more about the resource I have found this way too.  I can't wait to get started!

I have been studying mine and my husband's genealogy for quite some time now and realized that we have so much family that has come from and went to so many places.  I really feel I will be able to connect to many of you in this way.  Each time I study a new person or a new place, I find a new resource that I want to share.  Since many in my family don't share this passion, I figured I would share it with those who do, all of you!