New England has an abundance of records which go way back in time, often to the 1600s. For that reason many genealogists think that researching in New England can be fairly easy. But that abundance doesn't come without some pitfalls that are often unique to New England. By knowing what to look out for you'll avoid creating unnecessary obstacles in your research.

Here are 3 tips to help with your New England Genealogy Research:

1) Check the town settlement date

Colonial settlement and later migration westward created a situation in New England where original towns were broken up over time into new, smaller towns. This means your ancestor could have lived in two different towns without ever having moved. For this reason you will want to check both the settlement date and the incorporation date of a town.

Let's take a look at the town of Glastonbury, Connecticut. The land was first settled in 1636 as part of the town of Wethersfield. In 1693 Glastonbury was established as its own town separate from Wethersfield. To make things even more complicated Wethersfield was known as Watertown from 1634 until it changed its name in 1637. If you have ancestors who lived in what is now Glastonbury prior to 1693 you may need to search for their records in the town of Wethersfield.

How can you determine when towns were established as well as the names of their parent towns? The handiest reference is a book called Genealogist's Handbook for New England Research, now in it's 6th edition, and published by the New England Historic and Genealogical Society (NEHGS).

2) The oldest town cemetery might not be in the same town

Changing town borders in New England not only meant you might need to look in various towns for records but it also means you could have to search a different town to find a cemetery.

The town of Medway, Massachusetts was founded in 1713 from the town of Medfield. The eastern part of Medway was settled first and that's where the first church and graveyard were established. As more people settled in Medway a second church and graveyard were established in the western part of town. There was a bit of friction between the east and west side of town and ultimately, in 1885, the eastern half of the town broke off to form the new town of Millis.

This creates a complication for genealogists searching for their ancestors in Medway. They can see that Medway was established in 1713 but they often don't realize that Millis was part of Medway until 1885. Nor do they realize that the eastern part of Medway, now Millis, was the section that was settled first. Which means that Medway's oldest cemetery is actually located in the town of Millis.

Genealogists sometimes create memorials on cemetery websites for their ancestors in Evergreen Cemetery (established 1749) in Medway when the ancestor has already been documented as being located in Prospect Hill Cemetery (established 1724) in Millis. This can create duplicates or at the very least, confusion.

To get around this problem check the book A Guide to Massachusetts Cemeteries by David Allen Lambert. It includes both the year a Massachusetts town was established as well as the consecration date or oldest burial for each cemetery. For other New England states check with historical societies, USGenWeb sites or regional cemetery projects.

3) Check Town Reports for an alternate source of information

New England towns were founded by Puritan settlers whose governments were run at the town level. In the early years, important information such as births, marriages, deaths, and taxes were kept in town record books. In the 19th century these were transformed into an annual Town Report which summarized all the key information for the year. In some New England states annual Town Reports are still printed today.

Marriages from the 1919 Town Report, Concord, New Hampshire

Town Reports are an overlooked resource that may contain key details about the life of your ancestor. They are most often found in the local library, town hall or historical society but increasingly they can be found in digitized format on sites like Internet Archive. For best results search for annual report + town name. Here's a listing of the Town Reports for Concord, New Hampshire available on Internet Archive.

Deaths from the 1919 Town Report, Concord, New Hampshire

The next time you get stuck researching your New England ancestors be sure to check if you have a jurisdiction issue related the changing borders of the town or whether you need alternate sources of information which you can find in Town Reports.

Have you had success finding information about your New England ancestors? Tell us how you did it in the comments.

Marian Pierre-Louis is a house history and genealogy professional who specializes in educational outreach through webinars, internet broadcasts and video. Her areas of expertise include house history research, southern New England research and solving brick walls. Marian is the Online Education Producer for Legacy Family Tree Webinars where she produces online genealogy education classes. Check out her webinars in the Legacy library.

The recording of today's webinar by Mike Mansfield, "Norway Research with Online Records at MyHeritage and Beyond" is now available to view at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com for free.

The recordings of the 2022 Joy Reisinger Memorial Lecture series, a 6-class series taught by the Board for Certification of Genealogists and broadcast live on Friday are now online at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com/Reisinger. Taught by genealogy's elite educators (Meryl Schumacker, Gary Ball-Kilbourne, Mary Kircher Roddy, Jan Joyce, Nicole Gilkison LaRue, and Jennifer Zinck), the classes are free to view through Sunday, October 31 or available anytime with an annual webinar membership.

When Wrong is Actually Right: Constructing Proof Arguments for Counterintuitive Conflicts by Meryl Schumacker, CG  

Name changes, enumerator errors, and terrible informants can combine to create major inconsistencies in documentation. Records that, at first glance, appear to be major mismatches can later turn out to be correct. Researching non-English-speaking immigrant families requires a comfort level with these layered conflicts-upon-conflicts. This session demonstrates how to use logic to confirm that a wrong-name, wrong-age, wrong-everything record can actually be right, with an emphasis on immigrant families. Participants will learn how to transfer that logic to a written proof argument.

Click here to view.

Peeling the Onion: Getting to the Original Sources by Gary Ball-Kilbourne, PhD, CG

Genealogy Standards 38 and 58 strongly express a preference for using original sources. Diligent researching and a few tricks of the trade enable genealogists to find original sources that underlie authored narratives and derivative sources.

Click here to view.

The Hub of the Wheel: How Tracing a Brother with no Children Connected Ten Siblings by Mary Kircher Roddy, CG

A family from Ireland emigrated in a chain migration scheme to western Pennsylvania between 1825 and 1845. See how using the standards for researching connected the siblings and their descendants and led to their origins in County Tyrone.

Click here to view.

Consult via…Explore with…Discover through…Literature Reviews by Jan Joyce, CG, CGL

What if you could consult with genealogical experts each time your work slows? Together you could explore options for new paths of discovery. The right approach to a literature review allows you to do that. Other experts have encountered the same challenges that you do, and they have written about them even if not overtly. These challenges could range from beginning work in a new geography to parrying with a difficult brick wall. Learn how to conduct a targeted literature review, cull the information you need, and advance your research. A case study on the use of the FAN Club will highlight the methodology.

Click here to view.

Finding Henrietta: Reconciling Conflicting Evidence to Reveal a Woman’s Identity by Nicole Gilkison LaRue, CG

Henrietta Dixon was never enumerated with individuals identified as her parents in a federal census. Records revealing her family members, including her father, are often conflicting and open up new questions. Additionally, multiple marriages further obscure her identity. This case study uncovers Henrietta’s maiden name and emphasizes the importance of a focused research question when attempting to meet the Genealogical Proof Standard..

Click here to view.

Hidden Stories: Using Analysis to Explore the Unexpected in Family History by Jennifer Zinck, CG

Tales of illegitimacy, divorce, and desertion aren’t limited to soap operas and modern reality television. Discovering trails that lead to unanticipated events can be shocking, confusing, and exciting all at the same time. This session will explore how genealogists can utilize the law, conflict resolution, and tools like date calculators and timelines to help build a clearer understanding of some potentially challenging historical situations.

Click here to view.

 

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About the presenter

Mike Mansfield works for MyHeritage.com as the Director of Content Operations. Previously Mike has worked for Ancestry.com and FamilySearch and has been active in the genealogy and family history domain for the last 20 years. Mike has presented at numerous genealogical conferences and symposia in the United States, England, Scandinavia, and Australia. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from BYU and a Master of Science in Library and Information Science from Syracuse University.

With our Google Calendar button, you will never forget our upcoming webinars. Simply click the button to add it to your calendar. You can then optionally embed the webinar events (and even turn them on and off) into your own personal calendar. If you have already added the calendar, you do not have to do it again - the new webinar events will automatically appear.

Webinar time

The webinar will be live on Tuesday, October 11, 2022 at:

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6. Click on the webinar link (found in confirmation and reminder emails) prior to the start of the webinar. Arrive early as the room size is limited to the first 1,000 arrivals that day.
7. Listen via headset (USB headsets work best), your computer speakers, or by phone. 

We look forward to seeing you all there!

It would be wonderful to find a long biographical obituary for each of our ancestors replete with employment history, hobbies and family members.  For relatives who died before 1940, more often than not, that won't be the case. But if you look closely enough you can extract lots of good information from a quick death notice.

Let's take a look at the death notice for Christian Nunge which was published in the Pittsburgh Press in 1916.

Death Notice for Christian Nunge, 1916[1]

    NUNGE—On Tuesday, Nov. 20, 1916,
at 7:30 a. m., Christian Nunge, beloved
husband of Lizzie Nunge (nee Pfalz-
graf), in his 44th year.
    Funeral from his late residence, 2114
Lautner st., Troy Hill, Northside, on 
Friday afternoon at 2 o'clock. Mem-
bers of the Northside encampment, No.
251; Deborah Rebekah No. 27, I. O. O.
F.; Mozart lodge No. 971, I. O. O. F.;
Homewood commandery No. 378,
Knights of Malta; Grand Army band
and Pittsburgh Musical society and 
friends of the family are respectfully 
invited to attend.

First clue - date of death. Now we can go in search of an Allegheny County, Pennsylvania death certificate which would provide details about where he was born and list the names of his parents. 

Next - we have the name of his wife, Lizzie, and amazingly, her maiden name (Pfalzgraf)! With this information we can easily go in search of a marriage record. Combined with the next bit of information - "in his 44th year" - we can calculate his birth year to 1873 or so. We can also expect that he was married after his 18th birthday so we can narrow the search time frame for the marriage certificate to 1892 or later (up to 1916).

In the second paragraph of the death notice we get the funeral details and information about the people who are invited to attend. We learn that the funeral is taking place from his home and we even have his address - 2114 Lautner Street (Troy Hill, Northside of Pittsburgh). With this information we can look for the house on Google Maps and even use Google Street View to see what it looks like in more recent times.

Map showing 2114 Lautner Street, Pittsburgh. Source - Google Maps, 2022

With the precise location of his residence at the time of his death we can check land records to see if he owned the property or rented it.

Lastly, based on all the members of organizations that were invited to the funeral we can presume that Christian Nunge was a member of the following groups:

• Northside encampment, No. 251
• I. O. O. F. - Deborah Rebekah No. 27
• I. O. O. F. -  Mozart lodge No. 971
• Knights of Malta - Homewood commandery No. 378
• Grand Army band
• Pittsburgh Musical society

To learn more about these organizations it might take Googling their names, searching old city directories and watching the webinar Decoding Secret Societies: Finding Your Male Fraternal Ancestors by Michael L. Strauss. I would probably also check for history specific to music or musicians in Pittsburgh at the turn of the century to see if that reveals any further clues.

From a relatively short death notice we were able to find many clues that will lead us to other records which in turn will reveal more about his life. Did you catch any clues that I missed? Let me know in the comments.

[1] Source: “Death Notices,” The Pittsburgh Press [PA], Tuesday Evening, 21 November 1916, page 28, column 5; digital image, MyHeritage.com (https://www.myheritage.com/ : accessed 6 October 2022), Newspaper collection.

Marian Pierre-Louis is a house history and genealogy professional who specializes in educational outreach through webinars, internet broadcasts and video. Her areas of expertise include house history research, southern New England research and solving brick walls. Marian is the Online Education Producer for Legacy Family Tree Webinars where she produces online genealogy education classes. Check out her webinars in the Legacy library.

The recording of today's webinar by Dana Leeds, "One Man, Multiple Names: A DNA-Based Case Study" is now available to view at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com for free for a limited time.

The recording of today's webinar by Fiona Brooker "Encounters – Our Immigrant Ancestors " is now available to view at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com for free for a limited time.

 

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Can't make it to the live event?

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About the presenter

Dana Leeds started researching her family tree in 1998. She bought her first DNA kit in 2016 and solved her first unknown parentage case in early 2018. While working on another case that year, she created the innovative genetic genealogy tool known as the Leeds Method. This method quickly sorts DNA matches into clusters allowing the user to see which matches belong together. Dana quickly became a nationally known genetic genealogy speaker, and she enjoys helping others to easily understand and work with their DNA results.

With our Google Calendar button, you will never forget our upcoming webinars. Simply click the button to add it to your calendar. You can then optionally embed the webinar events (and even turn them on and off) into your own personal calendar. If you have already added the calendar, you do not have to do it again - the new webinar events will automatically appear.

Webinar time

The webinar will be live on Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at:

• 2pm Eastern (U.S.)
• 1pm Central
• 12pm Mountain
• 11am Pacific

Or use this Time Zone Converter.

Here's how to attend:

1. Register at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com today. It's free!
2. You will receive a confirmation email containing a link to the webinar.
3. You will receive a reminder email both 1 day and 1 hour prior to the live webinar.
4. Calculate your time zone by clicking here.
5. Check your GoToWebinar connection here.
6. Click on the webinar link (found in confirmation and reminder emails) prior to the start of the webinar. Arrive early as the room size is limited to the first 1,000 arrivals that day.
7. Listen via headset (USB headsets work best), your computer speakers, or by phone. 

We look forward to seeing you all there!

 

Test Your Webinar Connection

To ensure that your webinar connection is ready to go, click here.

Can't make it to the live event?

No worries. Its recording will be available for a limited time. Webinar Subscribers have unlimited access to all webinar recordings for the duration of their membership.

About the presenter

Fiona Brooker is a professional genealogist (Memories In Time) who has been actively researching her family history for over 35 years, inspired by two marriage certificates and a collection of family letters written from New Zealand back to her immigrant ancestor’s family in Devon. Whilst living and researching in the UK, she studied and gained a Higher Certificate in Genealogy from the Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies and is a ProGen graduate. Fiona has served as both President and Treasurer of the New Zealand Society of Genealogists (NZSG). She has organised family history conferences and expos in New Zealand. As well as helping people with their family history research, Fiona’s passion is to preserve today as much as the past and to get the research out of folders and the computer and into the hands of family members so that they can learn about their heritage.

With our Google Calendar button, you will never forget our upcoming webinars. Simply click the button to add it to your calendar. You can then optionally embed the webinar events (and even turn them on and off) into your own personal calendar. If you have already added the calendar, you do not have to do it again - the new webinar events will automatically appear.

Webinar time

The webinar will be live on Tuesday, October 4, 2022 at:

• 9pm Eastern (U.S.)
• 8pm Central
• 7pm Mountain
• 6pm Pacific

which, in Sydney, Australia is Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at:

• noon

Or use this Time Zone Converter.

Here's how to attend:

1. Register at www.FamilyTreeWebinars.com today. It's free!
2. You will receive a confirmation email containing a link to the webinar.
3. You will receive a reminder email both 1 day and 1 hour prior to the live webinar.
4. Calculate your time zone by clicking here.
5. Check your GoToWebinar connection here.
6. Click on the webinar link (found in confirmation and reminder emails) prior to the start of the webinar. Arrive early as the room size is limited to the first 1,000 arrivals that day.
7. Listen via headset (USB headsets work best), your computer speakers, or by phone. 

We look forward to seeing you all there!

We've tallied the numbers and made a list of the Top 10 FamilyTreeWebinars.com classes for September 2022! Are your favorite topics or instructors among the list? Need something new to learn? Use the list to get inspired!

Each month thousands of Legacy Family Tree Webinar subscribers head for the library to learn new skills and techniques to help improve their genealogy research. Among the now-1,863 genealogy classes in the members-only library, these were the most frequently played during the month of September 2022.  They aren't necessarily the newest classes but rather the topics that were sought out by our members.

Have you seen any of these classes? Are these among your favorites too? Some of these classes (and topics) might be new to you! Get inspired to learn more and make your genealogy journey more fun!

The Top 10 for September 2022

1. Mastering Digital Filing for Genealogists by Cyndi Ingle

2. mtDNA and YDNA in 2022 by Diahan Southard

3. Abstracting Documents: An Essential Skill for All Genealogists by Julie Miller, CG, CGL

4. Tracing migrating ancestors: Who what where when why and how by Myko Clelland

5. Finding Fayette's Father: Autosomal DNA Reveals Misattributed Parentage by Jennifer Zinck, CG

6. Descendants of the Enslaved and Enslavers - Working Together to Discover Family by Cheri Hudson Passey and Sharon Batiste Gillins

7. Entering the Old Northwest Territory: The First American West by Peggy Clemens Lauritzen, AG

8. 10 Best Self-Publishing Tips for Family Historians by Lisa A. Alzo, M.F.A.

9. Strategies to Jumpstart Your Research by Teri E. Flack, M.A. (Public History), M.B.A.

10. What's Next When You Are Told Those Records Were 'Burnt up' by J. Mark Lowe, FUGA

The Runner-Ups

11. Germany to Pennsylvania: 18th Century Odyssey by James M. Beidler

12. What You Can Learn from Lineage Societies... Without Being a Member! by Elizabeth Swanay O’Neal

13. Understanding and Using Scottish Kirk Session Records by Paul Milner FUGA, MDiv

14. Using Google Books to Find the Law by Judy G. Russell, JD, CG, CGL

15. FamilySearch.org - 5 More Links You Have to Try by Devin Ashby

16. A Deep Dive into the Map Collections of the Library of Congress by Rick Sayre, CG, CGL, FUGA

17. Changing Places Changing Borders: Overcoming geographic challenges by Dave Obee

18. Michigan: An Upper Midwest Researcher's Dream by Paula Stuart-Warren, CG, FMGS

19. Fruit of the Earth: Using Deeds to Uncover Your Ancestors by Robyn Smith

20. Delivering the Mail: Records of the United States Post Office by Michael L. Strauss, AG

The 2nd Runner-Ups

21. The Pros and Cons of Collaboration on Geni.com by E. Randol Schoenberg

22. Direct Your Letters to San Jose: Following Ancestors' Migration Trails by David W. Jackson

23. Ransomware and your computer by Andy Klein

24. An introduction to Filae: the largest source of French archives by Emmanuel Condamine

25. Cyndi's List in Practice by Cyndi Ingle

26. Proof Arguments - How to Write Them and Why They Matter by Warren Bittner, CG

27. Irish Emigration to North America: Before during and after Famine by Paul Milner FUGA, MDiv

28. What's New at DNA Painter by Jonny Perl

29. Researching Oklahoma Roots by Billie Stone Fogarty, M.Ed.

30. Documenting Cemeteries with BillionGraves by Cathy Wallace

Access to classes in the Legacy Family Tree Webinar library are available with an webinar membership. Not a member? Become one! Or watch one of our free classes here.