What Are the Odds?

In the last few weeks I added a few more names to my family tree. These are mostly recent births that I was made aware of by extended family members attending my mother's funeral. It just so happens that my "statistics" according to my Legacy software are:

Individuals: 2200
Families: 800
Sources: 240

Now what are the odds that I could come up with a combination of all round numbers like this without trying?

Carnival of Genealogy, 24th Edition

Welcome to the May 18, 2007 edition of the Carnival of Genealogy. The topic for this edition is Mothers! We have wonderful tributes and tales of the women who have for better or worse had a hand (or a gene ;-) in making us who we are today. They come in all shapes and sizes, races and religions, ages and eras. They live in our hearts and in our minds and now in our Carnival too. Let's hear it for moms!

Starting us off, Bill West shares with us a touching tale in HOW I LEARNED TO RIDE MY BIKE posted at West in New England. Here's a mom who used her head instead of her feet to help her son learn to ride a bike. Very ingenious of her! She sounds like a lovely lady, Bill. Thanks for sharing her with us.

Next up, Randy Seaver presents My Tribute to Mom - Betty Virginia (Carringer) Seaver posted at Genea-Musings. Betty is remembered and honored by a son that leaves no doubt of his respect, love, and devotion to her. She did well by you, Randy. Thanks for sharing her life with us.

Next, Tim Abbott presents "Every Picture Tells A Story, Don't It?" posted at Walking the Berkshires. When I look at Alice Jane I don't see "stoic", I see a poet/intellect. I see a classy lady who knew her own mind. A woman of conviction. What do you see? Thanks for sharing Alice Jane with us, Tim.

Christina Geyer shares with us two fascinating articles. First McGimpsey letter from 1854 , which consists of a mother's letter to her son back in 1854. Wow! What a treasure! And also Happy Mother's Day, an tribute to an immigrant mother from her immigrant daughter. Both are posted at Shaking the Tree. Rich, thought provoking articles Christina. Thanks for sharing and giving us a bit of international flare!

And next, Janice Brown presents My Tribute to A New Hampshire Mother posted at Cow Hampshire, saying, "Every mom deserves a tribute." Some writers have a knack of writing things that pull at your heart strings (which in turn causes your eyes to well with tears). Janice is that kind of writer. A lovely tribute. Thanks so much for sharing your mother with us, Janice.

Katie kindly shares with us A Mother's Day Tribute posted at Begat Chat. Everyone should have a mom that helps them read a thousand books! Here's a down to earth, from the heart, tribute that says "thanks mom" in a very moving way. Thanks Katie, it's so nice to meet your mom!

Next, Jasia presents My Memory Bouquet posted at Creative Gene. With my mother having passed away less than a month ago my grief is still deep and raw. This was hard for me to write but it does capture at least a handful of my favorite memories of her.

And next, Cheryl Schulte presents A Grandma's Faith posted at Two Sides of the Ocean. Cheryl manages to write a mini family history in one post! This wonderful article takes us across oceans, and across generations with great pictures too. I'm especially delighted to discover a fellow Detroiter with Polish ancestry who blogs! Yeah! Thanks so much for submitting your article, Cheryl!

Miriam Robbins Midkiff presents Eight Generations of Mothers posted at AnceStories: The Stories of My Ancestors, saying, "A photo gallery of my children's maternal line." Wow, this is an impressive collection of photographs! What a fine visual tribute to the mothers in your family. Thanks for sharing them with us, Miriam!

And now, Becky Wiseman presents Mothers and Grandmothers posted at kinexxions. Becky has some great photos to share and an impressive list of mothers from her family tree. What a nice way to get the names of all these women on the 'net! Thanks Becky!

Following next we have Denise Olson presenting A Soldier's Mom posted at Moultrie Creek. Denise reminds us that there are soldier's moms who spent Mother's Day in prayer for their sons' safety or grieving for their sons who died serving our country. How sad that even now, four days after her post, some of those moms still don't know the fate of their sons. Take a moment, say a prayer, remember these mothers and their sons. Thank you for reminding us, Denise.

Schelly Talalay Dardashti shares two articles with us, The legend of Little Grandma and Raising the curve: Nane-jan in Teheran both posted at Tracing the Tribe. I just love stories of immigrants and the resourcefulness they used to help acclimate to life in a foreign country. This is one of the best... here's to you Little Grandma! And Nane-Jan was resourceful as well, selling jewelry to the women in the shah's harem... how exotic! Great women, great stories! Thanks for sharing, Schelly! (Your email address didn't come through so I couldn't write you back. Email me at: imjasia at yahoo dot com)

And last but certainly not least, Susan A. Kitchens submitted While There is Yet Time: Mothers Day 2006 posted at The Elder Storytelling Place, saying, "This is a story written by Fred First of Fragments of Floyd [http://www.fragmentsfromfloyd.com/] at Ronni Bennet's Elder Storytelling Place, part of her site, Time Goes By. It's the story of how his mother recorded her memories and gave the tape to her son, the writer of this post. It's utterly fitting as part of our carnival theme." Absolutely wonderful. Thank you Susan!

And, Susan A. Kitchens offers a couple tributes to moms, Articles | My Mother tells me about HER mother posted at Family Oral History Using Digital Tools, saying, "I offer two reprise posts from my site-- the main one, which is a movie I made out of the recording I did with my mom last year on Mother's Day. -- wherein my Mom tells a story about her mom. And then this other one, I'm so glad you did this. So glad about doing my boyfriend's Mom's oral history, and the experience of listening to it right after she died last fall. This year, my observation of Mother's Day was mostly to take care of my boyfriend, as this was his first Mother's Day without his Mom. (we went walking in a nature/scenic spot in a "tourist in your hometown" kinda way). My Mom, in solidarity, was totally down with that." Thanks for sharing your article and video, Susan. You are the techno-leader of our little band of COG participants.

These are all the articles that I received from the BlogCarnival.com web site for this edition. However, there are a couple others that I think should be included here. I don't know if the author forgot to submit them, did submit them but I didn't get notified, or simply didn't choose to submit them. But here they are anyway...

Craig Manson wrote, The Mothers of Me and a follow up, The Mothers of Mine posted at GeneaBlogie. Obviously Craig has already done a good deal of writing about the Mothers in his family. Here's a nice, concise post that remembers them again and mentions a few he hasn't gotten around to writing about yet.

If there are any articles that were submitted on this topic but don't appear here, please let me know and I will add them ASAP.

That concludes this edition of the Carnival of Genealogy. Thanks to all who submitted articles and shared something about the moms in their lives with the rest of us. And now it's time for a Call for Submissions! The topic for the next edition of the COG will be: Who inherited the Creative Gene in your family? We're all aware of someone on the family tree who was/is "the creative one" or "the talented one"... the painter, musician, poet, wood carver, interior designer, writer, knitter, singer, calligrapher, or such. Tell us about their creative pursuits. Let's hear it for the creatives! Please submit your blog article to the next edition of Carnival of Genealogy using our carnival submission form. The deadline for submissions for the next edition will be June 1st. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags:carnival of genealogy, blog carnival.

What's In A City Directory?

A city directory can be an outstanding resource for both genealogists and family historians. R. L. Polk published city directories for many U.S. cities starting back in the 1870s. These directories are available in public libraries in print and on microfilm and in some instances online. They have massive amounts of information in them including residential and commercial listings for each building in a given city.

The directories actually have a cross-listing of information. So you can look up a person's name and get their address or you can look up a street address and find the name of the person or business occupying that address. What's more you can also find the names of other occupants in a multi-unit building or all of the neighbors living on the same block as your ancestor. And while the U.S. census was taken only once every 10 years, city directories were for the most part published annually (many were not published during WWII). So they are very good resources for tracing residential moves in the years between censuses.

I've used city directories many, many times in the course of my personal genealogy research but it wasn't until I purchased one that I realized just what a valuable resource they are. They are so much more than just an aid to locating residents and businesses. In the next few weeks I'll be taking a closer look at the very rich resource city directories are and examining their value/use to genealogists and family historians. Stay tuned... you may just learn a thing or two ;-)

I'll leave you with a list of few major cities that R. L. Polk has published directories for:
Ann Arbor, MI
Baltimore, MD
Boston, MA
Buffalo, NY
Chicago, IL
Cincinnati, OH
Cleveland, OH
Columbus, OH
Denver, CO
Detroit, MI
Grand Rapids, MI
Indianapolis, IN
Kansas City, MO
Memphis, TN
Milwaukee, WI
Minneapolis, MN
New Orleans, LA
New York City, NY
Philadelphia, PA
Pittsburgh, PA
St. Louis, MO
St. Paul, MN
San Antonio, TX
San Francisco, CA
Washington, D.C.

There are many more of course. May I suggest you check the web site City Directories of the United States of America for a much more extensive listing.

Read my series of articles about city directories:
I Won the eBay Bid
What's In A City Directory
City Directories: The Introduction
City Directories: The Indexes
City Directories: The Statistical Department
City Directories: Chronological History
City Directories: Miscellaneous Information
City Directories: Directory of Names
City Directories: Street Guide and Directory of Householders
City Directories: Classified Business Directory
City Directories: Additional Information

My Memory Bouquet

I've got pieces of April, I keep them in a memory bouquet
I've got pieces of April, it's a morning in May

The lyrics play over and over again in my mind, the melody haunts me. I think of my mom and this song starts playing again. My pieces of April are her last days in the hospital bed; the morning she died; and her funeral. But it's a morning in May and those pieces of April are kept in a memory bouquet along with pieces of August, October, June...

My pieces of May are mom with her grandchildren celebrating Mother's Day; dinners at fancy restaurants with her and my brothers before we were married; mom working in her garden, tending to her spring flowers; sitting next to mom in the pew at church and listening to Father Brennan's sermon, the same one he gave on Mother's Day every year and it made us cry every time.

My pieces of June are mom posing with her granddaughter as she graduated from high school; the scrumptious strawberry shortcake she would make and serve up when Michigan strawberries came in season; as a kid, I remember sitting at the kitchen table watching mom standing by the mixer baking cinnamon rolls as the morning sun came streaming in the open window the first day of summer vacation and feeling the purest, most absolute joy imaginable.

My pieces of July are the wonderful summer birthday parties we always had for mom... cruising up and down the Detroit River on my brother's boat; the family reunion at my house for her 87th birthday party; dinner and birthday cake in Frankenmuth; the party on the deck of my other brother's house on the lake, the birthday party at Camp Dearborn; my mom on my brother's motorcycle; the luscious ripe red raspberries that she grew in her yard, they came into season every year just in time for her birthday... she'd make her special cheesecake and top it with raspberries.

My pieces of August are mom in her garden... she had a green thumb and grew the best tomatoes, green peppers, zucchini, and melons; her roses were always stellar but they seemed to grow most profusely in August, that's when she'd cut them and bring bouquets of them inside the house; the back-to-school shopping we'd do, she always made sure I had a new outfit to wear the first day of school.

My pieces of September are mom with her grandson... when he was born and each of his birthdays she celebrated with him thereafter; the first days of school each year when I was a kid... I'd get home and she would sit and listen to me enthusiastically rattle on and on about who my new teacher was, which kids I liked in my class and which kids I didn't, who had the coolest new outfit, which boy I liked that year, and why I thought school would be so much harder that year...

My pieces of October are mom taking me trick-or-treating on Halloween. She never stayed home to pass out candy, she always took me around the whole neighborhood bringing an extra bag for me and carrying my full one when it got heavy; the one and only time she came to my dorm room on campus (U of M) to tell me that my dad died; mom dancing with my brother at his wedding.

My pieces of November are mom in the kitchen cooking a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner; the homemade birthday cakes she made me... chocolate cake with white buttercream frosting (still my favorite); watching the J.L. Hudson's Thanksgiving Day Parade on T.V. with her every Thanksgiving morning; Thanksgiving dinners at my brother's house.

My pieces of December are mom making Christmas cookies... frosted cutout cookies, spritzes, and "chicken necks"; decorating the Christmas tree with her; sitting next to her at Christmas Mass; the first Christmas after dad died, we spent it with friends in Florida at her suggestion; watching her writing out Christmas cards at the kitchen table; mom dancing with my brother at his wedding; the many Christmases spent with her grandchildren running around her.

My pieces of January are mom shoveling snow (she had a husband and two strapping sons to do it but she said she liked the exercise!); making hot chocolate for me when I came in from playing in the snow; mom listening to the weather forecast on the kitchen radio (WWJ on the am dial) and to see if school was closed for the day; the trip to Florida when we brought mom along.

My pieces of February are sitting at the kitchen table and showing my valentines to my mom... the ones I got from my classmates at school; mom making her special Valentine's Day cake, yellow batter baked in a heart shaped pan with strawberry filling in the middle and pink frosting on top; the chicken soup she made me when I'd get a cold or the flu and was too sick to go to school and how she waited on me and worried about me.

My pieces of March are mom holding her granddaughter for the first time, and each birthday she celebrated with her thereafter; as a kid, taking the food basket to church with her to have it blessed on the Saturday before Easter; mom in the kitchen coloring Easter eggs; going to the cemetery with her to visit the graves of her parents.

Some of you may remember the song, "Pieces of April" written by Dave Loggins and recorded by Three Dog Night in the early 1970s. If you'd like to hear the song in its entirety sung by Dave Loggins you can do so on his MySpace page (song #2 in the media player on the right side of the page) or if you're content to hear just a snippet of the version that haunts me by Three Dog Night you can do so on Amazon.com (song #15). I couldn't find a legitimate full version of the song by Three Dog Night on the web. If you know of one please leave its whereabouts as a comment.

Happy Mother's Day, Lucy. I miss you. I'm keeping all the pieces of your life in my memory bouquet.