Week 17: Document (52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks)

"Document" can be a noun or a verb and, as genealogists, we should be using it as both! Perhaps this week you share a neat document you've found or write about your efforts to document an ancestor. Click here to check out all the themes for 2022

Genealogist are always gathering documents to prove relationships and facts. When I was preparing to join the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), I was just gathering documents to prove facts that I thought I already knew.

I needed birth, marriage and death records for my parents and my maternal grandparents. I went to the courthouse where my mother’s birth certificate is filed along with her parent’s marriage record. My mother was born in 1927 and her parents were married in 1926. I happily went to the courthouse and used the birth index book first. For those of you who don’t know, the birth index book is a large book with the name of the person being born, their birth date and the volume and page number that the birth certificate can be found. Births are recorded by last name and in order of being recorded. I noticed that my mother’s name was listed as Hilts, her mother’s maiden name. Then it was crossed off and Hafenstein was written along with the year 1945. This was not the normal markings one would find in the birth index. 

As I was turning the pages of the volume that contained my mother’s birth certificate, there was nothing unusual about the pages. They were typed pages until I reached my mother’s. It looked like a microfilm printed page; it was black with white lettering. 

On the left side of the page was a 1945 written date, this was the same year as the Indexed book. The rest of the information looked normal, her parents are listed, her date of birth, doctor signatures and more.

I then proceeded to the Marriage index to find my grandparent’s marriage record. The marriage index is a little different, it is an index based on marriage date. They are recorded as they issue certificates, thus I went to May 1926 and found no marriage record for my grandparents. I keep looking through the remainder of the year, into 1927, and then 1928 and finally in 1929 I found the listing. Now I am questioning who is the father of my mother. My mother is a spitting image of my grandmother, so I have no doubts that she is her mother. 

I gather my documents and proceed home. I submit my application to DAR and they reject it, stating that it appears that my mother was adopted, since she was born before my grandparent’s wedding. Since I was going through my maternal grandmother’s line, I just needed to prove that her mother was indeed her biological mother.

I decided to send an inquiry email to the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families to find out if my mother was adopted in 1945 by her step-father. I stated that I am pretty sure that her mother was her biological mother. 

They were nice enough to confirm that my mother’s step-father did adopt her and sent me a form to request her non-identifying adoption paperwork. I did send for the paperwork, which confirmed that my mother was adopted after her 18th birthday. My mother was going to go to college and her step-father didn't want her to bear the shame of showing an illegitimate birth certificate the rest of her life. Up until that day, my mother didn't know that her father wasn't her biological father.  

At this point, my curiosity was sparked. I then contacted the local catholic dioceses for my mother’s baptism record. Unfortunately, the record appears it never had her birth father’s name on it and it was modified to include her step-father’s name.

The moral of this cautionary tale, is that not all documents are accurate. Even though the birth certificate I obtained is a legal document, it is not necessarily an accurate document because when my mother was adopted a new birth certificate was created. Whether or not her original certificate ever contained her biological father’s name, I don’t know. Also, her baptism record contains accurate information but also inaccurate since it also appears to not have her biological father listed on it.

This was my driving force to use DNA in my genealogy endeavors. I am pretty confident that I found out who my biological grandfather is. One of his daughter’s did finally show up as my half-aunt on one of the testing sites. It was his only surviving child. 

So keep looking for those documents and Just Do Genealogy!

Week 16: Negatives (52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks)

There are some negatives to family history... Discovering something "negative" about an ancestor, not finding what you were expecting, and even film negatives. This week, explore one of those negatives. Maybe it will turn into a positive! Click here to check out all the themes for2022

Negative can include evidence as in Negative Evidence. For example, I am helping my sister-in-law with a branch of her family, her mother’s maiden name of Steffes. Anyway, starting with the immigrant ancestor of Jacob Steffes (1821-1878) and Anna Arenz (1830-1915), I have been documenting all their descendants. We are working off a family history that someone started in 1980’s. He had listed the youngest child as Engelbart Steffes (1872-1905)

Most of the family is buried in a tiny cemetery located in the unincorporated area of St Joes, Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin. The area is named after the catholic church of Saint Joseph’s and there is a church cemetery.

However, the stone for Engelbart states his last name is Steffen. The stone does list that he is the son of Jacob. The stone has a birth date of 1872 and a death date of 1905. Thus, if Engelbart is a son of Jacob and Anna, he should be living with the family in 1880. However, looking at the census record, I find the other younger children, however no Engelbart.

So, I decided to take another approach, to search for an Engelbart Steffen. I find him in the 1880 census for the St Joe area living with his father Jacob and his mother Margaret. On the Ancestry website, I am also given a hint for a birth and christening records. These two records are for Engelbart Steffen and the birth date matches the gravestone.

I turn to Find A Grave and decide to look at what memorials are created. There are two memorials for this one gravestone, one is for Engelbart Steffen and the other for Engelbart Steffes. At this point I am very confident that there was never an Engelbart Steffes, so I reach out the creator of the memorial for Engelbart Steffes, who happens to be a distant relative of my sister-in-law and a descendant of Jacob and Anna.

I send him a message and point out that there are two memorials, one for each surname and reference the birth record and ask him to review those because I believe that this gravestone is for Engelbart Steffen. Please note, I never state that he is wrong and I am right. I like to gently guide people to come to their own conclusions. I also like to share my reasoning with records so that they can review what I am looking at. The memorial creator responded that he deleted his memorial.

Therefore, I used the Negative Evidence of not finding a Engelbart Steffes to conclude that there wasn’t a person by this name. To confirm this assumption, I found a Engelbart Steffen who fits the tombstone information. Ironically, last week’s theme was “how do you spell that”? and this wasn’t a case of changing the spelling of someone’s name.

Keep in mind, not all situations are this straight forward. I am currently dealing with a different family whose child doesn’t show up in the census record with the rest of the family. However, looking at obituaries, they are all listing each other as siblings. This child is too young to be a farm hand on another farm. Also, his parents and siblings are in the census record, but not him. I try to make sure it wasn’t the case where he was known as a different name as a child and another as an adult. I currently can’t figure out where this child came from. Based on the time frame, perhaps this is an adoption. Maybe from the orphan train or other family who died and left an orphan child. All speculation on my part. Currently I have added this child to the family unit with notes, because I need to investigate him more, to check all the siblings of the parents, maybe see if there are any newspapers articles about visiting orphan trains or other news worthy articles to explain a tragedy in the area that might had left an orphan child.

Good luck with your research and remember to Just do Genealogy!