We had an uneventful trip to Springfield, IL but before I start talking about FGS2011 I spent my first full day in Illinois on a side research trip to Logan County (about a half hour north of Springfield)

In all my prep and planning I missed the resource most dear to my heart, at least until the night before my side roadtrip. Then it finally dawned on me that the Lincoln Public Library opened two hours ahead of the Logan County Genealogical and Historical Society Research Center. So, I could look at their local history collection and newspapers if I revised my plans and got up and out of the hotel in the morning. So with a new plan… I still got out of town later than I planned but I was on the road to Lincoln at a reasonable time.

The trip itself was relatively uneventful though I miss having a handy sidekick and map reader. I took a few wrong turns in Lincoln and drove around the block a few times but I made it to their lovely 1902 Carnegie Library with more than enough time to look through microfilm newspapers. The staff was very helpful. They set me up at a reader/printer with my first reel loaded and I was off. My find of the day was H. R. Allison’s obituary. It was a lovely moment only slightly marred by the number of times it took to get it printed legibly. I did spend additional time looking for his wife’s obituary as well—but to be honest too much time looking at microfilm makes me ill.

Next stop was walking around the block to the LCGHS Research Center where a genial volunteer loaded me up with resources. Oddly enough, they had shelves of binders with obituaries but neither Harry nor Nancy was among them—I am so glad I finally remembered to try the library. But, if you have Logan County family, they have a Centenarian who is indexing the local sections of Lincoln newspapers. Not all of them are indexed yet, but there are 80 binders plus if you have time to work through them. I found a couple of interesting tidbits that way. For example, I don’t think I knew that Harry had been a village trustee on the People’s Ticket in 1899. There’s enough there that I may make a return trip to the Center again someday or at least contact one of the society researchers for assistance.

The last leg of my trip was to take a long drive down country roads to what felt like the middle of nowhere to a well-kept cemetery set way off the main road. Like my time in Lincoln this took a little circling but this time it was on foot. I had a rough layout of the cemetery from LCGHS and a location for Harry and Nancy (Thank you, Logan County GenWeb!) but I didn’t really understand the map until after I found them. I ended up getting in my exercise walking through the majority of the cemetery before I found the headstone on the back in the lot of his stepdaughter’s family. When I found him it felt like I was coming face to face with someone I’d been chasing for 16  years… I’ve finally caught him but I still have so many questions.

        

But that’s for another time.

Happy hunting!

Jess