Genie Road Trip

We’ll miss you, Grandma!

Elnora (York) Trotter, 1926-2013

Mother, Grandmother, Great-Grandmother

Enjoy the time you have and ask questions while you can!

Jess

Today is the 35th anniversary of the Blizzard of 1978 which evidently I got to see. It dumped 19.3 inches of snow on Lansing, Michigan in two days after the region had already been hit by snow earlier in the week. The end result looked like this on our block.

Happy hunting,

Jess

The weather has been on my mind this week so bear with me… I believe this is my 2nd Great Aunt Grace (Packer) Elliott near her home in Grand Rapids, MI. This is one of the happiest expressions I’ve seen on her in the photographs Gran and Aunt June have… but her family seems to have been hell-bent on putting huge bows in her hair. She was my Great Grandmother Cora’s youngest sibling.

Happy hunting,

Jess

This is the headstone of Thomas William Horton Packer and his wives Mary Garbutt and Isobel Black. Thomas was the brother of my 2^nd Great Grandfather, Cornelius and the 2^nd son of Joseph of and Harriett (Vaughan) Packer. He was born in Gillingham, Kent, England in 1851 and named for one of Joseph’s older brothers. The family then moved 8 miles east to Sittingbourne.

When the family immigrated to Canada around 1870 he was already almost 20 and was only listed on the 1871 Census in Canada with his family in Hamilton, Ontario. Not too long after that the family moved to Woodstock, Ontario where on 01 December 1875 Thomas married Mary Garbutt, the 4^th daughter of William and Martha (Ward) Garbutt.

On the 1881 Census Thomas reported working as a Sawyer and 1891 he was a Glass fitter and Mary’s nephew, William Rennick, was living with the couple and working as a photographer. In 1914 Mary died of Bright Disease.

In the summer of 1916 Thomas married Isobel Black, the daughter of John and Charlotte (Roberts) Black. Thomas died right around the new year of 1835-1836—a newspaper dated 31 Dec 1935 noted his death but the headstone reads 1936.

All three are buried at Hillview Cemetery on 5^th Street, on the southeast side of Woodstock, Ontario.

Happy hunting,

Jess

Today is the 66th anniversary of my grandparents wedding. On January 18, 1947 they married at the home of my Great Aunt Rachel (York) Elliot in Palestine Township, Bradley Co., Arkansas.

This is a shot of their 25th Anniversary party at their home in Detroit, Michigan. They were married 41 years and raised 8 children before Grandpa died in 1988.

Happy hunting,

Jessica

I’ve been a bit bogged down with deadlines and the creeping ick that seems to be common this time of year… but I didn’t want to miss Wordless Wednesday. And Grandma Trotter has been on my mind lately.

These are my grandparents Elnora (York) and Levie Trotter enjoying the swings at a Trotter-Johnson picnic outside of Potter Park Zoo in Lansing, Michigan in 1980 or 1981. It’s a bit fuzzy but it brings back fond memories.

Happy hunting,

Jessica

I was going through pictures again and these two struck me as an interesting pair. The first is my mother and the second is me. I had more hair and teeth… and yes, I am rocking Oscar the Grouch on my dress. But, yeah, we’re related.

Happy Hunting,

Jess

I’ve been scrounging through photos lately and I keep coming back to this set. I don’t know who everyone in the pictures is but these were taken around my Great Aunt Rachel (York) Elliot’s funeral in 1971 and the majority of the men are York brothers and in-laws.

Can any Yorks/Trotters or other Bradley County folk recognize any of my unknowns? Or, for that matter, correct our identifications?

Happy hunting,

Jess

Between Dad & I, we think we have identified…

Picture 1 (L to R): Oscar York, Levie Trotter, Arverse York, Preston York, UNKNOWN, and Herman York

Picture 2 (L to R): Arverse York, Preston York, UNKNOWN, Herman York, Ernest York, UNKNOWN, and UNKNOWN

Picture 3 (L to R):  Herman York, Ernest York, UNKNOWN, UNKNOWN, and UNKNOWN

Welcome all to 2013!

Another year has passed and I am thrilled to have made so much progress on various lines—largely inspired by maintaining this blog.  I have challenged myself searching out different (fabulous and informative) record types including trying DNA testing for the first time (more coming on that soon). I have hit a point where I have to use my almost non-existent German to work on one of my maternal lines (though I’m not quite out of the country yet). As for trips… it’s been mostly short hops though one was out of the country to learn more about the Alison’s and their allied families. And my professional clear has started to blend into my genealogy as I started co-teaching genealogy classes for my library. All that and I have met new friends and gotten to know some better over this endeavor.

And as I noted this time last year it’s the perfect time for a little goal-setting and I have a few in mind:

I will be doing Saturday research at the Archives of Michigan—when my job permits me—and you should too! Starting January 5^th the Archives will be open 10 am – 4 pm. I have had fabulous success with the Archives and found (more often than not) that they had a resource I thought I had to travel farther to get.  If you live in the area please consider supporting the Archives efforts to increase accessibility.

My Roadtrip wish list is long and varied but I’m eyeing trips to ACPL‘s Genealogy Center in Fort Wayne, the Burton Historical Collection in Detroit, and back to Fort Wayne in the Fall for FGS 2013.

My current research focuses are Dad’s African-American line and Mom’s German ancestors—which I have come to find equally hard to research just based on regular name variations. So, in the back of my mind Arkansas or Ohio/Pennsylvania field trips are being planned as well.

Plus, I’ll continue doing a little presenting. I have been asked to continue our genealogy classes at my library and will be presenting on African American research at WMGS’s February meeting.

I’ll keep up the posts and let you all know what I’m working on.

Happy Hunting!

Jess