September 25, 2022

Black Homesteaders of The South!

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I know, long time… no posts. But I’m happy to say it’s more because of projects than because a pandemic is occupying too much of my attention–which is a major improvement.

One of the things I worked on at the beginning of the year is about to see the light of day next month and I’m very thankful to have gotten an early look.

Cover of Black Homesteaders of the South by Bernice Alexander Bennett, available October 24, 2022

Black Homesteaders of The South by Bernice Alexander Bennett is a wonderful collection of Homesteader stories about families that didn’t necessarily head west for their land. These homesteaders took up property in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

The project grew out of Bennett’s coordinated efforts to solicit contributions for Black Homesteaders at the National Park Service site–in an effort to broaden the understanding of Black Homesteading beyond the Exodusters in the Great Plains states. I contributed the story of Levi Hampton, Harrison Trotter’s uncle, who homesteaded in Bradley County, Arkansas and granted some of that land to Harrison.

Grab a copy from your favorite vendor: https://bookshop.org/books/black-homesteaders-of-the-south/9781467152303?fbclid=IwAR34fhXjco5jEzHHg1RwKzICe_PFkdhfGeaj0w6st_I09P7qKkm8YPynodM

Happy hunting,

Jess

 

September 12, 2021

A Slightly Belated Happy Grandparents Day!

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This is just a quick thank you to the Grands in my life! I love you all, think of you often, and I am so happy to be able to talk to one of you still.

Older Black Couple sitting on a couch with 3 grandchildren--toddler, grade school age, and baby around 1979-1980.
Me, Grandma Elnora, my cousin, Grandpa Levie, and my brother.
Older olive-complected woman and two darker skinned children, all dressed for summer.
Grandma Ethel, Me, and my brother.
Older Caucasian man sitting watching darker skinned toddler playing on the ground and baby lying down on front. All in front of a Christmas tree.
Grandpa Bill, me, and my Brother
Older gentleman seated in a dark paneled room and in front of a window.
Grandpa Bailey, who Mom sat me down next to when I started working on our genealogy for a Girl Scout Badge.

Happy Grandparents Day!

Jess

 

September 15, 2016

ACPL Family History Month Programs

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Um… so, well this:

acplpostcard2016

She says, trying to act cool while in her head she’s doing a Snoopy dance. It’s a great library and staff and I’m honored to speak there.

“Scandalous Ancestors” provides ideas for tracing and teasing out the stories of our black sheep ancestors including a case study featuring an unreliable ancestor with a research story that began in 1860s Detroit and ends in Logan County, Illinois.

“Tracking my Trotters”: Sorting out my father’s family has been a joy… and maddening, but it’s also offered great lessons in research and made our history as a country more real—from the Second Great Migration, to the Jim Crow South to Slavery.

Join us at The Genealogy Center at Allen County Public Library’s Main Library in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Happy hunting,

Jess

 

August 5, 2014

52 Ancestors: #19 Cousin Carol

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Still… chugging (or maybe puttering) along at my 52 Ancestors… I haven’t totally given up. We’ll see how far I get by the end of the year.

Mom, Carol and I in Detroit, 1985It seems like many people (especially as viewing the world through children’s eyes or memories) have a family member around that they are sure their related too—they’re at all the family gatherings, everyone knows them, etc.—but you don’t quite know how they’re related. Now, yes, not all of them really are related but mostly in my family they have been.

For my Trotter side of the family that was Cousin Carol pictured to the left with my mother and I. This is a detail from a larger group shot I’ve shared before here. She was a regular face at my grandparents’ house. I remember her at Thanksgiving (our big annual Detroit gathering) and at all the in-between visits. But for the life of me I didn’t know how she fit into the family—especially after I started researching them. I didn’t even know her last name. Come to find out she’d been in my database all along but she (like many people in my family) didn’t use the name given in “official” sources within the family.

Cousin Carol was in fact my Grandfather Levi’s older first cousin through Great Grandfather Harrison’s sister, Pearl Trotter. Pearl married George Washington Webb on Christmas of 1905 and had a passel of children in Bradley County, Arkansas. Carol, born Calidona Webb, was the sixth child and second daughter, born in 1913. She married Robert Nickolson in 1935 (recorded as Nixon—though he clearly signed Nickolson) in Bradley County, Arkansas. After that it’s a bit of a blank for me.  She may have had a child named Charles? As I mentioned, she was family. I saw her often in Detroit. But I never really knew how she fit.

Nickolson-Webb Mg 1935Aunties, if you’re reading this I have more questions!

Happy hunting,

Jess

 

April 16, 2014

Not Quite Wordless Wednesday

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Easter Egg Hunt, 2008Easter’s coming up. Here’s a picture of my younger nephew and his two grandmother’s at my library for our indoor Easter egg hunt in 2008. Not my favorite program of the year… the run for eggs always seemed so dangerous.

Happy hunting,

Jess

 

March 12, 2014

Not Quite Wordless Wednesday

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Lee-TrotterNintendo

Last week’s chair is celebrating a birthday this week! Jack’s the red-head getting help from my brother. I’m thinking this is around about the first time we met our soon to be cousin. It was a Nintendo kind of afternoon with my brother at my parents’ house.

Happy hunting!

Jess

 

March 2, 2014

52 Ancestors: #7 Josephine Johnson

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Harrison Trotter SS AplicationI have mentioned my 2nd Great Grandmother, Josephine Johnson Trotter a few times as Harrison’s mother or Sam Trotter’s first wife but she, like her husband, is a bit of a mystery to me. My first knowledge of her was from family gatherings and reunions. The Trotters gather as the descendants of Sam and Josie Trotter but until I tracked down my grandfather’s Social Security application from 1942 when he named his parents I hadn’t seen her maiden name. I have since been able to track down a transcription of her and my 2nd Great Grandfather’s wedding license in Ashley County, Arkansas records from December of 1880. My one additional find has been a transcript of her testimony at the Coroner’s inquisition at the death of Joe Lawson in 1883. She, like her husband, just seems to have fallen through the cracks. I’m hoping that there is more out there on both of them—though I’m resigned to the fact that I’m probably going to need to head to Arkansas and find it.

Happy hunting!

Jess

 

February 26, 2014

Not Quite Wordless Wednesday

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Roseanne Lee Trotter JohnsonSaturday, March 1st, will mark the 102 anniversary of the birth of my Great Aunt Roseanna Lee Trotter Johnson. She was born in 1912 in Bradley County, Arkansas and married Leroy Johnson in 1932. This photo was one shared with my father prior to a recent Trotter family reunion.

Happy hunting,

Jess

P.S. Sharp-eyed Bradley County researchers, check out the picture in the upper left-hand corner. I swear I’ve seen that posted somewhere. It’s not something I’ve found in my collection.

 

February 19, 2014

Not Quite Wordless Wednesday

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Trotters, c1980

The 93rd anniversary of Grandpa Levie’s birth is coming up this week. I love his smile in this picture—enough to post it despite my expression. Yes, I’m the put-upon looking child on the left followed by Grandma Trotter, my older cousin, Grandpa, and my brother. This was taken in late 1979 or early 1980 at my parents’ home in Lansing, Michigan.

 

February 16, 2014

Wordless Wednesday Correction

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I have found the magic formula to get some of you to talk to me… post a picture and misidentify the people!

So this is actually my Great Grandfather Harrison and his half-sister Cora,  in the foreground—not my Great Grandmother Rhoda as I posted at the beginning of the month.

Harrison Trotter and Cora (Trotter) Steppes

This, however, is my Great Grandmother. She is the older woman in the cat glasses pictured with a few of her children,  including my Grandfather Levie immediately behind her.

Rhoda (Rogers) Trotter & Children

Keep correcting me. Really!

Happy hunting!

Jess

 

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