Genealogy thread

Virginia, North Carolina and Pennsylvania, I think, judging by the first records I can find for them that show their location.
Then your in luck. All three should have the records dating back to the 18th century. PA in particular has records on indentured servitude and on land grants. I believe VA and NC have similar sources.
 
I've tried to go do mine a little. My issue is my dad's family has an extremely common surname. Couple that with common first names like John/James and it gets messy figuring out if you have the right person or not.
Tip. When you go back as far as you can with ancestor records that you can prove is your bloodline, try this. If they have siblings or cousins living with or near them, try to look at those distant relatives’ records. That should help you have more access to finding relatives farther back.
 
Ages were often lied about and names were most of the time spelled phonetically and misspelled sometimes due to the illiteracy during different time periods. Many Germans came to North America between 1840-1870 due to religious persecution and the opportunity to own land not available in Germany.
Yeah, my wife's Stepfather lied about his age to get into the Air Force. He was 16. Not sure how he pulled that off, but it came back to bite him in the butt when he applied for Social Security at age 62. They had the correct information and told him he didn't qualify for benefits yet since he was only 60. And in straightening that out he discovered that his middle name on his birth certificate was different than the middle name he had been using his entire life.
 


Yeah, my wife's Stepfather lied about his age to get into the Air Force. He was 16. Not sure how he pulled that off, but it came back to bite him in the butt when he applied for Social Security at age 62. They had the correct information and told him he didn't qualify for benefits yet since he was only 60. And in straightening that out he discovered that his middle name on his birth certificate was different than the middle name he had been using his entire life.
If you trace the arrival record to the original departure record from Europe/Asia, it can help greatly in getting true family names/ages/origin towns and cities that can be vital in knowing more.
 
I do Ancestry for my family, my husband's family, my stepfather's family ...

Last December I joined Newspapers .com and it was the best investment. I found SO MUCH new information, I found so many names to connect, I found crazy articles (they wrote about everything back then) and so happy to finally connect some big gaps. Best investment!!
 


If you trace the arrival record to the original departure record from Europe/Asia, it can help greatly in getting true family names/ages/origin towns and cities that can be vital in knowing more.
That worked for my Grandmother on my dad's side. His dad, no records of how he got to the U.S. can be found.
On my mother's side, her parents families were from Czechoslovakia. Her older brother and his wife spent a month in Czechoslovakia trying to find anything about family history. They did find people who apparently were cousins, but records either just weren't kept, or if they were , they are gone now.
 
That worked for my Grandmother on my dad's side. His dad, no records of how he got to the U.S. can be found.
On my mother's side, her parents families were from Czechoslovakia. Her older brother and his wife spent a month in Czechoslovakia trying to find anything about family history. They did find people who apparently were cousins, but records either just weren't kept, or if they were , they are gone now.
WW2 is a reason records are sometimes lost since the Axis powers tried very hard to eliminate lasting records of people they found inferior. I have trouble finding some of my Eastern European family records from pre 1930 because of this.
 
I've tried to go do mine a little. My issue is my dad's family has an extremely common surname. Couple that with common first names like John/James and it gets messy figuring out if you have the right person or not.
Also I just wanted to mention that Ancestry has experts you can contact that may be able to solve that issue as well. They are very good.
 
I need help please!!!! I am organizing my father's "holocaust box" , that's what we call it. His German Jewish family was either killed or escaped the holocaust and his archived materials about their journeys to life or death are stuffed in a box. I took the box from him and am organizing them.
However....I have come across TONS of letters from concentration camps, labor camps, on the boat to America to freedom, correspondence between relatives after the war, and my grandfather's time in a refugee camp in London. BUT they are all in OLD SCRIPT GERMAN!! I thought I only had two letters and someone online I hired transcribed a couple but it was very expensive. Then I realized I had MANY letters!!!
How can I get them transcribed in an economical way? Google translate does not transcribe old german script.
Help!
 
Another question I need help with! (I love this thread thank you so much!): I have 3 photographs of an ancestor but I am not sure that all 3 are that same ancestor. I know for one is 100% her because it was her official i.d. of record in Germany before her death. The others don't look anything like her, a few years young. But they are labeled as being her on the back of a picture, etc. How can I be sure all 3 are the same person ?
 
I need help please!!!! I am organizing my father's "holocaust box" , that's what we call it. His German Jewish family was either killed or escaped the holocaust and his archived materials about their journeys to life or death are stuffed in a box. I took the box from him and am organizing them.
However....I have come across TONS of letters from concentration camps, labor camps, on the boat to America to freedom, correspondence between relatives after the war, and my grandfather's time in a refugee camp in London. BUT they are all in OLD SCRIPT GERMAN!! I thought I only had two letters and someone online I hired transcribed a couple but it was very expensive. Then I realized I had MANY letters!!!
How can I get them transcribed in an economical way? Google translate does not transcribe old german script.
Help!
A couple of things. First see if you can get a book from your library or book store on old German/English translation. Second, contact Ancestry.com and see if you can get advice from one of their experts. If you know what dialect of German your family spoke from a particular part of Germany it may help. Try to see if the your family was Ashkenazi Jewish. If so, the language you might be trying to translate is Yiddish and not just German. Yiddish is available on google translate.
 
Another question I need help with! (I love this thread thank you so much!): I have 3 photographs of an ancestor but I am not sure that all 3 are that same ancestor. I know for one is 100% her because it was her official i.d. of record in Germany before her death. The others don't look anything like her, a few years young. But they are labeled as being her on the back of a picture, etc. How can I be sure all 3 are the same person ?
Check US passport records/immigration records on Ancestry and also see if she had siblings or cousins that could look like her.
 
I need help please!!!! I am organizing my father's "holocaust box" , that's what we call it. His German Jewish family was either killed or escaped the holocaust and his archived materials about their journeys to life or death are stuffed in a box. I took the box from him and am organizing them.
However....I have come across TONS of letters from concentration camps, labor camps, on the boat to America to freedom, correspondence between relatives after the war, and my grandfather's time in a refugee camp in London. BUT they are all in OLD SCRIPT GERMAN!! I thought I only had two letters and someone online I hired transcribed a couple but it was very expensive. Then I realized I had MANY letters!!!
How can I get them transcribed in an economical way? Google translate does not transcribe old german script.
Help!
Do you have a university near by? I bet you could get students to do it. - Maybe a professor would even give them extra credit in their classes?
 

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