For those of you playing along at home, Anton was my Great Great Great Great Grandfather.  I can remember bouncing on his knee like it was yesterday.

UPDATE: I got back another generation still.

Collecting dust on a hard drive

A while back I decided to scan every image on a microfilm that included Deller over in the page margin. It was towards the end of a trip to the Family History Library, and I did it on a whim. The film was of church records, written by a German speaking priest … in Latin. I ended up with 66 full page scans, covering marriages and deaths. The plan was to then casually translate the images in my free time.

Fast forward 6 years, and I’ve started browsing through those images.  The diamond in the ruff (so far?) is this marriage record.  It shows my GG Grandfather and his first wife, Appolonia Buchwieser.  It also includes all 4 of their parents (including maiden names).  That is a whole new generation for me to pour over.

“On the twelfth day of May in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty six I, Bernard Ihle, parish priest in Iggelheim, after calling the banns three times, joined in marriage two young people, Johann Georg Deller, a catholic, in Iggelheim, the unmarried son of Johann Deller, deceased, a labourer in Iggelheim, and of his surviving wife, Catherina Mapp, and Apollonia Buchwieser, a catholic, in Iggelheim, the unmarried daughter of Johann Buchwieser, deceased, a labourer in Iggelheim, and of his surviving wife, Elisabeth Altvater. In the presence of the witnesses Johann Adam Hath and Daniel Buchwieser of Iggelheim.”

My Father, The Angel

If I had a $1.00 for every time I accused my father of not being an angel … well, I would still be broke.  But nevertheless, there is now photographic proof.

Special thanks to Ellen.  And also, please send more.

1. Get rid of whatever expired AntiVirus or Internet Security software you are running (Norton, McAfee … etc) and switch to Microsoft Security Essentials.  It is FREE (and we like free) and doesn’t slow your computer down to a crawl.
2. Install Lavasoft’s AdAware.  There is a free version.  I would recommend disabling the realtime protection, and just schedule it to run weekly.
3. STOP using Internet Explorer.  Start using Mozilla Firefox.
4. STOP using Internet Explorer.  Seriously.

Token picture of Frank Deller

I’m really digging the updated FamilySearch Pilot.  It’s got a few quirks, such as the mouse wheel and tab key not always behaving like you might expect, but … who cares.  It’s FREE and more and more stuff keeps getting added.

If you haven’t used it yet, imagine Ancestry.com but without 800 ads for “Who do you think you are?”

Utah Death Certificates are just one of the sources I’m getting a lot of mileage out of this week.

Pennock Barn?

I just pulled an obit for Jack Pennockof Longmont, who died in 1993.  I received the request from the RAOGK website.  There was also a 2nd article about Mr. Pennock in a 1988 newspaper:

By Kaye Bache-Snyder
Times-Call Corresponent

Out on east ninth Avenue past Fox Hill Country Club golf course, a black, wrought-iron arch on two poles reads, “PEN-O-TEX.”  Up the driveway are an historic farmhouse, barns, three topless silos and fields spread out behind.

And, Jack Pennock of Longmont is sure his rag doll “Billie” is tucked away somewhere in the farmhouse walls.

Pennock, 65, remembers his favorite toy as fondly as his childhood on that farm, where he lived from 1923 to 1939

…

It turns out that the Pennocks sold the farm in 1940 to “some well-heeled Texans”.  I’m not sure what happened next, but the farmhouse and barn are still there.  They are now architectural accents to the neighborhood that I live it.  I haven’t seen “Billie” lying around anywhere, but I’m sure going to keep my eyes open.

West 47th Street, NY NY (circa 1934)

On a recent visit with my amazing Aunt Pat on Long Island, we sat down and browsed thru some old family photographs.  What an absolute treasure.  Most of the pictures were not labeled at all, and some had partial information.  Together, we played detective for a few hours and filled in as many of the blanks as possible.

We grouped the pictures in a variety of ways … some had obviously shot the same day, others had matching serial numbers on the back from the developer, while others were so unique we couldn’t group them.  If one picture was labeled “About 1928″ we carefully wrote that on the like pictures.  If 5 pictures were all of the same people (and we were certain who those people were) we wrote the same info on each picture.  Maybe they will get separated in the future.

At one point Aunt Pat asked, “Have you done this with your own pictures?”

Ack.  The more I think about my own pictures, the more worried I get.  It’s all fine and good that the majority are digital … but almost none are labeled with names and places.  That is something that will get easier with time.

Dates and times have been part of digital pictures from the beginning.  Many new cameras have started tagging photos with GPS information (referred to as geotagging).  iPhoto ’09 has added facial recognition.  Those technologies will become more and more the standard over time.  But what good is that if your pictures are rotting away on an old hard drive or CD-ROM.  Yup.  CDs and DVDs aren’t going to last a fraction as long as those unlabeled pictures sitting in that shoebox.

Get in the habit of printing them, or copying them to new media every few years.

To understand my favorite photograph of the day, you have to know that I’ve never seen my grandmother smile.  She was … serious.  Even when in a good mood, she had a stern look on her face.  Also, my grandfather passed away before I was born.  If this photo had been taken today, I think almost any photographer would have deleted it immediately.  But look closely and you’ll see it tells a story.

Dellers at Sunken Meadows

The camera was probably set on the ground (the grass is so close to the lens).  I think the timer has been set.  The family is in a park, maybe having a picnic.  My grandfather is sitting on his knees, with part of a smile on his face.  Had he planned on sitting lower?  Is that his suit coat under him?  To his left is Uncle Lawrence, waiting patiently.  The picture was taken the year my father was born, but he’s not in the picture.  Grandma is likely pregnant with him.  Aunt Patricia holds her baby doll and wears a grin as she watches Grandma race into position.  Look closely at my grandmother and you might see it.  Is that a dimple?  And a smile?  She tries to sit down in time.  Click.  She doesn’t quite make it, and I’m thankful.

What are these for?

The Family History Library has 2.4 million rolls of microfilm, 3 quarters of a million microfiche, a couple hundred thousand books and a bunch of other cool stuff.  Then why is it that the majority of the people here are sitting in front of computers looking at Ancestry.com and other online databases?

I want to *scream* at these people.  What an absolute waste of time and resources.  Every decent public library in the country has Ancestry.com and HeritageQueset Online.  Don’t get me wrong, those are great tools, when you are NOT sitting next to 2 and a half MILLION rolls of 16mm and 35mm microfilms.

On the bright side, there is barely a wait for the microfilm scanners.  Most people are still doing photocopies and printouts.  Pfft.

PODUNK, IA – Exciting news today from the developer of Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Duis ac libero. Nam eros neque, convallis eu, tempor ac, gravida id, diam. Donec a lectus id dui scelerisque varius. Nulla quis neque. Quisque varius lectus volutpat sapien. Pellentesque libero lorem, rhoncus eget, fermentum non, tempus vel, leo. Nam orci libero, euismod vitae, consequat vitae, malesuada non, est. Aliquam at est. Praesent consequat. Aenean ac neque et ante dictum varius. Ut ultrices aliquam orci. Etiam vel turpis. Ut ut ipsum.

I dunno.  Maybe it’s newsworthy.  I guess it is for the original company … but probably not exciting enough for the blogosphere to simply repost it everywhere.  At any rate, I was looking at some of the hyperlinks in one of the posts:

http://www.evilcompany.com/click.mv?FTC=1234&A=evilbloggersusername

As soon as I see a URL that contains the word CLICK and/or a username, red flags go off in my head.  They usually have to do with advertisements, affiliate programs, finder fees … etc.  In this case, it’s just that.  The blogger was posting “News” as a service to his readers, that generates revenue for him every time someone reads it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to advertisements and people making money from their efforts.  But, do bloggers owe it to their readers to make advertisements obvious?  Is it okay to hide ads in what appear to be innocent links?

There were 5,741 volunteer requests in February.  I took care of an amazing, er substantial, er adequate 4 of them.  That’s almost .07%!

You can get help from me, or one of the other 3,900 volunteers over at www.raogk.org.