Knext Gen Weekly #1

What did I do this week?

The Big Audit

I made headway in my family tree audit, working up my paternal line first. I did get a little bogged down in extra research but with my new “objective and aims” tool I was able to get back on track and stick to my plan to only verify I had accurate birth, marriage and death records for each ancestor.

The main detour I took was with my great-grandfather and his career in the United States Merchant Marine. I spent far too much time making tables in sheets and editing his Ancestry profile. I got in contact with a St Louis researcher who will be able to go and copy his USMM files for me, and I left Louis there.

I then moved on to his father, Preston Perry Morrow. This time I got somewhat sidetracked when I was looking for birth announcements on Newspapers.com and kept seeing really interesting-sounding articles mentioning Preston. But I was able to resist and refocus on my task. Unfortunately for Preston, I can’t find a birth OR death record. Which is frustrating to say the least. I have him flagged on my spreadsheet as incomplete, and I’m planning on booking a free consultation session with FamilySearch to see if they can assist me in finding any of the records I’m looking for.

Spreadsheet with my pedigree ancestors all numbered. I've highlighted those in green who have sufficient documentation and those in yellow are still lacking.

I then moved on to his father, Joseph Clay Stiles Morrow, who I’m still working on. I did find a photograph in a newspaper obituary of him that I hadn’t seen before… and when looking for death records, I found his death certificate, which listed him as dying in Arlington Heights Sanitarium — a private psychiatric hospital in Fort Worth, Texas. I resisted my urge to dive down that rabbit hole and instead jotted it down in my notes for him under “further research avenues.”

My Work on Louis Gleason Morrow

As mentioned above, I got a little in the weeds with Louis. I created a spreadsheet of all his known USMM voyages and then mapped them out using Google Map Maker. It was a fun detour, and I loved how the map visuals turned out.

Cuppa’s with Grandad

For my genealogy method class, I chose my 2x great-grandmother, Ada Williams, as my research subject. When I popped in to see my Grandad for a cuppa, I was telling him about what I’ve been researching and how I was taking another look at Ada.

We got into the 1911 census and how she was living as a servant with a John Atkin who owned a pub in Christleton. The Plough Inn.

“Oh, the Plough!” my Grandad responded when I told him that, which made me laugh, thinking that he knew all the pubs within a 20-mile radius of Chester.

He then told me it was funny I mentioned her working in a pub because, from the time he can remember as a boy until she retired, he recalled that Ada was the head barmaid at the Albion Hotel on City Road in Chester. It was at this point I scrambled to open my note-taking app on my phone!

He said that when he remembers walking from his house when he was about 5 down to the pub, Ada would give him a packet of chips, and all the regulars would give him sweets or coins because they all knew he was Ada’s grandson. When he would get home, his Mum would be going mad because he’d disappeared.

A lovely reminder that sometimes a simple cup of tea and casual chat can bring up the most amazing memories (and genealogical tidbits).

Updating my website and trying to learn how to create and edit videos

It wasn’t all fun, though. I did some boring stuff, like spending waaaaaay too long updating my website. Though I must say I’m much happier with it now, and the mobile interface is far better than it was.

I’ve also started trying to learn how to edit videos so I can expand out onto YouTube. I’m not terribly good at it, but there's only one way to learn, and that's by having a go.

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