Updates: Thank you to Pam Carter, Market Basket, Thanks to Bill Clinton, Ipswich, MA changes

I haven't written a Bits of News post in over three years, but thought I would group a few "bits of news" today.

Pam Carter writes in her blog, My Maine Ancestry blog, and received the Blog of 2012 award. She recently awarded me the One Lovely Blog Award, which was very kind of her, since I do very little writing anymore. To show my appreciation, I am highlighting her blog (just mentioned above). Please read about Pam, a seasoned U. S. History teacher at a high school, so whatever she writes will be a thorough blog post. Carter is her maiden name, so if you have Carters in your tree, you might be related. As a matter of fact, Pam and I are distant cousins through Thomas Carter. Thank you, Pam, very much for my award and I hope some of my readers will follow your blog.

Castle Hill (Wikipedia) at Ipswich, Massachusetts

More news, the above shows the almost completed restoration of the casino area. Today was a cloudy day, so you can't see the ocean. The huge house faces the ocean.

Some of you might recognize the castle because it has been shown in several movies, such as; "The Witches of Eastwick," "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past," "Flowers in the Attic" and more recently the current movie, “The Equalizer,” with Dezel Washington.

The 1677 Whipple House and the reconstructed 1657 Alexander Knight House were recently in the news. The Whipple House lost a huge tree during a severe storm, and there was roof damage to the house. The Alexander Knight House has a new handmade fence to go with the 1657 house. (my photo)

Yesterday, I was delighted to see that the Market Basket grocery store chain again made the news. The below statement was what Bill Clinton said...glad to see he follows my local news. He has been to Lowell, at least two times, perhaps more.

Clinton name-drops Market Basket in CNBC interview

Sentinel & Enterprise UPDATED:   09/28/2014 06:32:14 AM EDT

Read more: http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/news/ci_26622370/sunday-notebook-clinton-name-drops-market-basket-cnbc#ixzz3EjhWkvUI
Part of the article reads:

"THE MARKET BASKET fight first made headlines in national outlets such as The New York Times and NBC Nightly News, among others. Last week, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology held a forum that attracted hundreds to hear about lessons that can be gleaned from employees' victory in getting the company to sell to beloved leader Arthur T. Demoulas.

A few workers who attended the forum loved that it was held just across the river from the Prudential Center in Boston, where the Market Basket board held so many of its meetings.

But no one probably expected a former U.S. president to mention the chain's name. But Bill Clinton did in a CNBC interview Sept. 23 at the Clinton Global Initiative.

Clinton was asked by reporter Becky Quick about the American economy, with the stock market soaring as many middle-class families still struggle. Clinton mentioned three reasons for the sluggish job market: a need to raise the minimum wage, a need for a better mix of jobs, and the fact that so many companies are using their wealth on dividends or buying back stock.

Clinton mentioned Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba, which recently went public, as saying his investors would make more money in the long run if the company placed employees and customers first. He then turned to Market Basket, which has been putting employees and customers ahead of shareholders for years.

"This Market Basket case in Massachusetts and New Hampshire was a big issue because the family that owned it wanted to get rid of the guy who was running it," Clinton said, showing an accurate familiarity with the saga. "They thought he gave too much of the wealth of the company to the employees. The customers loved it. So the employees and the customers left when they got rid of him. They had to bring him back."

Read more: http://www.sentinelandenterprise.com/news/ci_26622370/sunday-notebook-clinton-name-drops-market-basket-cnbc#ixzz3EkA81Nun

Please, no more Awards

Several days have been spent thinking about the Awards issue. I say issue, because quite a few people don't believe in them, and some do. Now, is the time to let you know how I feel about them. About three years ago, like a chain letter, various awards were given to bloggers who were felt to be deserving of an award. When I saw that a lot of good writers were being left out, I felt uncomfortable about receiving the ones I did, so I didn't participate. However, I did recognize the 30 people who honored me with one or more awards, including two well-known certified genealogists, by mentioning their names and their own blog name/link.

During that time, I also received some special awards, including being one in their top 100 genealogy sites awarded by MyHeritage and The Rose Blogger Award. You may see all the names and links of these kind people at Awards.

With sincere appreciation and gratitude, I want to thank the three bloggers listed below for the four new awards. Please visit their blogs, if you haven't already done so.

Nancy at My Ancestors and Me, and other Relatives, too gave me The Wonderful Team Member Readership Award

and the

Illuminating Blogger Award

Brenda Leyndyke at Journey to the Past gave me the Blog of 2012 The Year

Heather Rojo at Nutfield Genealogy gave me the Blog of 2012 The Year

Looking Back

The One Lovely Blog Award was given to me by Deb Ruth of Adventures in Genealogy Blog. Thanks Deb. Please check out her site, if you haven't already seen it. I especially love her articles about Baltimore.


This past week was spent doing a lot of thinking about the 1 1/2 years I have been blogging, non-stop. I decided to take a little break. My plan is to do far less blogging for a few months, instead, I'll work on my family history, make more trips to libraries, and read your posts.


Dick Eastman wrote Archaeological Dig Reveals Lifestyles of Early Irish Settlers in my city of Lowell, Massachusetts. He also lived here as well, so we both claim the city.


Continuing with my Historical Society photos, I discovered another one recently in Harvard, Massachusetts. When I went to take the photo, I saw that it shares the building with the Still River Baptist Church... smart utilization of the space.

Looking Back

I like to acknowledge those who enjoy my blog and thought I should have an award. Some bloggers mentioned they knew I don't accept them, but wanted me to have one anyway. I understand why people love giving them, as well as receiving them. However, from the very first day I received one, I decided that wasn't the route I wanted to take. But thank you ladies for the three different awards. Please check out their blogs, you will be so glad you did.

The Ancestor Approved award was given on Jan. 20th, and I didn't discover it until months later. It was embarrassing that I didn't catch it earlier, and it pays to read each and every blog you follow, you just never know what might be in a post. And, I think it is important for recipients to also thank the sender, which I don't see happening very often.

My Ancestor Approved award came from: Suz of The Hunt for Henrietta

One Lovely Blog awards from:
Cyndi Beane Henry of Mountain Genealogy                     
Leslie Albrecht Huber of The Journey Takers Blog
Leslie Ann of Ancestors Live Here
Yvonne Mashburn Schmidt of ATCO, Georgia, The Village


and Betty Huber Tartas of Betty's Boneyard Genealogy presented me with the Genea-Angel award.


The past month has been busy, and I will be blogging about some of the events in the next few weeks. One interesting thing, I hate to admit, is I didn't learn all I could about my parents and grandparents first and then work backward. I instead by-passed them and steam rolled through each generation rather quickly, (which took about 21 years). But, I realized I didn't know the first thing about my parents, especially before I was born. During the past week, I discovered some great information about them, and will share that. If I had asked questions about the last two generations years ago, some relatives were around to answer what I wanted to know.


Much of this winter-like month has been devoted to webinars, I love them and in one week attended five, and one day there were two. I'm getting a great free education, learning about things such as: Using Twitter, Backing up your Genealogy Data, Tracing Female Ancestors, Writing your Personal History, two on Blogging, and several on RootsMagic4. I hope you have been able to take advantage of them, some are still available to listen to/see and new ones have been scheduled. Most are FREE, so please visit the above webinar site.


This has nothing to do with genealogy, but to illustrate how quickly time flies. When I heard it was 30 years ago that President Reagan was shot, to me, it was like yesterday.
I was working at the Veteran's Administration, my office on the first floor of a 14-floor building, and on the L Street side in Washington, DC. When we heard the sirens and saw police cars fly by, we knew something serious had happened. We grouped together, and imagined a disaster at the White House, which was a few blocks away. Soon we knew the real story. Now, it's hard to believe it was 30 years ago. Did I age, what was I doing as a hobby (not genealogy yet), no idea what I was doing, but I remember that freeze in time.

Looking Back

This month I want to thank three individuals who awarded me the Ancestor Approved Award, and in doing so, I have chosen something they have written from their "What They Learned."

From Jo of Images Past, wrote:  "Enlightened to find that my grandparents were not married by my grandad’s father, who was a Minister – it turns out that they ran away to Gretna Green to get married, probably due to the fact that my granny was pregnant.  Oops-a-daisy!" (I loved this because, as a genealogist, you should know about Gretna Green.)


From Michelle Roos Goodrum of The Turning of Generations, wrote:  "There are so many ancestors in my tree who were farmers. They contributed to the settlement of our great country by moving west and making a living off the land." (I'm a bit envious, because I didn't have anybody move west, at least until much later.)

From Cynthia Shenette of Heritage Zen, wrote:  "I am humbled by the circumstances that lead my great-grandmother Lucie Touchette to marry my great-grandfather Francois Chenette. Why would a young woman of 20 agree to become the fourth wife of a man 34 years her senior and already the father of 16 children? I don't know, but I want to find out. Was it a love match? I suspect not. Someone had to to take care of all those kids..."  (I want to know too.)


This is the first month I haven't taken a photo of a historical society, but as soon as winter is over and the travels begin, I will continue to post them.


Many bloggers will be writing their reviews of "Who Do You Think You Are?" which begins this coming Friday evening. I hope many non-bloggers will also watch this interesting series. Vanessa Williams will be featured, and I'm looking forward in hearing about her ancestors. Professional genealogist, Kathleen Brandt of A3Genealogy will be on the show with Tim McGraw, and I am anxious in seeing her. Kathleen you are a star now.


Don't forget, you have less than a week to listen to Tom MacEntee's lecture on "Google For Genealogists," a FREE webinar on LegacyFamilyTree. This is available to all, I saw it once, and need to watch again, it is that good. Regarding the lecture, there is a short introduction first, and don't forget to print out Tom's four-page handout.


I'm taking a little break from this blog. I am working on four new ones, each covering a surname of mine: Poole, Scrambling, Ten Eyck and Westover, the titles and the first posts are done! In the meantime, if you are hating your winter, you might enjoy some flower and nature photos at my Flower Blog.

Looking Back

Thank you to the 12 bloggers who posted their own personal favorite posts to my blog at Your Top Ten - Not My Top Ten over the weekend. Two were new to me, and I'm now following them. Anybody else can post until Sunday evening. There is some great reading in these posts, and it's a good way to read somebody new!


In my "Looking Back" post on the last day of each month, I like to do a public thank you to those who gave me an award. My usual policy is not to accept awards; I just don't feel comfortable with them. However, I do want to acknowledge them with gratitude.

Susan Petersen of Long Lost Relatives, Joy Burkhart of Tomorrow's Memories and Katie Chambers of  FromLittleAcorns all gave me the Ancestor Approved Award. Thank you again.

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino of Lucie's Legacy and Acadian Ancestral Home blogs, awarded me her, "The Rose Blogger Award." Lucy established this beautiful award last year, in honor of her mother, Rosanna Levesque LeBlanc. Lucie says, "It is awarded to bloggers who keep the memory of their ancestors alive." She (Lucie) wrote me several weeks ago to ask if I would accept, and I said, "yes." Thank you very much Lucie.  

In the future, please refrain from giving me any awards. I've been very lucky with all that I've received. But no more for 2011, please. On another note, I plan on cutting back on my blogs, my hope is to do 2-3 a week,  beginning Monday, and spend more time researching.


I'm not sure if anybody noticed, but I removed almost all of my "Wordless Wednesday" posts. I had way too many posts for the year, and deleted almost 55. What in the heck did I show / talk about?

Last year I wrote the following on December 31st, "The month of December was filled with wonderful blogs about Christmas traditions. Although, I didn't participate much, I sure enjoyed being on the receiving end and I will remember many posts for years to come." That statement applies to this year as well. However, I spent considerable time listening to all the Christmas music and watching YouTube videos that bloggers posted. A few new favorites: Let It Be Christmas Everywhere, Hallelujah Chorus at Food Court and Evening Bells.

"On Dec. 29th (2009), I noticed that http://www.findagrave.com/ hit 40 million entries. The day before, it was at 39 million, I sure would have loved seeing the number change." Earlier this month (Dec. 18, 2010), I posted to facebook that Find-A-Grave has 55 million grave records now. Nice increase.

This month I only took one Historical Society photo, that being the Littleton Historical Society in Littleton, Massachusetts.  (Pictured below.)

Looking Back

It was quite a surprise to be in the Top 100 Genealogy Blog list from MyHeritage.com.  I must admit, it was nice, but now on to other things.

I received an Ancestors Approved Award from Lisa who writes Old Stones Undeciphered.  Thank you Lisa. When I read her 1920s Beeville, Texas: Shades of the Ku Klux Klan I really woke up at 5:45 AM on a Sunday morning. I know I should be talking about the article, but I was delighted that she had photos of Beeville, Texas. I made many trips to the NARA to use the microfilm to locate a family from there and that memory is very vivid. Why did they move from Michigan to Beeville, Texas, I've often wondered.

Another email came from Brenda of Journey to the Past who wrote, "Do you have gravesite photos? This (West Leroy) cemetery is about 3 miles from where I live." Subsequent emails brought additional information and about 19 photos!  She also drew a detailed map of the cemetery and indicated where my different direct line families were buried! Brenda has helped me in the past in locating a newspaper article about Yates Adams, and his murder / suicide.  She may help me with obituaries too.

Lester "Les" Larrabee of Bits and Pieces sent me an email with an attachment of a Barnes tombstone. In his note, he mentioned that I didn't have that name in my Surname Saturday for the Barnes name listed that week. Lester knows I have a lot of Barnes, and that is why he sent the photo.  I now have this person entered into my database, and Les gave me permission to put the picture on Find-A-Grave.

Joyce, a friend of mine who took the same Family Tree Maker class with me over four years ago knows a number of my surnames. She wrote about her ancestor, then said, "They were married in St. Armand, Quebec, Canada on February 22, 1813 and the 2 witnesses to the marriage were Abigail's father, Benjamin JOY and a AQUILA KNAP."  She was right, I have that Aquila Knap in my tree. My ancestor and hers knew each other in 1813, pretty amazing.

Thank you to MyHeritage.com for the Award

On May 12th I received a huge surprise, that of being listed in MyHeritage.coms Top 100 Genealogy Sites for 2010. The news came early in the day, and I spent the entire day in shock. Every blog I’ve written has come easily, but this one is difficult. I am not an award type person, not competitive and haven't accepted any of the 23 awards I've received in the past from fellow bloggers. That being said, I would be a poor sport for not accepting this one, so from the bottom of my heart, I thank you. Somebody was kind enough to suggest my Life From the Roots, and through their voting, I was selected to be among the 99 others, many of whom I already follow and feel as though I know personally.

Please visit MyHeritage.com, the home page for the company, and the quick link to the list to the blogs at MyHeritage.coms Top 100 Genealogy Sites. In their letter to me, they stated the following: “Our expert judging panel has set three criteria:

1) high quality content;
2) originality in topic choice, approach and design; and
3) frequently updated content.”

"Ancestor Approved Award" -- Thank You Ten Times

For the past several months, my "Looking Back" post on the last day of the month, had a public thank you to those who decided I should be given an award. The current "Ancestor Approved Award" was given to me by 10 people. I am beyond shock, especially since I decided from the very beginning that I wouldn't accept them. It is just the way I am. I love each and every blog. If anybody would like this award, please be my guest.

However, I gladly want to show my appreciation here by naming the wonderful bloggers who thought my blog was worthy of receiving this award.

Brenda at Journey to the Past

Cyndi aka Texicanwife at Mountain Genealogists

Deborah at The Sum of All My Research 

Lindalee at Flipside

Frances aka Hummer at Branching Out Through the Years

Heather at Nutfield Genealogy

Travis at TJLGenes: Preserving Our Family History

Kathleen at a3genealogy

Betty at Betty's Boneyard Genealogy Blog

Theresa at Tangled Trees

Looking Back

There is good news and not so good.  First, The Happy 101 Award was given to me by the following six people. Thank you to each of you.  Please visit these blogs and then follow them, if you don't already. Each is among the very best.

Bill West at West in New England
Dr. Bill Smith at Dr. Bill Tells Ancestor Stories
Amanda Acquard at A Tale of Two Ancestors
Jenna Mills at Desperately Seeking Surnames
Heather Rojo at  Nutfield Genealogy
Travis LeMaster at TJLGenes: Preserving Our Family History

When Randy Seaver mentioned John Newmark's blog at Transylvanian Dutch on January 15th, I decided to read a few of his blogs before deciding to follow him.  In one post, he had a newspaper article from St. Louis dated 1917.  That is the same city and year that my great-grandfather, Yates Adams was either murdered or committed suicide of which I wrote about in the Monday Madness- A Suicide or a Murder blog.  Right after I posted my blog, Apple of Apple's Tree wrote a comment, "I would look to see if there are any St Louis papers you can access online. An account written where the death occurred may have more information."  Well, it took 11 years for me to try and solve this, so I got the nerve to write John Newmark personally and inquired if he had any suggestions for me.  (Ha, did he ever.) I told him about my ancestor's death in 1917 in St. Louis, exactly the same location and year that his blog pertained to. After hitting send, I went and got a drink, came back and there was a pdf of a newspaper article about my great-grandfather's death.  11 years vs. 17 minutes, what can I say?  But...that information contained some differing information from my original newspaper article.  Now I am trying to find yet a third newspaper article from Battle Creek, Michigan.  Thanks Apple for your comment and John for the newspaper article.

Heather Rojo of Nutfield Genealogy and I are  distant cousins through the Balch line. Also, Midge Frazel at Granite in my Blood and I seem to share quite a few surnames from Connecticut.

Bill West of West in New England and Gini Webb of Ginisology  spent quite a bit of time helping me with two different problems.  Bill tried to find the book, The Culture Club, about the Boston Athenaeum. We couldn't find it around here, so Bill, I finally ordered it from Amazon. Gini helped me for a long time assisting me in trying to post my blog to fb.  I still haven't been able to do it.  But on Jan. 29th, David Allen Lambert of NEHGS posted one for me, and I was pretty happy and very surprised.  That was the day before the big story about the relationship between President Obama and Scott Brown (new MA senator) appeared in the news, of which David was one of the two researchers.

I was in a genealogy mode this past week.  Went to the New England Historic Genealogical Society Library (NEHGS) this week and had a nice long talk with David Dearborn, librarian and then I called Eric Grundset, librarian at the DAR in Washington.  Neither blogs or are on face book.  And, both men were at the same ALA meeting this month as our own Amanda Acquard, of A Tale of Two Ancestors!

Thanks go to Apple for mentioning my blog articles about Cemetery Research in her Weekly Rewind post. It was nice being listed with Steve Danko's blog, as he is a pal of four years.

Now the sad news.  Another suggestion from Apple at Apple's Tree pertained to a November blog in which I mentioned I had donated a very large DAR membership certificate belonging to my ancestor, dated 1901. She suggested I contact the DAR. At long last, I made the call and spoke with the archivist, and we corresponded 10 times!  One of the last things she wrote was, "The other certificate from you that I came across in the accession records was number 90-275, a certificate given to those who attended the NSDAR Centennial dinner." At least I now know...it is missing!

Looking Back

First I want to publically thank the seven people who awarded me the Kreativ Blogger Award, their first names and blog sites are below.  Please check them out.
Gini at http://ginisology.blogspot.com/
Sharon at http://kindredfootprints.blogspot.com/
Jenna at http://desperatelyseekingsurnames.blogspot.com/
Bill at http://westinnewengland.blogspot.com/
Earline at http://ancestralnotes.ebradt.org/
Hummer at http://branchingoutthroughtheyears.blogspot.com/
Dru at http://findyourfolks.blogspot.com/

The first six of the above names are new friends, I didn't know them prior to October.   The awards came via a commet to my site, or email.  I am not sure if the senders ever read my replies, so I am doing it publically here.  When each award was given, I was really shocked, and didn't know what to do.  So I did what comes naturally, I declined for several reasons.  First, I am hoping to have clean and clutter free blog, and second, I don't want to be in the position of awarding it to others, as there are so many good Blogs out there.  Each and everyone is deserving, we are all spending lots of time on them, both in the thinking, typing and editing phases of their creation.  I don't think I will ever single out a blog as being one of the best, as I already like many.


Sometimes, I feel like I am living in the editing phase.  There hasn't been a single blog that, even tho I use the Preview option, I haven't had to go back to change something.  Yesterday's blog was set in error for 12/29/09 because I was working on December blogs, and did the entire month.  But, in reality, I wanted the cemetery article shown for yesterday, Nov. 29.  I began to wonder where it was on the dashboard.  A quick check showed it was set for December 29!


This new time-consuming part of my life has forced me to be a bit more organized and plan ahead about the subject matter.  I think that yesterday's blog is a good example.  I decided when I posted my cemetery list, (see November 18, 2009, Cemetery List in Google Spreadsheet) that I would scan and enter all those photos into http://www.findagrave.com/ in the order of that cemetery list. I was going to post some Bishop photos for Tuesday, then in going through my stuff, found the plot information, cemetery map and my old photo from 1981.  That did it, I had my article, and decided it was good for a Sunday read.


Thank you too to the people who have helped me:  Gini and Dru for recent help and Cheryl for her early encouragement.  Apple sent me a detailed explanation of how to make my links smaller (I am still having problems, but maybe it due to our different programs).  I appreciate you all.


And a special thank you to Les, who quickly emailed me after my yesterday blog of Nov. 29th appeared.  He said he would go three miles to the cemetery to take pictures for me.  Within hours, I had new pictures of the monument with the names of my grandparents, great grandparents, gg grandparents and ggg grandparents!


I hope to make this Looking Back segment a monthy piece, and will cover just a few things, mostly follow-ups during the current month.