James Lardner: Excerpts from....

Excerpts from, Pioneer tales of the Oregon trail and of Jefferson County by Charles Dawson (1912)
LINK

Obituary of Thomas Raymond (Ray) Wiggins

Sometimes obituaries really just make me depressed...

The attached story to this particular obituary fills up the majority of the The Fairbury Journal's front page and a portion of page 8.  Below is the actual, "offiical" obituary that was placed at he end of story about the search for the bodies of my great grandfather and uncle.  

What wasn't reported at the time of their deaths was that my great grandmother was pregnant at the time.  Gr-Grandma Agnes (Lardner) Wiggins, after the death of her husband and youngest son, moved into town, began to work at a local department store, and proceed to put all seven of her remaining children through school on her own.

I really wish I could have met her, and my great grandfather and uncle.


N.B.  Ray Wiggins was married to Agnes Lardner, the daughter of James Lardner from County Clare, Ireland and Mary Ann Cashman, who was the daughter of William Cashman from County Cork, Ireland.

Obituary of Mrs. Mary King Costelloe

Obituaries for relatives are bittersweet things for me at times.

On one hand they can make me happy...they can make me smile and wish that I had known these individuals when they were living.  While on the other, they make me ache for those who had been left behind.

If you are related to this family please let me know.

All the Best,
Jessica

Note to self (and other's)....don't for get the basics!

Don't forget to the basic sources for ancestor information, such as death certificates and obituaries. *facepalm*

I'm finding that in my excitement over learning other details of my ancestor's lives that I've skipped over these valuable resources.

I always start with the smaller institutions first and then work my way up to the large historical societies and such for information...with exceptions for the various certificates that are held by the state only of course.

Check the local library, small historical societies and museums.  Sometimes these smaller locations might have built up 'family files' for those individuals whom they've had requests for or have fees that are less expensive than the larger statewide record holders.  Plus, they have a better idea of what resources are available for their area or where certain cemeteries or local history my be applicable to your research.

One thing to remember though, patience is a virtue.  These institutions are not genealogical centers only, they have other duties and are at times run by volunteers who are donating their time.

Be specific with your request.  Be patient waiting for results.  And donate to the cause where applicable!

All the Best,
Jessica

A Post About....

History and Genealogy Books Online

One thing I learned pretty quickly when I started out on my genealogical search was that there are actually a lot of older books that I have needed in my genealogical quest that have in fact been placed online and are FREE to read.

Some are downloadable in .PDF form... some require that you access them online... but they are there and they can save time, effort and money if you can read them before trying to access them through ILL, travel, etc. 

With that being said, two of my favorite sources come from Google Books and Archive.org.  Browse through their scanned materials and see if anything strikes your fancy!

I will be adding a page to the blog that lists those books that I've been helpful in my research.  It won't be specific to just Nebraska, but will encompass other states that I'm currently working in for my family research. (Page Link)

Please let me know if you have any additional suggestions or sources to add to the list!

All The Best,

Jessica

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General Archives:

Archive.org

Google Books

My Irish Family in Nebraska - The Starting Point

My Irish Family in Nebraska - The Starting Point

The starting point for my Irish ancestry is located in the southeast corner of Nebraska, specifically in the present day counties of Thayer and Jefferson.

(Original map can be found at Ancestry.com: Link)

Arriving in the state as early as 1869 by means of railroad work and the Nebraska Homestead Act of 1862, the Lardners, Cashmans, and Costelloes of my family line first settled themselves on the land surrounding the towns of Alexandria and Fairbury, Nebraska.

• James and Mary (Cashman) Lardner, first arrived in 1869 due to James' job with the Burlington Railroad in Ashland, Nebraska before moving on to Thayer County in 1870 and beginning their farm.  Mary's parents, William and Mary (née Cavanaugh) Cashman and their family arrived soon after, settling first in Saunders County in 1870 and then taking up a homestead in Jefferson County in 1872.

• John and Mary (King) Costelloe and their infant son first homesteaded in February of 1876 after following Mary's mother, Mary (King) King Cavanaugh and her step-father, Patrick Cavanaugh who arrived in the state in 1874.

For those families who took advantage of the 1862 Homestead Act, the paperwork that the families needed to file to gain ownership of the land that they were living on is now being scanned and uploaded online.  Working with the NARA in Washington, D.C, Fold3 (a website that is primarily geared towards accessing various military documents) is making the documents available to the public.

In order access the files you will need to be a paying member of the site.  However with that being said, I have found through my research that the cost is minimal, especially considering the number of family members I have that have participated in the program.  Instead of paying for individual searches through NARA or local offices, I paid a one time fee for year long access to ALL of their available records (this especially handy for all the military members of my tree!).

A description of their project can be found here: LINK

Currently they only have 57% of the available records scanned and posted online, but they continually add to the database.  So if you do not find your relatives in your first search, you may find them at a later time when more information has been added.

A list of the land offices that currently have documents already online can be seen here: LINK

In these records I have found naturalization information/documents, detailed descriptions of the homestead (house, crops, out builidings, etc), the number of people who were living on the farms, date of  a family's arrival/homestead on the land, and so on.

The files are great sources for genealogical material!

A word to the wise on searches in the Fold3 system... the search field will generally only search for whatever names you place in the blanks.  I have found it necessary to search, at times, the various possible misspellings of first/last names even with there 'sounds like' option.  So be patient and be creative.

If you have any suggestions for location land documentation or if you just feel like commenting.  Please feel free to leave a message.

All The Best,
Jessica

The Relatives You Never Knew You Had: A Short Tale of Two Brothers - John and Bartholomew Costello(e)

The Relatives You Never Knew You Had

One of the things I like most about researching my family genealogy is finding out about the relatives I never knew I had.  Those instances, where quite literally, one moment the only tie I have to a family is a name and then all of a sudden they have a siblings and/or parents.

These discoveries are in their own way both comforting and exciting to me because a lone person in one of my family branches quite an anomaly (especially when one considers that I come from a predominately German, British Isles and Scandinavian heritage). Big families are the norm.  

This was what happened in the case of my second great-grandfather, John Costelloe...

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In the course of trying to gather additional information on John Costelloe's birth and death, I had contacted the local library in Fairbury, Nebraska (its about 15 miles away from the family homestead near Alexandria) and the librarian there was able to find a transcribed funeral record for him.  

In just a few sentences I learned that his youngest daughter, Nora, had made the funeral arrangements, that John was from Co. Galway and that his parents were Ulic Costello and Winnifred Burke. AH HA!  Parents!  

I must admit, I think I may have made a little noise and did a little dance at that particular revelation.

Armed with the new names, I took to the internet. First I went Ancestry.com...where there were no immediate matches, but I really wasn't too surprised by that fact.  With some deliberate misspellings of the names, in any infinite number combinations, I was able to find Griffith's Valuation records for an Ulick Costelloe in Co. Galway, Killannin parish, Kilroe West dated to 1855.  Good news, at least I had some place to start.

Next, I went to one of my favorite search pages, FamilySearch.org.  Once again I imputed the names of Ulic and Winnifred and their variations, but this time I was able to search for them as parents of a unknown child and lo and behold, another name pops up: Bartholomew Costello of Newark, Ohio.

Could this Bartholomew be a relative of my John?  Turning to the record found on FS, I found that the site had a digital copy of Bartholomew's death certificate.

Listed on the certificate were his parents names: Ulic Costello and Winnefred Burke (Although the transcriber who recorded the information in the FS system confused the U in Ulick with a V), he was born in about 1842 in Co. Mayo, Ireland and died a widow in 1917.  The different county of birth concerned me, but the names of the parents were so similar it would be hard not to prove that Bartholomew and John weren't actually related in some manner.  

With Bartholomew's death date in hand, I went in search of an obituary because he died in 1917.  In one of the obituaries I found, there was mention of a brother named John Costello from Alexandria, Nebraska.  Ding! Ding! Ding!

Just like that, I had a new second great-uncle, and 3rd great-grandparents...and yet...

Ding! Ding! Ding! Another stop in the family tree with two names: Ulic and Winnifred, no dates, and two counties: Galway and Mayo. 

C'est la Vie in the world of genealogy.

Until Later,

Jessica

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Quick Summary of John Costelloe's Details:

According to family conversations, his funeral record and tombstone, John was born in Co. Galway around 1845 during the time of the 'Great Potato Famine'.  By the late 1860s, between the ages of 19-23, he had made his way to the United States.

In 1870, he declared his intent to naturalize in Harrison Co., West Virginia and in 1874 he married my second great-grandmother, Mary King in Westernport, Maryland before moving west to Nebraska and setting up a homestead in 1876.  

From that point on, he and his wife and their eleven children continued to live in Thayer Co., Nebraska, just south of Alexandria, Nebraska until his death in 1930.

Opening Salvo - Help Needed

Who, What, When, Where, Why and How

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My name is Jessica and I'm a genealogy addict.

I have a persistent...niggling...annoying problem...Irish townland/village/parish envy.  I don't know how to resolve it, but I'm willing to admit it and ask for help.

I mean, what else is a person to do when they begin to research an Irish ancestor and come to find out that all they have to go on is a name of a county?

The various searches that I have run on my family tree revealed rather quickly that the Irish branches come to a rather abrupt halt within a 5-10 year radius of a family's or person's arrival to the United States.  While at the same time, all the usual sources of vital statistics (birth and death records, obituaries, their children's life stories, etc.) provided only a basic level of information: the name of a counting in Ireland from which a person is reportedly from.

I had to had to ask myself, what else could I do to try and narrow their home locations down?

The only thing I could come up with after getting tired of chasing phantom databases/weblinks was to create a blog and hope that someone may be willing to offer some kind advice or information that might assist in the search.

And so, as I work through and post on various family members I will be including my search process, helpful links that I may find or even noting any technical difficulties that I may encounter in my quest.  If you have any suggestions, please feel free to comment or send me a message.

In return, I hope this blog will also help you too in your own genealogical pursuits.  Thank you in advance to anyone who may comment on this blog in the future.

All The Best,
Jessica