Posts Tagged ‘Grandparent’
Thank you to Jennifer Shoer for her second guest post for kids! If you missed Part I, you can still read it here.
Turn the Camera on Your Parents and Grandparents – Video for Family History – Part 2
The holidays are right around the corner. No matter what holiday you will be celebrating, I bet you will be spending time with your family. Sometimes it seems boring to spend time with older people, but when was the last time you sat down and asked them questions about their lives…what they love, what they remember and what it feels like to be X years old?
In my last post I told you about my grandfather, Bubba, who was an amazing family historian. He recorded the details of our lives in both photos and movie film. Bubba died twelve years ago. I will always remember how many years it has been because my youngest son was born the same year. Bubba did get to hold him, make a wish (Do all families make wishes on new babies?) and call him the ugliest baby in the family (the newest was always the ugliest).
I like knowing that Bubba lived to hold all of my babies and I love looking at pictures of him, but do you know what I really wish? I wish I had taken movies (or videos as they are known today). I wish I could hear his voice and his chuckle. He told my sister and me so many stories. I tell my kids the ones I can remember, but how much cooler would it be if they could hear his stories and his chuckle as if he was sitting in the room. Some people might find that creepy and it might have been hard to watch the videos soon after he died, but now twelve years later I would love to hear and see him tell one of his stories again.
Turn the Camera on Your Parents and Grandparents
When you get together with your parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents over the holidays, do me a favor and turn the camera on your parents and grandparents. Borrow a video camera or whip out your smart phone and ask one of them (or the eldest) to sit down with you. Tell them you want to learn more about them and their lives and that you would like to create a video of your conversation.
Create a Video for Family History
- Make a list of questions before the interview or look at websites for questions:
http://genealogy.about.com/cs/oralhistory/a/interview.htm
http://articles.scrapbooking.com/family_history.htm
- Be sure your video camera is fully charged and that you have extra batteries or a charger.
- Ask as many or as few questions as you would like. There are no rules! This is your interview.
- Prop the camera up so that your hands are free and so that your subject does not get distracted by it.
- Let your subject talk without interrupting him or her. If you think of something to ask while they are talking, write it down and then ask it when they finish.
- Thank them for their time and for sharing their stories with you!
- Upload the video to your computer and share it with your family members. Burn copies to DVD or flash drives.
I hope you get a chance to make a video soon.
Happy Holidays!
Scrappy Gen
Let’s Remember!
Photo credits: Jennifer Shoer’s personal collection. Used with permission.
Want to know more about Jennifer? You can find her at the Scrappy Genealogist blog or on Twitter @ScrappyGen. Thank you Jennifer!!
This continues a series of guest posts from my friends around the blogosphere who can offer specialized tips for kids.
Lorel Kapke on using Sort Your Story
Finding your grandparents name listed in a document can be very exciting, not just for you but for your parents as well. My dad Raymond Kapke, was 5 years old when his father Walter Kapke died and he new little of his fathers life. He took the train from Milwaukee to Cedarburg, WI to visit his grandparents, John Kapke and Mother Marie Nero but they passed away when Ray was 7 and 8 years old. Ruby Toll, Walter’s wife, was left to raise Ray and his three older brothers, this left little time to discuss their family history. Ruby and her mother Bertha Gilbert ran a boarding house and while cooking and baking they would talk about family with little Ray under foot, this was during the 1930’ and 1940’s, during troubled times.
So back to finding those documents and forming a picture of your family as you put the pieces of your puzzle together.
I went into Ancestry.com and entered my grandfathers SURNAME (last name) and First name and found my grandfather in the 1920 Census. Walter was listed with Ruby and dad’s older brothers but my father would have to wait until the 1930’s census as he was born in 1923. Each Census offers different data and 1920 Census offered this information.
I transcribed and placed this valuable information into the Sort Your Story Profiler and included thumbnails of both the 1920 Census and the Ancestry.com 1920 Template Census for reference.
Now it is time to print out this data and add to the KAPKE PROFILER BOOK!
I’ve acquired valuable information to continue the search for more information about my grandfather.
Walter A KAPKE.
Have you found a Census of your grandparent???
Thank you Lorel for sharing your story about Walter Kapke!
Today I have an another activity for you. Let’s break down your family. Write a story about your mom, dad, aunt, uncle, grandma and grandpa that includes the following information:
Their name
Date of birth
Place of birth
How big they were at birth – both in length and weight?
What color are their eyes and hair?
Where did they live when they were born? Who lived with them?
What is your father’s full name? What is his date of birth?
What is your mother’s full name? What is her date of birth?
Name all your aunts and uncles and write down their dates of birth.
Did your family attend church? Which one? Did they have any special roles in the church?
Where did your parents or grandparents go to school? Who were their teachers? What were their favorite subjects?
Have they achieved anything? Won a contest? Received an award for something?
What hobbies do they have?
Did they play any sports?
Who were their best friends? What did they like to do together? Where did they hang out?
Make a timeline of important events in their lives.
Add important historical events to that timeline.
Ask them how much things were when they were growing up.
Save your responses in your notebook. Check back next week for a guide to write about your parents and grandparents.
When you are first starting your genealogy research you will come across many different relationship terms. But what do they all mean? Here is a breakdown.
Siblings: This means two people have parents in common. So brothers and sisters are siblings.
First Cousin: This is your mom or dad’s brother’s (or sister’s) child.
Second Cousin: This is your grandma or grandpa’s child.
Third Cousin: This is your great grandma or great grandpa’s child.
Grandnephew or Grandniece: This means a grandchild of your brother or sister.
Grandaunt or Granduncle: This means a sister or brother of your grandparents.
Lineal relationships: Those people in a “direct” line in your family tree. This can go up (ascending) from you to your parents and grandparents or down (descending) from your great grandparents to your grandparents to your parents to you.
Collateral relationships: Family members linked by a common ancestor in your family tree. This could be a cousin, aunt or uncle.
My friend Terri at Finding Our Ancestors blog asked me why someone would get a marriage license in Chicago and go to Kewanee, Illinois to get married. That is a good question and one I have wondered as my grandparents appeared to have done the same thing!
I have two documents for my grandparents, Joseph Holik and Libbie Brouk. One is a Marriage License issued 19 April 1930 in Chicago. States they married on the same day. The second document was given to me recently by my father and is a fancy Certificate of Marriage for Joseph Holik and Libbie Brouk. Glancing over the document I can see it was signed by a Judge of the Circuit Court of Kewanee, IL named H. Sterling Pomeroy.
So they married in Kewanee? Why on earth in 1930 would they drive from Chicago to Kewanee to get married?
They didn’t. Let’s break this down and look at the clues.
As Terri and I found, looking more closely at our documents, they were indeed married in the County Building in the city of Chicago. The address given is 226 County Building, Chicago, IL.
They were married by a Judge from Kewanee, IL, who spent time serving in the Cook County Courts. Both documents say Chicago, IL as the marriage place. On the license, his name is stamped as the name of the officiant. On the Certificate of Marriage he signed his name and stamped “Judge of the City Court of Kewanee, IL.”
The Certificate of Marriage was even signed by the witnesses, my Great uncle Ladislav Brouk and Great uncle John J. Holik, Jr. Signatures are nice to have to compare documents.
When you break down a document for the first, second, or even third time, pull out all the clues and make sure you are reading things in the context in which they were intended. Why would you break down a document more than once? Sometimes you think you pulled all the details out but when you go back to it later, after more research is done, you may see something you “missed” before. Something that didn’t mean anything to you at the time. I find reviewing documents for an individual after more research is done sometimes sparks a new research idea or shows me a clue that now has greater meaning.
Upon first glance at both of these documents you think my grandparents drove to Kewanee to get married. Breaking down the details you find out that was not the case.
