Heartland Genealogy

Do you ever look at other trees on Ancestry? I know I do. I use them for hints. I also attach them as 'sources' so that I can get back to trees that match my ancestors. However, I try not to add 'new people' from those trees to my tree. I also try to add additional sources to support the information in my tree. Some of those sources are obtained thru Ancestry and the hinting system. However, some of my sources come from outside of Ancestry. Thus, when you search Ancestry's Public Member Trees for someone in my tree, the number of sources attached to the individual will be shown.

Do you have older source citations in your tree that your high school English teacher would yell at you about? Do you have source citations in your tree that even you can't use to locate the information? I don't know about you, but I have such sources in my tree. As I'm reviewing my Crawford research, I'm finding those source citations. Most of these HORRIBLE citations came from my early days of research when citation standards were just being developed.

189 141 Examined & Sent May 22d 1815 James Madison, President of the United States of America To all to whom these presents shall come, Greeting: Know Ye, that William B Guthrie of Clark County Ind. Territory

As discussed in my recent post, Duplicate or Different , I followed up on a 'notice of change' message to discover two Eliza Van Valkenbergs on Family Search. By looking at the differences between the two women, I discovered some clues that led to more information in Eliza. One of those clues was the differing death dates for Eliza. In one case, the death date was given as between 1920 and 1930. I'm sure this was due to not finding Eliza in records. The other Eliza had a death date of 1943 listed. Knowing that Eliza had been married several times, I suspected that a different surname was contributing to the difficulty in finding records. When I searched Newspapers.com for the term Eliza in 1943 in St. Joseph, Missouri, I found a notice of her death.

Anderson, Rebecca, d/o John Anderson, native of NY and Anne Irvine, was born at Augusta Parish, VA , m. 1st R. John Maxwell, 2nd James Crawford, located in Jeff. Co. IN prior to 1830 rawford, Mary (Polly) d/o James and Rebecca Anderson Crawford, b. in Garrard Co. KY May 28, 1786, m. William Brown Guthrie, Apr. 6, 1809; came to Jeff. Co. soon after marriage; had 11 children. She d. July 18, 1834 and she and her husband are buried at Hanover. Her husband was called to fight Indians in 1812 and she walked 12 miles carrying her baby, Anderson Crawford Guthrie, who was born Apr. 22, 1811 and her companion, a boy age 12, carried an older child, James Guthrie. They walked to the block house near the Francisco farm. Her ancestors served in the Rev. War. Crawford, Betsey, d/o James & Rebecca A. Crawford, b. in 1792, m. in Mar, 1812 to Beverly Vawter of Woodford Co. KY, a minister of the Christian Ch. Source: Melish Mrs. Charles, Pioneer Women (www.jeffersoncountylocalhistory.o...

Bureau of Land Management Patent No 1153 The United States of America To all to whome these presents shall come, Greeting Whereas William B Guthrie of Jefferson County, Indiana has deposited in the General Land Office of the United States, a certificate of the Register of the Land Office at Terre Haute State of Indiana whereby it appears that full payment has been made by the said William B Guthrie according to the provisions of the Act of Congress of the 24th of April, 1820, entitle “An act making further provision for the sale of the Public Lands,” for

142 Certificate No. 1152 Exc The United States of America To all to whom these presents shall come, Greeting: Whereas William B. Guthrie of Jefferson County, Indiana has deposited in the General Land office of the United States, a certificate of the Register of the Land Office at Terre Haute, State of Indiana whereby it appears that full payment has been made by the said William B Guthrie according to the provisions of the Act of Congress of the 24th of April, 1820, entitled “An act making further provision for the sale of the Public Lands,” for The East fraction of the South West quarter of section thirty one in Township nineteen North of Range three West in the District of Terre Haute and State of Indiana containing eighty acres.