Ezra Peter Koontz, my great-great grandfather, did more that patent a rocking chair (see prior post). As indicated in the above advertisement for his furniture and bedding store in Ligonier, Indiana, he was a cabinet maker by trade. Once in a while, it became necessary to address the practical needs of the times. So, on May 15, 1888, E. P. Koontz took out a patent for an implement for exterminating rodents:
Based on the drawings for this device, Grandfather Koontz had a real dislike for rodents of all kinds. One good whack and it would be a goner. In the text, it is called out to help eradicate moles. Was my great-great grandfather the true inventor of Whack-a-Mole? Where are the family royalties?
Not only did Great-great Grandfather Ezra Peter Koontz sit in a rocking chair, he invented one! Below are the drawings and patent document for that chair.
After completion of Diahan Southerd’s mtDNA for Genealogy Course, I was hooked on getting a better understanding of the areas in which I appear to be most interested. Therefore, I have set up a study program using the following texts:
Mastering Genealogical Proof – Thomas W Jones
Mastering Genealogicial Documentation – Thomas W Jones
Genealogy and the Law – Kay Haviland Freilich and William B Freilich
Professional Genealogy – Various contributors, Elizabeth Shown Mills,ed.
Advanced Genetic Genealogy – Debbie Parker Wayne
Setting aside time to either learn something new or to reinforce what I have learned in the past is very fulfilling. I am learning why I do things that I just thought made sense and with the knowing the “why”, things make even more sense.
Unfortunately, or fortunately, as I learn some new tool or technique, I tend to want to put it to use to firm up my understanding. This has been the result of going through the text on Genetic Genealogy and having the concept of Genetic Triangulation explained as to what it is and how to use the results. Of course, this has also led to a new project of determining the meaning of the triangulations.
Just to keep those shiny objects in sight, Ancestry has just released new ethnicity estimates, MyHeritage is now offering full genome analysis, and 23andMe is back in business with a better business plan and new ethnicity and health reports. There is now annual subscriptions attached to the testing which was one of the problems in the prior incarnation – one just bought a kit and that was the end of the income for the company. Development in Genetic Genalogy is complex and expensive. So, I am re-upping on 23andMe with a new test kit and I am getting a new MyHeritage DNA kit since the full genome analysis will only be done on submissions going forward, not on previous tests. Luckily MH is having a sale and it is only $36 to get a new test kit.
Now, I need to close off and get going to Book Club where we are discussing Lineage by Karin Wulf. It was a slow read, but Karin gives a very in depth picture of how and why genealogy evolved in the 17th and 18th centuries. Coverage of social customs figure greatly as background.
Well, that is the title of a new presentation in the works. I have noticed that a number of my ancestral lines just start or just end. Some of my genealogy colleagues call this a brick wall. I, on the other hand, am speculating that they were either dropped as UFO babies or were just beamed up to a ship.
No, I am not serious, but I like to have fun in the creation of a presentation — and hope the fun is transferred on to my audience. If you are not having fun while doing your genealogy research, why are you doing it?
Anyway, today I am starting a specific search for my great-great-great grandfather who was apparently dropped from a space ship around 1812 in rural Pennsylvania:
Robert Allen, my GGG Grandfather, was born on 8 May 1812 in Pennsylvania. On 3 June 1834, he married Mary Miller, the daughter of Fredrick Miller and Mary Fausler Miller, in Stark County, Ohio. By profession, Robert was a blacksmith. The couple were the parents of nine (9) children:
William H., born 22 December 1834, in Tuscarora County, Ohio
Mary Ann, born 15 June 1836, in Stark County, Ohio
Rebecca, born 24 August 1838, in Ohio
Levi, born 20 August 1840, in Stark County, Ohio
Mahala, born 4 March 1843, in Stark County, Ohio
Haman, born 9 November 1845, in Stark County, Ohio
David, born 26 August 1849, in Merkle, Huntington County, Indiana
Alfred, born 8 November 1852, in Merkle, Huntington County, Indiana
Eutera Elura, born 29 Aug 1856, in Merkle, Huntington County, Indiana
Robert died 11 March 1857, in Merle, Huntington County, Indiana.
The only record of his date of birth appears to be an entry on Find a Grave that also, claims the following as his headstone:
Which reads Robert husband of Mary Allen Died Mar 11, 1857 Aged 44y.10m.3d
Date calculation of 44 years, 10 months and 3 days before March 11, 1857 provides the birth date of May 8, 1812.
The 1812 birth date is supported by the entry in the 1850 US Population Census which records the family in Huntington, Indiana, and head, Robert, a blacksmith, at age 38.
On 20 June 1854, Robert was appointed Postmaster in Markle. On 23 June 1855, Benjamin F Miley was appointed to the position. Since the listing appears to have a new Postmaster every year, there is nothing I am reading into Robert’s short tenure.
In the 1860 US Population Census, Mary is listed as the head of the household and widowed.
So, that still leaves me with finding proof of Robert’s Pennsylvania birth in 1812.
I am making slow progress through Diahan Southard’s mtDNA for Genealogy Course. I have finally gotten to the point where I have identified the matches provided for my mitochodrial DNA and have filtered out that are not the best use of my time to delve deaper into possible connections. Thank you #YourDNAGuide #DiahanSouthard for making this process easy to understand and for the explanations of which of the matches I can filter out and which ones I should explore.
I find that I really have no comlete match. The farthest I can guarantee to find out Most Recent Common Ancestor is 200 CE. This is really a lot closer that the 3550 BCE that I can establish just by haplogroup T2f8a when the mitotree was ewxpanded and shifted me into T2f8a1. Now to hope someone tests and falls into the F1341220 haplotype. (cool dropping of DNA terms!).
But, I do have 8 matches to the T2f8a1 level that have posted family tree pedigree charts that go back more than one generation and are not all tagged PRIVATE!
I still have a bit more work in the class that will give me better insight on how to make use of the 8 matches I have isolated. At the same time, I am periodically checkng for new matches on my account – now that I have an idea of what to do with them.
I am slowly, very slowly, working my way through Diahan Southard’s online class on mitochondrial DNA. Finally, through my own fault, I am in the midst of lesson 2. Diahan has given a “light bulb goes on” explanation of the haplogroup and its association with each mutation from the RSCS standard. My T2f8a1 haplogroup reflects the mutations within my maternal line over time and locations. Each of my mutations is part of the reasons I appear on a separate branch of the tree.
T – c 13,000 BCE
T2 – c 9350 BCE
T2f – c 4000 BCE
T2f8 – c 3750 BCE
T2f8a – c 3550 BCE
T2f8a1 – c 250 CE
These mutations all appear to have taken place in Europe, with the exception of T which is thought to have originated in Egypt.
With a better understanding of the meaning behind this tool, I am looking forward to undstanding the use, if any, in trying to expand my pedigree beyond ggggm, Phebe Curry, who is a dead end.
Into a rabbit hole, that is. I have been getting a slog of articles on DNA – mitochondrial DNA to be specific. These are being written by a number of my most respected authors – Roberta Estes (#RobertaEstes #DNAeXplained ), Katy Rowe-Schurwanz (#KatyRoweSchurwanz ), and Diahan Southard (#DiahanSouthard #YourDNAGuide ).
For the most part these articles all centered around the expanded aide offered by FamilyTreeDNA (familytreedna.com) on the mtDNA tests. AND, there is a recent expansion of the Haplotree which expanded my Haplogroup, T2f8a into a sub-clade T2f8a1 (still beta). Big whoop, right? Well, not really.
This analysis took T2f8a from having a potential Haplogroup match that does not meet up until 3550 BCE to T2f8a1 with a stake in the ground at 200 CE — that is a jump of 3370 years earlier! In addition, the new classification also assigned Haplotypes – a smaller classification that signifies a full match, no mutations, to a single haplogroup test result. These appear in the mapping of my matches. Unfortunately, Mom was right, I am unique with Haplotype F1341220. But now when I find a haplotype match, I can have a better clue of how far back I need to look to find that elusive MRCA.
Why am I devoting time to this? My great-great-grandmother, Phebe Curry (1802-1864) is one of my Brick Walls. She is also my furthest back known source of my mtDNA – direct mother to daughter line through the generations to Mom to me. I have tried to track down all of Phebe’s descendants that could possibly also carry the same mtDNA (wiping out all of the males and their descendants is helping to limit the scope).
There is so much information to absorb and try to figure out how to make use of it all. I have to admit doing this would have been a lot easier at 45, maybe 55, but at 75 it is a slow process.
I have started taking Diahan Southard’s class on mtDNA for Genealogists #yourdnaguide . So far, it is really helping fit the pieces together, but I am taking it slow and checking and double checking my understanding and relating it to my mtDNA results on FamilyTreeDNA(that being 75 thing). I just finished Lesson 1 (over a month, Diahan sent a congrats on finishing Lesson 1, now on to #2, which was a whole lot nicer than “so you finished it, what is taking so long?” that I deserved.
It is true, the dumpster was filled with thousands of pages of paper records that I have digitized and I was very proud of the space I created in my office. Then I looked around and found I have a significant number of notebooks on my shelves. 67 to be exact.
I decided it was time to review the contents of those notebooks and make sure:
I still needed to keep the information
I did not also have the same information in another notebook
I could find the information if I needed it.
So, being a bit-nerd at heart, I created a database that includes each of the notebooks and the major tabs that define what is in each. In the 67 notebooks, there are 621 tabbed topics.
I have set the database up to inquire into the topics with a wildcard query across all notebooks to answer the question – “Where did I put that?” I can now find the data that I, well as of today, felt was important enough to keep for future reference.
There are a number of the topic fields that I might go back and itemize the detail contents. Again, I am a bit-nerd, so I set the database as relational and can create all kinds of sub-groupings when the mood strikes.
Now back to finding the elusive, hiding, ancestral lines.
As I was discussing in the previous blog, I have been trying to get the mess reference materials down to a size that I would be able to manage and would be able to locate when I needed and item. There were about 300 CDs in 6 containers, holding 50 CDs each, that represented 730 various reference materials that I have amassed over the years. This was beyond the 8 shelf feet of notebooks with various citations. The notebooks are now gone (digitizing any items that I could not easily replicate). The CDs and their containers are now gone (all items including the ones that I somehow lost in the transfer) now reside on a 1 TB external disk drive.
With 8 shelf feet of space cleared, I was able to pull my complete set of Silver Books (Mayflower Families, Volumes 1-25) out of the closet and along with my Descendants of Governor Thomas Welles (6 volume set) and the tree volume set of Biographies of Original Members and Qualifying Officers Society of the Cincinnati in the State of Connecticut and store / display them there. Now that shelf happens to be 7 feet above the floor. I had the presence of mind to keep the index to the Welles volumes and the Index to the Silver Books on a lower-level shelf so I could just pull down one volume when I needed it.
A number of years ago, I created a Microsoft Access database to keep track of the contents of my Library. The library distinguishes between Books and Digital Books. I have just completed a full audit of the digital side of the house, now on to the Book side – it should be easier as there are only 277 of them!
This past week, I had to say goodbye to an old friend – my great grandparents’ clock. It had been ticking and keeping good time since the 1880s. Long ago, thankfully, it gave up the ability to chime. It had stopped working altogether in the 1940s and was religated to the basement of my grandparents’ home. In the early 1960s, my grandfather placed a small spray can cap inside the chamber with 3-in-1 oil and let the fumes rise. It started to tick. Grandpa was happy (it belonged to his parents); Grandma was not happy since it was in her bedroom. Finally, Grandma had enough and religated it to the “clothes press” (translation, closet). Having seen the clock when my brother and I were at our grandparents’, I asked what happened to it. Grandpa, asked if I wanted it. My answer was YES. So, I took ownership of the family heirloom in the mid-1960s. It went with me to my apartment in college. It has been in my home ever since.
Last week, it stopped. It would run for an hour and stop. It was fully wound up and I have kept oil in the chamber. Maybe after about 150 years it was time to let it go. As you can see, there is damage to the base (it was like that when I got it) so, other than emotional value, there was none. My wife reminded me of all the things that did not work or had no use that each of our parents had when we had to clean our their homes. That resonated with me. Time to break the “oh, I cannot throw that out” concept. A number of years (decades) ago, I took it in to see if it could be repaired (to activate the chime). The price then was astronomical. It was time to let it go.
The concept of too much stuff that would be left for someone else to dispose really hit me. I have downloaded a number (450+) of digital books that I have used at various times in my genealogical research. They were all on CDs. As of today, they are all on a 1TB disc drive and the CDs and their cases are gone. Now all anyone had to do is hit delete on the main directory and they will have a clean 1TB external drive. [And, yes, there is still room for more]. So now I am updating my database with a full library system that tracks the digital books and where they can be found. As part of this, I am finding I have some in more than one directory, so I am also cleaning that up.
As a side benefit of all of this, I am only maintaining minimal paper copies of evidence — things are scanned and attached with full citations to my family database and I have a directory of where the images exist outside of the database. The space that used to contain all of the notebooks (14 3″ binders) opened up and I could pull some of the volumes I had stored away and put them on a shelf (like the full 24 volumes of Mayflower Families. They are up on the shelf near the ceiling, but I did buy the three volume index and keep it at a more convienent level.
So, when the time comes, a big donation to a library of the over 250 books I have purchased over the year is the task I am leaving instead of filling dumpster after dumpster (we filled 3 when we cleaned out my parents’ house)
A Tree Grew in Oakland 