The very first thing I did with genealogy was search for my father's mother -- Ruth Henrietta Scovill. I had no idea who she was, where she was from. I had no idea HOW to search, how to use a census, how to diagnose information. I was just clueless.
Now, I don't know how I did it, but one day, after work I was inspired to visit the Mormon church over in Fort Myers. No, I'm not a Mormon -- I'm a Luthern -- but I heard they had a lot of genealogy stuff and I figured if since their library was in their church that maybe they would be nice and maybe bump me in the right direction.
There was a man and a woman in about a 1000 square feet of space. I would find out later that they were volunteers. And that it was always volunteers who ran the library. I introduced myself, pulled out my dozen sheets of scribble family tree and told them I really wanted to find my grandmother, Ruth Henrietta Scovill who married a Don Dee Drake.
Now let me add here that this wasn't like a typical library where someone walked around shushing anyone who spoke above a whisper. There were people in this library who were talking about researching and discussing various methods of research and where would be a good place to look next.
I was pretty uncomfortable. I kept waiting for them to ask me for my Mormon card and when they found out that I wasn't a Mormon, they would toss me out. But that didn't happen. The gentlemen who helped me suggested that because there were so many ways to spell Scovill that perhaps I should do a Soundex search. I know. What? We'll get into a Soundex search later, but just let it be enough right now for me to say, the gentleman showed me how to do it. He then said that it would cost $3.00 for The Church of the Latter Day Saints to send me this reel of microfilm. $3.00. That was it. We'll, I didn't have a machine to read the microfilm. The man looked it me like I was mad. "You can use one of ours," he said. Duh! Well, I had to tell him. "I'm not a Mormon," I whispered. "It doesn't matter," he whispered back. Mmmmmm. Yeah, we'll see about that.
Okay. Soundex. According to Wikipedia, Soundex "is a phonetic algorithm for indexing names by sound as pronounced in English."
So I gave him $3.00 and filled out a little paper work. He told me that they would let me know when the microfilm came in. He also encouraged me to look around and brought me a couple of books that I might be interested in.
Less than a week later, I got a postcard from the Family History Center that told me my microfilm was in. It made me crazy because it was almost a week before I was able to get back over the river to check it out.
A different volunteer couple was working in there, but the man took my postcard, retrieved the roll of microfilm, beckoned me to follow him into a room filled with all kind of mechanical devices. He strung the film onto the machine, showed me how to work it, showed me how to take a picture of the image if I found it. He wished me good luck then flipped the light switch. I sat in the dark room, slowly winding me way through Scovills, Scovilles, Schovilles, Skovils and on and on. And there it was.
Ruth H. Scovill. My grandmother. The gran I never knew. The gran that died young. The gran who birthed 3 wild and crazy children that all died before the age of 40. Her father was William H Scovill. And her mother was Martha Scovill. MARTHA. My name. Ruth had eventually named her only daughter Martha. In turn, my dad had named HIS only daughter Martha. I sat there and cried like a baby. Not just little tears oozing out the corner of my eyes. But great, heaving sobs. Smearing mascara, and lots of snot.
About an hour later, I handed the reel back to the volunteer, keeping my chin tucked so he couldn't see the mess I was. He smiled at me and said, "That happens to all of us."
I sat out in my truck and wondered what the hell had just happened. And, I'll tell you, that wasn't the last time I cried like a baby over finding another family member. It's what I do.
Right now I am wading through a tome called A Survey of the Scovils or Scovilles in England and America: Seven Hundred Years of History and Genealogy by Homer Worthington Brainard. And -- here's a link where you can get it FOR FREE -- http://books.google.com/books/about/A_Survey_of_the_Scovils_Or_Scovills_in_E.html?id=Qe4UAAAAYAAJ
I'm warning you -- it's over a 1000 pages. Personally, I find it fascinating and so far have resisted jumping to the end to find my family. It is magnificent. But, I must caution all you new genealogist, just because it is in a book doesn't necessarily mean that all the information is true.
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