"Tracing Our Roots" Newsletter Archive (A monthly genealogy newsletter written by the late Brenda Kellow, dec'd, for the Plano Star Courier newspaper. We've included all the ones we could recover.)
1860 CENSUS INDEX IDENTIFIES MISSING FAMILY MEMBERS
by Brenda Kellow, B.A. (History), Certified Genealogist
Understanding what is inside a book, regardless of how scholarly the publication, is found in the Introduction or in the first pages of the publication. Often, this knowledge, if used properly, can unlock the mystery that all of us have in our quest to find our roots. The 1860 census index books by HeritageQuest is such a tome. Due to a generous donation by Genealogy Friends, most of the indexes for the southern states published by HeritageQuest have just hit the library shelves. In order for the users to understand it better, I have discussed several items that make this so valuable.
In the all new 1860 indexes, every head of household is listed, alphabetized by surname, then gives given name and any middle name or initial if applicable, age, and county in which that person resided. In addition to the head of household, it lists all people living in the home who have a different surname no matter the age of the individual. All people living in orphanages, hospitals, poorhouses, or other institutions is also listed. If a name was illegible, then a question mark is used. They added brackets to include information about the person such as occupation, title, illness, etc.
Hyphenated surnames such as MacKenzie-Kennedy, the name is alphabetized by the name before the hyphen. Ecclesiastical nuns, brothers, and sisters take on those names and are indexed such as Sister, Mary Catherine. This makes searching a snap.
It records the races with a symbol that represents white, black, mulatto, Indian, Hispanic, oriental, Chinese, Japanese, mixed race, or gives three dashes if the race is not given. When abbreviations appear on the film they are given as they appear without making any attempt to indicate the word for which it is substituted.
Census searchers are well aware that individual microfilmed pages may contain several page numbers. This is always confusing to new researchers, and sometimes to experienced ones when something other than the National Archives numbers are used. These 1860 indexes use the National Archives hand stamped numbers in the upper right hand corner. There are several exceptions, therefore I suggest the user examine the explanation on pagination.
There is a Table of Common Interpretations that is invaluable to researchers that helps define letters that are often recorded incorrectly by users unfamiliar with old handwriting. I suggest that everyone examine this page thoroughly.
There are some mistakes in this book, but HeritageQuest made every attempt to correct them. The publishers request that when mistakes are found they be notified so the error can be rectified.
The addition of the 1860 HeritageQuest indexes to the genealogy collection is one more attempt by Genealogy Friends to make it a prime collection indicative of a twenty-first century collection. Their goal continues as it builds the genealogy department that is appropriate for a city the size of Plano, and reflect the sophistication of the rapidly growing telecommunications retirement community.
COPYLEFT EXPLAINED
The term "copyleft" may catch some people off-guard. I have to admit that I fall into this category. I typed "copyleft" into Google and immediately went to a Web page that discusses the meaning and how it relates to copyright. The URL is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyleft. The site defines it thusly: Copyleft is that property of a human creation (or discovery) that aims at preventing that the use, the propagation, and the modification of that creation (or discovery) be hindered by intellectual rights. One of the most important reasons why creators or authors might want to make copyleft applicable to their work is that in doing so they hope to create the most favourable conditions for a wide range of people to feel invited to contribute improvements and/or elaborations to this work, in a continuing process. It goes on to remind the reader that this is the process used in the scientific community. This raises all kinds of questions when it is used in the genealogical community. This just might be something you would want to consider in your family history search.
JOHN HUMPHREY SPEAKS SATURDAY
National speaker John Humphrey lectures at the library from 9:30 until 4 p.m. on Saturday. For information go to the Genealogy Friends URL at www.rootsweb.com/~txgfpl or phone 972-783-8484. Cost is $37 at the door and $6.50 for a box lunch. Hope to see you there!
Brenda Kellow, dec'd, Certified Genealogist and Certified Genealogical Instructor, had a Bachelor s Degree in history and taught genealogy courses at the local Community College and computer genealogy at the University.
