Jan 11

Using Family Heirlooms

Pete Miller's Trunk

Pete Miller’s Trunk

I have acquired a few family heirlooms over the years and I dearly treasure them. Some are packed away but I try to keep as many as I can out for display. I even use some of them regularly.

Pete Miller’s old trunk is in our basement. Pete (1878-1957) was my granduncle, the son of Jacob Miller and his second wife Margaretha Strabel. Pete carved Pete Miller, Willshire, Ohio into the wood on the front of the turn-of-the-century trunk.

We hosted the Bennetts on Christmas Day so I tried to have a nice holiday display that included some of my family’s old treasures. I opened up Pete Miller’s old trunk and filled it with toys. It looked right at home between the Christmas tree and the fireplace.

Pete Miller's old trunk, Christmas 2012.

Pete Miller’s trunk, Christmas 2012.

I was pleased with the way the trunk looked and I showed a photo of it to one of my co-workers. I was taken aback when she said, “Look at that old toy top!” (Emphasis on the word old.) Old! Seriously? I received that toy top one year for Christmas. I remember it well. As it spun around the colors ran together and it made a whistling sound. It is not that old! Really.

We rarely use our fireplace in the basement and the inside of it looked rather bare. I recalled that we had an electric log set in our fireplace at home when I was little. I enjoyed watching the revolving light move and glow like real flames of a fire. A couple years ago I asked my parents if they still had those electric logs. They did and they gave them to me. The motor still runs and now we have a “fire” in our fireplace. It actually looks better than the log sets I see in stores today. It must be over 50 years old, just like my old toy top. I am so grateful that my parents saved just about everything.

Old electric fireplace logs.

Old electric fireplace logs.

We found this nice old primitive cupboard while cleaning out the Miller barn this past summer. We believe that my grandfather Carl Miller made it and they used it in their utility room. Now it is in our basement, housing other family heirlooms.

Cupboard that Carl Miller probably made.

Cupboard that Carl Miller made.

I remember the plates we used every day when I was growing up and hoped to include them in my collection of family heirlooms. I could picture the roses around the rim and I asked my mom if she remembered them, too. And if she still had any of them. Sadly, she said that none of them had survived. However, she did have some accessory pieces that were not often used. She still had a pitcher, a sugar and creamer, a platter and a couple serving dishes. Maybe some of you remember the Priscilla pattern from the Household Institute that was popular back in the 50s. I was able to find  and acquire a couple of the matching plates from eBay. These dishes bring back memories of our family meals.

Platter, Household Institute, Priscilla Pattern.

Platter, Household Institute, Priscilla Pattern.

From time to time I will share some of the other ways I use our family heirlooms.

Jan 08

Tombstone Tuesday–Katherine Hardzog

Katherine Hardzog, Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio.

Katherine Hardzog, Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio.

This is the tombstone of Katherine Hardzog, located in row 7 of Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio. The marker is inscribed, Katherine, Wife of Christan Hardzog, Died Oct 9, 1843, Aged 40 years & 6 days. The marker is inscribed this way:

Katherine
Wife of
Christan Hard
zog   Died Oct 9
1843 Aged 40
years & 6 days

 

Katherine’s tombstone stands next to Caroline Hardzog’s tombstone, the young child’s marker featured in last week’s Tombstone Tuesday. Katherine was likely Caroline’s mother. Their markers indicate that Christian Hardzog was Katherine’s husband as well as Caroline’s father.

As was the case with Caroline, Katherine died before Zion Lutheran Schumm began keeping records. In fact they both died before Zion was even an established church. As a result there are no records of Katherine’s death at Zion.

It appears that the same engraver inscribed both Katherine and Caroline’s tombstones. He had a way of breaking up names or words and continuing them on the next line, without a hyphen.

This is a nice sandstone marker with a weeping willow motif at the top. The weeping willow signifies mourning and sorrow.  The willow tree was one of the first funerary motifs to replace the death head and soul effigy, both popular during the colonial period.

Jan 04

Welcome 2013!

New-Year-Clip-Art-FreeWe have said good bye to 2012 and I can say that I am not sorry to see that year end. Last year certainly had its ups and downs. My dad passed away in April. Then we spent a good deal of the summer cleaning out a barn and a couple garages. My computer crashed last month. This was the first crash I ever had and thank goodness I had my data backed up. The year ended on a happy note with our son’s marriage and a very busy and fun holiday season with family.

Life happens and as a result I did not do a lot of family history research last year.

So here we are, in the first week of 2013. It is another new year with a blank calendar to fill; a new year with an opportunity to set new goals.

Last year I made a small number of genealogy goals and the small number worked well. How did I do with my list of goals for 2012?

  • Digitize old home movies. Failed! [I have not even started this project. This goal has been moved to the 2013 list.]
  • Keep my office organized. Relatively successful. [I succeeded most of the year, although I had a couple messy relapses from time to time.]
  • Write and journal regularly. Success! [I continue to write, mainly for this blog.]
  • Collect old family stories. Relatively successful. [I have collected a few family stories and need to keep listening and writing them down.]
  • Photograph all the tombstones in Zion Lutheran Cemetery at Schumm. Completed! [I photographed them in April 2012.]
  • Journal regularly in the “52 Weeks of Sharing Memories”. Failed!

I accomplished about 66% of my goals. Not too bad.

Not on last year’s goal list, but something that I have wanted to do for some time, was join the National Society United States Daughters of 1812. My application was approved on 1 December and I received my acceptance letter yesterday. I was pleased that it was verified in 2012 and that I became a member in their 200th anniversary year.

Here are my goals for 2013:

  • Digitize those old home movies–before they deteriorate. [I actually need help with this project since I don’t know how to run the old movie projector. Joe???]
  • Complete and submit my BCG renewal application. [This is a must do, due by November.]
  • Scan and digitize the old records of Zion, Chatt. [I have a hard copy of them but I would like to make a digital copy as well.]
  • Clean up my Roots Magic files. [I merged several family files into one large database and ended up with quite a few duplicate names.]
  • Get a better photo program to better organize and label my photos. [Photo organization is a big problem for me. I need to do my research and select a good photo program.]
  • Better organize my room, documents and data.

Organization, organization, organization… As usual, several of my goals center around organization. Organization does seem to be one of the biggest challenges for me and for most genealogists. Keeping all the paper documents, photos and digital files organized is a constant chore.

Here I go. I have 361 days left to achieve these goals.

Jan 01

Tombstone Tuesday–Caroline Hardzog

Caroline Hardzog, Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio.

Caroline Hardzog, Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio.

This is the tombstone of Caroline Hardzog, located in row 7 of Zion Lutheran Cemetery, Schumm, Van Wert County, Ohio. The sandstone marker is inscribed: Caroline, Daught of Christian Hardzog died March 8 1840, Aged 2 years & 3 ms.

Exactly as the marker is inscribed:

Caroline
Daught of Ch
ristian Hardzo
g died March
8 1840
Aged 2 year
s & 3 ms

It is interesting to note the way the monument carver broke up the words. When he ran out of room he finished the word on the next line.

This tombstone is probably the only record of Caroline’s birth and death. She died during a time when most vital events were not recorded.

The Schumms arrived in the area in 1838 and had to establish a burial ground that same year to bury one of their own. Katherine (Schumm) Schueler, the 28 year old daughter of John George Schumm, was the first one buried in Schumm Cemetery.

Zion Lutheran Church was not established until 1840, the year same Caroline Hardzog died. The earliest of Zion’s records date back to 1846 so there is no church record of Caroline’s birth or death.

Caroline’s father appears to have been buried in Hileman/Smith/Hartzog/Alspaugh Cemetery, just south of Zion’s Cemetery.

The name Hardzog was spelled Hartzog in later years.

Dec 28

Family Photo Game at Christmas

Goldie Helen, Louise & Fred Roesner.

Goldie Helen, Louise & Fred Roesner.

Another Christmas has come and gone. Most families, large or small, get together this time of year and our families are no exception. We hosted a Christmas dinner for my immediate Miller family, a small group. We also hosted the annual Christmas gathering for the Bennetts, Joe’s siblings and their children and grandchildren. This is a larger group, between 17-24 depending on who can attend.

I racked my brain this year to come up with something different to do during the time between eating and opening presents at the Bennett gathering. They like to play games so I wanted to have something that involved thinking, guessing and some good old family competition.

I came up with an idea that involved old and not so old family photos shown in a slide show. I hoped the younger ones would enjoy looking at photos of past holidays as well as photos of grandparents and relatives that they never knew. Some of the photos were over 100 years old and showed the great-great-great-grandparents of the youngest children here. Who knows what could spark an interest in genealogy. Photos are also good prompts for sharing memories and learning new things about family history.

This is how we played the game: We divided the younger generations into two groups. Our generation, the “older” generation, would recognize most of the photos, so we not actively involved in the competition. But we were there to add details and memories.

The photos were in a slide show on my netbook, which we connected to the TV for ease of viewing. For the baby photos the contestants were to guess the person. For group photos they were to guess the date and place the photo was taken. For the oldest photos, those from the early 1900s, I identified the people and explained their relationship to the family.

Family members learned that some of their Bennett ancestors were named after U.S. states and territories:

The Henry Brandenburg Bennett family: Vermont, Goldsby Alaska, Dakota, Arizona, Delaware. Seated: Nevada, Henry Brandenburg Bennett, Sarah (Milligan), Minnesota.

The Henry Brandenburg Bennett family: Vermont, Goldsby Alaska, Dakota, Arizona, Delaware. Seated: Nevada, Henry Brandenburg Bennett, Sarah (Milligan), Minnesota.

Happily, the slide show was a success. Everyone enjoyed seeing the oldest photos as well as photos of themselves and their parents as little children. It was fun (sometimes funny) to look at past holiday photos and see how everyone had changed over the years.

The children saw photos of grandparents they never knew. It was a time to reminisce and comment on past family events. It was also very interesting to notice family resemblances, passed on from earlier generations.

The photo game turned out to be a lot of fun. Perhaps it even created an interest in genealogy for some family members.