I am seriously in love with the Internet right now

[Gerald Creasy]

http://www.skyn.net/






Gerald, have you seen this page?

Thanks Rahab. No I had not seen this page.

[Susie Hamilton]

http://members.tripod.com/kahamilton/

My sis in law does geneology. This is her web page. It has a lot of links plus a lot of info for Ky. Might help, might not.

[Gerald Creasy]

Awesome Gerald. Teach me this skill you have.

Skill. Man YOU have the skill I'd give my eye teeth for.


SOME people only want to find out grand parents as far back through time as they can go...not realizing that uncles, cousins, brothers and sisters of each generation can tell more about the family.

It takes creative thinking to get around walls.

I was looking for a great uncle who had fought in the Civil War: Shiloh, Perryville, Chickamauga until he was sent to Rock Island POW. After he signed the oath, I lost track of him.

Seperately I had come across some Creasys I had never heard of in a Ky cemetery with unfamiliar first names. For the longest time I left them alone And did not look into them.

But one of their names bugged me. The first name was King born right after the Civil War.

I started thinking: When my great uncle was a kid in the 1850s he lived in the middle of no where on a thousand acre farm. The next farm over was owned by the Counties first sheriff with a first name King.
What if...as a bored farm kid..he ventured next door to learn of the exploits of the Sherriff? What if he admired him so much he named a kid after him?

So I tracked down the death certificate of King Creasy and guess what I found? My missing uncle as his father. His wife and children had relocated to Smiths grove Ky out of Lafayette, TN after the Civil War.

By playing a little detective and learning about all relatives I was able to find wall breaking information.

More than you or anyone really wants to know, I'm sure.

[MacUser]

By playing a little detective and learning about all relatives I was able to find wall breaking information.

More than you or anyone really wants to know, I'm sure.

No thanks for illustrating your detective methodology. I am extremely interested in it.. but not sure what sources to trust to begin. Would ancestry.com be a good source? How much does it cost?

On family stories.. my grandmother would tell a story about family members named Knox. Keeping the story short.. she related this to how Knoxville got it's name from this family offshoot.

[Gerald Creasy]

No thanks for illustrating your detective methodology. I am extremely interested in it.. but not sure what sources to trust to begin. Would ancestry.com be a good source? How much does it cost?

Ancestry.com is Supreme. If I had had it years ago I would have saved thousands of miles, hours and money.

I costs less than 150 a year (one payment) or 20 monthly.

1) Get this software: http://www.familysearch.org/eng/default.asp

It is free and theres no use in paying for any software.

Fill in as much as you know first hand.

2) Talk to your oldest relatives. My mom happened to mention that her father talked of an "Aunt Josie". She mentioned this years after I was into genealogy. That simple comment led to the recent winning of the above old photo.

3) Did your family live in a certain place for a long while?

I knew my family had lived in Macon County tennessee from 1845 until 1910 when my great grand father left.
Call the library in the biggest town in your County. See if theres a genealogy society.
Call and talk to someone in that society.
Three times I have done this which resulted in:
a) Where my 3rd great grandfather was buried, a list of many of his children who they married, where THEY were buried and even a photo of a two great aunts and their husbands.
b) A Newspaper copy of the story of the great Harrodsburg Fire which wiped out Ballard Bros Department store owned by another great grandfather
c) A line on a family Bible which detaled THAT greatgrandfathers grandfather


4) Census records and Death certificates

Census records are wonderful for finding ancestors.

Records naming all in the household run are availble from 1850 to 1930 with 1890 missing. Used to be you'd have to go to the state library and examine each county by microfilm reader cranking cranking cranking. Now ancestry has them all read and indexed and you can look at the original records.

Hopefully you are researching uncommon names. Uncommon names are easier.

And always look for supporting information. Is the Frank Mumbles in Montana in 1930 the same Frank Mumbles that was in tennesse in 1920?
How would you know? Does he have the same wife? The same Children? Is he the proper age? Where does the census say he was born?


What relative of yours was alive in 1930? They had to be living somewhere and many times they lived near relatives. Find them and copy every one on that page...the neighboring Mrs. of a unknown name could be a parent or grandparents sister.
Death certificate always list father and mother if the Informant knew and are another good way to build your genealogy.

On family stories.. my grandmother would tell a story about family members named Knox. Keeping the story short.. she related this to how Knoxville got it's name from this family offshoot.

My 3rd great grandfather was one of the founders of Williamsburg Ky, my great grandfather named nearby Goldbug and Corbin was named after a distant Uncle. With a little work you could found out your exact connection to the Knoxs and maybe you'd get invited to a city celebration or something.

[MacUser]

Thanks for the detailed info. Let me visit a few and see what I can get into