Category Archives: Newspapers

2025 Week 46

16 Sunday Nov 2025

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There is a light at the end of the tunnel as I am researching the youngest child of Ben and Sarah Piety Cox–Finetta. I’ve already done a little research on her and her family back in Week 23 when I was researching older sister Sarah (aka Sally). Finetta married Elbridge Arnold and they moved to the Kansas City, Missouri area. Their home, Woodneath, is now on the National Register of Historic Places.

Information on the children of Finetta and Elbridge was at times hard to come by. Sarah, Mollie and Mariana all married. Benjamin disappeared after the 1850 census. Nettie was living with Mollie’s family and is listed as having lung disease in the 1880 census. Susan appears in the 1870 census, but has not been found in the 1880 census.

A land deed record dated 1874, after the death of their mother, names Sarah and husband, Susan, Nettie and Mollie. A Susan Arnold is listed as a creditor in multiple probate reports well into the 1880s. Without knowing how many Arnold families were in the Clay County area, it is difficult to know if this is the same Susan Arnold or possibly a cousin. Since Elbridge’s father died in Clay County, Missouri, it is possible that one or more siblings also relocated.

Can’t find the newspaper you want on the subscription sites? Google it! Some states, like Missouri, have digital collections that are available for free. I found the following information on that site.

A mention in the Liberty Tribune published January 13, 1882, stated that J(ohn) P(eter) Stowers buried a child on January 10th and his wife (Mariana Arnold) was buried the previous week.

Catching up on my library research and access to the restricted files on FamilySearch, I started with Benjamin F Cox, son of Jonathan P and Rachel Cox, who was born in 1819. Using Full Text Search, I immediately found the History of Mariah Creek Church which mentioned Benjamin F. It provided his year of death and the name of his wife, Patsy Shepherd. I have to wonder, though, if the author of the church history was confusing this Benjamin (b. 1819) with his uncle (b. 1804). The elder Benjamin married an Elizabeth Shepherd in 1834. 1834 would have been too early for the younger Benjamin to marry–he would have been 15 years old. Of course, Patsy was usually associated with Patricia or Martha as a nickname.

Interestingly enough, I was also looking for Benjamin F Cox, brother to Jonathan Piety Cox. Benjamin was assigned as guardian for his grandchildren Virgil and Elizabeth Farmer in 1868 after the death of their father Amos. He terminated the guardianship in 1874 when the money ran out, however, the children continued to live with him and his wife Lucinda until the children reached adulthood. Nothing after 1861 was found for Sarah Cox Farmer, Benjamin’s daughter and the children’s mother.

I had hoped to find documentation of Benjamin’s death in 1887, however, I was not able to locate anything. The latest recorded deed which mentioned Benjamin and wife Lucinda was recorded in 1886. After that, there was a deed recorded in 1893 that names Lucy Cox, unmarried, Carrie and Virgil Farmer, John and Caroline Cox, and Lizzie Berry, unmarried. This would be consistent with the living heirs of Benjamin. This would also give credence to the fact that Albert was no longer living and had no known descendants in 1893.

With that, I believe I have concluded the research portion of the family of Benjamin and Sarah Piety Cox. I can now move to editing and writing. This is actually my favorite part of my project as the people start to come to life. My first task will be to merge duplicate event records and standardize place names. Then I will generate the rough draft and start filling in the blanks and citing references. With the long Thanksgiving weekend right around the corner, I should be able to complete this step fairly quickly…at least that is my hope.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 errors from this week to resolve. I have 4947 errors in the tree–374 possible duplicates, 4115 with no documents, 458 other errors.

  • The spouse of a distant cousin has no sources attached. However, he has several hints which have cleared this error.
  • A distant cousin Jean was eleven at the time a child attached to him was born. Based on the information in the 1860 census, the children in question are probably his brother’s children who were living with Jean and his wife.
  • The last error for this week is another spouse of a distant cousin. As it turns out the cousin also was lacking sources. Cleaned up both at the same time.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
353 years ago – marriage of Jeanne Lemarche-Beaudry (8th ggm) and Jacques Duguay (8th ggf)
325 yeas ago – death of Jean Lemarche-Beaudry Duguay (8th ggm)
262 years ago – death of Nathaniel Bonnell (7th ggf)
250 years ago – birth of Mary Overlin (6th ggm)
238 years ago – marriage of James Shields (6th ggf) and his 2nd wife Nancy Brown
198 years ago – marriage of Letitia Casey (4th ggm) and William Fielden (4th ggf)
196 years ago – death of John Keirsey (6th ggf)
155 years ago – birth of Anna Gravel (2nd ggm)
110 years ago – marriage of Ethel Thompson (ggm) and August Cardinal (ggf)
101 years ago – death of Emma Nagele Keller (2nd ggm)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 26,997 people
End of Week: 27,009 people
Change = +12 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Write the biographies of the family of Benjamin and Sarah Piety Cox.
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have.
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 43

26 Sunday Oct 2025

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This week I have started on the family of John Calhoun Cox and his wife Eliza Garrett. They are documented to have had eleven children. After Ben and Sarah died, John and Eliza lived in their farmhouse in Shelby County. In their later years, they lived with one or more of their children in both Franklin County and Jefferson County.

Research for Eliza was pretty straight forward. John, however, is proving to be a little more difficult. Some researchers have assigned a death date of 1869 for John, however, he was still alive in the 1870 census. The 1869 death was for a John Cox who resided in Butler County, so I’m not convinced this is the correct information for Eliza’s husband. Other sources have provided a death date in 1878. This would be consistent with Eliza stating she was a widow in 1880, however, I cannot find any documentation supporting this date either. As for now, it will remain a mystery.

JC and Eliza’s first son, Dr. Henry Clay Cox, married Mary Jane Newland in 1859. Mary Jane died in 1926. Her obituary stated that she lived with her husband until his death in Shelby County and in Crestwood (Oldham County). It later states that she resided with her son Ben and/or his wife for the past thirty-seven years. Could that mean that Henry died around 1889? Also, his mother Eliza passed in 1891. He was not listed as a surviving child of hers at that time. This would be consistent with a ca. 1889 death. I have not found any mention of his demise in the papers and there is nothing on Find-a-Grave. For now, I’ll stick with a death of about 1889.

Daughters Martha and Elizabeth were fairly straight forward to research, but Mary was a little more complicated. She was actually Martha’s twin sister, and the algorithm kept insisting that she was actually Martha. Since Kester’s book named Mary’s husband as Samuel C. Long, I was able to research her through him. Similarly, Ancestry wanted to confuse brothers Willis and Wallace, although they were not twins.

Sarah “Sallie” Cox was slim on the documentation. While the family lived in Franklin County, she apparently married a man by the name of Edward Hancock in 1868. Oddly enough, she was listed with her parents in the 1870 census sans Edward. Sallie died in 1874 but she did have a will. She names her brother Benjamin guardian of her minor son Oliver Hancock.
Oliver was living with his uncle and grandmother in 1880, but he disappears into the ether beyond that. When Oliver was born is also in question. The 1880 census claims he is twelve, but he was not listed in the 1870 census. Was he left out on purpose? Was his age inflated in 1880? This is another question that likely won’t be answered.
It’s unclear if Sallie and Edward separated, divorced or if he actually died. Her death record states she was a widow. Some researchers claim that Edward remained in Franklin County and lived to a ripe old age, but didn’t appear to marry again.

I wasn’t quite able to finish up JC and Eliza’s children this week. There were just so many! I have four left to tidy up then I can move on to JC’s brother Benjamin. Yes, another of the Benjamin Coxes.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 4948 errors in the tree–372 possible duplicates, 4116 with no documents, 460 other errors.

  • The first error was a potential duplicate. The algorithm postulated that sisters Martha and Mary were the same person. This was debunked by the fact that both girls were listed on the 1860 Census.
  • A distant cousin who needed a citation. Finding documentation for him was difficult, but I did find an obituary for his older brother.
  • Finally, another suspected duplicate. This time, it truly was a duplicate. I confirmed it with several other documents and merged the two records.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
97 years ago – marriage of Mathias Keller (2nd ggf) and his 2nd wife Mary Bouvy Bowman
81 years ago – marriage of Dorothy Cardinal (gm) and Francis W Keller (gf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 26,923 people
End of Week: 26,947 people
Change = +24 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Finish family of John Calhoun Cox and Eliza Garrett; return to Knox County and start reviewing the family of Benjamin Cox and Elizabeth Shepherd.
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 42

19 Sunday Oct 2025

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Finally, we’ve moved on to another of Ben and Sarah Cox’s children…Austin. Austin was child number eight, born in 1799. He spent his adult years in Frankfort, Kentucky, marrying Rebecca Phillips in 1831. In addition to farming, Austin was known to have served as a land surveyor and as a clerk. He was briefly appointed to the role of Secretary of State of Kentucky from February to August 1836 by Governor James Morehead. Austin and Rebecca reportedly had ten children, most of which were daughters.

Nothing unusual cropped up in researching their oldest daughter Elizabeth. Sarah, however, raised a question or two. Kester’s The Other Polks listed Sarah’s date of death as July 25, 1850. Sarah was enumerated in the 1850 US Census. The date Austin’s household was recorded was on September 10, 1850. This would seem to be a discrepancy in the data. Unfortunately, Franklin County, KY, didn’t start recording deaths until 1852. However, careful examination of the instructions for the census state the name of every person whose usual place of abode on the 1st day of June 1850. Furthermore, Sarah’s death was published in The Frankfort Commonwealth on August 6, 1850, supporting the fact that she died on July 25th.

An interesting fact about Austin P. Cox was revealed in the obituary of his daughter Laura Cox Kearns published in the Kentucky Post in 1906. There is an irregular boundary between Kentucky and Tennessee in Simpson County commonly referred to as the “Triangular Jog”. Apparently when the boundary was originally surveyed in 1780, the surveyors could not keep a straight bearing due to several factors present at the time. Several attempts were made to correct the issue and finally it was resolved in 1859 by Austin Cox and Benjamin Peeples. A historical marker identifies the site along US Hwy 31-W at the Tennessee-Kentucky State Line. You can read more about this dispute on the Kentucky Historical Society‘s website.

I was able to complete my research on Austin and Rebecca’s children this week. Interesting facts included:

  • a set of girl twins born in 1835 (Mary and Laura),
  • a couple daughters did not live past their teens (Sarah and Charlotte), and
  • a couple daughters never married (Mary and Rebecca).

One son, Wallace, was listed in Kester’s book but I could not corroborate with any documentation. He died as an infant in 1844.

I will now move forward to child number nine of Ben and Sarah–John Calhoun Cox. John married Eliza Garrett and they had eleven children. A descendant of at least one of those children is a DNA match for me. In the meantime, I’ll do a little clean up of danglers and placenames.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 5017 errors in the tree–376 possible duplicates, 4142 with no documents, 499 other errors.

  • Up first is a second cousin whose family I think I worked on last week. He needed some citations, as did a couple of his brothers, so I fixed them up.
  • The next was a father-in-law of a distant great uncle. Since I am not keeping in-laws in my database, I have deleted him and his wife.
  • Finally, I have Francoise Bonneau who was born in 1786. She is a distant cousin with no citations. I was able to find one church record–thank you to the Catholic priests of Old Cathedral. There might be more information available in the Canadian records when I am ready to dive into that.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
210 years ago – marriage of Elizabeth Staton (4th ggm) and Jonathan McCullough (4th ggf)
200 years ago – marriage of Michael Keller Jr (4th ggf) and his first wife Barbara Klein
177 years ago – marriage of Mary Caywood (3rd ggm) and John S Cox (3rd ggf)
154 years ago – birth of John F Thompson (2nd ggf)
125 years ago – death of Isaac DeMoss (3rd ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,106 people
End of Week: 26,923 people
Change = -183 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Focus on family of John Calhoun Cox and Eliza Garrett
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 37

13 Saturday Sep 2025

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This week I’m starting on the family of Harvey Innes Cox. I’ll get it started, but likely won’t finish it. His parents were Jonathan P Cox and Rachel Tigert Cox. He married Mary Nicholson in Knox County. They had nine kids that I know of. After he served in the Civil War, they picked up stakes and moved to Labette County, Kansas around 1868. This is where they remained until death.

Where exactly is Labette County? It is in the southeastern corner of Kansas, not too far west of Joplin, Missouri. Harvey’s family was mostly located in the Parsons area, in the northern part of the county, but over the years they could be found in the southern towns of Edna and Bartlett.

I have concerns about some of the information out there for Harvey’s descendants and families. His daughter Eliza appears in the 1860 census as a one year old, however, there is no trace of her after that. Some trees, and print books, list an actual date of birth and death, however no sources have yet to be found with this information. I would only hope there is a family bible out there somewhere that contains that information.

There is also erroneous information regarding the family of Benjamin F Cox, Harvey’s son. Benjamin married Etta Pond when she was 19. Some sources claim her maiden name was Stark based on her headstone, but this is incorrect. Benjamin’s obituary claims Etta died before his second marriage, but that is also incorrect. Scouring the newspapers, Etta filed for divorce from Benjamin in February 1916 according to The Times-Journal. It was granted in May. A marriage license for Etta Cox, 51, to William Wright was located in the South Kansas Tribune in January 1918. This was followed by a legal notice in the Parsons Daily Sun on April 21, 1921, where Etta Wright sues a William Wright for divorce. Part of her suit is to return her name to Etta Cox. Prior to 1930 Etta seems to have remarried to Eugene Stark, which explains the Stark name on her headstone. Pulling information from two very different obituaries for Etta ties the two women together.

I actually made more progress than I thought I would on this family this week. Three of the sons–Henry, and the twins Jonathan and Simon–appear to have never married so there wasn’t much drama to try and unfold. Two of the daughters–Eliza and Irene–seem to have died as small children so there was little to be found about them. The 1900 census mentions that Mary Nicholson Cox had 12 children, however, I have not been able to account for two of them. There does seem to be a significant gap between Harriet (b. 1851) and Henry (b. 1855). Researchers on FamilySearch have indicated there was a baby born in January 1853, however, no source is provided. The gap between Benjamin and Irene is likely due to Harvey being away at war for three years, so I would not expect a child to be hidden there.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines the week ahead.
281 years ago – death of Louise Arrivee Cardinal (8th ggm)
258 years ago – birth of Lydia Smith (6th ggm)
242 years ago – death of Rev. William Smith (7th ggf)
228 years ago – marriage of Mary Gott (5th ggm) and John Squires (5th ggf)
193 years ago – birth of Benjamin Coppock (3rd ggf)
193 years ago – death of Richard Puckett (5th ggf)
179 years ago – death of George Boord (6th ggf)
148 years ago – marriage of Joseph E Cardinal (3rd ggf) and Elisabeth Carrie, his 2nd wife

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,020 people
End of Week: 27,029 people
Change = +9 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Harvey Innes Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 9

02 Sunday Mar 2025

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I was pleasantly surprised this week when I discovered one of my first cousins had submitted an Ancestry DNA kit and she appeared as a match! Easy enough to assign her to the tree. I decided to sort all of my common ancestor matches by branch. I may choose every now and again to briefly work on one of those lines just to change things up. There were actually a couple of matches that were easily added to the tree since those lines were built out pretty well. I am still bit frustrated with the algorithm Ancestry uses to predetermine matches. It has at least a dozen matches that are attributed to my 4th great grandmother Elizabeth Lowe DeMoss that should be attached to her sister Catherine Elizabeth Lowe Ishmael. Also, why did they remove “5th cousin” on the relationship dropdown? I am forced to call these individuals a generic “distant relationship” and add notes.

I made some decent progress on the Arnold-Cassidy family. This week the focus was on their daughter Martha who married Jerome McCain. I’m about half finished researching their family. One of their grandsons, Maurice Delaney, served in World War II. He was in the US Navy, stationed in the Marshall Islands in the South Pacific. He sadly lost his life while trying to help another sailor who was caught in an undertow while swimming, as reported in The Pharos-Tribune on October 10, 1947. His remains were shipped home in 1947.

I looked a bit more into the tree score. I have a feeling mine will be stuck at 9.4 for a long time. Apparently I have 5232 possible errors, with 4235 of those being people with no documentation. Resolving three a week will be like paying down the national debt.

  • The first one was another floater which I decided to delete.
  • The second was for a distant cousin who had an approximate birth date but no documentation. That was easily fixed
  • The third one was a descendant of my DeMoss line, but for some reason I had not fully reviewed all the hints. I went back and completed my review of him and ended up adding several more distant cousins in the process.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines which will occur during the week ahead.
318 years ago – Birth of Elizabeth Bennett (7th ggm)
227 years ago – Death of Eleanor Robinson (6th ggm)
224 years ago – Death of Joseph Coppock (5th ggf)
222 years ago – Birth of Joshua Frost (4th ggf)
207 years ago – Death of Reuben Staton (5th ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,340 people
End of Week: 27,485 people
Change = +145 people – goal MET!!
Goal for coming week: Add 50 new people and continue researching the Isaac and Rebecca Arnold descendants, specifically the Martha and Jerome McCain family this week.

2025 Week 8

23 Sunday Feb 2025

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Mary Frances Arnold has been found! I did not locate her in the Pike County Newspaper, but I did find her in her sister Bertha’s obituary before locating her own obituary in the April 30, 1938 edition of the Princeton Daily Clarion (shown here). Mary Frances married Marcellus Chew and they had two children. Other researchers trees with Mary Frances in them make my head hurt. One such tree has documents with three different sets of parents. How does that even make sense?

The Chews are providing me with plenty of material this week. A second interesting puzzle was found in the 1940 census for Clarence and Audi Fowler Chew. Clarence was the son of Mary and Marcellus. In 1940, Clarence and Audi were in their early 50s. There was, presumably, a 7 month old girl named Carolyn Sue listed as their daughter. While not completely impossible, the probability of Carolyn Sue being the biological daughter of this couple is not very high. Checking the birth records for Pike County in late 1939, a birth certificate for Carolyn Sue Roberts born in Jefferson Township in September was found. Checking FindAGrave, Carolyn’s birth parents Floyd and Jewel lived long lives and Carolyn’s memorial was attached to theirs. Still not convinced Carolyn was a Chew, I flipped a couple pages back and found Floyd and Jewel at the bottom of Sheet 10A. Clarence and Audi were at the bottom of Sheet 10B. Carolyn was listed at the top of 11A. I then compared the household numbers…BINGO! The pages were recorded out of order! What a mess!

Tip of the Week: Leverage those FAN Clubs!

This week’s take away…check those FAN Clubs! You would be amazed how many questions can be answered by checking out those Friends/Family, Associates and Neighbors.

Sadly, I have discovered several individuals who died at a relatively young age for various reasons. One was an apparent suicide, one an overdose, and two were casualties of war. Sgt James Herschel Arnold (1916-1945) served in the US Army 152nd Infantry during World War II. His younger cousin, Pfc. Charles Ajay Arnold (1924-1945), was a member of the 132nd Infantry and fatally wounded assisting a wounded teammate to safety during battle. Both men lost their lives in the Philippines. We will be forever grateful for the sacrifice they made for our country.

I added two new DNA matches on my mother’s side of the family tree. One was fairly easy to add as his daughters are already tagged as matches in my tree. The other only required a small number of updates to add.

With the new updates Ancestry has added to their site, they now give trees a score. Mine is 9.4. They then give you hints to bring that score up. I was given three tasks to do.

  • One was for a floater which I decided to delete.
  • The second was for a distant cousin who did not have any dates associated with her. I found her marriage record which listed her approximate birth year to clear that one.
  • The last one had a census record dated before her assumed date of birth. Considering she was born around 1870, there was no official record of her birth. The birth year on her death certificate likely was a guess and her age was actually underestimated. I made an executive decision that she was born in 1869 not 1872.

We’ll see what my new score is tomorrow.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines which will occur during the week ahead.
217 years ago – Birth of Gesina Brake Sievers (4th ggm)
217 years ago – Birth of Eva Korz Keller (4 ggm)
196 years ago – Marriage of Isaac Lowe (5th ggf) and his second wife Sarah Beckner
186 years ago – Marriage of Suzanne Board (4th ggm) and Isaac Catt (4th ggf)
185 years ago – Birth of Amanda Newcomb Butler (3rd ggm)
161 years ago – Death of Sarah Ireland Reeve (4th ggm)
152 years ago – Death of Zeresh Puckett Coppock (3rd ggm)
115 years ago – Death of Joseph E. Cardinal (3rd ggf)
113 years ago – Death of Michael Kaiser (2nd ggf)
107 years ago – Birth of Samuel T. DeMoss Sr (gf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,220 people
End of Week: 27,340 people
Change = +120 people – goal MET!!
Goal for coming week: Add 50 new people and continue researching the Isaac and Rebecca Arnold descendants. Barring any rabbit holes, it could take into early or mid April to complete.

2025 Week 7

16 Sunday Feb 2025

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I feel like I have made some progress this week, closing out the family of Martha Cassidy Rhodes on Monday. She has quite the extensive family that was and still seems to be mostly concentrated in Central Illinois and in Central California.

Moving on to Martha’s sibling Sarah, I cannot find any information on her after the 1850 Census. She was born about 1849 most likely in Perry County, Indiana. After that it would seem she has vaporized. I can only speculate at this time that she died as a young child between 1850 and 1860 in either Perry County or Pike County, Indiana…or somewhere inbetween. Her mother died in 1855 in Pike County and the remaining family was still there in 1860. Maybe something useful will surface as I flesh out her other siblings. There is at least one researcher on Ancestry who has attributed some facts to her that belong to her sister Rebecca Jane who is now the focus of my research. I’m fairly confident that they were two different persons as they were both listed in the 1850 Census.

Rebecca Jane married Isaac Arnold in Pike County, Indiana. I’m a bit remiss in that I don’t know a whole lot about this county which borders the one I grew up in. On initial review, it would seem the Arnolds, for the most part, remained in the Pike County area. As best as I can tell Rebecca and Isaac had seven children. Their oldest, Mary F, is already giving me heartburn.

There seems to be no trace of Mary after 1880, and other researchers seemingly are confusing her with her younger sister Martha. I usually try not to fall head first down rabbit holes, but I really want to try and find something about Mary Arnold. The Pike County Democrat is available on the Hoosier State Chronicles website and the pages are transcribed using OCR technology. The newspaper is a weekly publication and issues up to 1900 are available for viewing. Local community information is included on page 3 of the paper and I’m up to 1886 at the moment looking for any trace of the Arnolds. Hopefully I can find something about Mary.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines which will occur during the week ahead.
311 years ago – Marriage of Jeanne Duguay (7th ggm) and Jacques J. Cardinal (7th ggf)
273 years ago – Birth of James C Butler (6th ggf)
244 years ago – Death of Abraham Short Jr (7th ggf)
199 years ago – Marriage of Sarah Carroll (4th ggm) and Joshua Frost (4th ggf)
197 years ago – Death of Sybilla Braun (5th ggm)
187 years ago – Marriage of Francoise Courtright (4th ggm) and James D. Cardinal (4th ggf)
130 years ago – Birth of Magdelena Kaiser Keller (ggm)
107 years ago – Death of Mary Sievers Gravel (3rd ggm)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,182 people
End of Week: 27,220 people
Change = +38 people – goal not met.
Goal for coming week: Add 50 new people and continue researching the Isaac Arnold descendants.

Leave no stone unturned

11 Wednesday Sep 2024

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Currently I am working to build out the Cox line of my family tree. I hate to leave a branch completely unresearched. I try to find a minimal amount of information on everyone that I might share DNA with just in case it becomes useful to someone someday. Even if that person is not me.

Today I was fleshing out a fifth cousin, Nell. Granted, she will not make it into the family history I am assembling, but my genealogy OCD is alive and well and I felt obligated to learn what I could about my cousin. Nell was listed in both her parents’ obituaries in 1989 and 1991 with a married name. When I was sorting through her hints on Ancestry, it gave me a marriage record, but the name did not match what I had for 1989. A divorce record was located prior to 1989 so the next logical step was to search the newspapers for a second marriage announcement. Her surname in 1989 did not appear to be overly common so I went with that.

A marriage announcement for Nell in the four year window in California did not populate using the new surname, however, there were a few articles with a byline for the night city editor with the Los Angeles Times. What were the chances? Could this guy be Nell’s husband? I clicked on one. It started out “I did not want to go: I didn’t believe in doctors.” The writer proceeds to describe how he’s been getting in shape in the past few years and this doctor’s visit. Unfortunately, the EKG was abnormal and the doctors thought he was in the middle of a heart attack! He then mentions his wife’s name, Nell. BINGO! I found the second husband…and several genealogical details about Nell.

I almost skipped over the article by Nell’s husband…but I didn’t. Something made me read it. It’s important to turn over all those stones, even if they are the size of pea gravel. You never know what is hidden underneath.

UPDATE: Cox and McCullough

25 Sunday Feb 2024

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I’ve set aside my DeMoss research and am moving on to my Cox ancestors. I don’t know why but my Cox ancestors are some of my favorites. Maybe it is because of the snippets about great-grandma Blanche I’ve been told by my aunt over the years…how she stepped in on behalf of my uncle during my grandmother’s difficult second marriage. Maybe because Blanche’s grandfather died in the Civil War. Maybe because of the well-documented stories that already exist about the Cox family members who came before. If nothing else, this is not a boring bunch of skeletons in my closet!

So, I’m working on the Cox line and the first family unit to clean up for the manuscript is that of my 2nd-great grandfather Frank Cox. I’ve written about Frank before, exposing some details that other researchers in the family hadn’t yet discovered. The one detail that really bugged me that I didn’t have was the date that Frank married Jennie Hollingsworth. I had searched the Knox County marriage records forward and backward with no luck. This time, I decided to try the newspaper. I simply love the fact that the Knox County library has digitized so many of the old papers and I can access them from 2000 miles away! I plugged in my search criteria and voila! They were married on July 4, 1876 in LAWRENCEVILLE! That would explain why I could not find them in the Knox County marriage database. For those of you that don’t know, back in the day, Lawrence Co, IL was Knox County’s very own Gretna Green. Yay! Now I have another source to confirm they did get married and now we have a date.

Of course, I don’t work on just a single person at one time. I’m also unraveling the generation before and after at the same time. This was especially true today with Frank Cox’s family. In building the timeline for this family, it seems they kept moving back and forth between Cape Girardeau County, Missouri and Knox County, Indiana…and so did the McCullough family. I wrote about Arabelle’s parents, Oliver and Rachel, way back in 2014. I basically lost track of them after the 1880 census. Re-examining Arabelle’s marriage license from Cape Girardeau, she was under 18 and it has a notation that her father OP McCullough gave written permission for her to marry. This means Oliver was alive in 1888. Then, as I was scouring the land and court records for Frank down there, I came across a land transaction listing Rachel McCullough and Francis M Cox as grantors in 1891. Since Frank was listed on the transaction instead of Oliver, either Oliver and Rachel had divorced or Oliver was deceased. At this point in time, I’m leaning toward deceased. I haven’t found any additional information on Rachel.

So, to sum up my new findings…

  • Frank married Jennie Hollingsworth in Lawrenceville, IL on July 4, 1876
  • Oliver McCullough likely died sometime between 1888 and 1891, in either Missouri or Indiana
  • Rachel McCullough died sometime after 1891, probably in Missouri

Marriage Announcement: Thompson-Williams

04 Thursday Dec 2014

Posted by in Newspapers

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Now that I’m working on my mother’s family which is mainly from southern Knox County, use of the online archives for the Vincennes papers is more relevant.  While looking for information on my 2nd great grandfather, John Franklin Thompson, I came across the following announcement for marriage license applications.

“Everett Williams, farmer, of this county, son of Louis Williams, farmer, of this county, and Miss Ethel Thompson, of this county, daughter of Frank Thompson, farmer, of this county.”  [The Vincennes Commercial, January 14, 1916, page 2.]

Okay, so what? you say.  The wrong daughter is named.  Ethel, my great-grandmother, was already married to August Cardinal when this was printed.  It should have read Edith, her younger sister.  Edith and Everett were indeed married the day before on January 13, 1916.