The National Archives of Ireland

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity of visiting The National Archives of Ireland in Dublin. As I didn’t know my way around Dublin, Shirley, one of the members of the tour group that I was with, came with me. She also had planned to do some research there and wanted to consult with the professional genealogist.

The professional genealogist that we met was a very helpful lady. Shirley had met with her on another trip and had consequently recognized her when she saw her on an episode of “Who Do You Think You Are?” I can’t remember what her name was but she was a soft spoken professional who knew her stuff.

This kind lady was friendly and was able to give me direction on two different matters within half an hour. The first was for a friend in Pembroke who wanted to know where to look for a marriage. The second was for me in locating exactly where my third great-grandfather came from in Wexford County. She suggested that I use the Tithe Applotment Books and Griffiths Evaluation to determine the parishes most likely to be his home parish before he sailed to Canada in 1820. I am able to do this as I know what his mother’s name was along with her maiden name and also his father’s name.

After determining which parishes would be the most likely, I met with this lady again and asked about my third great-grandparents who settled in Huron County in Ontario. There is a connection with Galway, but after meeting with her, I believe that this connection may just be the port that they sailed from in 1831 or 1832. This lady suggested that I do the same thing for this couple as I did for my other third great-grandfather, only, if I did not find anything in County Galway, I should expand the search to County Cavan as my third great-grandmother’s headstone says that she was from County Cavan.

Before going to Ireland, I thought that maybe she was from County Cavan and her family had moved to County Galway and that she had married there. I could find no record of there marriage there and very few records of either of the family names.

I then started to look at Griffith’s Evaluation and the Tithe Applotment Books for County Cavan. I found a number of parishes that the family names appear in, both together and by themselves. I think that I may have found where my third great-grandparents came from.

I now need to follow through with this work and take it to its conclusion.

I am so thankful that I decided to spend time at the National Archives of Ireland and consult with their genealogist. I know that I will gain more information about my family from this experience. I thank my Father in Heaven for sending the guidance to me so that I will find the correct information.

Family History Fireside Chat – 7 May 2016

Recently, I had an opportunity to attend a Family History Fireside Chat which was sponsored by the Family History Centers of Newfoundland. This was originally planned as a one-day conference but because of lack of preregistrations, it was considered to be unfeasible to continue on as a conference.

As Lesley Anderson was scheduled to fly into St John’s from Ottawa and already had her ticket booked, there was a certain cost that had to be covered whether Lesley came or not. So, the decision was made to have her come and change the venue into a fireside chat. It gave Lesley a chance to tour St John’s and to visit places that she hadn’t been to before.

The committee decided to also ask Yvonne Sorenson from FamilySearch.org to also speak. Yvonne was invited to Skype in from Salt Lake City which is what she did.

There were four locations where you could go to attend the fireside chat. They were the chapels of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in St John’s, Bay Roberts, and Corner Brook as well as the meeting place for the members in Grand Falls-Windsor/Gander area. Those attending in St John’s, Bay Roberts, and Corner Brook were treated to a potluck dinner. Those attending in Grand Falls-Windsor had light refreshments during the fireside chat. This was because the facility in Grand Falls-Windsor is not big enough to be able to have a meal like the others and then immediately go into the other room for the program.

I am not sure of the attendance in the other locations, but in Grand Falls-Windsor, we had eight people in attendance. It looked like the other locations had approximately 20 to 30 people each. I personally think that, for this area and the fact that this is the first time that we have done this, the fireside chat was a success.

Lesley Anderson was the first speaker and spoke about Ancestry.ca. She explained how to get started on your family history as well as how Ancestry can help you with it. Ancestry has come out with some new initiatives and Lesley explained how they worked.

Yvonne Sorenson then spoke, giving a quick history of Newfoundland, the Atlantic provinces, and the northeastern states and how they related to each other. She then demonstrated what kind of records that are available online with FamilySearch.org and also mentioned some of the records that are available through Ancestry, Find My Past, and My Heritage. Yvonne also touched on the Indexing program and how anyone could index the records through this program. She mentioned that the Indexing program is about to make available some additional options that will be offered.

As we know, there are many records that are not available online as of yet. There are some in archives that may never be online. However, all of the records held in the Family History Library in Salt Lake City will eventually be online. In the meantime, these records are on microfilm that can still be ordered into Family History Centers for viewing. Personally, this is the case that I have, some of my records may be the last records to be digitized and put online. Living in Gander, we are hours away from the closest Family History Center, but, at least there are two here on the island.

This Family History Fireside Chat was an initiative that may have been a way of making the best of things for the conference, but I can see that it can produce good things. We are hoping that we will be able to continue with them, highlighting various organizations here in Newfoundland that hold records and explain how they can help us find and understand our ancestors.

My direct ancestors did not settle here in Newfoundland. My mother’s ancestors went to what is now Lanark County and Huron County in Ontario, and my father’s parents and grandparents left Liverpool and moved to Toronto.

However, there are records pertaining to my great-grandfather here in Newfoundland. This is part of the reason why my husband and I are here. These records are the ships logs for the British Merchant Marines for all the years except those ending in 5. These also have the crews’ lists. I am also thinking that I might be able to find some passenger lists in them as well. I have already made one trip to St John’s but I have more than just my great-grandfather who was a sailor in the Merchant Marine. I have a number of indirect ancestors who were sailors and I want to find their records and be able to tell their stories to my children, my grandchildren, and possibly even my great-grandchildren.

May we work towards finding the records of our ancestors to tell our descendants about these people who came before us. May Heavenly Father help us to find the records, the people and the stories to become the family historians that we need to be. May our ancestors help us by prompting us about where to look for this vital information. May our love for our families, past, present, and future grow to encompass every member from the babies that died so young to the parents and grandparents who guided their children, to the black sheep and the white sheep, the adventurers, the tree-huggers, those that stayed at home, and those that trusted that the future would be all that it could. These are they that come before us and come after us. Let us remember them all as we find them. Everyone deserves to be remembered no matter what they have or have not done.

Mother’s Day, 2016

Today is Mother’s Day in North America. Today is a day when I remember my mother and how much she meant to me, she still means to me. It’s also a day that I either get or don’t get phone calls from my sons.

I was just looking at a website to learn the history of Mother’s Day. There is a lot that I didn’t know about this special occasion. I also didn’t take the time to think about it. There are probably a lot of people like me who don’t make time to look up things just for information’s sake. Life is busy, but it pays to take some time to learn about the little or not so little things.

Here goes. Apparently, the ancient Greeks and Romans celebrated a form of Mother’s Day. This was dedicated more to the maternal goddesses than to human mothers. They held festivals and celebrations. These festivals date back prior to the birth of Christ. The early church also celebrated a form of Mother’s Day in the way of a celebration of Mary, the mother of Christ.

Let’s fast forward a few hundred years, now. During the 1600s, the English church had what was called Mothering Sunday. This was held during Lent and the church service was dedicated to Mary the mother of Christ. The children brought gifts and flowers to their mothers to honour them on this day. Apprentices, servants, and other employees were encouraged to visit their mothers, as well.

Another fast forward to the 1870s when Julia Ward Howe encouraged an official day for Mother’s Day. She also wanted it tied in as a day for peace. The US government didn’t really do anything until May 8, 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson signed a joint resolution recognizing the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day thanks to the efforts of Anna Jarvis.

Today, Mother’s Day has been extremely commercialized and it is one of the biggest money making events of the year for retail businesses. I think that only Christmas surpasses the amount of sales during the year.

As a mother, the only wish that I have is to have a phone call from my children and their families. This afternoon, I heard from one of my sons and his family. His oldest daughter wanted to make sure that I received a call from them because it is Mother’s Day. I am so happy that she insisted on the call and enjoyed every minute of the conversation. I pray that she will always have the promptings to do the right thing as she had today.

My family is very precious to me. I want to see them more than I do, but circumstances stand in the way. I would love to talk with them every day, but all of us have our lives to live. We all have things that we need to do so that we live as happy as we can.

Enjoy your family. Enjoy your mothers. Show your love to your mothers and always, always, make sure that your mothers know that you love them. I don’t think that you will go wrong if you do this.

Jetlag and Other Things

Why is it that time can fly by without any reason? That is what happened to me this evening. Today, I thought that I would get everything done in the timeframe that I wanted it done, but I just realized that I forgot something important.

I guess that that I am under the influence of jetlag without realizing it. I am ready to go to bed about 8:30 or 9:00 pm and I just think about just staying up until 9:30. This evening, we also had a couple of visitors for about an hour.

I did manage to wash the dishes after our visitors left, but then I sat down at the computer and started to do some work on Ancestry. When I took a short break just now, thinking that I should go to bed, I realized that I had one more thing to do.

I am trying to get into a routine that I get certain things done by certain times so that I have a balanced life and can complete everything that I set out to do. Fridays, I usually go for massage therapy in the morning every other week. I also usually try to get some resumes out to possible employers. Then, in the late afternoon, I go over to the mess for social hour. I like to go over so that I can meet my husband’s co-workers and possibly make a friend or two.

Well, I did all of that, but when I got home, I should have worked on my blog at that time. Instead, I was looking into something else. Then along came time to make and eat supper.

All that I can ask you is to be patient with me. I am still getting used to the idea of writing a blog, let alone writing an entry every day. I do like it when it has been completed and find out where in the world the readers are.

This is going to be short tonight as I need to get up in the morning. I need to do some preparation for tomorrow evening when the first Newfoundland Family History Fireside Chat will be taking place. This first one is being broadcasted through Skype between St John’s, Bay Roberts, Corner Brook, and Grand Falls-Windsor. Lesley Anderson from Ancestry is our first speaker and Yvonne Sorensen from FamilySearch is our second and final speaker. Lesley will be speaking from the chapel of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in St John’s, and Yvonne will be skyping in from Salt Lake City. We are looking forward to this being the first of a series of Family History Fireside Chats.

Good night all and sweet dreams. 

The Reality of Life

Meanwhile, back in the real world of day-to-day living, we spend a lot of time doing things that need to be done. Do we have the time to do everything that we want to do? Not really, unless you don’t have much ambition or very many dreams. Sometimes we wait for things to happen and we get anxious that things won’t happen the way that we want. If we look at reality, things will not happen the way that we want.

How then should we handle ourselves when this happens? There are two ways that we can handle this. Number one is to have a meltdown, blame everyone else, and say, “Why is it always me that gets the short end of the stick?”

Number two is to roll with the punches. Take the situation that was given to you and make the best of it.

There was one time in my life that someone said to me that they didn’t really believe that I had done all of the things that I had said that I have done. What they didn’t realize was that I was in the right place at the right time and took advantage of the opportunity for every thing that I managed to try to do. I’m not saying that I perfected everything that I have tried. All that I am saying is that, the opportunity came up for me to try something new, I took it, and then decided whether I would continue with the activity or not.

I am also not saying that I didn’t make mistakes in my life. I made plenty of mistakes. I have tried not to make stupid mistakes and have tried to warn others when they try what I already found to be a mistake in doing so.

I also have learned that people do not like to be given advice when they haven’t asked for it. Most of the time, now, I try not to pass on advice, unless I know that it would be welcomed. But then, again, I seem to put my foot in my mouth and cause someone to get upset with me because I have said something that they didn’t want to hear. There are times when I am in a position that I have to say something whether I want to or not. I sometimes don’t say things the right way, especially when I hurt a great deal or am very tired. Even though what was said needed to be said, it could have been a lot more tactful. I am trying my best to improve on this note but, every so often, I get it all wrong.

Why do I try to roll with the punches? I have found that if I try to roll with the punches, I end up in a situation that is usually better than what I had planned. If people around me do not wish to communicate with me, I usually accept that and do what I feel that I can do, and offer to help those who need the help. If they don’t want my help, I usually leave the situation alone. After all, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.

I really don’t know where I am going with this except I just feel the need to write this.

Don’t give up on life. You can take life and make it better but you need to have the desire to do so. 

Final Entry – Field Trip, April 2016

Well, I am home again. I arrived about mid afternoon, this afternoon. I really didn’t have enough time to write a blog post yesterday. I thought that I might have enough time as I was supposed to have about six hours between arriving in Toronto and leaving Toronto for St John’s. However, the plane that we travelled back to Toronto from Ireland was very late in arriving in Dublin. We were supposed to leave shortly after 12:00 pm Dublin time but it was well after 2:00 pm before we were able to.

Once we arrived in Toronto, we had to go through Customs and Immigration. Customs has installed scanners to scan our declaration paperwork as soon as we disembark and it gets checked right after we go through Immigration. Before we can pick up our baggage, it gets checked again. Then we have to collect our baggage, then go through Customs where it gets turned in. If we have a connecting flight, we then have to go to the check-in counter for the airline that you are flying with and check your luggage in again. You then have to go through the security check point again.

You know, it would be nice if Customs got their act in gear and allow the baggage that has to be transferred to go directly over to the connecting flight. This system that they have set up has your paperwork being checked about three times with the luggage being there only once. If there is a possible problem, they could easily contact the traveller before the flight leaves and pull that suitcase or let the next airport know that the suitcase has to be checked. It would save a lot of grief and frustration on the part of travellers.

I mentioned earlier that I should have had about six hours between flights yesterday. I ended up with much less time as the flight travelling from Toronto to Dublin was delayed as I mentioned. When we finally were able to board the plane, we were advised that the tail winds were quite good and that we should be able to arrive in St John’s ahead of schedule. Then we were delayed because the plane was waiting for two travellers.

I was hoping to get some sleep on the flight from Dublin to Toronto, but that did not happen. I knew that we would have an opportunity to have something to eat not too long after take-off, so I forced myself to stay awake. I did not want to be woken up or miss the meal as I was beginning to be hungry. After eating, I waited a bit of time, and then tried to go to sleep, but couldn’t. However, I was able to sleep for about a half hour on the flight to St John’s. We arrived in St John’s about 1:40 am this morning. Because I was in a window seat, I had to wait until my seat mate was able to leave. I still had to get my carry ons down and I let everyone that I would have held up go before I tried to get them down. Because I was the last on the plane, the steward lifted my carry on down. As I headed to the exit, I passed the pilot on the way and the three of us walked together to the luggage retrieval area together. There, my husband was waiting for me. I was so happy that he was there when the plane landed instead of me having to wait for him.

Once I retrieved my large suitcase, we headed for the car and drove to the Comfort Inn, Airport, in St John’s where my husband had already checked in. I had made the reservation before going to Ireland. I was very glad that I had thought about this. I was asleep about three minutes after my head hit the pillow and wasn’t up for the day until about 8:45 this morning.

We missed the continental breakfast, but I was okay with that as I knew that I needed the sleep more. After checking out, we went to Tim Horton’s for breakfast, then headed for home. I was able to stay away for about half of the travel time and then fell asleep again.

Once we were home, the cats insisted on a very thorough greeting. Even Angel insisted that I make a fuss of her and she usually just tolerates me. After all, I do feed her and clean the litter, and apparently, my head scratches are totally acceptable.

After the greetings from the two cats, I headed upstairs and proceeded to fill up my laundry hamper. It’s laundry day tomorrow and I will have a full load. After all, I was gone for more than two weeks and I only wore two shirts twice. The rest were only worn once while away. On the other hand, I did wash the underwear halfway through the trip.

I spent the rest of the day trying to finish the unpacking and going through the mail. It was mostly household bills. I was able to pretty much stay within my budget. I knew that I would have to use a credit card for some of it, but I was able to keep it at the minimum.

Well, my trip to Ireland is completed and I am back to look for a job, fill my church responsibilities, and work on my family history and blog until the next trip which will be for five days in Ontario for a wedding. I have already booked the flights for that trip. But more of that at a later date. Please watch for future posts where I fill in more details about each of the visits that we made in Ireland.

Day Seventeen – Field Trip, April 2016

This morning, we left our hotel a little later than usual. We were scheduled to leave at 8:30 am and I think that we were very close to our timing. We had only two stops before arriving at our hotel, but we were on the bus for quite a while.

During the first leg of our trip, the bus driver put on “Ryan’s Daughter” for our entertainment. I think that quite a few of us got some zzz during that time and we finished the first half of the movie by the time we arrived at our first destination.

We visited the sixth century monastic settlement that had seven churches and a visitor’s center. We walked through their display and then watched the audio-visual presentation. Afterwards, we had a guided tour through some of the grounds. Most of the grounds are now a cemetery. I may be wrong, but I think that I can safely say that there are thousands of people buried there. Our first stop was in front of some headstones for some of the Farrell clan. I was quite excited to see them. My brother also saw them and I now have a picture of him beside one of them.

Once we were back on the bus, the driver put on the rest of the movie for us to enjoy. The movie was almost finished when we arrived at our second destination and we wanted to finish before going in. It was taking too long, so we watched the last of it while we were waiting for some members of the group to return to the bus.

We had arrived at Trinity College and had a date with the Book of Kells. I enjoyed the exhibition put together that discussed various aspect of the Book. Then, we went into another room where the Book of Kells is kept. It was something to see.

The exit was through the Long Room upstairs. I was astounded with the sight that I never thought that I would be having. All those books, all those bookshelves, in one space.

I may not be able to do a post tomorrow. If I don’t, I will be posting the next day.