For the past two days we have spent at least 6 hours a day or more at the Family History Center operated and owned by the LDS(Latter Day Saints, aka Mormons).
This is an amazing free service provided by the LDS. The building is four floor tall with an extensive microfilm library, family history books, and computer terminals that connect to US and world wide data bases. The originals of all these records that LDS holds are kept in a granite vault outside of Salt Lake City.There are missionaries in the center to help and they all seem to get as excited as those that they help.Every once in a while someone would say loudly, That is my .... whatever and we would all look to see who was so lucky. On the wall there is a family tree that shows how Shirley Temple, Donnie Osmond,the Wright Brothers and Lucille Ball are related.. How 'bout that!
I was surprised that I could go back at least 6 generations in the Baker family. It certainly helped that in most generations the name Peter Baker showed up. I got as far as the Baker immigration from either NC or VA to KY in the early 1800's then I got stuck. By the time I got to there, my brain was in overload. The Moore family ( my Mom's) were a bit harder to trace, but I am still working on it.
Erwin on the other hand had a great time finding his ancestors in Charleston and Germany. He found passenger lists and even a picture of the ship his Grandmother took from Germany to the USA.... more to follow on that I am sure.
We got home each night after 9 PM, our heads full of history and questions. It is surprising how much information the government has on each of us that is public knowledge. Imagine if I were a hacker what I would find...........
1 comment:
Oh, Jonathan will be thrilled to hear about that passenger ship. And is Peter Baker the soldier you were looking for?
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