castiron | Entries tagged with genealogy

In looking for relatives of my grandmother's second husband, I have found a person whose father's surname was Weatherwax and whose mother's maiden name was Potter.

I have never wanted to fake a genealogy to show me as the descendant of someone, but this tempts me.

Crossposts: http://castiron.livejournal.com/99209.html

1. Last Friday, the 29th of November, was the 20th anniversary of the initial posting of Stephen Ratliff's ST:TNG fanfic "Enterprized", the first in his long series about Marrissa Amber Flores Picard. Spelling and grammar errors, a proper Mary Sue of a main character (forget these modern heroines labeled "Mary Sue" solely because they're unusually competent; Marrissa is the real thing), long-winded introduction scenes, tedious space battles, summarizing of major dramatic events as a dry speech after the fact -- these fics were prime fodder for the denizens of rec.arts.tv.misc.mst3k, and to his credit, Mr. Ratliff was a good sport about the whole thing (and actually improved his writing quite a bit over the years, though the ratmm folks still found plenty to have fun with). I'm very grateful to

norabombay for bringing the MSTings to my attention many years ago; they've given me much amusement ever since, and I hope Mr. Ratliff is prospering.

2. After watching him roughhouse with other kids last week, Spouse and I think Middle Son has a fine career ahead of him as a professional wrestler -- sports plus drama!

3. Youngest Son is officially a toddler. Eek.

4. I have about half the required word count for my Yuletide fic; I need to claw out some room-of-my-own time to finish it. I'm trying something that I've never done to this extent in a Yuletide fic, and one of the pieces hasn't quite clicked :-P.

5. Dear self: buying yarn is really, really not the same thing as buying knitting/crocheting time. (Corollary: buying fiber is really, really not the same thing as buying spinning time, let alone knitting/crocheting time.)

6. One of the mysteries surrounding my (presumed) paternal grandfather has been solved. Back in January, I'd learned that someone of his name (and right age and birth state) was in federal prison in Oklahoma in 1940. This week, while searching a database of old newspaper articles, I found a couple of articles in the Dallas Morning News that confirmed it was the right man. The crime? Stealing/destroying third-class mail when he was working as a substitute letter carrier in 1936, and then running off to Chicago and hiding out there for three years. (And the best part: his job in Chicago was as a clerk of the criminal court.) He was sentenced to three and a half years in prison, three of those suspended, so he might have been finishing up his jail time at the time of the census. Fun with genealogy!

Crossposts: http://castiron.livejournal.com/89761.html

1. You know those decals that parents put in their car's rear window to brag about what school sport their kid plays? (For readers unfamiliar with this bit of possibly-regional American culture, here's an example.) Spouse keeps saying he wants to make and sell some with first names of famous dictators. I now want a set that references Marvel's Avengers -- "Clint" with a bow and arrow, "Thor" with a hammer, "Tony" with a science-club-ish logo, etc.

2. Tonight's household discussion began with The Cat in the Hat and ended with the idea of William Shatner, Time Lord. (Yes, there was actually a logical progression.) (If a Time Lord was a redshirt, would anyone notice that they were regenerating?)

3. And on that note, is there a Doctor Who fic where Martha Jones says "I'm a doctor, not a TIme Lord"?

4. Now that we have a PC working well enough to run The Master Genealogist, I've been doing a little bit of genealogy research online, and I've found the marriage licenses for my paternal grandmother's second and third marriages. (#2 we knew about; #3 we didn't.) It's very interesting which records list her as widowed (1940 census; marriage license #3 [when there was a license for husband #2 marrying someone else a couple years earlier) and which list her as divorced (marriage license #2, which was after the 1940 census). (Divorced was almost certainly the correct status, though I've never been able to find any documentation; if the Los Angeles Superior Court's archive & records center is open to the public, some day I want to go there and see what I can find.)

5. What's especially interesting: When I searched the census index for husband #1, my grandfather (or at least, the person who I get my surname from), who I know was actually alive in 1940 (and for many years afterwards), I did find a person with the right name, age, and birth state...who was an inmate in a federal prison. While I can't confirm that it's the right guy, if he is, it would certainly explain why my dad and his siblings were told that their father died overseas in WWII when in fact he was alive.

6. Sadly, everyone who'd know what the heck was really going on with my grandparents is long dead, and they probably wouldn't have been willing to tell the gory truth anyway.

7. Genealogy is really fun.