I know there's been very little posted the past couple weeks, less than half the usual
and nothing like the occasional deeply researched post about some artist or biography, I enjoy those as much or more than the large volume of funny, stupid, goofy, or fantastic things that there's isn't much about, but there are so many of them that it's a full day posting them.
Like I mentioned a week or so ago, I'm doing my family tree on Ancestry.com and it's far more in depth than I thought, and NO ONE ever mentioned to me before that it's so time consuming. I now spend as much time on that as I used to on this.
So, after 14 years of this, and 42000 posts, you are probably not surprised to know I get very focused and committed to a project, and go to great lengths of time and online research to get to the bottom of something.
So, anyway, just a note to tell you it's going pretty well, and I'm maybe 40% done with the family tree project. A person could seriously spend years at that, and write books about their ancestors.
If you're ever stuck trying to figure out what to get someone, who likes to research, or is a history buff, or is a kid that will eagerly become a history nut - get them a 6 month Ancestry.com membership, and you'll seriously make them happy longer than anything that isn't a car, truck, or motorcycle.
I wish I could say Ancestry was giving me a freebie so I'd post about them, but, seriously, hell no. My best friend got me a 6 month membership for xmas. It's incredible, and you probably know I LOVE history.
Well, when you're looking to see what relatives did in WW2, WW1, the civil war, the revolutionary war, the war of 1812, which relatives crossed the Atlantic in sailing ships to immigrate here, which ones were on the Mayflower, which ones were knights, barons, dukes, kings, queens, emperors, roman senators, Visogoths, Huguenots, Gauls, Franks, Saxons, in the crusades, etc etc etc, you're getting one hell of a history education, and more, because it's real, and it's personal, and it's family.
What a hell of a mind trip, I can tell you
and nothing like the occasional deeply researched post about some artist or biography, I enjoy those as much or more than the large volume of funny, stupid, goofy, or fantastic things that there's isn't much about, but there are so many of them that it's a full day posting them.
Like I mentioned a week or so ago, I'm doing my family tree on Ancestry.com and it's far more in depth than I thought, and NO ONE ever mentioned to me before that it's so time consuming. I now spend as much time on that as I used to on this.
So, after 14 years of this, and 42000 posts, you are probably not surprised to know I get very focused and committed to a project, and go to great lengths of time and online research to get to the bottom of something.
So, anyway, just a note to tell you it's going pretty well, and I'm maybe 40% done with the family tree project. A person could seriously spend years at that, and write books about their ancestors.
If you're ever stuck trying to figure out what to get someone, who likes to research, or is a history buff, or is a kid that will eagerly become a history nut - get them a 6 month Ancestry.com membership, and you'll seriously make them happy longer than anything that isn't a car, truck, or motorcycle.
I wish I could say Ancestry was giving me a freebie so I'd post about them, but, seriously, hell no. My best friend got me a 6 month membership for xmas. It's incredible, and you probably know I LOVE history.
Well, when you're looking to see what relatives did in WW2, WW1, the civil war, the revolutionary war, the war of 1812, which relatives crossed the Atlantic in sailing ships to immigrate here, which ones were on the Mayflower, which ones were knights, barons, dukes, kings, queens, emperors, roman senators, Visogoths, Huguenots, Gauls, Franks, Saxons, in the crusades, etc etc etc, you're getting one hell of a history education, and more, because it's real, and it's personal, and it's family.
What a hell of a mind trip, I can tell you
Time is our most precious commodity, so we all just try to make the best use of it. If you're happy & excited tracing your family's roots, go for it, enjoy it and do it for as long as you want. If we, your faithful followers, cannot live off new entries alone, then it's nostalgia time when we dig into your 42K previous entries. They'll be new to those of us who discovered JACG years after it started - or merely because we've forgotten half of them by now.
ReplyDeleteI'm afraid of what I might find.
ReplyDeleteYou are doing something important - your readers will survive, plenty of Older Posts to read.
ReplyDelete"Did your family come over on the Mayflower too?"
Not at all, our family had their own boats!!
Lucky! They crammed the passengers of the Speedwell into the Mayflower because the Speedwell started leaking too damn much to make it across the ocean, so there they were with 2wice the usual load of passengers, who not all happened to be religious zealots, and then were late in the crossing, so it was bad weather mostly, and then they got to Cape Cod nearly in winter, spent the winter onboard instead of on land, about 1/2 the passengers died... probably to get away from the religious zealots, and then tried to make a go of a new life with very little training.
DeleteSo, it's been made into a nearly romantically historic myth, the wonderful Pilgrims, and the struggle for liberty and religious freedom... but they must have seriously been suffering stuck on that little boat with too damn many passengers. I haven't read yet if they were successful in moving the food stores WITH the Speedwell passengers, and the cargo.
Anyway, I was looking for some important historic moments, and the Mayflower was one of them, and yep, one ancestor was on the Mayflower.
I have an ancestor that came over on the Hurcules, in 1634, 15 years after the Mayflower. he was 1/4 owner of the Hurcules. everyone who came over back then were very brave people.
ReplyDeleteto get on a ship for 4 months that may or may not make it all the way, and arrive in an unknown uncivilized land and never see your family or friends back home again.
also discovered that my moms fathers grandparents were first cousins.
not a lot of people to choose from in 1845 in Burnt Corn Alabama.
Wow! Good research on someone's part to learn of the part ownership of the ship! That's amazing!
DeleteYup, I've come across several examples of first cousins, 2nd cousins, etc etc. Of course, I've also looked at thousands of ancestors, and have about 50 pages of notes. I'm still not done with just my fathers side of the family.
Isn't history amazing Jesse, especially when it's your own family. Keep digging brother, there's bound to be more. As for your posting, well as mentioned above, we have plenty to read and enjoy in the sidebar. Not worried about any lack of reading and viewing material, that's for sure. So I say, thank you again sir for this great blog.
ReplyDelete