NERGC-2017 - Finding Someone Who Eluded Census Records

Directions to the Springfield, MA Civic Center provided by the New England Regional Genealogical Society were easy to follow. We exited I-91 at Columbus Street, onto Main Street, and within a few blocks was the Civic Center where the Fourteenth New England Regional Genealogical Conference was being held. Excitement was mounting!

Parking was right across the street; registration was easy. While we waited to meet our friends Wally and Marian for lunch, we had a long chat with speaker DonnaMoughty. We first met Donna when we lived in Newtown, CT, and she spoke to our newly formed genealogy club. Donna now lives in Florida, is a member of the Manatee Genealogical Society, as are we, so we see her there as well. It was nice to have a chance to visit in Springfield. Donna is a professional genealogist specializing in Irish research along with U.S. research, methodology and technology including Macs, iPhones and iPads.  She provides research, consultations and training. She is one busy lady!

After a delicious lunch at the Red Rose restaurant, my first NERGC session was Finding Someone Who Eluded Census Records, by Carol Prescott McCoy.

There are different types of censuses. The population census is the most used, but there are also industrial, agricultural, Veteran’s, some state censuses, and slave schedules. Note the date when the census was taken, i.e. in 1920, the date was 1 January. Check every year, every type. People moved and could have been missed. Or they were too far out in the country, in dangerous territory, where the census taker didn’t want to go. Sometimes ancestors are listed twice, if they were traveling between residences. And these could contain different information!

Copy/download entire census page to capture neighbors for future searches. Record all members of the household. Sometimes boarders or “servants” can be relatives. Record names, ages, and places exactly as in the census.

Name spelling issues are the most common. Try every variation. If that doesn’t work, find neighbors from previous census. If your ancestors stayed in the same place, finding the neighbors will locate your people. This was the only way we were able to find my New York City Nunn family in the 1900 census. When the census taker was told the last name was Nunn, he thought he was being told “none.” After several attempts at this misunderstanding, he finally wrote the deceased father’s first name “Joseph,” as the last name, scribbled in with the wife’s first name – a real mess. I located them because I found a 1905 New York Times article where Elizabeth Nunn (eldest daughter) sued her neighbor for return of money Elizabeth had entrusted with the woman in 1900. When I untangled that mess, I found the family!

Census Substitutes. Town records, tax lists, school lists, old maps, town histories, voter lists are all places where your ancestors’ histories reside. Hubby and I developed an 1890 Census Substitute for Newtown, Connecticut by using tax records, school and voter lists, and some church records. It was our hope that other towns would follow suit in order to fill in this 20 year gap.

My best takeaways: Develop a census database. This can be done for each person or by family, to sort by last name as well as date. Develop a timeline (I did that years ago, but it is a good reminder to review and update.) FAN Club - Follow friends, associates and neighbors. Be flexible!

Samuel Agard, An Early Settler of the Town of Catherine, NY

This afternoon I pulled out the research I did many years ago – when I was a baby genealogist – on my Agard family line. The document I had started was 43 pages of family history starting with the founding couple, John and Esther Agard who arrived on the Massachusetts shore in 1683.

The plan is to read through a few pages at a time, run them off, and then perform a “genealogy do-over” checking names, dates, and all other facts. I am so glad I did this original research when we lived in New England, as that was where I had access to the records.

When I came to Samuel Agard, I got that small world feeling again, as genealogists are wont to do. When I write up monographs, I like to explain the geographic areas in which my ancestors lived. In this case, the Agards settled in the Town of Catherine, NY. And if you read the write-up I found, one of the land purchasers was from Newtown, CT, where I was living when I did this original research. And then my Agard ancestors went on to establish the first library in Catherine. You go guys!

And so, with that introduction, meet Samuel Agard.

Samuel Agard (b: 6 Sept 1782) was the second child of Noah and Lucina (Jones) Agard. In 1807 Samuel married Sally Stone (1785-1813), daughter of John and Lowly Stone of Branford, Connecticut. The promise of available western lands was tempting for folks trying to farm the rocky Connecticut soil. Samuel traveled to Catherine Township, NY with his father Noah in 1809 and took title to land in 1814.  He then found property in the Town of Dix that had a sawmill.

The town of Catherine was originally called Johnson’s Settlement, named for Robert C. Johnson of New York City who purchased 10,725 acres in this area of Upstate New York.  In the center of the crossroads stood a post, not unlike the liberty pole that stands in the middle of State Route 25 and Route 6 in Newtown, Connecticut. The town was divided into northeast, northwest, southeast and southwest sections. Interestingly, the lot in the southeast corner of the town was purchased by Job Lattin, Jr. of Newtown, Connecticut.  In fact, many early settlers arrived from Connecticut as this area of Upstate New York was known for its fertile land and abundant orchards. 

The Town of Catherine was organized by act of legislature on 9 March 1798. John Mitchell is listed as the first bona fide settler; Eaton Agard is listed as one of the early settlers. The Methodist Episcopal Church in Catherine was organized in 1805; one of the first trustees is Samuel Agard. The Catherine Library Association was organized 1 April 1817 and Samuel Agard again listed as a first trustee. The first post office was established in 1816.

Samuel Agard, son of Noah, was also a circuit preacher in 1825. Eaton Agard was Town of Catherine Supervisor in 1847, 1867-68.  The Agard farm was located at Lawrence 75A, Northwest Section Township 3, Johnson Settlement to Cayuta Lake.

Sally died in 1813 and is buried in the Agard Cemetery on Route 414 between Alpine and Odessa, New York.

In 1819 Samuel married Lydia Hibbard, the fourth daughter of Daniel and Anna (Ripley) Hibbard, of Dummerston, Vermont. Lydia (Hibbard) Agard was born 1 August 1792. Samuel and Lydia’s children were all born in Catherine, NY. Lydia died 25 August 1846 in Havana (Montour Falls, NY);[1] Samuel died 27 October 1861. Samuel and Lydia are buried in the Montour Cemetery, Montour, New York. See later pages for further information on Samuel and Lydia. 

On 22 May 1817 Samuel and Eaton Agard, along with others “…did by writing under their hands signify their consent and desire to associate themselves together for the procuring and creating a public library…” Samuel was First Trustee of the Catherine Library Association

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[1] Jarvis, Louise Huntington Bailey, Some ancestors and descendants of Samuel Agard and Florence Williams (Huntington) Bailey, Grand Rapids, MI, 1947. P. 4.

Let us not forget ...

In Memory - Perform a Random Act of Kindness Today

“Perform a kindness in honor of those who lost their lives at Sandy Hook School; and spend some time in reflection about how our future can be made better for all persons. We have the opportunity to continue to move toward positive change — there is no greater gift of love than to act on behalf of those whose lives were taken.”

 - Pat Llodra, Newtown First Selectman

Newtown, CT Genealogy Club Programs for 2013-2014

The Genealogy Club of Newtown (CT) began on September 11, 2001, so it is only fitting that the first program of the year is slated for September 11!  

They have great programs planned, so if you live within driving distance, the club meets the second Wednesday of each month (except July/August) 7:00 p.m. at the C.H. Booth Library, 25 Main Street, Newtown, CT 06470.

If you have Newtown ancestors, and live far away, the club website has a Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness link. Help is just a click away.

Genealogy Club of Newtown Programs for 2013

Sept.11 - Joe Lieby - German Research

Oct. 9 -  Penny Hartzell - Updates at Family Search, Ancestry, and other sites

Nov. 13 - TBA

Dec. 11 - Holiday Party with a Genealogy Theme

Stay tuned for 2014 programs that will include "Using Find-a-Grave" and "French-Canadian Resources."

Tuesday's Tip - Genealogy Resources in Newtown, Connecticut

“The libraries of the world also constitute a vast resource of information that is totally ignored by genealogists.”  James Tanner, Genealogy’s Star blog.

James Tanner’s recent blog, “Non-Traditional Genealogy Data Sources” reminded me of the wealth of resources that reside in the genealogy room of the C.H. Booth Library in Newtown, Connecticut.  Listed below are just some of the items in the collection. There is also a large number of “How-to” books, as well as availability to Ancestry.com, help with Newtown research through the Genealogy Club of Newtown website's Random Acts link, our local professional genealogist, and our town historian.

Specific to Newtown ancestor research there is:

·      1890 Census Substitute for Newtown

·      1890-1899 Newtown Death Database

·      Cemetery Inscriptions: St. Paul’s Church, Huntington, CT

·      Genealogy Room Historic Papers

·      Hale Collection of Headstone Inscriptions for Newtown

·      Irish Tombstone Transcriptions for St. Rose Cemetery

·      Irish Tombstone Transcriptions for Old St. Peter’s Cemetery, Danbury, CT

·      Julia Brush Collection – Family Files

·      Newtown Bee Vital Records Index 1889-1953, 1960, 1980, and Newtown Bee Obits Index 2004-2011.

·      Newtown Congregational Church Records 1715-1946

·      Newtown Supplementary Vital Records

·      Newtown: Births, Marriages, Deaths, 1711-1852

·      Stratford: Births, Marriages, Deaths, 1639-1840

For those searching New England and beyond is:

·      New England Historical and Genealogical Register Mayflower Families

·      Great Migration books

·      Family Histories

·      Rhode Island Vital Records

·      Rhode Island Colonial Records

·      Revolutionary War materials

·      Military Service books

·      Genealogies of Connecticut Families

·      Census books (1850)

·      Heads of Families

·      New England states, towns, localities. Starting with Maine, ending with Connecticut.

·      Settlers of the Beekman Patent (NY)

·      DAR Lineage Books with Index

·      Connecticut Nutmegger with Index

·      Connecticut Ancestry Magazine

·      New York Genealogical and Biographical Record

·      American Genealogy

·      Long Island church books

·      Great Migration books

·      Reference books on individual states

·      Index: George Budke Tombstone inscriptions, Bergen County, NJ and Rockland County, NY

·      Ethnic group how-to books (Scottish roots, German-American ancestry, Jewish roots, Irish, English, Swedish and Polish roots)

After a trip to the state library in Hartford for some research I thought was only there, I then discovered what I needed was only four miles away at the C.H. Booth Library in Newtown!  As James Tanner suggests, take advantage of the materials in your own local library, historical society, and state library.  

Sympathy Saturday - Maggie Houlihan

Last year we developed a database of Newtown Deaths that occurred between 1890 and 1899 in order to fill in the gap presented by the loss of the 1890 census.  The editor of Connecticut Ancestry was interested in the project, but what he really wanted was some stories behind the deaths.  We complied an article about the Newtown Deaths database and added some stories surrounding a few of those deaths that was published in the February 2011 issue of Connecticut Ancestry. Here is one of those stories:

Twenty-six-year old Margaret “Maggie” Houlihan worked as a hat trimmer in Danbury, Connecticut until she received a “partial shock” which caused her to convalesce at home for several weeks. She tried to return to work, but her sickness affected her brain and she would become irrational. She could not continue to work. On a Friday afternoon in early February 1894, Maggie spoke of visiting her friends the Misses Brennan. Her parents discouraged her. But, “About 6 o’clock… she said she was going on an errand. Shortly afterward her parents heard the milk train whistle and stop and Mr. Houlihan ran down to see what was the matter, only to find his daughter had been struck by the engine and was in a dying condition…She was taken to the house where she soon died. Whether Miss Houlihan deliberately threw herself in front of the engine or whether she still had it in her mind to call on the Misses Brennan, and becoming confused fell on the track will never be known.”  (Newtown Bee February 16, 1894.)

Oral Histories

I have had the honor of working on oral histories for the Newtown, CT, Ulysses (Trumansburg), NY and Newfield, NY historical societies.  The stories are always fascinating and capture that person’s memory of time and place.  My husband and I have captured our mother’s voices and their oral histories. This excerpt from my mother’s, Carol Agard Nunn (b: 1924) oral history opens a window for me into what it was like to grow up on a farm in rural Willow Creek near Jacksonville, NY:

“Baths – showers were unheard of – baths were water heated in a big pan, usually an enameled pan – we called it a tub – on the stove, and on Saturday nights - it was one bath a week, we would put that in front of the stove and take our baths. During the week you would have what we called the sponge bath where you took a damp washcloth and went over your body. That was about it. You washed your hair once a week also.”

                                                    Agard Homestead early 1900s