Heartland Genealogy

  Have you ever started researching one question only to find yourself investigating something entirely different? Genealogy research often works that way. We find one record, which raises a question, which sends us looking for another record. Before long, we're following a research trail we hadn't anticipated. I've discovered that my conversations with ChatGPT can evolve in much the same way. A recent conversation about James Marshall Ricketts is a good example. I started with a fairly simple request: Create a timeline from the transcription of James Marshall Ricketts's Civil War pension file. I wasn't asking ChatGPT to solve a mystery. I simply wanted help organizing the information I already had. But that timeline led us somewhere I hadn't expected. Starting with a Pension File James Marshall Ricketts served in Company K of the 7th Indiana Cavalry during the Civil War. His pension file contains documents created over many years, making it difficult to see h...

Do you remember sitting at a microfilm reader, turning the handle as you scrolled through page after page of an old newspaper looking for a marriage announcement? When you finally found what you were searching for, did you print a copy, transcribe the entire article, or simply jot down the information that seemed important at the time? I have to admit that I sometimes chose that last option. Printing an article from microfilm wasn’t always convenient. At the library where I was researching, I had to rewind the roll, move it to a separate reader/printer, relocate the article, and then spend a quarter to make a copy. Apparently, that was enough of an obstacle for me to decide that handwritten notes would do! One of those sets of notes concerned the marriage of my great-grandparents, Charles O. Mentzer and Nettie E. Wells . Their wedding announcement appeared in the 20 October 1893 issue of The Yates Center News . Fortunately, genealogy research has changed considerably since I made those...

    Calling all Genea-Musings Fans:   It's Saturday Night again -  time for some more Genealogy Fun!! Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission Impossible music, please!): 1)  How do you use Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools to help you understand the lives, history, and geography associated with your family and your ancestors, that aid your genealogy and family history research?   Instead of composing my own answer to this post, I asked my primary AI partner, ChatGPT to answer the question. Below is the complete answer from ChatGPT. You’ve used AI less as a simple “answer machine” and more as a research partner for interpreting records, understanding historical context, exploring geography, testing hypotheses, and turning evidence into family stories . Based on the genealogy projects we’ve worked on, your uses fall into several broad areas: Reading and interpreting historical records. You’ve used ChatGPT and other AI...

Have you ever discovered that a military record doesn't tell quite the whole story? While researching the Civil War service of James Marshall Ricketts , I initially had a fairly straightforward account of his service. James enlisted in the 7th Indiana Cavalry, was hospitalized in Memphis, returned to his regiment, was promoted to corporal, and eventually mustered out in Texas. Then I looked more closely at his age. Enlisting in the 7th Indiana Cavalry According to his military records, James M. Ricketts enrolled on 18 August 1863 at Indianapolis, Indiana , for a term of three years. He was mustered into service on 11 September 1863 as a private in Company K, 7th Indiana Cavalry. His Company Descriptive Book provides additional information about the young soldier. It describes James as about 5 feet 4½ inches tall, with a light complexion, gray eyes and light hair. He was born in Clinton County, Indiana, and had been working as a farmer. Most importantly, the military record gives h...

Do you have photocopies of newspaper articles tucked away in your genealogy files—clippings you copied years ago and perhaps haven't looked at since? Today's Friday Find is one of those items from my Kansas CRAWFORD files: an obituary for Cora Adams Crawford published in the Dodge City Daily Globe on December 6, 1947. Cora Adams married Nelson G. Crawford , a brother of my great-grandfather, Judson Foster Crawford . Although Cora isn't a direct ancestor, her obituary adds details to the story of the extended Crawford family in Dodge City. Beyond documenting her death, the obituary provides a glimpse into Cora's life and community connections. It identifies her parents, tells when the family came to Kansas and later moved to Dodge City, gives her marriage date, names her surviving siblings, and describes her involvement with the Methodist Church, Eastern Star, and P.E.O. It's a good reminder of why those old photocopies are worth revisiting. A single obituary ...

Do you remember learning about the scientific method in high school—or perhaps even earlier? Have you ever considered how closely the process of genealogy research can resemble the scientific method? Most genealogy researchers will tell you to begin with a question. From there, genealogists may use different terminology, but I often find myself mentally following the familiar steps of the scientific method: Question Hypothesis — a proposed answer to the question Test the hypothesis Collect data Evaluate the data Draw a conclusion Translated into genealogy, those steps might look something like this: Question: Who are the parents of _____? Hypothesis: Preliminary research suggests that X may be the son or daughter of Y. Research/Test: Locate records for Y, X, and their relatives while documenting the research. Collect Data: Gather census records, land records, probate records, DNA matches, family trees, and other evidence. Evaluate: Does the accumulated evidence support or contrad...

Do you have ancestral lines going back to the settlement of New Netherland ? I knew that my husband's SEBRING line could be traced back to New Netherland. However, it wasn't until recently, when I connected my third great-grandmother, Rachel Harris Currey, to her parents, that I uncovered several Dutch lines in my own tree. Suddenly, New Netherland research became much more relevant to my genealogy. Thus, when I recently saw a Facebook post from the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society (NYG&B) about its New Netherland Settlers project, I immediately clicked to learn more. The project has an ambitious goal: to develop detailed, peer-reviewed biographical sketches of the people who resided in New Netherland prior to 1664. The first completed sketches were released online in July 2025, and additional sketches are being added as research is completed. What makes these sketches especially valuable to genealogists is their scope. Depending on the records available for...

Have you ever unlinked a child from parents in your family tree? If so, did you stop to consider all the different places where that relationship—and your reason for changing it—might need to be updated? Recently, I made the difficult decision to unlink my second great-grandfather, Albert Hutchinson , from the parents I had long assigned to him: Aaron Hutchinson and Sarah Merry . Why I Questioned the Relationship My recent research into the descendants of Aaron and Hannah Hutchinson , combined with a closer look at my autosomal DNA matches, has caused me to question whether Albert was actually their grandson. The problem is fairly simple: I have not found evidence directly connecting my Albert Hutchinson of Iowa to the Hutchinson family of Livingston County, New York. I do have records stating that Albert was born in Fulton County, New York . That location does not prove he wasn't related to the Livingston County family, but it adds to my concerns about a relationship that was alre...

Charles Mentzer and Nettie Wells Marry in 1893 Have you ever looked at a marriage record and realized how much more it tells you than simply the date of the wedding? As I continue digging through the records in my genealogy files, I came across the marriage record for my maternal great-grandparents, Charles O. Mentzer and Nettie A. Wells . They were married in Woodson County, Kansas, in October 1893. While I already had their marriage date in my family tree, the actual record adds several details about the beginning of their married life. The Marriage License The license was issued by the Woodson County Probate Court on 14 October 1893 . At the time, both Charles and Nettie were residents of Yates Center, Kansas . Charles was listed as 24 years old, while Nettie was 20. The couple did not marry on the day the license was issued. Instead, the certificate on the lower portion of the record documents their marriage four days later, on 18 October 1893 . The completed license was then retur...