Hello Reader!

It's offically spring and the weather here in Pennsylvania has been matching the season. Warm sun, soft breezes, and occassional light rain. Oh, we had the sudden 5" snow dumped on us one weekend just as we always do this time of year, but we quickly returned to spring.

My afternoons have been spent sitting for a bit on the porch swing and enjoying the return of warm days, birds chirping, and plants budding out. Does this mean I haven't kept up with what I normally do? Yes, I've skipped the newsletter for a couple of weeks now. But that porch setting has been like a healing balm on the low level anxiety I've been carrying around. My ancestors must have done the same to get through troubled times they lived through. As we say today, self care!

What I've Been Up To

I was interviewed by Craig Constantine, one of my mentors in the Akimbo Podcasting Fellowship. If you'd like to hear me talk about genealogy and Pennsylvania for non-genealogists, the interview is about 20 minutes and here. I always forget how many details we learn as we do family history that most people don't know, and talking outside my usual circle is a good practice.

I'm finishing the last ProGen assignment, a ten page family narrative. Finally writing on one of my families I've research for years. Yay! We get feedback on it next week, then revise it for submission in April, then we graduate in May. I don't know if "graduate" is the right term, but after 15 months having ProGen work so central to each week, it feels like graduation. If you want to work through the Professional Genealogy text book and get continual peer feedback on your work, then submit your name to be put in a future class here.

U.S. Census Stories

The NARA blog posts on the U.S. census have been excellent. This one explaining the various immigration status codes is a keeper. I have one family who came over in 1846 and gave birth to a child on board the ship. It was entertaining following his immigration status and birth place in the various censuses - "at sea," "on the boat," and "water" were all used. And yes, they made him apply for citzenship! Guess the "international waters" rule really is true. I have not pulled his declaration of intention and naturalization papers, but I will have to so I can see how he listed his birth place.

County Resources

Some digitization has gone on at county historical and genealogical societies during the past couple of years. If you haven't checked in with them lately, you could be in for a treat. York County just added some digitized and indexed surname files and Bible records.

The Zoom based webinars are continuing - South Central Pennsylvania Genealogical Society is hosting a meeting on researching instititutionalized people in Pennsylvania on May 1st. Ty Stump from the PA Archives is teaching and he is the expert on this topic. Highly recommend.

If you are looking for some images of the places where your ancestors lived, the State Library of PA has been digitizing their county postcard collection. You can keyword search by county and city names. It's a work-in-progress but I still found some treasures of churches they attended which have been demolished.

If you need a list of all the local county historical and genealogical societies, I have a list on my website here.

I hope spring is feeling welcoming to you too🌷

Let's discover our Pennsylvania ancestors together,

Denyse Allen, PA Ancestors

Where to find me and follow my work