Thanksgiving is a good time for families to share family history, through stories, photographs and heirlooms.
It’s easy to pull out some scrapbooks and go through them. Younger relatives might even get interested in inheriting some of the items, or taking ownership of them now. If you are ready to part with some things, perhaps now would be a good time to gift photos and other treasured pieces to the next generation. Most families have some possessions that have special meaning. So, try to facilitate the next step in the preservation of family heritage items by showing them to whomever comes for Thanksgiving dinner. Sometimes younger family members don’t even know some “treasures” exist, so they can’t even ask about them.
I learned that a cousin had my grandmother’s wedding ring and luckily passed it on to a younger relative. My mother surprised me one Christmas with six letters my Dad wrote in 1943, while in training in California. I had no idea they existed, so they were not on my radar to ask for them. If you don’t know what your parents or grandparents might have, this might be a good time to bring up the discussion in some sort of general way, like “Do you have anything that belonged to your grandmother?”
Genealogy terminology
At a lecture I gave the other day, a woman in attendance did not know what I meant by “chain carriers,” with regard to land records. In surveying land, measurements were made with a chain (66 feet) that contained 100 links, and usually younger men were called on to carry the chain around. They were called chain carriers and their names can be very important to your project. Lots of other genealogy terminology may need to be explained to people, so lecturers should be aware of that.
The 1918 flu pandemic online
Two websites are featuring the 1918 flu pandemic. One has information on Americus — influenzainamericus.com. The other — influenzaarchive.org — has a national focus. You can check the latter by major cities. Atlanta is one of the cities listed.
Contact Kenneth H. Thomas Jr., P.O. Box 901, Decatur, Ga., 30031, or kenthomasongenealogy.com.
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