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Wednesday, March 02, 2011

SO MANY GEDCOMS, SO LITTLE TIME.

Now that Family History Writing Month is over(more on that tomorrow) , I’m
returning to blogging more about generations before mine. The trouble is,
I have so much to choose from, I’m having trouble deciding which way to
go.

A few years back I found and downloaded the Revolutionary War Pension
Files for eight direct ancestors and three of their siblings. I’ve analyzed
and transcribed three of them so far and intended to do the others.
(Remember my still not started Elisha Houghton series?) But I kept
finding other things to research, and I started adding to and expanding
my tree online at Ancestry and here at home. And of course there
was my health problems and then my move to a new apartment last
year.


Now I’ve gotten my great great grandfather Asa Ellingwood’s Civil War
Pension file and I’m planning to send for my great great granduncle
Asa West’s file. I have new leads on my McFarland ancestry and I
may still have information to bring down my John Cutter West brick
wall.

I suppose I could lock myself away in my apartment for a few months
and do nothing but transcribe and interpret all of this, but I do still have
a job(knock on wood) and besides, there’s a ll that graveyard fieldwork
I’m planning to do once the snows melt and the weather turns warm.

What’s a poor geneablogger to do?

Ok, that’s it, I need more time.

I’m living to 100!

5 comments:

Carol said...

I want a wife, a maid, a secretary, a chauffeur and a FULL staff of another 10 or so, just to do whatever needs doing! LOL

But, look at it this way Bill, you are not bored!

Kathy Reed said...

I remember a similar situation where I actually discussed my writer's block -- due not from a lack of material, but too much. I can identify.

One question -- did you get the $25 pension record or the full blown $75 version? At least in one case, I wish I had more -- but I have no reason to believe that the extra $50 would have provided me with more information.

Bill West said...

Kathy,
I got the full record. Although much of the information on the affidavits
was repetitious it did fill in some
gaps. And Asa's affidavit as you'll see when I post it gives a good timeline of his residences before
his enlistment, so it was worth it.

Jennifer said...

I know how you feel!! I have a stack of wills and deeds which I copied LAST MAY on my trip to Virginia. I still haven't scanned or transcribed them. I really need to get to it....
I'm thankful to have too much to do rather than too little though. I'd hate to be stuck at a bunch of brick walls early on.

Greta Koehl said...

Same here. Too much to do, too much to write about.