Determining 1940 Census EDs for Czech and Slovak Neighborhoods

Kevin Hurbanis sent me a link to his "Searching Chicago's 1940 Czech & Slovak Neighborhoods" page this morning and I asked permission to share it. It's meant as a tool for people who will be looking for ancestors in Pilsen and Lawndale, but it's nicely done and I think it has information that's relevant to us all.

Take a look when you get a chance. And if you know of any other 1940 census tools for Chicago, please post a comment and let us know.

Kevin--thank you!

Update: I posted on the ChicagoGenealogy Facebook page this morning and a group member reminded me that Stephen Morse has some great tools for census research on his One-Step Webpages. Check those out, too!

Embracing our Musical Heritage: What I Learned at Fiddle Club this Weekend

Saturday evening I went to a Fiddle Club of the World gathering to hear Finnish fiddler Arto Järvelä play with the American duo Kaivama. How was it, you ask? Click through to Arto's website and listen to the tune he has playing on the main page. Yes. Do it! Before reading any more, click the link. It'll open in a new window and the music player will start automatically.

Now multiply that sound by two exquisite fiddlers playing in harmony and add in a brisk rhythm from mandolin or guitar or a slow drone accompaniment on harmonium and you will understand why  the only word I have to describe the experience is, well, "incredible."

And what does this have to do with Chicago genealogy? Plenty, actually.

Kaivama musicians Sara Pajunen and Jonathan Rundman are Finnish-Americans hailing from Finnish immigrant communities in Michigan and Minnesota. During a break between tunes, Sara noted, with great feeling, the connection that the music provides to their cultural heritage.

In the midst of collecting names and dates and places, maybe even photos and family stories, let's not overlook the power that music has to strengthen our ties to our ancestors.

For an fascinating overview of ethnic music in Chicago, check out the "Ethnic Music" article in the Chicago History Museum's Encyclopedia of Chicago. Then, if you're in the Chicago area, here are a few examples of ways to learn more about the music of your ancestors:

• Irish? Check out programming at the Irish-American Heritage Center. Click on the "Education" tab to explore classes in music and dance.


• Swedish? Stop by the Swedish American Museum. I see both a dance and a jam on the calendar for March. 


• Ukrainian? A search for the topic "music" in the Ukrainian National Museum's library catalog returns 80 results.


• Polish? The Polish Museum of America has a music library with 4000 78rpm records donated by the family of a Polish music store owner.

If your ancestors came from other places or if you're not local, just Google. I suspect you'll be able to turn up all sorts of creative ways to learn about your family's musical heritage.

Arto, Sara, and Jonathan are touring the mid-west right now and they have concerts planned for Michigan, Ohio, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, California, Oregon, and Washington. Kaivama Concert ScheduleIf you have Finnish ancestry and live near one of the cities they'll be visiting, or if you'd just like to be inspired to learn more about the music that accompanied your own ancestors through life, you should go. Really. You should go.

100 Years Ago: Chicago's 75th Birthday

Chicago celebrates its 175th birthday today and news of the festivities reminds me of--well, actually, it reminds me of Valentine Smith, my husband's 1st cousin 3 times removed. In January of 1912, she urged the city fathers to create a public holiday and fund a 75th birthday party for the city but they chose, instead, to read the incorporation documents in a city council meeting.

Twenty-five years later, though, they threw a party and invited the world to stop by. Chicago celebrated its centennial with the Century of Progress Exposition. Unfortunately, by that time Valentine was living at the Kankakee State Hospital. Even if she caught word of the world's fair, I think it's unlikely that she was able to attend. If she had gone, though, she would have liked it. A lot.

The Chicago Tribune, January 22, 1912, p. 11 (obtained from Fold3.com)

Chicago Tribune, March 4, 1912, p. 1 (obtained from Fold3.com)

CGS Publication: Chicago Cemetery Records 1847-1863

A number of years ago, I had an opportunity to look at undertakers reports from 1863 held by the Illinois Regional Archives Depository (IRAD) at Northeastern Illinois University. I was thrilled to find these pre-fire death records and asked about the possibility of offering my help to index them to make them more accessible. I was told that there was a project already underway. There was!

In 2008 the Chicago Genealogical Society published a book titled Chicago Cemetery Records 1847-1863: Sexton's Reports and Certificates, Treasurer Receipts, Deeds, and Undertakers' Reports. It's a useful resource for early Chicago research and I'll introduce you to it in this post. Below you'll find the main sections listed along with an example entry and a quick summary (in parenthesis) of what the information means. The book includes a name index which makes it easy to use.

Chicago Cemetery Records 1847-1863 can be found in many libraries (see WorldCat Entry) or it can be purchased from the Chicago Genealogical Society for $40.00.

Have you used the book? Has it been of help to you?

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Contents

"Sexton's Receipts and Certificates, Treasurer Receipts, Deeds" 1847-1859

August 1851
South half [of]; 517; [blank]; [New]; Edward Cleghorn; $5.00; [blank] 2

(Date of deed or receipt, location in cemetery, name of grantee, amount, comments, page)


Undertakers' Reports 1863 (January - July)

February 1863
15; 15; dtr of W. K. Greenleaf; 2 years, 4 months; ND; Scarlet fever; Chicago; Chicago Cem; Unknown

(Date of death, date interred, name, age, residence, disease, where born, where interried, physician)


Oak Woods Cemetery: Lots Sold to the City of Chicago (Deeded 1867)

13; Andrew Gausen; 1; 7; $64.72

(Lot number, deeded to, number of burials, possible vacancies, charges)


'Old Catholic Cemetery' Records (Dates appear to be from the 1850s and 1860s)

DEHN, Carolina 8  11 8/16/63 4/7/64

(Name, Age, Date of Death, Date of Burial)


Additional Sections

The book also includes Chicago ward boundaries 1837, 1851, 1857, and 1863 and information about the IRAD system.

Explore the Chicago Examiner, 1908-1918, for Free

Recently Bonnie Brown, a fellow Chicago researcher, sent a message to the IL-COOK-CHICAGO-L list at Rootsweb to make sure that we were aware of a free online resource for Chicago newspaper research -- Harold Washington Library's digital images for the Chicago Examiner, 1908-1918. It wasn't long before people began posting news of their success in finding family-related information. If you haven't explored images, you should!

If you want to browse the newspaper by topic, you can access it through a link from the library's Digital Collections page. Highlights include "Cubs World Series," "White Socks World Series," "Eastland Disaster," and "Plan of Chicago." Other topics include "Jane Addams and Hull House," and the "1912 Olympics."

If you want to search the newspaper, go to the library's main page, click on "A-Z Research Databases," click on the letter "C," and select "Chicago Examiner."

The default view will let you search using various combinations of words

 but I'd recommend using the other search options, too. These include "Selected fields," "By proximity," and "By date."

Give it a try. And if you find something you'd like to share, post a comment.

What to Do when the Church Name isn't on the Marriage License

Cook County marriage license images, 1871-1920 are online for free at FamilySearch up through 1920. If you find that your ancestors were married by a justice of the peace, it's likely that there's no other marriage record available. The Cook County Circuit Court Archives website says "Justice of the Peace Court records were destroyed as allowed by Illinois statute in the early 1970s." But, if they were married in a church, there's a good chance that you can find a church marriage record and in some cases--if it was a Catholic marriage in a Polish parish, for example--the ecclesiastical record might have additional information such as witness names or parent names.

If the church name is listed on the marriage license, the next step is to find where the records are held. The Newberry Library's "Guide to Chicago Church and Synagogue Records" is a good place to start.

But, if the church name isn't listed, you'll have to do some detective work to figure it out. If the name of the priest or pastor is easy to read, try checking the name in a Chicago city directory. They're online at Fold3.com and many of them are also available online for free. Check the "Tools Tab" at ChicagoAncestors.org, for example.

If the name isn't easy to read it's a lot harder. Recently, a researcher sought help from the IL-COOK-CHICAGO list at RootsWeb. The priest on a license was listed as "Carl A." but what was the surname? What letter does it start with? N? M? St? And it looks like "ead" but is there an "h" at the end? "eadh?"

I skimmed the names of Catholic priests in city directories c. 1915, but, unfortunately, most of the entries just had initials for given names so there was little chance of finding the name Carl and nothing resembling the surname caught my eye. To help with the search, I typed the address in at ChicagoAncestors.org to see which parishes were close by but still no match. I even checked the marriage register images for the closest parish to see if there was a priest with a similar name making entries. There wasn't.

I decided to check the marriage license on microfilm at the Wilmette Family History Center to see if better contrast would help me decipher the writing but no luck. I enlisted the help of a FHC volunteer and long-time Chicago researcher and we puzzled over the name, skimming the index to a two-volume Chicago Archdiocese history, but still no luck.

Finally she said, "It must be an Episcopal priest." It didn't seem likely -- the bride was Irish and the groom had a name that looked to be Polish -- but I decided to check a city directory anyway. Skimming the entries for Episcopal churches, the name jumped out at me almost immediately.

Rev. Carl A. Nybladh was the priest who performed the marriage ceremony.

Collaborative genealogy works!

Canoscan LIDE 200: Using Plexiglass to Flatten Documents

Like many researchers, I use a Canoscan LIDE 200 to scan archival records where it's allowed. It's small (easily fits into my messenger bag next to my computer), lightweight (3.5 lbs), inexpensive (currently $75 on Amazon),  convenient (connects to my computer with a USB cable), and it works great.

The challenge has been scanning tri-folded documents from a hundred years ago. It's impossible to flatten them so it's hard to keep them straight while closing the scanner cover. I've finally found a solution.

A few weeks ago I had the clerk at my local hardware store cut a piece of thin plexiglass slightly smaller than the glass on the scanning bed. There's a small lip around the scanning glass and when I set the plexiglass against it the plexiglass becomes a see-through cover. I put the paper on the glass, straighten it, bring the plexiglass down on the page, and make sure the paper underneath is straight. Then I close the actual cover and scan. The plexiglass doesn't seem to affect the image quality.

And what about stapled tri-fold documents that can't be unfastened? It's not always possible to use the plexiglass in those cases, but a double-thick file folder or piece of poster board used in place of the stiff scanner cover can make it easier to line up those documents for scanning.

Chicago Birth Registers: W. P. A. Entries

If you look at the Illinois, Cook County Birth Registers, 1871-1915 on FamilySearch, you'll notice that some entries read "W. P. A." Members of the Chicago Genealogy Facebook group were pondering those entries last night and I realized that my thoughts on the subject were too lengthy for a Facebook post so I'll share them here.

First things first. What are the birth registers and how were they created? The short answer is that I don't know for sure. But, I have a guess that pertains to the books that were organized into alphabetical sections by month and year. (The earliest books are arranged differently.) Many early births went unrecorded, but when a record was created, I believe a doctor or midwife, or another person who attended the birth, filled out a birth certificate form and returned it to the county clerk's office.

At that point, I think the county copied the information from the birth certificate into a birth register and assigned a certificate number based on the line number for the entry. The registers would have provided a systematic way for assigning certificate numbers while serving as a detailed, chronological index to the actual records.

Example birth register page from 1913. (Year is recorded on
the right-hand page but I've omitted that image to save space.)
Notice that the lines were pre-numbered and that
the writing is consistent up to the last few entries.

Let's look at an example page from a register that shows W.P.A. entries. Notice that the last six entries are in different handwriting. What's unique about them?


Register: Acerra (regular writing)
Certificate: 608 Maria Acerra, record not dated
Comment: This was probably the last entry made in March of 1913

Register: Altiger (dark pen)
Certificate: 609 Edward Atiger, record dated March 29, 1927
Comment: This certificate was signed by a doctor many years after the birth

Register: Arizzi (dark pen)
Certificate: 610 Laura Arizzi, record dated April 1, 1929 (regular form)
Comment: This certificate was signed by the father many years after the birth

Register: Taken Adler (dark pen)
Certificate: 611 George Adler, record dated March 18, 1929 (later form)
Comment: This certificate was signed by a doctor many years after the birth

Register: Taken WPA
Certificate: 612 Zosfia Andzejewska, no date (regular form)
Comment: This certificate appears to be from 1913 but the certificate number has been changed

Register: Taken WPA
Certificate: 613 John Adams, record dated March 30, 1914 (regular form)
Comment: This certificate was signed by a doctor in 1914 and the certificate number has been changed

Register: Anderson "Late Entry"
Certificate: 614 Douglas Anderson, record dated March 7, 1941
Comment: This certificate was "signed" by the father but the name is actually typed

The two W. P. A. entries come after births reported in the 1920s and before a birth reported in 1941. The Works Progress Administration was active in the 1930s and I think it's safe to assume that these entries were made by W. P. A workers.

So, why were the entries made? Notice that the two W. P. A. certificates had at least one thing in common. The certificate number was changed. It's possible that the workers were moving misfiled records.

The certificate numbers that were changed were low, as I'd expect for an "A" birth early in the year, so I decided to check the birth register for March of 1914 to see if I could find an entry for John Adams. It was there on line 458, just as I'd hoped. It looks like his certificate was originally recorded in the 1914 register and assigned a certificate number from there but that's misleading because he was really born in 1913. I think the W. P. A. workers were correcting that error and I think it's likely a bit of detective work would also locate a register entry for Zosfia Andzejewska.

1914 birth register page showing entry for John Adams on line 458.

Continuation of John Adams entry showing year as 1914.

The curious thing to me is that the W. P. A. didn't record the names in the registers when they fixed errors and that they didn't make notations by the original register entries to document the certificate number changes. If I had located the birth register entry for John Adams in 1914 and used the year and line number there to search for his birth certificate on microfilm, I would have come up empty-handed.

Two things come to mind as I bring this post to a close.

1) Thing aren't always as they would seem. Looking at the birth register entry for John Adams, it would make no sense to say that he was born in 1913, and yet ... Notice, though, that the register probably isn't a primary source.

2) I am grateful for the efforts of the countless individuals who have volunteered indexing time to make Chicago records accessible through FamilySearch.