And 30 seconds later...

Yes. I literally examined the two death certificates that fast and made a determination. I am just that good. Catharina Rhinehart is not my 5th great grandmother. She was born in New York and still married at the time of her death. My 5th great grandmother was born in Germany and a widow. As was Magdalena Reinhardt at the time of her death. The age is off by between 5-15 years, which is not uncommon for that time period, and I still have to cross check the residence at time of death, but her death certificate was presented to a son, Wilhelm. My 5th great-grandmother had a son, William/Wilhelm. But this is why I am sure it is her - she is buried in Weehawken Cemetery in Hoboken, New Jersey. Why is that significant?

My 5th great-grandfather, her husband, John Reinhardt, died in Union, New Jersey in 1870. My Reinhardts lived in the Hoboken/Weehawken/Union area for years. My gut is telling me this is her. My gut is wrong about a lot of things, but never about genealogy.

So, it's disappointing because it gives no maiden name, no parents' names, no specific place of birth. But a cemetery listing is HUGE. I have always wondered where John might have been buried in Jersey, and now I have a clue. So now I have another gravesite I get to look for - and an out-of-state one, too! For this New Yorker by way of muchos, muchos, muchos generations, finding a burial site out of state, even if it's just across the river, is EXTREMELY exciting.

It's the little things, people. I am off to look up this cemetery now to see if it still exists. Between Peter Stutzmann and Magdalena Reinhardt, I may have to schedule a Veteran's Day cemetery field trip for next week!

Yay! :)

Finally! NYC Municipal Archives comes through

I am not a patient person. Ask anyone I know. So the fact that I had to wait almost four weeks for the documents I requested from the New York City municipal archives, especially since I had provided both names AND certificate numbers, miffed me just a little bit. I get that they're busy - but don't they get how important my genealogy research is?? To me???

So three out of the four documents I requested were waiting for me in the stack of mail when I got home. The first, Peter Stutzmann's death certificate, is definitely my Peter Stutzmann. I knew it the moment I saw the address at which he died, 54 Morrell Street in Brooklyn. That's where the Stutzmanns were living at that time (1892). Disappointingly, it does not provide his parents' names, though I had wanted that only to verify information I already had, but it did confirm for me that he died in New York even though he pretty much didn't live here - according to his death certificate he had only been living here for four months. And it gives me the cemetery he was buried in, Evergreens, so now I can find his gravesite. So that's kind of cool. Peter Stutzmann, by the way, was my great-great-great grandfather, from Grossbockenheim, Germany.

I received two other death certificates, too - one for Catharina Ann Rhinehart and one for Magdalena Reinhardt, both died in 1887, on the suspicion that one may be my fifth-great grandmother, who went by a variety of first names and who may have died in Brooklyn in 1887. Unfortunately, neither gives parents' names, which was what I was really hoping for, or a maiden name, which would have helped confirm or eliminate, but it gives addresses and the names of children to whom the certificate was delivered, so I have clues to work with, but I am going to have to examine both of these documents much more closely before I can make any kind of determination, but I will keep you posted.

Happy weekend everyone!

Just in time for Halloween...some more cemetery wandering!

I actually didn't go into this cemetery yesterday, since I had an appointment I had to get to, and I've definitely been to more rundown, spookier cemeteries than this one, but it was pouring rain and just so dark and gloomy out, and the entrance with the leafless vine was kind of creepy, that I had to stop and take a few photos. This is the church cemetery at St. Boniface Catholic Church in Elmont, on Long Island, just over the border from Queens County. I love cemeteries but I think even I would get a little spooked by actually being in a cemetery on Halloween, especially on a day like this!

St. Boniface Catholic Church cemetery, Elmont, New York. Taken Oct. 27, 2011.

Through the gate at St. Boniface cemetery, Elmont. Oct. 27, 2011.

Some Halloween genealogy fun: Prince Charles claims Vlad the Impaler as ancestor

With Halloween right around the corner, I thought this was a fun/scary genealogy story. Not sure I'd want to be related to someone who inspired one of the most iconic, scariest vampires ever, but we don't choose who our family is! :)

Prince Charles claims Vlad the Impaler as ancestor

Blast from the past: Old Bethpage Village Restoration

Old Bethpage Village Restoration, opened in 1970, recreates a typical mid 19th century Long Island farming village, with preserved and reconstructed buildings from all over Long Island. It's like a very tiny Colonial Williamsburg - you can go inside the buildings, which are set up with furniture and knick knacks and paintings from that time period, and staff dressed in costume will give you the history of the house, or demonstrate some skill or trade that villagers might have used.



Main road to the crossroads



I have always had fond memories of going here on field trips when I was a kid in school - I loved going to the general store for old fashioned candy and a cup of birch beer. I always felt like I was transported back in time. But the boyfriend had never been, so we went over the weekend - it was a blustery but sunny day as we walked around the town square watching 21st century kids playing with 19th century toys, visited the Powell farmhouse (and I cringed as he tried to feed one of the cows), looked at the goods (real 19th century paint powder!) and advertisements in Layton's store. One house was so tiny his head was nearly touching the ceiling and with Halloween so close, I was kind of hoping but kind of not hoping we'd see a ghost.



The boyfriend doesn't even look like he'll fit in this house!



Probably the coolest thing, though, was Noon's Inn, which was an East Meadow tavern that served mostly local farmers looking for a drink at the end of the day and 14 hours of manual labor. The original location of the Inn was two blocks away from where the boyfriend grew up and lives, and it was built circa 1830, though restored to what it would have looked like about 1850 - which was about the time my family was living in East Meadow (my great great grandmother Delia Dauch Berg was born in East Meadow in 1858), so her father and brothers might have actually stepped foot in that building!

Recreated bedroom

The general store - birch beer, anyone?

Noon's Inn, from East Meadow, is on the right.

Terrible photo, but this was a map from 1840 on the schoolhouse wall. On the bottom righthand corner, you can see Raynortown, the old name for Freeport, which is where I live...love it!

Quick Monday post...

Monday's are super busy at work, but I came across this story today on CNN.com by Mark Whitaker. I always enjoy reading about how someone got interested in their family history, the hows and whys they decided to dig a little deeper. Whitaker also gives some good tips for anyone who not only just wants the dates and facts, but the stories behind the stories - he interviewed old family members (with more than a little insistence and cajoling it sounds like) and asked them for any paper documents - books, diaries, letters, etc. - that they had held on to from back then, which I thought was a great idea. You never know who has what, or what they have that will give you more info, even if it's just a glimpse into "a day in the life" of that person - my grandfather was a packrat, and because of that, we have his father's daily planner, documenting the ordinary ins and outs of his routine, including work, card games with friends, visits to family members, for the entire year before my grandfather was born. Ordinary, every day things that tell us a little more about who these people were. Anyway, nice story at CNN. Check it out if your Monday is a little less hectic than mine! :)

Shout-out of the day: Italian Genealogical Group

I have not a drop of Italian blood in me, but I have to give mad props, again, to the Italian Genealogical Group for having been an invaluable resource to me in my family history research. You can see where their work started, what with all the Italian immigrants who came through/ended up in New York City, but for anybody who has late 19th century and/or early 20th century family history in New York City (that would be all five boroughs), you are doing yourself a great disservice by not visiting their website. While you can't find actual records or record information on their website, the group's many wonderful volunteers have put in countless hours indexing the vital record holdings for the city's municipal archives. That means that when visiting the archives in lower Manhattan or sending away for them from the archives' website, you save both time and money by already having a spelling (for those of us whose families loved to spell their names every which way imagineable under he sun) AND a certificate number.

I especially wanted to give them a shout-out today because as I've been going through my laundry list of records I need, I found in their index two certificates I have been searching for for YEARS - the birth certificate of my great grandfather, Frederick Stutzmann (listed under Fred Stutzmann) and the death certificate of HIS grandfather, Peter Stutzmann, who I could never prove emigrated or died in New York City instead of his native Germany, even though I had somewhat reliable information saying he died in New York on January 10, 1891. Well, thanks to a search just 5 minutes ago on IGG's site, I found a Peter Stutzmna who died in Brooklyn on January 10, 1892. I can't know for sure yet that this is MY Peter, but my gut is telling me that it is, and when it comes to genealogy, my gut is always, always right.

You can find the Italian Genealogical Group's website here.