My First Day at the National Archives

I remember my first day at the National Archives. I went armed with my rudimentary research plan and a lot of trepidation. The DC metro didn't exist, so I took the train from Baltimore to Washington's Union Station and walked to the Archives. There was no metal detector, you didn't need an ID card, and the beautiful new reading room wasn't even a dream. I found my way to the fourth floor microfilm reading room, got a researcher's card, and signed in to a microfilm reader with my first roll of census microfilm. After a few hours of census scanning, I took a break and switched to the microfilm pension indexes. I ordered the Civil War pensions of two of my 2xgreat-grandfathers, the Civil War pension of one 3xgreat-grandfather, and the War of 1812 pension of a 4xgreat-grandfather. I was then told that these pensions would be available in about one hour in the second-floor research room - so I took a real break and went to lunch.

After lunch, I signed in to the second-floor research room, after depositing everything I carried in a locker, and asked to see my first pension. "Name?" the man behind the desk asked. "Benjamin Rollins," I replied. He actually looked at me then, and said, "Your name, not the pensioner's name." "Oh," an embarrassed me replied. After getting my name, he went to a box, pulled out a pile of manila envelopes, and handed me an envelope and a pink sheet. "What's this?" I asked. "Your pension," he replied. "Name and date here," he pointed to the pink sheet. I signed the sheet, then stood there, holding this big manila envelope. I had been expecting microfilm, and my mind had simply frozen. He looked at me for a moment, sighed, then said, "Take the pension, find a seat at one of the tables, and open it." I did, and I've been hooked ever since. He had given me the War of 1812 pension, and among the real, live, original papers was the last letter ever written by Benjamin Rollins, my 4xgreat-grandfather.

The three Civil War pensions were equally wonderful. I couldn't believe the stories I found in those pages. Each pension was similar, and each pension was unique. I finished the last pension, looked at my watch, and realized that I might not be able to make my train back to Baltimore! I grabbed my photocopies, signed out of the research room, grabbed my things from my locker, signed out of the Archives, and ran all the way to Union Station. As I ran through the station, I caught a glimpse of the Baltimore train's track number and ran to the track. A train was pulling out, and, just like in the movies, the conductor leaned out of the last car's door, grabbed my hand, and pulled me on. Out of breath, I grabbed an empty seat, and said to the woman across from me, "This train is going to Baltimore, isn't it?" "Not as far as I know," she replied. "Oh, no! Where am I going?" I cried. "I get off at the airport," she said, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I was on the right train, on my way home, with wonderful treasures.

"What have you been doing?" this poor woman now asked me. "Oh, you don't really want to know," I warned her. "No. Tell me," the unsuspecting thing said, and I didn't need any more persuading. I started telling her the story of my 2xgreat-grandmother, her four children, and her Civil War soldier husband. I talked about how her husband was wounded in the war, and recovered from his wound, but never quite recovered from the lung infection he suffered. I told her about his work as a traveling tinker and his death in 1879, leaving his widow with no money and four children, the youngest, my great-grandfather, only one year old. I talked about her sorrow as she apprenticed out her two oldest children and took in boarders and laundry to make ends meet. I told her about the scandal when a neighbor accused her of sleeping with a boarder. This neighbor wrote the War Department, saying that a widow who slept with a man should lose her pension. My 2xgreat-grandmother was poorly educated and didn't know what to do, but her second son had been apprenticed to an influential man in the neighborhood who helped her retain her pension. I then continued the story, and told the woman that my 2xgreat-grandmother eventually married this boarder, so the scandalous accusation might have had some truth to it. I grabbed papers and read her excerpts, showing her the difficult-to-read handwriting. I simply couldn't stop talking, even as I watched her eyes glaze over and her face begin to take on a shocked look. She was only released when her stop came and she could stumble off the train. I know she didn't take a seat on that train for at least a week before making sure I was nowhere near her.

Ironically, when I decided to make my own test of Ancestry's pension indexes, I discovered that, if limited to Ancestry's indexes only, I might not have found three of these four pensions.

First, you should all realize that Ancestry's War of 1812 pension index database contains the index images, but these images have not been indexed. When Ancestry announced their big military collection a few years ago, I plugged in Benjamin Rollins' name, but no 1812 pension results appeared. If you're searching for a War of 1812 pensioner on Ancestry, you must browse these images to find him.

I could find no pension entry for Guy Beckley Staples, the Civil War pensioner featured in the above story, in Ancestry's database, regardless of the many possible search configurations I used. I did find an entry for him in Footnote's database.

I could find no pension entry for William Henry Peck, my 3xgreat-grandfather, whose pension I also devoured on this memorable first day. I couldn't find him in Footnote's database, either. Only one of the four pensioners, Benjamin S. Gifford, was readily available on both Ancestry and Footnote. If I had access only to Ancestry, my first day at the Archives might not have been so memorable. Of course, that poor woman on the train back to Baltimore would have had a much more peaceful ride.

Apples and Fraktur

One of my college classmates loved to pontificate on any subject. He fascinated me, because I hadn't met too many people like him before those days. Of course, he irritated me a great deal, too. Over the years, though, one of his rambling commentaries has returned to mind many times - his "Apple Argument." He contended that most Americans had no idea what a wonderful thing an apple could be. The only apple we'd ever eaten was a Red Delicious, with an occasional adventure with a Jonathan or a Granny Smith. (This was in the days before most grocery stores added Gala and Fuji to their limited collection.) There were hundreds, if not thousands, of tastier apples in the country, but we never saw them because they didn't ship or store as well. Big business was destroying quality and variety in apples simply to make money. On the other hand, I replied, big business was providing people with inexpensive apples year round. That couldn't be all bad, could it? I'm not sure I agree with my early self now. How many of these apple varieties have you tasted? How many have you even heard of? Isn't there some way to have both quality and availability? And what does this have to do with genealogy?

Late last year, a controversial post by Peggy Reeves on the APG mailing list started a discussion that carried over to several other lists and blogs. Like Peggy, I have found missing records in many Ancestry databases, and we all have stories of horrendous indexing errors in all the major subscription databases. Many of the responses to Peggy's posts boiled down to this: "Okay, there may be problems, but we should be grateful for what we have. Look at how much better access is now to these records." True, but will we have access to these records if they're not digitized in the first place? Do we have access if there's no index or finding aid? How do you look at a record, if you can't find proof it exists?

I took comfort from the fact that the Archives would be there for us, but in gossiping with some of the reference people on my recent trip, I discovered that the Archives really is planning to retire digitized records from "active reference," and there are rumors of plans to replace the microfilm reading room at Archives I with a museum store. Microfilm, like text records, could be requested, but self-service rolls would be limited. Records no longer considered active reference could be requested, but usually only when your need to see the original is demonstrated. Consider also Peggy's comment that the companies digitizing NARA's records weren't even taking advantage of modern technology. That brings me to the fraktur in my title. If you can't look at the original, which image would you rather see? This fraktur image found on Footnote, or this image found on NARA's Flickr site?

Isn't there some way to have both quality and availability? Whose responsibility is it to see that we do?

Research Trip: How Do You Prepare?

Why do you use a genealogy software program? One of my main requirements for my program is the ability to help me track my research. Does it help me store and retrieve all those "What if . . ." and "I wonder . . ." ideas we all get as we analyze our data? Does it allow me to quickly prepare a to-do list tailored to a particular repository, family, or record type? If you're using The Master Genealogist (TMG), the answer to these questions is, "Yes." I've been using TMG since it's beta days, so I'm not sure my methods are as up-to-date as those allowed by the program now, but those methods did allow me to prepare a manageable list of tasks, complete with all the information I needed to request records, in a very efficient manner.


Here is a screen shot showing one of my research tasks. I create one every time I have one of those "I wonder . . ." moments. My task name always begins with the main surname of interest. My keywords always include the repository, the record type, relevant surname(s), and relevant residence(s). The comments field always includes my thoughts or the information necessary to order the record. With only three research days available on this trip, I limited my repositories to the National Archives (keyword: NARA). This gave me a list of about 600 tasks. I wasn't completing that in three days! I then excluded most of the microfilmed record types. I wanted to concentrate on NARA's text records. The list was now reduced to about 300 tasks. Still not manageable, so I limited it to tasks designed since 1 January 2008. Those would cover my most current projects. The final list comprised about sixty tasks. I might not finish this list, but it was now manageable. The list was printed in Task Name order, so all my major families of interest were grouped together, and the information in the Comments field allowed me to fill out NARA request forms the minute I walked into the research room.

As you're all aware, as each task is completed and the record is analyzed, you're likely to come up with new research ideas. I did add several possibilities to my list in the first two days, and I didn't complete nine of those on the original list, but I made significant progress. Given the fact that some of the records I investigated would have required hiring a researcher, I estimate that all my photocopies would have cost about $3000 if I'd been doing long-distance research. There was one problem. An eight-inch stack of photocopies weighs quite a bit and takes up a lot of space. I had to buy a new carry-on to bring my records home!