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Celebrating Memorial Day Online

May 16, 2025

Memorial Day is just around the corner. When I was a kid, Memorial Day was my favorite holiday. School had finished for the year, and summer stretched ahead in an endless stretch of sunny days.

 

In those days, the local Uintah Cemetery where many of my ancestors were buried was not maintained. It was unirrigated. Cheat grass, cacti and other weeds grew unchecked. A few days before Memorial Day my dad went to the cemetery to clean the graves. I went to “help,” but I mostly ran around looking at the old headstones and picking the yellow roses that survived to bloom every year on that dry hillside.

 

On the day itself, we picked wildflowers along the edges of the fields. After my grandfather passed, we made sure to pick the sweet-scented wild roses that were his favorite flowers. We made bouquets in old canning jars to take to the cemetery and decorate the graves.

 

My Swedish great grandparents were buried at the cemetery. They’d been prolific and produced eleven children. By the time I was growing up, there were dozens and dozens of children, grandchildren and great grandchildren who all visited the family graves on Memorial Day.

 

When we arrived with our flowers, there were already lots of other visitors. Everyone stood in the shade of the old honey locust trees that dotted the cemetery and shared memories of the family. It was the only time I saw many of my more distant cousins. We seldom had family reunions in those days, but Memorial Day was a good substitute.

 

I loved those days when I knew exactly what Memorial Day was for: to remember family who was gone and to catch up with family who remained. Nowadays, I live hundreds of miles from the Uintah Cemetery. I seldom make it home for Memorial Day.

 

Thanks to technology,  I can make a virtual visit to the cemeteries where my ancestors rest. Websites such as Find a Grave and Billion Graves post pictures of headstones and sometimes even biographical sketches for graves from all over the United States and beyond.

 

This Memorial Day I plan to “visit” my ancestors on some of those sites. I can’t be there in person, but I can look at my ancestral graves and spend some time remembering my grandparents, parents, sibling, aunts and cousins.

 

Carol Stetser

Researcher

Larimer County Genealogical Society

Start with Yourself

May 9, 2025

New genealogists often visit the one-on-one sessions that Larimer County Genealogical Society provides. They’re on Thursday afternoons, 1:00 to 3:00 pm, Old Town Library, Fort Collins and Loveland Library, Loveland. The sessions are drop-in, first come, first served.

 

Many of these beginners have no idea how to start their genealogy journey. They’re often interested in proving their descent from a famous person or proving a family story they’ve heard. They hope that the helpers at the session will be able to wave a magic wand and answer their questions in a short half-hour visit.

 

Unfortunately, family history doesn’t work like that. Serious genealogy takes time, persistence and patience. Just ask anyone who has spent decades searching for an elusive brick wall ancestor. Genealogy isn’t a good pastime for anyone who needs instant gratification.

 

It’s a methodical process of proving birth, marriage and death dates and places for your ancestors – starting with yourself. Since you’re obviously still alive, you won’t be proving your own death, but otherwise, the information you collect should be the same for you as for each of your ancestors.

 

You will need to prove your parents, grandparents, great grandparents and so on. It’s important not to skip a generation. If you do, you may miss clues that can lead you further back.

 

Every family’s genealogy research will be different. One family line may lead to colonial New York while another may lead to French Canada. Each researcher will need to use different records and methods to prove their ancestry.

 

Sometimes you may find a genealogy book or other set of records that seems like a short cut. Even that should be verified. Authors of older books may not have had access to the records we have today. Sometimes online family trees are copied from other trees with no reference to sources.

 

Learning the who, when and where of our family can be fascinating. The more you know, the more you want to know. A visit to a one-on-one session can be the first step on a lifelong journey.

 

The volunteers can help you take the first steps to learn about your family. We probably won’t be able to tell you immediately that you are or are not a descendant of Thomas Jefferson. To learn that you’ll have to start with yourself and work backwards. Good luck on your journey.

Carol Stetser

Researcher

Larimer County Genealogical Society

 

 

Family Search Wiki

May 2, 2025

This week I’ve been working on updating an older presentation on U.S.  church records. It has been several years since I used this presentation. That means I need to make sure that the sources and resources I recommend are up to date.

 

The problem is how to do that without spending hours searching the internet and various genealogical books and publications. My solution, like the solution to many of my genealogical how-to questions, is the Family Search Wiki.

 

The Family Search Wiki (https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Main_Page ) is part of the Family Search website. It is a free website containing reference information and educational articles. This information aids in locating and interpreting genealogical information.

 

Family Search Wiki is not a place to find documents or records about a specific person or family. Instead, it is a directory indicating where that information can be found. Whenever I start a new project or review an old project, my first stop is the Family Search Wiki.

 

Most Wiki articles focus on a place. This can be a country, state, or town. For each location, you can then specify a topic. For example, I entered “United States Church Record” to begin my search for information on church records.

 

This led me to links to articles on various topics related to church records. Articles such as church denominations, church records by states and the value of church records were available.

 

All the articles included links to records relating to the topic. One of the best parts of the Family Search Wiki is that links to articles are not just for articles found on the Family Search website. Articles from other genealogy-related websites are also included. Offline resources are discussed, as well.

 

Family Search Wiki is a shortcut to finding genealogical resources. If you’re not already using it, you should consider it. You won’t be disappointed.

 

Carol Stetser

Researcher

Larimer County Genealogical Society