In June my husband and I drove from our home outside Minneapolis, Minnesota, to my family’s summer cabin in northeastern Pennsylvania in order to spend a few weeks with my mother before attending the Advanced DNA course at the second session of GRIP–the Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburgh. On...
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Memorial Day, 2016, Part 2–Generations 5 and 6
Continuing our virtual visit to my family cemeteries with my great-great-grandparents, let’s start with my mother’s side, where we’re coming to the Civil War generation. Her paternal grandfather Roland R. Neifert’s parents were Martin Neifert (1840-1912) and Harriet (Gerhard) Neifert (1939-1915). Martin is buried in Christ Church Cemetery, Barnesville,...

Memorial Day, 2016, Part 1–Generations 2 through 4
On Memorial Day it used to be the custom to visit family cemeteries. As a young girl, my mother did so with her grandparents, and I’m sure my father did as well. When I was a child, my family did not live close to the burial places of any...

The Power of Dormancy
Never believe that something will never happen if it doesn’t happen right away! I just received an email message from a distant cousin I have never met, sent in response to a letter I wrote to another distant cousin I have never met. Commendable, but not very remarkable, right?–until...
