Saturday Serendipity (September 6, 2014)

1.         UpFront With NGS has an interesting post with links to a Newsweek article and another article discussing how analysis of family photos might unlock clues about non-diagnosed health issues. You can see the post and links here.  

2.         Nancy Messier of My Ancestors and Me blog has a clever and creative post about data she would love to have concerning one of the people in her family tree.  You can read Nancy's wish list and the way she communicates it here. And be sure to see the creative image Nancy developed to illustrate her post theme.  Q: How did she do that?? [A: read the comments to her post.] ;-)

3.         Barbara Poole has what I have come to think of as a photo journal blog centered on New England -- and Massachusetts in particular.  As I have mentioned more than once before, if one lives far away from New England, but has deep genealogy roots in the six most northeast states, you need to check in regularly at Life From the Roots blog.  Barbara has an eye for photographs that tell a story and illustrate the saying that "a picture is worth a thousand words."  For example, have a look at her most recent photo essay on Lowell, Massachusetts here. 

4.         And speaking of what I might call photo journal genealogy, how many of us wish we had a pictorial history of our family spanning four decades and involving thousands of photographs?  Horace Poolaw, a member of the Kiowa tribe, developed a photo collection from the 1920s through the 1950s to show his family and community.  His work now forms the basis for an exhibition at the National Museum of the American Indian.  You can read and see more here at The Vault.  

5.         Did you have any ancestors or relatives who were students at Harvard in or around 1741?  If so, you will find another post at The Vault of interest and useful for fleshing out the life and experiences of your ancestor/relative.  Read the post found here to see a list of officially sanctioned rules imposed on Freshmen at Harvard during the period around 1741.  The listed "rules" would be considered a form of hazing today, yet they were read out at official school functions and were considered requirements if not laws for student behavior and privileges.

6.         A post by Midge Frazel at Granite In My Blood blog last Sunday brought back some nice memories and passed on a useful bit of tool information.  You can read how Midge recalls the little, thick, glass bottles that were used to deliver cream back in the day -- and you can see a photo of the bottle and the tool she tells us about here. This trip down memory lane brought back images for me of daily milk that was delivered for students when I was in grammar school in Concord, NH at the now demolished Kimball School.  Each day heavy wire racks were brought to the school by local dairies.  The racks contained about 20 thick glass bottles each holding 1/2 pint of whole milk.  Each bottle cost mere pennies.  Like the errand of clapping blackboard erases outside to clean them for the teacher, a student from each class had the job of carrying the racks of milk into the classroom for a milk break.  Just as Midge recalled, the tops of our milk bottles were sealed with a waxed cardboard disk that had a little pull tab.  These disks had the dairy name, but they also had information on them as both a learning tool and a collectible. We students collected and traded the tops to get the state capital series and the Presidents of the United States series.  In this way we learned all the state capitals and all the Presidents.  I understand that these milk bottle top disks and/or the tops from a passionfruit, orange and guava drink (POG) were the inspiration for the 1990s fad game called Pogs!

7.         A post titled "The Airplane Experiment, or, Reading Rhode Island Roots"  by Diane MacLean Boumenot of One Rhode Island Family blog was mentioned recently in a past Saturday Serendipity. The most recent issue of the Rhode Island Genealogical Society's newsletter, RIGS Reporter (August 25, 2104, Vol. XVII, Issue 1), republished Diane's post in full.  Congratulations to Diane! 

The same newsletter brought the news that the next NERGC (New England Regional Genealogical Conference will be held April 15 - 19, 2015 at the Rhode Island Convention Center in Providence. There are 22 genealogical societies making up NERG and RIGS is one of the founding members.  The Conference usually attracts over 800 participants.  Mark your calendars if you have New England roots.  The Conference registration form will be released this fall.  More details will be available at the NERGC website www.nergc.org .
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Copyright 2014, John D. Tew

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