Saturday Serendipity (September 28, 2019)

Here are a few recommended weekend reads for this week .  .  .

1.     The first of the so-called "miracle drugs," penicillin, was discovered and named by Alexander Fleming, a Scottish bacteriologist, on this day in 1928.  Why is this of interest to genealogists?  It took more than ten years from the discovery of penicillin to extract and mass produce penicillin as a usable drug for treatment of a number of diseases.  A need for penicillin became a priority with the onset of World War II and by 1943 production began on a large scale through enlistment of a number of pharmaceutical companies.  Pneumonia had long been a feared killer (especially among the very young and the elderly) and in WWI it accounted for 18% of the Army deaths.  With the introduction of penicillin as the vanguard of the coming antibiotic revolution in the 1940s, the pneumonia death rate in in the Army during WWII was reduced to less than 1%.  Similarly, the death rates from diseases such as strep throat, tonsillitis, scarlet fever, meningitis, and rheumatic fever (among others) were dramatically reduced.  Many of you have surely noted the alarming number of children in your genealogies who died very young from diseases that today are rarely fatal due to the availability of  penicillin or other modern antibiotics.  By way of example, in 1900, children under 5 years old accounted for almost 31% of all deaths, but by 1997 the percentage had been reduced to just 1.4%.  In 1900, 40% of the fatalities from the three leading causes of death -- pneumonia, tuberculosis, and cholera/diphtheria (with the symptoms of diarrhea, enteritis and severe dehydration) -- were among children under 5 years of age.  And those diseases together caused 33% of all deaths.   Read a brief summary of the story of penicillin here at today's The Writer's Almanac by Garrison Keillor.

2.     Janine Adams of Organze Your Family History blog had a post this week about a scan feature buried in the Notes app on the iPhone.  This was news to me and I have had an iPhone for more than 8 years now.  I followed Janine's easy directions and tried the scan feature and it works nicely and easily.  I am not sure yet what the benefits are beyond just taking a photo, but it is always nice to have an alternate tool available.  You can read Janine's post here.

3.     This week's "Genealogy News Bytes" on Randy Seaver's Genea-Musings blog highlights an article about the Justice Department promulgating new rules for the use of genealogy sites in the investigation of crimes.  With the burgeoning use of DNA tests by genealogists and those simply interested in their ethnic backgrounds, this is a must read for those who are concerned about DNA testing and privacy issues vs. the pursuit of justice.  You can go directly to the article tagged by Randy by clicking here, but the following paragraph from the article provides an idea of the limits initially established by the new rules: "The policy generally limits law enforcement to considering genealogy sites when a candidate sample belongs to a possible culprit, or when a likely homicide victim is unidentified. Prosecutors can greenlight the use of these sites for violent crimes beyond murder and sexual assault, but only when the circumstances create a 'substantial and ongoing threat' to the public. Agencies can't use the sites unless a sample has first been uploaded to the FBI's DNA profile database and hasn't produced a match. Also, the investigators in the relevant jurisdiction need to have followed 'reasonable investigative leads,' and case info need to be entered into national databases for missing people and violent criminals."

4.     If you read last week's recommendation on James Tanner's "Rules of Genealogy: Rule Five," then you might want to check out this week's "Expanded Commentary on the Rules of Genealogy: Rule Six."  Rule Six states, "Records move."  You can read the expanded commentary here.  

5.     A post by Judy Russell of The Legal Genealogist blog caught my eye this week for two reason: (1) It mentions the Larimer County Genealogical Society (LCGS), which is in Colorado, and I lived in Ft. Collins in Larimer County for almost a year back in the mid-70s; and (2) More interestingly, Judy was attending the 5th annual "Conference for a Cause" hosted by the LCGS.  The idea of a Conference for a Cause was new to me.  I had never heard of this before, but it sounds like a great idea that perhaps many more genealogy organizations should consider adopting.  As Judy succinctly explains via a quote from the LCGS website, “All profits from the conference are donated to non-profit projects to preserve, digitize, and make historical documents accessible for genealogical research.”  You can read Judy's post here and then you might consider passing on the idea of hosting a "Conference for a Cause" to local. regional, or state genealogical organizations to which you belong. 

6.     I just discovered a post by Marian Wood of Climbing My Family Tree blog from early this month (Sept. 9th -- "Grandma Minnie's 'Mistake'").  It seems twins run in Marian's family and I learned that she herself is a twin.  The post is an engaging piece on parenting and the special challenge of how to encourage twins to become individuals while at the same time making sure each twin gets equal opportunity to develop friendships, interest, careers, etc.  You can read Marian's post here.

7.     And finally, reader's of this blog will recall that as a born New Englander I have enjoyed the stories posted on Peter Muise's blog, NEW ENGLAND FOLKLORE.  This week Peter posted a piece that has a connection to the Salem witch trials.  It is an interesting read that might have notable resonance as we are about to enter the month of October and the season of the witch associated with Halloween.  You can read Peter's story here.

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Copyright 2019, John D. Tew
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