Well, Summer started and then a thunderstorm! Fires are out of control and my bees are dead! But we keep right on chugging along hoping to finally get things under control on the family tree! The high priority has become the dealing with emails the week they come and chipping away at the emails of 2009. Its enough work to make a grown man cry!

Ok, it has been a couple weeks since I did an update. I have been hung up on the Finney Family, and in particular my dad’s grandpa’s grandpa, John Russell Kelso.

Main Family Update Links

1. Finney
2. Macomber

Statistics:

1. Added documents: 42
2. Added gravestones: 2
3. Added Face photos: 3
4. Added Photos: 3
5. Added individuals: 76 (150591-150515)
6. Added locations: 33 (17049-17016)
7. Added sources: 14 (3960-3946)

The software we use, The Next Generation, was upgraded to version 9.2.1. Things went smoothly. In the process we uninstalled and reinstalled the many mods we have. The following were updated in the process to more recent versions:

Family Indicators

We also fixed some links in the Green blog so they work again.

Specific Family Work

1. Douthit
2. Finney

Unspecified Family additions

1. Gravestone and photo of Rachel Mason Parker (i173584) from F. Singer
2. Gravestone of Samuel Parker (i173583) from F. Singer
3. Robert Jordan Pritchard (i48253) from Katherine George
4. Luther Curtis Pritchard (i48298) from Katherine George
5. Made corrections to dates and added Cemetery from Keo City Website: Dorothy, Ella, Luther, & Raymond Pritchard
6. Children of Henry & Sarah Dewitt (i64727) from Henry DeWitt
7. Other details from Family Trees added to the Henry Dewitt family
8. Many DeWitt family members changed and updated as well as added
9. 1850 Census for Johnathan Dewitt and family
10. 1850 Census for John Baptist Dewitt and family
11. 1860 Census for Jonathan DeWitt and family
12. 1860 census for James H. DeWitt and family
13. 1860 census for William R. DeWitt and family
14. 1860 census for William DeWitt and family
15. 1860 census for Albert DeWitt and family
16. The normal listing of family is skewed in this area and there seems to be confusion around the several Henry Dewitts to start with. Others like to add David and Bernard to Henry and Sarah Friend Dewitt, but she was dead! Much more work needs to be done to sort out things in a clear consistent manner, with special attention paid to getting children to the right fathers!
17. Farm report for Johnathan and William DeWitt in 1860
18. I suspect that the census sheets are not being applied correctly so am stopping this work till I can be sure things are being listed correctly.
19. Johnathan Dewitt marriage record to Mary Wells as per Kevin DeWitt

General Data Changes

1. Removed 77 “unknown” in birth date fields
2. Nov 2009 emails cleared
3. Oct 2009 emails cleared
4. Added documents: 16
5. Added gravestones: 17
6. Added face photos: 1
7. Added photos: 12
8. Added individuals: 104 (150515-150411)
9. Added locations: 28 (17016-16988)
10. Added sources: 21 (3946-3925)

Main Family Updates

1. Douthit
2. Erhardt
3. Finney
4. Macomber

Unassigned Updates

1. Miles Sessions Parker place of birth changed from Butler (city) to county (i177332) thanks to note from F. Singer
2. Miles Parker gravestone photo and cemetery from F. Singer
3. Nancy Caroline Parker cemetery (i177333) and husband William D. Cummings (fixed name! i176464)
4. Miles E. Parker (i177426) cemetery and death date fixed
5. Reworked Ella Jane Cushing (i105850) photo and added two more from Destiney Burgess. When I reworked the photo of her, I removed the color and in so doing removed the pink cheeks that developed in the photo from some natural fluke!
6. Laura J. Craft mentioned that Albert Craft (i1354) had wrong dates and an incorrect name.

General Progress

1. Dec 2009 emails cleared!!!
2. Added documents: 33
3. Added gravestones: 2
4. Added face photos: 2
5. Added photos: 12
6. Added individuals: 37 (150411-150374)
7. Added locations: 26 (16988-16962)
8. Added sources: 17 (3925-3908)

Specific family additions

Macomber

General family additions

1. Duane Booth sent the photo of Zephaniah Teed’s gravestone (i127131) and Find A Grave website location, from which we added the cemetery as well.
2. Harriet Teed (i127787) dates changed
3. Added Cemetery: 1623. Ithaca Cemetery, Gratiot County, Michigan
4. Nathaniel Teed (i128249) dates changed and added cemetery
5. Zephaniah Teed (i127132) cemetery added and his wife’s date changed and cemetery added
6. Jesse Wood (i127785) cemetery and dates
7. William Frances Wood (i127783) cemetery and marriage info

Data Additions

1. Added Photos:  4
2. Added Faces:  1
3. Added Headstones:  2
4. Added Documents: 25
5. Added Locations: 17 (16962-16945)
6. Added Individuals: 150 (150374-150224)
7. Added Sources: 17 (3908-3891)

Specific Family Tree Work

1. Douthit
2. Erhardt
3. Hartman
4. Macomber  (Tripp part)

Uncategorized updates

1. Derek Van Deren sent us the information on Martha Priscilla Burford who was born to Preston & Elizabeth Burford (f22759)
2. James Burford (i34691) family in 1850 census
3. Preston Burford (i20293) family in 1870 census
4. Benjamin Burford (i35562) family in 1870 census
5. Added cemetery #1616. Big Creek Cemetery, Baker County, Oregon
6. Gravesite of Preston Burford
7. Corrected death date and gravesite of Elizabeth Burford (i26735)
8. Clara Jane Hurley dates and grave as well as husband
9. Mary Ella Burford husbands and grave
10. Added cemetery #1617. Citizen’s Cemetery, Coconino County, Arizona
11. Added cemetery #1618. Saint David Cemetery, Cochise, Arizona
12. Tiffany Ballard cited a reliable source which corrects the last name of Eleanor Langley to Panton (i36160). Her place of birth was Langley
13. Several Head family members were changed from living to dead, while poking around the family, looking for connections.

Statistical Overview

1. Added Photos: 0
2. Added Faces: 3
3. Added Headstones: 0
4. Added Documents: 35
5. Added Locations: 31 (16945-16914)
6. Added Individuals: 76 (150224-150148)
7. Added Sources: 32 (3891-3859)

Family Updates

1. Douthit
2. Hartman – Being rebuilt! Directory also reactivated
3. Erhardt
4. Schunke

Uncategorized individuals

1. Death & cemetery for Frank Alanzo Marsh (i99360) from Shelly Ann Marsh
2. Cemetery 1610. Robinson Cemetery, St. Clair County, Missouri

Emails

2008 emails now closed! I was beginning to think I would never get that year finished! On to Jan 2009 … I’m supposed to be over half way done with the year by now, due to aggressive scheduling.

Overall Progress:

1. Added Documents: 9
2. Added Gravestones: 1
3. Added Faces: 3
4. Added Photos: 13
5. Added Locations: 10 (16914-16904)
6. Added Individuals: 159 (150148-149989)
7. Added Sources: 6 (3859-3853)

Help Section

It has been a while since we did anything with the help section. We had an email asking how to add photos, and it reminded me I needed to get that topic addressed! So we now have the written instructions up, and hopefully will have time to add the video later.

How to add a photo to MacomberKin

Website Appearance

1. Fixed the photo samples that were no longer centered and spaced out on the “jump in” main page
2. Fixed the uncentered ads on the directory pages

Categorized Family Work

Click on the family to open the family directory, then scroll down to the news section to see latest report.

1. Douthit
2. Macomber

Uncategorized Individuals

1. Turned off the “living” tag on Harry B. Dixon (i176787) and his children
2. Gravestone from Michael F. Harris for Alexander G. Garner (i163914)
3. Cemetery 1607. Woodlawn National Cemetery, Chemung County, New York
4. Ella Jane Cushing photo (i105850) from Destiney Burgess
5. Gravestone of Louis Alvin Graham (i50469) from Paul Gipson
6. Death and burial location of Thankful Chapman Homer (i110646) from Kevin Keegan

Week’s Gains

1. Grave photos added: 4
2. Individual face photos: 8
3. General photos added: 3
4. Documents added: 17
5. Individuals: 115 (149989-149874)
6. Locations: 42 (16904-16862)
7. Sources: 23 (3853-3830)

Special Website Software Update

The author of our website software made 19 changes, the biggest is the media handling improvements. The mapping function has been updated to use Google man’s latest api. Some search bugs were fixed too. As usual we are very happy with the updates and so glad to let someone else work on the website programming and let me work on the research!

We reinstalled the old list of mods after the update. Here were the mods updated:

1. Age Calculation
2. Create Sitemap

Here are the mods we added:

1. ID prefix mod, this makes the letters and numbers easier to read
2. Redundant Tabs removed mod, when there are not ancestors or descendants, the tabs will no longer show.
3. Mouse Wheel Zoom, now if you have a mouse wheel, it will zoom in and out on the map

Specific Family Work

Click on the family to open the family directory, then scroll down to the news section to see latest report.

1. Erhardt Home Page

Emails:

Our focus this week was on the oldest emails, and we got hung up on the next one, so we are now 6 months behind schedule on clearing this old but good ones. We also are now really behind on the current list for this year, so we hope to focus on the current pile this next week and see if we can’t reduce that long list!

1. May 2008 finally closed!

Statistical Progress

1. Added photos: 8
2. Added face photos: 4
3. Added gravestones: 0
4. Added document scans: 11
5. Added locations: 8 (16862-16854)
6. Individuals: 54 (149874-149820)
7. Sources: 2 (3830-3828)

We had a list, but it crashed! Of course it never happens to anyone else! And to make things worse we are a day late on the update. Now I don’t know what general things were fixed to report, but frankly we got hung up on the Gambrell family and never got even one email cleared this week, trying to get the ground work laid for the next email! So sorry if you wrote, I’m really backed up!

Statistics

1. Added documents: 10
2. Added gravestones: 0
3. Added face photos: 2
4. Added general photos: 1
5. Added individuals: 293 (149820-149527)
6. Added sources: 3 (3828-3825)
7. Added locations: 15 (16854-16839 but scan said 25 probably due to about 10 replacements!)