Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Write a Poem on "Where I'm From"

From Randy Seaver's blog, this week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun is this assignment:

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:


1) Write a poem about "Where I'm From" using the template found at the website http://www.swva.net/fred1st/wif.htm


2) Tell us about it in a blog post of your own, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Google Plus or Facebook note.

I haven't done one of these for over a year, but I liked the challenge and decided to try. I'm pretty happy with the result. Here's what I came up with:

Where I'm From

I am from old cars, from Skippy peanut butter and hand-me-downs from cousins whose pretty dresses I loved to wear.

I am from the house on a dead-end near the dog pound, a tiny rental, the only one on the street with pine trees instead of sycamores and flower gardens planted by my mom.

I am from the pricker bushes that scratched my legs, from poison ivy rashes every summer, and from seeds sprouting through the coffee grounds next to the back stoop where we spit them because we were too messy to eat watermelon in the house.

I am from vacations spent at Grandma’s every year and cheapskates, from Atkinson and Tolbert and Fife.

I am from secret keepers and avoiders of doctors, from stories about relatives who weren’t, and true stories that I should have listened to more closely.

I am from Presbyterians who became Methodists, and from Baptists, who took me to a liberal pacifist church. I'm agnostic, yet I see evidence that my Sunday school lessons still influence me daily.

I'm from Scots and Germans from Pennsylvania and hillbillies of unknown origin, brought up on meat and potatoes and canned green beans.

I'm from my mom’s invented ancestry uncovered when I grew up, from a kiln operator whose work I’m reminded of every time I turn over a plate to read the pottery mark, from many housewives, some rumored to have earned a little extra income in ways that were whispered about, and maybe from a moonshiner.

I am from lost and re-found connections on my mother’s side and deep-rooted family trees collected by others who came before me on my dad’s. When I search for my ancestry, I learn about myself and feel closer to the people I love.

My Genealogical Threes

I haven't been keeping up, have I? But I try to check out Randy Seaver's "Saturday Night Genealogy Fun" each week to see if he comes up with something that inspires me. This week he's asking us to:

1) Tell us your three responses to the questions:

* Three genealogical libraries I frequent
* Three places I've visited on genealogy trips
* Three genealogy societies I belong to (or want to)
* Three websites that help my research
* Three ancestral graves that I've visited
* Three ancestral places I want to visit
* Three brickwall ancestors I want to research more

2) Post your responses as comments to this blog post, in your own blog, or in a Facebook comment.

Check him out at: Genea-Musings: Saturday Night Genealogy Fun -- My Genealogical Threes

Here are my answers:

* Three genealogical libraries I frequent:

I haven't been out much lately, but my favorites are

1. Family History Library, Salt Lake City (where I used to be able to visit for a week every year until this one when they canceled the computer conference that my husband would attend at the same time)
2. Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne IN (which I used to live close enough to visit when I first got started in genealogy back in 1997. I'd love to get a chance to visit again!)
3. North Carolina State Archives (where I need to go sometime soon to work on some genealogy I promised my sister!)

* Three places I've visited on genealogy trips

1. Pax & Scarbro, WV
2. Carroll County, VA
3. Washington, Greene & Allegheny Counties, PA

* Three genealogy societies I belong to (or want to)

I'm really bad about this, I've never actually joined any. These are some I SHOULD join:

1. Genealogical Society of Southwestern Pennsylvania
2. Carroll County Genealogy Club
3. Durham-Orange Genealogical Society of North Carolina

* Three websites that help my research

1. WAGS & Ohio County WV Genweb
2. Washington Co., Pennsylvania Genealogy & History
3. Historic Pittsburgh

* Three ancestral graves that I've visited

This one is hard to limit to 3. Here is a list of my ancestors on Find a Grave & I've visited all but a couple myself: Cherie's Ancestors. And here are three specific ones that were particularly difficult to find:

1. William S. Tolbert
2. Nancy J. (Chase) Wolfe
3. Michael S. McDaid

* Three ancestral places I want to visit

1. Founders Brook Park, Portsmouth, RI
2. Glen Cemetery, Paxton, IL (where my 3rd g-grandfather is buried)
3. Summers County, WV (but first I have to track down a location for the "Talbert Cemetery" where my g-grandmother, Rhoda (Webb) Tolbert Wilson is buried according to her death certificate.)

* Three brickwall ancestors I want to research more

Sometimes I think the only way I'm going to find out more about any of these people is if someone has an old Bible or other records hidden away in an attic or basement somewhere.

1. James P. Skiles
2. Allen Tolbert
3. George Shrewsbury

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun

Randy has been coming up with Saturday Night Genealogy Fun projects, and THIS is his latest:

Provide a list of your paternal grandmother's patrilineal line. Answer these questions:

• What was your father's mother's maiden name?
• What was your father's mother's father's name?
• What is your father's mother's father's patrilineal line? That is, his father's father's father's ... back to the most distant male ancestor in that line?
• Can you identify male sibling(s) of your father's mother, and any living male descendants from those male sibling(s)? If so, you have a candidate to do a Y-DNA test on that patrilineal line. If not, you may have to find male siblings, and their descendants, of the next generation back, or even further.
  
  

1. Grandma's maiden name was Rowene Mae Fife, born in Canonsburg, Washington Co. PA
   
   
2. Her father was Charles Edgar Fife who was born in Upper St. Clair Twp, Allegheny County, PA
   
   
3. These are his patrilineal ancestors (from earliest known to Charles E. Fife):
   William Fife 1720 - 1799 (born in Scotland, died in Pennsylvania)
   William Fife 1757 - 1838
   William Fife 1789 - 1868
   John Fife 1816 - 1892
   John Calvin Fife 1846 - 1879
   Charles Edgar Fife 1874 - 1941
   
   
4. My grandma had two bothers. Selwyn Fife who had no children, and Raymond Fife whose male descendants are my dad's first cousin Chuck and Chuck's son Paul who are both living in or around Canonsburg, PA.

That was fun! I'll have to participate again next week and maybe I'll even remember to do it on Saturday night!