I love geneamemes and was thrilled to see that Jill Ball has shared her Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019. I’m a couple of days late getting to the party, but as my mom used to say, better late than never.

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was: Robert Stewart/Stuart, who married Eliza Grass in Washington County, Maine. I suspected that he either moved across the border into Canada and/or died fairly young. I was right on both counts!

2.  A great newspaper article I found was: the Passaic Herald News in New Jersey. It has been digitized, FINALLY, and during a free access weekend, I was able to save over 100 articles and images relating to my family and our life in Passaic.

3.  A geneajourney I took was: to Salt Lake City to RootsTech 2019. Three friends came along with me this year, which made the trip even more fun:

4.  I located an important record: This is a difficult one, but I’d have to say piecing together the life of Rebecca Blackman in the 1700s in Stoughton, Massachusetts led me to the unindexed town records, which were invaluable in building my case.

5.  A newly found family member shared: No newly found family members shared anything.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was: from GeneaSanta who brought me a great book – The Lost World of Subcarpathian Rus’ in the Photographs of Rudolf Hulka (1887-1961). My father’s side of the family were Carpatho-Rusyn. This book has 200 photos documenting the daily lives of Rusyn people in the early 20th century, which is the time period in which my Nana lived in Slovakia.

7.   My 2019 social media post that I was particularly proud of was: I’m not into social media much and even deleted my Pinterest account this year.

8.   I made a new genimate who: not only loves to takes cruises (like Dave and me), but has jumped into genealogy research with both feet in spite of some DNA surprises.

9.  A new piece of technology or skill I mastered was: navigating my blog dashboard on the site of my hosting company.

10. I joined: the Sun City Vistoso Genealogical Society and am now trained to monitor to the room and have volunteered to mentor members.

11. A genealogy education session or event from which I learnt something new was: the New England Historic Genealogical Society seminar held in Phoenix, Arizona last February.

12. A blog post that taught me something new was: many of those written by Roberta Estes on DNAeXplained – Genetic Genealogy. Her posts are lengthy, but packed full of information about using DNA and excellent methodology as she writes about her ancestors.

13. A DNA discovery I made was: that my husband has only one Y-DNA match at a genetic distance of 7 (!!!) in spite of taking the 111 marker test.

14. I taught a genimate how to: expand his research horizon to include tax records, land deeds and court minutes to find needed information.

15. A brick wall I demolished was: identifying the second wife of John Spur (died 1781, Massachusetts) as Rebecca BLACKMAN, although through preponderance of evidence and no conflicting documentation.

16. A great site I visited was: the Nova Scotia Archives and even had an opportunity to visit Halifax in person last fall.

17. A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was: Lost Lives New Voices: Unlocking the Stories of the Scottish Soldiers from the Battle of Dunbar 1650 by Christopher Gerrard, Pam Graves, Andrew Millard, Richard Annis and Anwen Caffell. I have a handful of Scottish ancestors arriving in Massachusetts c1650s and have learned more about the conflicts at home that brought them to the decision to migrate – voluntarily or not – to the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

18. It was exciting to finally meet: unfortunately, no one new this year!

19. I am excited for 2020 because: the National Genealogical Society conference is finally going to be far enough west this year for me to attend. It is being held in May in Salt Lake City. 🙂

20. Another positive I would like to share is: Blogging is not only a lot of fun, it is an excellent way to make new geneabuddies AND meet new distant cousins. Many of the comments I get on my posts are from descendants of my ancestors. Try it, you’ll like it!

Many thanks to Jill Ball for bringing back her Accentuate the Positive geneameme.