First Day at the Family History Library

Posted on April 21, 2006 by Steve

Right now, it’s about noon in Salt Lake City, and I’m writing from the Family History Library (FHL) .  My plane was about two hours late last night, and I arrived at the hotel after midnight, but I still managed to get to the FHL before 9 AM this morning.

When I arrived at the FHL, I retrieved the five vault films I had previously ordered, and I ordered an additional five films which should arrive on Monday .  I found what I was looking for in four of the five films .  I found seven relatives, including my grandfather, Michael Danko, in the Massachusetts World War II Draft Registration Cards for men born between April 28, 1877 and February 16, 1897 .  By the way, the FHL has the draft records for Massachusetts.

The big find for me, though, was on the fifth film I ordered:  Naturalization Information for my grandfather, Kostanty Niedzialkowski .  The film contained my grandfather’s Certificate of Arrival (showing a date of arrival of 24 May 1910), his Petition for Naturalization (dated 18 Jul 1939, and his Declaration of Intention (dated 27 April 1955) .  I already had a copy of his Certificate of Naturalization, dated 1955, but I also previously had a copy of his Declaration of Intention, dated 02 June 1917!  The 1917 Declaration stated that it expired seven years from the date signed, so I guess my grandfather made his Declaration of Intention in 1917, the Declaration expired in 1924, so he made another Declaration in 1955, at which time he actually did become a citizen.

Time for me to get back to my research .  I’ll post some of these records I found, but I probably won’t be able to do that until I get back home next week.

Copyright © 2006 by Stephen J. Danko

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Heading to Salt Lake City

Posted on April 20, 2006 by Steve

My flight to Salt Lake City leaves from Oakland at 7:30 PM tonight .  I’m all packed, but I’m not sure I’ve ever really been ready for a genealogy research trip .  I’ve been preparing for the last couple of months, trying to get my Family Tree Maker files in order, trying to organize my sources so I don’t spend time looking up documentation I already have, and searching the Family History Library (FHL) catalog for the books and microfilms I want to see while I’m at the FHL.

I found a bunch of films that were in the Granite Mountain Vault, so about two weeks ago I sent off an email to the FHL asking if they could get those films to the FHL in time for my visit .  Two weeks is a good lead time for this task;  one time I only gave them a week and they weren’t able to get the films in time for my visit.

One unusual set of films I want to look at is the Massachusetts Selective Service System Registration Cards [World War II]: Fourth Registration .  These cards represent older men, born between 28 Apr 1877 and 16 Feb 1892, who registered for the draft in 1942 .  I set up a custom report in FTM to find any men in my file for whom I had recorded a birth, marriage, or death in Massachusetts, and who were born in the appropriate period .  This gave me the names of 55 men to look up in this set of films .  Unfortunately, this collection includes 166 microfilm reels, all of which are in the vault!  I guess nobody knows about this set of records and has never requested them before!  Well, I couldn’t order all 166 reels, so I ordered the four I thought would be the most relevant for me .  When I get to the FHL on Friday, the first thing I’ll do is order some more films and hope that they’ll arrive before I leave on Tuesday . 

Some of the other sources I plan to look at are:

  • Petitions for Naturalization for Worcester Co., Massachusetts,
  • Selective Service Records and Exemptions as Aliens for Massachusetts in 1917-1918
  • Roman Catholic Church Records of Butrymance Parish in Lithuania (1834-1841)
  • Roman Catholic Church Records of Saint Krzyza Parish in Warsaw (1826-1876)
  • Roman Catholic Church Records of Krasne Parish in Poland (1657-1892)
  • Roman Catholic Church Records of Szwelice Parish in Poland (1780-1890)
  • Protestant marriages in the District of Bedford, Quebec (1804-1879)
  • Non-Catholic Civil Registration Index for Bedford, Quebec (1899-1989)
  • New Brunswick Vital Statistics from Newspapers (1784-1896)
  • New Brunswick Births, Marriages, and Deaths (1801-1925)
  • Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography

I’m looking forward to seeing Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography .  There is one biography in particular I’m interested to read, but this source is rather notorious for containing at least 200 fictitious biographies!   Most family historians don’t trust published genealogies that don’t list the sources of the information, but here’s a case where the source might not be trustworthy, either!

So, I should have plenty to keep me busy!  I’ll let you know how things are going!

Copyright © 2006 by Stephen J. Danko

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Three New Pages

Posted on April 19, 2006 by Steve

Thanks for the kind comments people have left me both on the blog and elsewhere .  It’s nice to get some feedback!  Last night I started to set up the actual website .  You can connect to the pages using the links on the right side of the blog.

The first page is About the Author, with some information about me.

The second page is part of my family tree, starting with my earliest known Dańko ancestor, Józef Dańko down through my grandfather and his siblings .  I ran into a few difficulties here, the biggest of which was that when I copied the Register report from Family Tree Maker (FTM) to my webpage, all the formatting was lost .  I have now reformatted the report and will link the events in the report to the actual images as I post those images to this site.

The third page is the start of my Vital Records page .  For now, I just have links to some sources of vital records in the United States, but will add more as time goes by.

When I first started entering information into FTM back in 1999, I noticed that FTM offered three basic report types:  the Register Report, the NGS Report, and the Ahnentafel Report .  All three are useful from different perspectives, and I chose the Register Report for my webpage on the Descendants of Józef Dańko, although I may decide to add an Ahnentafel Report later.

The Register Report and the NGS Quarterly Report are descendant-ordered, that is, they start with a single individual and show all the descendants of that person .  The reason for the names of these reports is that these are the report formats preferred by The New England Historical and Genealogical Register (Register Report) and The National Genealogical Society Quarterly (NGS Quarterly Report), two very well-respected genealogy journals .  The third type of report is the Ahnentafel Report (Ahnentafel is from the German for Forefathers Table) and is ancestor-ordered, meaning that the Ahnentafel lists all the ancestors of a single person and the resulting report is essentially a pedigree chart .  The Ahnentafel uses a strict numbering system, where the subject of the Ahnentafel is #1, a father’s number is always twice his child’s number, and a mother’s number is always twice her child’s number plus one .  Thus, except for the person listed as #1 (who can be either male or female), all the even numbered individuals will be male, and all the odd numbered individuals will be female.

Well, I’ve rambled on enough for today .  I have to pack tonight and get ready to fly to Salt Lake City tomorrow evening .  I plan to post on this blog each day during the conference directly from the Family History Library, so keep checking back .  Be sure to leave your comments, too!

Copyright © 2006 by Stephen J. Danko

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First Day of My New Website

Posted on April 18, 2006 by Steve

I’ve wanted to start a genealogy website for a while, and I’ve also wanted to start a blog to record my genealogy activities .  So, after some encouragement from one of my classmates in an online class at the now defunct MyFamily website, here it is.

I’m off to Salt Lake City on Thursday for the United Polish Genealogical Societies Biennial Conference .  I’ll arrive on Thursday night, spend most of Friday at the Family History Library (FHL), and be ready for the Opening Lecture of the conference at 8 PM .  The Conference Program is filled with lectures presented by distinguished genealogists such as Ceil Jensen, George Ott from Heritage Consulting and Services, a representative of the Sorensen Molecular Genealogy Foundation and staff members from the FHL, including Daniel M. Schlyter.  Still, we are provided with some free time on Friday, Saturday, and Monday to research at the FHL . Â Tuesday, I’ll spend most of the day the FHL again, and then head back home .  I’ll provide an update here of what happens at the conference.

Copyright © 2006 by Stephen J. Danko

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