Every day is a learning day! What have you learnt today?

[Gardengirl]

Following my comment on the RAF thread earlier I thought it might be interesting to share the little things we learn from time to time as off shoots from our Family History researches. Share your snippets here...

[Gardengirl]

Yesterday, I came across a letter from a cousin who mentioned a bible bought in 1865 in a shop called Keets in Farnham, Surrey. When I asked about it on the Historic Farnham facebook page I got an answer from someone called Pullinger. Turns out that a Mr Pullinger married the daughter of Mr Keets and when she died he inherited the Keets shop, changed the name to Pullinger and started the chain of shops which I have used many times in the past 20 years. Small world!

[Jill on the A272]

Someone on our local Facebook page shared an old painting of his ancestor, an ag lab born in 1816 in his smock and gaiters painted in 1874 (amateur painting but characterful). After a bit of digging and it turns out then old man's son married into OH's family.

I've also seen some pics of the frozen sea at East Wittering (my mum's home village) taken 1962/3 by her cousin. He's now 87 and isn't online but lent them to the local history group who scanned them.

[pinefamily]

There always seems to be something new to learn with family history. As soon as you delve deeper than the bare dates, you come across topics of interest.
One of my ancestors was a vet in London; it was interesting to read that he also wrote many textbooks that were used for many years in the training of vets.
I have also read up on confectioners of the past, slightly different to confectionery of today.
I was lucky to come across a sort of farmers almanac from the 16th century put up on the internet. Not only did give advice on how for farmers, but also the "duties" of the farmer's wife.

[Lin Fisher]

Yesterday I received a will for a distant cousin, hoping it would mention names just to verify what I had found.

I discovered his sister didn't marry the man I thought or remarried later in life. Not very interesting but I now have to sort that out.

Also years ago I was delving into a direct ancestor and through the web was contacted by a distant cousin, She said she lived in the next village to where they were buried having moved from Derby. She went there and they were all buried inside the church with lovely plaques. I have been to stay with her twice and seem them and also a Baptismal jug donated by one of this family from her will in 1638. It was kept in the church safe in a Tesco Bag!!

[ozgirl]

Today I learnt that the eruption of a volcano in Iceland in 1783 indirectly led to the deaths of an entire family on one of my lines. The ash and particles in the air following the eruption caused changes to the weather for the summer, making it one of the hottest on record. This affected the water supply in the area where this family lived in Netherlands, and a dysentery epidemic broke out. In a village of 600 people, 296 caught the disease and 108 of them died. This was over only 2 months, normally they averaged 2 deaths a month.

Evidently parts of England were similarly affected and excess deaths occurred in a number of places here too.

[Gardengirl]

That’s an amazing story, Linda! Who knew that there were knock on effects like that

[Little Nell]

Can't think of any specific knowledge, but I have vastly increased my knowledge of geography - little-known hamlets, where county borders run etc as well as general social history and some info about various occupations and illnesses.

[PhotoFamily]

Family History has brought into focus things that I vaguely remember from history class as well as problems of everyday life. Why did ancestors choose t immigrate leads to - what was going on in the home country at the time? It appears that my g'g'grandfather was plagued in his lifetime with poor employment opportunities. Trained as a bricklayer, but went into the REs at the tail end of the Crimean War (what was the economy like at the time? what was happening during the War?). He opted out at the end of his first enlistment (learned about attestation papers and terms of service), but struggled to make it as a photographer (learned a lot about the history of photography), finally immigrating (learned a lot about Castle Gardens and the ways that families move in segments).

I've also learned a lot about the Livery Companies of London.

Other branches are reminding me about plagues and illnesses that we don't usually see now - I've found two 1st cousins, twice removed who died young in the 1918 epidemic; an uncle by marriage who died from tetanus in the early 1900s (ugh); another uncle who died in London in the late 1700s from small pox (the first born of that marriage); another cousin who died of whooping cough in the early 1900s.

[Little Nell]

I found a family of various siblings and cousins, about 9 children in all, not related to me, but living in a small village with my ancestors, who all died of "summer diarrhoea" according to the parish burial register. I'm thinking it could be cholera. Also had a gt gt grandfather who died of "chronic laryngitis" according to his death cert. But he died in 1858, when there was the first outbreak of diphtheria. I think he probably had that and the local doctor didn't recognise it.

[PhotoFamily]

The Next Generation software allows you to set up a History Timeline. Then you can pull up your ancestors info against that history timeline and see how events in their lives coincide with world events.

[Gardengirl]

The Next Generation software allows you to set up a History Timeline. Then you can pull up your ancestors info against that history timeline and see how events in their lives coincide with world events.

I'd really like to have something like that in Excel format so when I am working out family timelines I can add them to an existing historical timeline that shows wars, epidemics and economic events. Does such a thing already exists anywhere?

[PhotoFamily]

I don't know - I've just manually added dates that were of interest to me.

[Gardengirl]

I attended a zoom talk this evening about the Gentleman’s Magazine by Julian Pooley, organised by Kent FHS. One of many interesting snippets was this picture of early reconstructive surgery done in India to repair a missing nose. A wax structure was made for the nose then a skin graft taken from the forehead as shown in the image. I didn’t catch the date but some time in the 19th century! Amazing.

[Caroline]

I'd really like to have something like that in Excel format so when I am working out family timelines I can add them to an existing historical timeline that shows wars, epidemics and economic events. Does such a thing already exists anywhere?

Do you mean a timeline to refer to?

FTF Timeline - the front page is rather uninspiring since the upgrade, but it's all there if you click on GO TO POST.

[Gardengirl]

Oh! That’s perfect! I didn’t know that was there, it’s exactly what I wanted. Who do we thank for that?

Is it possible to download it to put in a spreadsheet alongside my family events?

[Anne in Carlisle]

Oh! That’s perfect! I didn’t know that was there, it’s exactly what I wanted. Who do we thank for that?

Is it possible to download it to put in a spreadsheet alongside my family events?

Oh wow! I didn't know that was there either. Thank you to those involved!
Anne

[cbcarolyn]

Me neither - will have to take a look through, looks great

[Gardengirl]

Looks as if today is a learning day for lots of us!

[Caroline]

Oh! That’s perfect! I didn’t know that was there, it’s exactly what I wanted. Who do we thank for that?

Is it possible to download it to put in a spreadsheet alongside my family events?

It was at least 11 years ago as I remember remaking it when we moved the Reference library pages over to the CMS from the Wiki . Members made the suggestions and then I put it together. It was originally a word document which I may still have. I am not sure that it would download from the page as is successfully as Excel or CSV but it might as a pdf. Bear in mind that some of the links may not work within the table.