52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks – 21 – Military

Yes, I do know that week 21 was last week, so I am late, which is not that uncommon for me. I had thought that I would probably skip this theme because most of my family did not serve in the military and I had already written about many who did. However, yesterday I saw that Ancestry had added a new database to their collection, U.S. WWII Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947, so I decided to look up some family names in that collection and write about them today.

I started with Albertson in Linn County, Oregon. There was my father, Lester Albertson and his first cousin Earle Albertson, both listed as Halsey, Linn County, Oregon as their residence place. My father's registration was on 16 Oct 1940. I checked the historical background for this database as given by Ancestry:

“The U.S. officially entered World War II on 8 December 1941 following an attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. About a year before, in October 1940, President Roosevelt had signed into law the first peacetime selective service draft in U.S. history because of rising world conflicts. Multiple registrations held between November 1940 and October 1946 signed up more than 50 million American men aged 18–45 for the draft.”

Although this states the registrations began in November, apparently Linn County started soon after the law was passed.

Next I looked at my Falk cousins who lived in Linn County. There were 10 of them listed, except Gerald was my uncle, not cousin. The first 5 were registered on the same day as my father, 16 Oct 1940. The next 2 were registered on 1 Jul 1941, still before war had been declared. They both were born in 1920, so were age 21 before that date. The next 3 were on or a few days after their 18^th birthday. They were registered near the end or after the end of World War II. Here is a listing as found on Ancestry.

Name	Birthdate	Registration Date
Charles Donald Falk	08 Nov 1913	16 Oct 1940
Leslie Edgar Falk	03 Jun 1915	16 Oct 1940
Russell Charles Falk	05 Apr 1915	16 Oct 1940
Omar Ellsworth Falk	27 Aug 1916	16 Oct 1940
Rawley Lincoln Falk	12 Feb 1918	16 Oct 1940
Everett Henry Falk	21 Jun 1920	01 Jul 1941
Lyman Lyle Falk	15 Feb 1920	01 Jul 1941
Louis Raymond Falk	12 Apr 1926	12 Apr 1944
Gerald Keith Falk	01 Aug 1927	08 Aug 1945
Delmer Orvilee Falk	13 Mar 1929	13 Mar 1947

I checked one more place. Were any of my relatives in Sherman County, Kansas registered?  The answer is yes. An Albertson cousin, Wilfred Glen Albertson, and a Smalley cousin, Lauren Bobby Smalley, were both registered on that first date, 16 Oct 1940.  For these 2, Ancestry provided a link to Fold 3, where I could see a copy of the actual registration. So here are those 2 registrations. 

So, what did I learn from this? Often it pays to check the research databases to see if any of the new records will include your family members.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks – 20 – Another Language

The records for my Falk ancestors that I have found before they came to the United States are written in German.

The ones I have found were in Posen Province of Prussia, which is now in Poland. But they attended the Evangelische or protestant church and spoke German. Most of these records are quite difficult for me to read.

Here are some examples:

The birth record for my gt-grandmother: Anna Luise Boehm, from the church at Nakel.

The death record for my 2^nd gt-grandfather: Michael Boehm from the church at Nakel.

And I am hoping this is the birth record for my gt-grandfather, Ludwig/Carl Ludwig Falk, from the church at Wirsitz.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks – 19 – Mother's Day

I skipped week 18, but here is week 19 – Mother's Day.

All the females in my family tree have this one thing in common. They were all mothers. Also they were all grandmothers. I like this photo shared with me by my cousin, Robert Bond, of my 2^nd gt-grandmother, Huldah (Hayes) Bond, showing her with 5 of her grandchildren. It was taken about 1901 and I believe the grandchildren were, beginning at the left corner and going clockwise around her: Lela Bond, daughter of Charles; Lawrence Bond, son of Melvin; Leland Bond, son of Harvey; Guy Bond, son of Melvin and Bessie Bond, daughter of Charles.

Another thing that all the women on my family tree have in common is that they are all daughters. But for some of them I have been unable to establish who they are the daughter of. On my website, www.joanneskelton.com, I have a menu item named “special people.” In that category is a section called “earliest ancestors.” In that long list are a number of women without any identified parents.

Last year I discovered that even if I had recorded parents for an ancestor, maybe I did not have good documentation for that connection. One of my Bond cousins was attempting to join the DAR through an ancestor of Huldah's mother and the documentation was not enough to connect Huldah to her parents.

Why did I believe that Huldah was the daughter of Seth Hayes and Lydia Jewett?

• I had a published family history, Little Otter to Lost River, about Huldah's mother-in-law's family and on page 69 it stated “Solomon Bond...was married to Huldah Hayes,...daughter of Seth and Lydia Jewett Hayes...”
• I had a booklet compiled for the Bond family reunion in 1963 which stated they were her parents.
• The Genealogical Material in Oregon Donation Land Claims, Supplement to Volume I, Volume V, stated on page 45, “BOND, Solomon, ….m Huldah Hayes, dau of Seth and Lydia Jewell Hayes.”
• I had a photocopy of a family history of the Hayes family which stated Huldah was the daughter of Seth and Lydia.
• I had a copy of the Geauga County Ohio marriage record for Seth and Lydia.

But the DAR wanted better documentation showing Huldah was their daughter.

What were the obstacles for finding this?

• Her parents were Methodist so it was unlikely that church records documenting her birth could be found.
• Huldah was married in 1842, so she never appeared by name in the household of her parents on a census.
• The marriage record from 1842 in Iowa did not name parents.
• Huldah was born in Ohio in 1827, which was about 30 years before Ohio even enacted a law for birth registration.
• Although an abstract for early wills in Linn County Oregon where Seth died showed an heir as Huldah Boyd, a probable misreading for the name Bond, the original will record seems to have been lost.

What did I do? I made a trip to the Linn County Courthouse and requested a search for any probate records for Seth Hayes. I was so thankful when they telephoned me and said that a file had been found and I could have it emailed to me for just $3.00. Of course I paid it gratefully. When it arrived I was so glad to find that Huldah was among the heirs and did receive money from her father's estate. I shared this for the DAR application and now my cousin is a member.

I am confident that Huldah was the daughter of Seth and Lydia.