My Military Ancestors

     This 4th of July I am thinking back about my ancestors that served the United States in times of conflict.  My ancestors fought in nearly ever major war, from the French and Indian War, through the Revolution and in to the 20th Century (the exceptions being World War I and the Mexican-American War).  Below is what I have been able to uncover so far about the military service of my ancestors.

French and Indian War

Battaile Harrison (1725-1776)

Lieutenant in VA Militia

Henry Francis (1734-1780)

Sergeant, 1st VA Regiment

John Hurlbut, Jr. (1732-1782)

Private, Connecticut Militia, Capt. Daniel Bradley's Company of Col.Andrew Burr's Regiment.

Kept a diary of his service at Fort Ticonderoga. More info.

Grave of Henry Francis, at the site of the Battle of Shallow Ford

Revolutionary War

Henry Francis (1734-1780)

Captain, VA Militia

Killed in action at Battle of Shallow Ford (NC), October 14, 1780. More info.

Battaile Harrison (1725-1776)

Lieutenant, MD & VA Rifle Regiment

Killed in action at Battle of Fort Washington (NY), November 16, 1776 More info.

Elisha Blackman

Elisha Blackman III (1760-1846)

Private, Pennsylvania Militia under Captain Bidlack.

Survivor of the Wyoming Massacre (PA) (July 3rd 1778) More info.

Henry Boas (1760-1834)

Private, Col. William Hay's Pennsylvania Regiment

Fought at Battles of Long Island, White Plains, and Trenton. More info.

Reuben Harrison Sr. (1749-1824)

Ensign, Amherst Co., VA Militia

Hezekiah Stone (1752-1798)

Corporal, 6th VA Regiment (Lunenburg Co.) Commanded by Capt. Garland.

Present at Valley Forge, PA in January, 1778.

Joshua Ferguson (1753-1837)

Private, Fairfax Co. VA Militia under Col. Waggoner.

Met George Washington and defended Mount Vernon and Alexandria, VA. More info.

Isham Beasley (1760-1855)

Private, Enlisted November, 1779, North Carolina

John Knight (1760-1843)

Private, in Regiment Commanded by Col. Matthew Locke in North Carolina.

John Stewart (1730-1805)

Private, 3rd VA Regiment (Halifax Co.) Commanded by Col. Thomas Marshall.

 

War of 1812

Reuben Harrison Jr. (1782-1844)

Major, Kentucky Mounted Militia.

Samuel Shelton Sr. (1793-1868)

John Selby (1786-1851)

Private, Virginia Militia, Commanded by Capt. Baldwin

Civil War

Jacob Frank (1833-1909) (Union)

Private, 9th Cavalry Regiment, Missouri State Militia Vols, Co. D.

Patrolled Missouri, mostly in Franklin and Gasconade counties. Protected rail lines from saboteurs. Reenlisted 1863, Thomas’ Callaway County Volunteer Militia G.O. #3 (Callaway County Home Guard)

James L Crisp (1830-1887) (Union)

Private, Company C, 42 Regiment Enrolled Missouri Militia

Patrick Sullivan

Patrick Sullivan (1839-1888) (Union)

Private, Co. B, 7th Mo. Reg't Inv. Vols. under Captain Coffee.

Siege of Vicksburg, MS, May 18-July 4, 1863. Reenlisted as a veteran Dec 13, 1863 at Vicksburg, MS. Transferred to 11th Mo. Reg't Inf. Vols., Co. C under Captain Scott. Injured while on patrol in TN in 1865. More info.

George Gruenewald (1844-1917) (Union)

Private, 1st Missouri Vols., Co. C.

Jacob Gruenewald (1815-1869)(Union)

Private, 1st Regiment, Missouri State Militia Infantry, Co.K

Joseph Selby (1824-1874) (Union)

Private, 7th Regt Iowa Infantry, Co. E. Reenlisted as a veteran 1863 in Missouri

Jesse Beasley (1827-1904) (Confederate)

Private, 24th TN Inf., Co. H

Battle of Shiloh (TN, April 6-7, 1862)
Battle of Perryville (KY, October 8, 1862)
Battle of Murfreesboro(TN, December 31, 1862)
Battle of Chickamauga (TN, September 19-20, 1863)
Battle of Missionary Ridge (TN, November 25, 1863)
Atlanta Campaign (GA, May-July 1864)
Battle of Franklin (TN, November 30, 1864)

Forrest Frank Jr. and wife Ruth, Alabama, 1941

World War II

Forrest F. Frank, Jr.

Private, U.S. Army

Served in Pacific Theater, stationed at base in Philippines.

Selected Sources

Diary of John Hurlbut, Jr.

Describes his march from Connecticut to upstate New York and the capture of Fort Ticonderoga from the French in 1759.

Battaile Harrison Revolutionary War Land Bounty Application

Filed by his nephew.

Ancestor Spotlight Elisha Blackman III
My blog post recounting Elisha Blackman's experience during the Wyoming Massacre.

Revolutionary War Pension application of Henry Boas.

Details where he lived after the war.

Revolutionary War Pension application of Joshua Ferguson.     

In which he recalls his wartime activities in Fairfax County, Virginia, including meeting General George Washington. Transcript

Civil War Pension application of Hannah Sullivan, widow of Patrick Sullivan.

Includes testimony regarding his service and injury, as well as family birth and marriage records.

Ancestor Spotlight - Engle Backer (1806-1890)

Johannes Engleberth Becker, called Engle, is my G-G-G-Great Grandfather on my father's side. He was born on January 27, 1806 in the village of Burbach in Germany. Engle was one of three brothers that emigrated to the United States in 1854 (though despite knowing the names of over 30 people who traveled together, I have yet to find a record of their ship). All three settled in Callaway county, Missouri. Engle and his brother Phillip, who owned adjoining farms, were both farmers. Their third brother, John Henry, lived in Fulton. Upon arrival, the family changed the spelling of their name from Becker to Backer (either spelling is supposed to be pronounced "Baker").

Engle was first married on Dec 30, 1830 to Katherine Sophie Sauer, at the Lutheran Church in Burbach, Germany. The couple had six children: Christian, Sohpia Landman, Katherine Frank, William, Leonard, and Henrich. In 1843, Engle's wife Katherine died in childbirth with Henrich, who also died. Engle then remarried Dec 24, 1843 to Juliann Hild in Burbach. Engle and Juliann had nine children, six of whom lived to adulthood. Of these children four were born in Burbach: Henriette Charlotte Bury, Charlotte Hagebusch, Henry and Charles Backer. Two more were born in Missouri: Louis Backer and Matilda Brooks.

Engle lived in Callaway county, Missouri from 1854 until about 1877. During this time he and his family were members of the Presbyterian Church in Fulton. Between 1876 and 1880 Engle moved his family to Washington, Missouri, in Franklin county. His wife Juliann died in 1885. Engle remained in Washington until his death on Jan 27, 1890 of pneumonia. He died on his birthday and was exactly 84 years old. He was survived by 11 children.

Below is a copy of the Fulton Sun from Jan 28, 1890, recording the death of Engle Backer. Right click and select zoom in to read the text. His obituary is at the bottom of the middle column.

Engle Backer Obituary

Jacob Frank, 1833-1909

Today is the first in a series of obituary postings I plan to make. The county libraries in Fulton and St. Louis, Missouri have indexes for local obituaries going back to the late 19th century that make it very easy to find multiple obituaries for relatives. The St. Louis library has their obituary index online here. Both libraries charge only a nominal fee to locate and mail copies of the obituaries to you. If you have any relatives who lived in these areas (regardless of where they died) then you should check with these libraries as obituaries are one of the best pieces of genealogical evidence available.

My first profile is for my G-G-Great-Grandfather Jacob Frank. The Fulton library had two obituaries and a burial notice for Jacob Frank. These obituaries provided a great deal of information and I was happy to see most of my theories in my prior post on the Frank family were correct.

Jacob Frank was born in Hammelburg, Bavaria on April 19, 1833. He emigrated to the United States at age 17 and settled in Fulton, Missouri at age 19 (about 1852). In 1857 he married Katherine Backer, the daughter of a recent Prussian immigrant.

Jacob worked as a coal miner from 1852 until 1891, when he retired and became a gardener. He had a house on Market St. in Fulton with a small plot of land in the back with a garden from which he sold produce to other residents of the city. Oddly, neither obituary mentions his service in the civil war. He served for about three years in the Missouri 9th Calvary Regiment State Militia Volunteers. Perhaps this was omitted because much of his service during the war was dedicated to combatting Confederate sympathizers in the Fulton area.

Jacob was a member of the Fulton First Presbyterian Church. His obituary from the Fulton Journal describes him as a very holy and honorable man:

He was faithful in filling as his obligations to his fellow man and to his God. His one ambition in life was to deal justly and fairly with all men and in this he was remarkably successful. He was a man of generous heart and sought to be helpful to those about him. Mr. Frank was a consistent and faithful member of the Presbyterian Church and lived a truly Christian life in both his public and private affairs. It can be truly said of Mr. Frank that he was a faithful servant to his God, his country and his home. For none truer or more faithful and useful men have come and gone in this life than our departed friend and neighbor.

Jacob Frank died at his home in Fulton on Wednesday, May 12th, 1909 at 9:30 a.m. of a heart attack. He was preceded in death by one son, Albert Jacob Frank of Fulton (I will post his obituaries later) and one daughter, Lottie Kester, wife of August, also of Fulton. He was survived by his wife, Katherine, and seven children. He left three sons: Charles, Henry and William Frank, all of Fulton, and four daughters: Matilda Langenbach, wife of Herman, of Marion, Ill., Julia Egerer, wife of Adolph, of Mexico, Mo., Bertha Lockridge, wife of James, of Fulton, and Mary Fitzhugh, wife of George, also of Fulton.

Below are Jacob's obituaries from the Fulton Telegraph and Fulton Journal, and a burial notice. You can right click on the obituaries to zoom in if you would like to read the text better.

Jacob Frank Obituaries

Frank Family Reunion

Late summer seems to be the choice time for a family reunion. I have three between now and October. This last weekend was the Frank family reunion in O'Fallon, Missouri. Next weekend is the Roberts family reunion in Owensboro, Kentucky. Then in early October is the Dickson family reunion in Tebbetts, Missouri. I have been busy preparing information to share at each reunion, and I hope to come back from all three with lots of new information.

The Frank reunion was a lot of fun. The Frank family is very small, and the reunion was just the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of my grandma and grandpa Frank. We used to all get together for Chirstmas and Thanksgiving, but now many of us live in other states and have conflicting schedules for which holidays are with which families. The summertime reunion is a great way for me to keep in touch with all my cousins.

Below are some pictures from the Frank Family reunion at my Aunt Zoe and Uncle Dave's house in O'Fallon, Missouri. This reunion also served as the 90th birthday for my grandpa, Forrest F. Frank Jr. His birthday isn't until the end of the month, but we celebrated early because that was when everyone could get together. We also used the reunion as a time to remember my grandma, who passed away last year. My mother brought all my grandma's jewelry to the party and the grandkids all went through picking out items. As you can see, there was a lot of jewelry. It was really fun to see all that jewelry spread across the table and to remember some of the huge earrings, bracelets and necklaces that she was so fond of.

Click on the photo slideshows to go directly to the albums and see more detailed descriptions.

While I was there, I also took some photos of old family photographs. These include photos of my 90-year-old grandpa as a young boy in a sailor suit, him as a young man going off to World War II, his mother and father, and a few very old and priceless photographs from the Dickson family.

Finally, on my way out of town I stopped by St. Charles Borromeo Cemetery to take photos of the grave of my mother's great-grandfather. I recently learned that the Archdiocese of St. Louis has records of all their cemeteries online. Most of my family was not Catholic, but I searched anyway, as a few of the cemeteries were popular with non-Catholics as well. I found a listing for my great-great grandfather, John Patrick Hickey, a native of Ireland. What's more, the Archdiocese website revealed there were five related graves in the same family plot: His wife and four children who never married. Stopped by the cemetary and easily found the graves. Below are some photos of the graves.

Back in Action

For the last few months my genealogy research has taken a back seat while I finished my final semester of law school and studied for and took the Bar exam (and hopefully passed it!). Now I am finally free of school obligations. I am not completely free as I now have to go from excessive studying to be a lawyer to excessive working as a lawyer. Still, I hope to squeeze in the time for a post a week on this blog.

I have a large backlog of information that I have collected over the last few months that I need to process and organize into posts. Some of my finds have been quite exciting and I really hope to get the time to post about them soon. I have contacted other researchers who gave me a wealth of information on my wife's family. I also have received a large set of obituaries for the Frank family that I hope to post soon. There have also been numerous updates to other related families in my tree. I will spotlight some of the more interesting people in these less well known parts of my tree through regular "Spotlight" posts.

It will take me a while to get a lot of this information digitized and organized enough for publication. Until then, here is a status update on the various families of interest in my research:

Frank (my father's family): I have obtained numerous obituaries for my earliest Frank ancestors. These included the obituary of my earliest known Frank ancestor, Jacob Frank. His obituary (actually, several obituaries in various local papers) confirm many of my theories about him, including his town of origin and his occupations.

Sullivan (my mother's family): My mother has provided me her family photo album which contains a wonderful collection of old family photographs of ancestors going back to the Civil War. I am currently scanning these photographs when I have free time. Unfortunately, most all of the photographs are unlabled. I am trying to identify as many photographs as I can. I am hopeful this will help me identify some current Sullivan relations.

Dickson (my paternal grandmother's family): I have begun writing the story of this family for a blog post. I have one major missing link in this family that I am trying to resolve first. I was hopeful to answer some questions about this family when I took a recent trip to Raleigh, North Carolina for a wedding. Raleigh is home to the State Archives, which have the old court records for all NC counties. Unfortunately, the office was closed for an extended Memorial Day holiday while I was there. I will either write to them or contact other researchers that might have the information before I post.

Roberts (my wife's father's family): I have been in contact with a few researchers who have extensive information on this family. I am also going to a Roberts Family Reunion in Owensboro Kentucky next weekend. After this I will try and post my findings.

Ebelhar (my wife's mother's family): As I have previously mentioned, I found out a great deal of information on this family. My wife's mother's families have especially interesting stories to them, including murder and other shocking deaths. I simply have too much information to sort out right now, and will need to get that done before I write some posts.

I also have updated information on several related families in Missouri, Indiana and Kentucky, including the following surnames: Beasley, Gruenewald, Hickey, Kelley, Riney, Runge, Shelton, Shields and Weber. If you are a researcher interested in any of these surnames in these areas, please contact me!

A few words from my Grandfather

I recently found some notes I took last year during a conversation with my Grandfather Forrest Frank Jr., who was telling me his memories of his childhood and family. Here are my notes, in no particular order, told from his point of view:

• My childhood home was 600 Grand Ave in Fulton.
  
• My grandfather Frank went by Charley. He ran a "little red store" in Fulton. It was called either Frank & McClure or Frank & Market.
• My grandmother Frank's name was Emma. I think her maiden name was Runge. I remember that she had a relative named Frank Runge that visited some.
  
• My uncle Melvin also ran a grocery store on 9th St in Fulton. He was in business with my uncle Frank Backer, his brother-in-law.
• My father Forrest Sr. drove a horse-drawn laundry truck in Fulton. Once a horse stepped on him, injuring his stomach. Later in life he got stomach cancer, and he always believed that it was caused by that horse stepping on him.
• My father once ran for Fulton City Collector, but as a Republican! I was very embarrassed. After the war, I ran for City Collector and was elected, but as a Democrat.
  
• My mother and father divorced when I was 13. My father then moved to Michigan City, Indiana, where he ran a Peptolene gas station on the corner of 10th and Franklin St. The gas station was owned by my uncle Poole Harrison, who was very rich and owned several gas stations in the Chicago area. My mother remarried to a man named Arthur Bergin and lived in Fulton.
  
• The summer after my father moved to Michigan City, I went to visit him and worked at his gas station. We also went to the World's Fair in Chicago. (Note: This was 1933, grandpa was 14 -SPF)
• All of my family is buried in Hillcrest Cemetary in Fulton.

• My grandfather Harrison was named Robert Berry, but went by R.B. He moved from Cole County (Note: It was actually Miller Co, south of Jeff City - SPF) to Callaway County before I was born.
• Grandfather Harrison owned a melon farm. He did pretty well for himself and was able to pay off his $13,000 mortgage in the first year.
• My mother had four sisters and a brother.
  
• My aunt Vesta was married when she was young to a man who turnd out to have a drug habit. It was very scandalous and she got a divorce. She then married a man named T. Page Rogers, who was very rich. I think he was in the oil business. They moved to Galveston, Texas, then later to Dallas.
  
• After I enlisted in the Army, I stopped to visit my Aunt and Uncle in Dallas along with some Army buddies. Their driver picked us up from the bus station in a limo and drove us to their mansion! We all drank cold beers and ate steak that night. We lived the fancy life for a night. It was one of the best meals I've ever had.

A Familiar Face

As I mentioned in my previous post on the Frank family, the family is very small. There are few living descendants with the last name Frank outside my immediate family. Here is one of the closest relatives I've found so far. The following obituary came to me courtesy of Phyllis Dixon of Fulton, Mo., who keeps a collection of Callaway County obituaries. This man, John Walker Frank, was a generation older than my grandfather. Yet looking at his picture, I would say they could be brothers.
John Walker Frank was a very well known member of the community in Fulton, serving as a deacon at his church, President of his lumber company, and on the board of directors of several associations. It is even possible that my grandfather knew him. My grandfather, Forrest Jr., served in elected office as the city collector in Fulton for a time, though I am not sure when. If he held this position before the war, then it is likely he knew John Walker Frank, as he was a city councilman at that time.
You can right click on the obituary to zoom in if you would like to read the text better. The second obituary is for his wife.


Frank Obituaries

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The Frank Family

I started my current genealogy research in the hope of finding clues as to the origin of my surname, a side of the family largely neglected in prior genealogy research. I started my research by talking to my grandfather, Forrest F. Frank Junior. Forrest was largely raised by his mother and stepfather, and did not keep in contact with much of the Frank family. He did however know his grandparents' names, and that was enough for me to start my research.

Grave of Jacob and Katherine Frank in Hillcrest Cemetary, Fulton, Mo.

The Frank family story starts with Jacob Frank, an immigrant from Hammelburg, Bavaria. Hammelburg is a small town in northern Bavaria on the Saale river, well known in Germany for its wineries and the nearby Rhön nature preserve. In America, Hammelburg is best known as the location of several POW camps during WWII. It is also the setting for the fictional POW camp in the sitcom Hogan's Heroes.

I do not have information about Jacob's parents or his life in Hammelburg. I know that in 1852 he emigrated to the United States, settling in Fulton, Callaway County, Missouri, where a small German community was formed the First Presbyterian Church in the early 1850's. Two years later, the Backers, a large Prussian family of merchants and bakers (Backer means Baker) moved to the area and began attending the same church. It was then that he met Katherine Backer, his future wife. The two were married on July 29, 1857 in Fulton. I will post more about the Backer family in later posts.

Jacob and Katherine started a family during tumultuous times. In the late 1850's tensions between the northern and southern states were rising. These tensions were felt especially in Callaway county. Missouri was a split state, with northern abolitionists settling parts of the state and slave owners from the south settling others. While Missouri was a slave state, it actually had few slave owners. Almost all the slave owners were concentrated in an area called "Little Dixie" along the Missouri River in central Missouri where a large number of families from Virginia and North Carolina had settled between 1820 and 1850. Callaway county lies at the heart of this area.

When war broke out in 1861 and the Missouri government voted to remain in the Union, Callaway county famously tried to secede from the state and proclaim itself the Kingdom of Callaway county. In response to the strong anti-Union sentiment in the area, the state set up several volunteer militia regiments to guard against attacks by Confederate sympathizers. On April 19, 1862, Jacob Frank enlisted with the 9th Calvary Regiment State Militia Volunteers. The Regiment remained for the most part in the central Missouri area, and saw action in a number of small skirmishes against guerrilla Confederate troops and sympathizers seeking to sabotage railroads and roads.

Jacob was one of the rare few soldiers in the Civil War who made it through the war without injury or illness. He was discharged on April 21, 1865 and returned home. However, a few months later he was again summoned to service. Although the war was over, gangs of Confederate sympathizers known as "Bushwackers" still plagued central Missouri. One of the gangs operating in the area eventually became known as the James-Younger gang (Jesse James' gang). Jacob re-enrolled under command of Lt. William H. Thomas in the Callaway County Volunteer Militia on July 5, 1865 and served off and on as needed to protect the countryside from Bushwackers.

After the war Jacob remained in Fulton. He worked for the next few decades in a local coal mine. Eventually as his health began to fail him, he took a less demanding job. On the 1900 census his job title was listed as "Market Gardener." He and Katherine lived on Market St., so it is possible that he worked as a caretaker at a nearby municipal park or garden.

Jacob and Katherine had nine children, 5 girls and 4 boys, all of whom lived to adulthood and married. For the most part their children married the children of other German immigrants, and stayed in Fulton. Their son Charles Henry "Charley" Frank is my g-g-grandfather.

Beulah, Charley, Forrest, Emma, Melvin and Effie Frank.

Charley Frank was born in 1865 in Fulton. He married Emma Weimeyer of Franklin county on 24 Sep 1890. Charley worked for the Backer family's grocery and bakery. He and Emma had four children, Effie, Melvin, Forrest, and Beulah. Effie married Poole Harrison from Mexico, Mo., and moved to the Chicago area, where the couple owned a chain of gas stations. The couple became quite rich but never had children. Melvin followed his father into the family business, eventually becoming co-owner of the Frank & Backer bakery. Melvin married Louise Humbrook, and they had one daughter, Marcella, who married Harry Johnson, and currently lives just north of Kingdom City. Beulah married a distant cousin, Frank Backer, who worked as a car salesman. They had two sons, Homer and Howard Backer. Howard lives in Los Angeles and Homer lives in Florida.

My great-grandfather, Forrest Sr. was born on October 27, 1896. He married Lela Harrison around 1918. They had one child, my grandfather, Forrest Jr. For the next few years, Forrest Sr. worked as a laundry truck driver in Fulton. He and Lela divorced around 1930, and Forrest Sr. moved to northern Indiana, where he managed a gas station owned by his brother-in-law Poole Harrison. Around 1945 he moved back to Fulton where he worked as a salesman at a department store. He died in 1953 at his son's house in St. Ann, Missouri. His death certificate lists the cause of death as stomach cancer.

The Frank family is a small family, with few living descendants today. Unlike the farmer families common on other branches of my family, who often had 10+ children, the Franks were city dwellers and often had two working spouses and little time for children. My research indicates that the only living descendants with the Frank last name are my grandfather and his family, of which only myself and my cousin James might still carry on the family name.

Below are documents related to the Frank family, including the military service record of Jacob Frank, census data sheets, and death certificates for my direct ancestors. I have also created a descendants chart that traces all the generations descended from Jacob Frank. It contains much more detailed information on the family.

Descendants of Jacob Frank -- A 'register report' style list of all the Frank relatives I have found so far.

Jacob & Katherine:

• Jacob Frank Civil War Service Card
• Jacob Frank Civil War Service Card 2
• Katharine Backer Frank Death Certificate
• Jacob Frank & Family 1860 Census
• Jacob Frank & Family 1870 Census Pg. 1 and Pg. 2
• Jacob Frank & Family 1880 Census
• Jacob Frank 1890 Veterans Schedule
• Jacob Frank & Family 1900 Census

Charley & Emma:

• Charles Henry Frank Death Certificate
• Emma Weimeyer Frank Death Certificate
• Charles Frank 1900 Census
• Charles Frank 1910 Census
• Charles Frank 1920 Census
• Charles Frank 1930 Census
  

Forrest Sr.:

• Forrest Frank Sr. Death Certificate
• Forrest Frank Sr. 1920 Census
• Forrest Frank Sr. 1930 Census
• Forrest Frank Sr. WWI Draft Registration
• Forrest Frank Sr. WWII Draft Registration

Digging for Roots

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sanh.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today.

-- Inaugural Address of President Barack Obama, January 20, 2009.


Hello and Welcome!

The above quote pretty much sums up why I am interested in genealogy. The stories of our ancestors make us who we are today. Their life stories, both famous and obscure, rich and poor, remind us of the significance each life has on the rest of the world.

I have created this blog in order to keep my family updated on the findings of my genealogy research. Most of the posts will be updates on research into particular family lines. I will post updates and interesting stories I find on the families I am researching. Along the way I will also post on other subjects related to genealogy. I am especially interested in efforts to digitize ancient records and make them accessible to the public. I will post on these efforts as well as tips on the resources available on the internet that I have found most helpful in my searches.

Here are the main family names I will am researching:

My father's family:

• Frank
• Dickson
• Beasley
• Backer
• Shelton

My father's family is from Callaway County, Missouri.

My mother's family:

• Sullivan
• Hickey
• Gruenewald

My mother's family is from the St. Louis, Missouri area.

My wife's father's family:

• Roberts
• Westerfield

My wife's mother's family:

• Ebelhar
• Riney

My wife's family is from Daviess County, Kentucky.

You can keep up to date on my findings for all of these families by subscribing to this blog's rss feed. Thanks for visiting, and I wish you the best of luck in your own searches.