News from the One-Name Studies

 A one-name study can be a tedious activity.  The effort is to identify every individual with any of the included surname variant spellings and any other interesting related bits of information that turns up; everywhere in the world.  It's not enough just to identify them, it's necessary to record the names, locations and any other information that gives a picture of the history and spread of the surname.  So, there's a spreadsheet.  The details of each individual will not be shared but, at various points, I will share information like how many people with any of the variant spellings live in the U.S. or elsewhere; how many are female, male, etc.  I will share a few things in this blog, from the Beismer One-Name Study because that's what I've been working on for the past few days.

One of the web sites that I came across, again, in my search was the Surname Datebase.  This is a great web site, based in Ireland, that researches surnames and writes articles giving historical and other information about the surname and some of the individuals who have that surname.  Searching on the spelling Besemer, I found their article on that surname.  I won't share the article here because of copyright but I have shared the link to the home page and to the Besemer page.  I will also tell you that two people named in the article are in my family tree:  Hans Bessamer who may be the same Hans Jurgen Besemer in our family and, Johannes Christian Besemer who is the brother of my ggg grandfather, Casparus Besemer Jr.  The article also indicates what I had learned previously that the name Besemer is derived from the German word besem for broom, indicating a possible historic occupation of broommaker.

The Wormuth surname is not represented in the Surname Database, so far.

Variant spellings of the surname found, up to now:  

• Beismer, 
• Beesimer, 
• Beesmer, 
• Beasmer, 
• Beasimer, 
• Besimer, 
• Bismer, 
• Bezemer, 
• Besemere, 
• Besemeyere, 
• Besemer, 
• Biesemeyer.

I will be researching each of these spellings of the surname and adding to the list as I find them.  

I will not include the surnames:  Bessemer or Beisner as they are pronounced differently which I believe is significant.

There are some interesting places that have turned up in the research as well.  More about that later.

So far, people found in the research have lived in:  NY, MN, IN, SC, NE CA, Germany, NJ.

I attempt to contact each person who appear to be living to let them know what I'm doing.  So far, nobody has responded.

Right now I'm just doing Yahoo searches for each spelling of the name, for 10 pages of results and recording various things about the individuals I find:  name, general location, gender, web address.  I photocopy obituaries.  There are many, many web sites and browsers to search and many, many variant spellings.

More to come.

Way Behind

 I'm way behind.  I'm not sure how it happened but I'm nearly a month behind in email and research.  I know my addiction to games on my phone is part of the problem.  In any case....

Gleaned from my WikiTree account: all of these are not relatives; some are profiles I created for various projects I'm a member of at WikiTree.  You can visit the links below to find out more about any of those people.

August

01 Aug 1864 Darius Oliver was born.

02 Aug 1937 Simeon Beismer [share tree] married Frances Beismer.

03 Aug 1933 Ruth Mattice died.

03 Aug 1913 Henry Mattice died.

04 Aug 1898 Sylvia Beismer died.

04 Aug 1899 Adelia Ingraham married Leo Ingraham.

05 Aug 1779 Elizabeth Hollenbeck was born.

11 Aug 1957 James Hulse died.

15 Aug 1912 Peter Wormuth died.

16 Aug 1913 Jeremiah Beesimer died.

17 Aug 1809 Daniel L. Dudley was born.

23 Aug 1856 John Oliver was born.

25 Aug 1861 Franklin Oliver was born.

27 Aug 1956 Marcus Wormuth died.

29 Aug 1919 Mary Mattice died.

31 Aug 1778 Daniel Nimham died.

31 Aug 1849 Peter Wormuth married Grace Deighton.

I also created a profile for Stephen (Steve) Watson who is still listed as MIA.  He was a friend of the family and engaged to my mother when his plane went missing during WWII.

One-Name Studies

I haven't done much with either - as I said, I'm behind, but I have added a couple of profiles to the list of ancestors with the Beismer and Wormuth surnames.  I, just today, saw a one-name study page that I like very much with a nice layout and some different, interesting data on that surname that I intend to include in my studies.  You can visit those links to see what's happening with the studies.

That's about it for now since I'm so far behind and have to catch up.

Genealogical Assumptions

Blogger tells me this is a draft so I'm hitting the Publish button again.  Scroll down for NEWS.

I research ALL my family lines: matrilineal and patrilineal.  I also, out of necessity, sometimes have to research collateral families (mostly related by marriage).

I've been doing a lot more research lately.  No, not because of the pandemic but because I rejoined WikiTree and it's opened up a lot of new paths for research and it's also taught me a lot.  I highly recommend WikiTree.  It's completely free.

In addition, all the well-known family history web sites, as well as many lesser known sites, add new data constantly.  My Links page has links to most of them.  It's a good idea to check all of them fairly regularly.

As I've been so frantically busy with all this new family history activity, I've noticed a lot of assumptions that I make in searching for ancestors.  I've also noticed assumptions that most of these web sites also make.  I've also noticed assumptions that family members make about our families.

Here are some:

1.  The family name we now have was always the same.  

First, if you could see the list of variant spellings I have for some of my families' surnames, you'd understand that this is a ridiculous assumption.  My maternal grandfather's surname; spelled, in our family, BEISMER, has between 42 and 52 variant spellings; and I still don't have their origin.  The Beismer spelling appears to have appeared in my family with my great grandfather, although I have no signature of his so I have no idea how he spelled his name.  Before him, though, the name was spelled differently.

Second, spelling, in general, was not so well defined in the not so distant past.

Next, many of of ancestors, probably most, came from European countries where English was not the primary language and many who arrived did not read, speak or write English.  Some changed their surnames to look and sound more English and to be understood, quite soon after arrival.  

In addition, where you see documents for and about your ancestors, most were written by someone other than your actual ancestor.  They wrote what they heard, in many cases; this resulted in errors; as well as the fact that some of those same "officials" who completed documents about your ancestors had terrible handwriting and later transcriptions exacerbated the situation.

NOTE: I have begun to collect signatures of my ancestors, when I can find them, in digital form for just this reason.

I am, shortly, going to begin two different one-name studies for surnames in my family where I'm at brick walls and can't find the next generation back.  This appears, in some cases, to be caused by surname variants.  If I have 20 variant spellings to check every time I need to find out something about an individual or his parents, it's very likely that I'll miss something in the process. News of those studies, which will be done though WikiTree and the Guild of One-Name Studies, will be posted here from time to time.

2.  Our ancestors were married, formally, officially, in a church or by clergy.

My assumption, in contrast, is that, if I don't find an "official" marriage document (a legal document) or a church record, they were common law.  

Most of my ancestors were in New York State at some point.  Vital records for New York began to be officially required and kept in about 1880.  Early compliance was not strictly adhered to and the maintenance of early records was, by experience, not the best.

Many of my ancestors lived in very rural areas.  Some were quite poor.  Getting somewhere to "be married" might have been difficult for some people.

3.  In connection with the previous assumption, our ancestors were members of a church.

In most cases, yes, but we can be quite sure that not all our ancestors were religions or attended church.  And, churches, as they do, are very determined to get everyone under their roofs somehow.  Churches were and are very important historically as a central institution for the communities where they were located.  But, like people today, everyone was not interested in religion and church.

NEWS

I have joined The Guild of One-Name Studies as part of the suggestions at WikiTree for conducting a one-name study.  I'm conducting 2 one-name studies: The Beismer Name Study (with variants) and The Wormuth Name Study (with variants).  There will shortly be web pages for each study at The Guild so you can see what's being done.  You can also check on the studies at WikiTree by using the study links above.  Remember, WikiTree is always free.

I will include news from WikiTree and The Guild from time.