Ancestral Profile

Ruth Ann Butler was my Second Great Grand Aunt, daughter of Barney Butler and Hannah Chase Butler, sister of William Butler, my Great Great Grandfather, namesake of my Great Grandmother, Ruth Ann Butler Mattice. She was born, probably in Roxbury, Delaware County, New York in about 1833.

She's an example of a large number of ancestors for whom there is little information.  She was born way before vital records had begun to be officially kept.  And, in the rural parts of the country, even then many births were not always registered.

The only documents I have of her life are census records.  The first time that the names of all family members were enumerated on the U.S. census was in 1850, so the first record of Ruth Ann's existence is on the 1850 U.S. Census in Roxbury, New York and she was already 17 years old.  She also appears, with her parents and siblings, on the 1855 New York State Census and the 1860 U.S. Census, still in Roxbury.  In 1860, she was 27. I have found no record of her after that.

This is not unusual, not just for my family branches, but for thousands of families.  Think about it; you're born, you live and you die and, except for a handful of family members, there is no record of your life.  It's one of the reasons I do this; to record all of these people who I'm related to.

In order to write this post about Aunt Ruth Ann, I've done some recent research.  Whether she died shortly after the 1860 Census or got married, I've found no record, yet.  My research always includes searching online family trees, official records, old newspaper sites and various other genealogical sites.  So far, I've found nothing.  Had she married and had children, there may have been mention of her in a variety of records; but I've found none, so far.  This is one of the frustrations of family history.  She existed; there are a few census records, but nothing else has been found.  

I revisit these ancestors from time to time because you never know where you'll find some little bit of family information, but I'm researching ALL my family branches and each individual so revisiting specific individuals who have little documentation is rare.

And, it's sad that someone in the family lived and died and we know little about her:  Ruth Ann Butler was probably born in Roxbury. She was last seen, age 27, in Roxbury.  She was my Great Great Grand Aunt on my father's side.

That's it for now.

                                     

Catching Up

News:

I haven't been working on family history lately.  The truth is I'm addicted to video games on my phone.  It's too easy to get caught up.  In any case, I'm trying to get back to it.  I posted some family photos in family tree order a couple of days ago and it gave me the idea to include profiles of individual family members and ancestors with photos here in this blog.  In some cases, I have photos of ancestors from when they were children throughout their lives.  You can also see my family tree and profiles of individuals at WikiTree.  

Profile:

William Joseph Odell was my paternal grandfather.  

He was the son of George Odell and Fannie Flowers born in Delhi, New York, January 5, 1900.  His mother died when he was about 7 months old and he was raised much of the time by his grandparents:  Joseph and Minerva.  His father, George, married Ella Zurner about 2 years after William's mother passed.  

William lied about his age and joined the Army when he was 17 and was part of the U.S. Army control of the Panama Canal during its construction.  I think this is the earliest photo of I have of my grandfather; he was with his pet monkey at the Canal Zone.

This might be a younger photo of him but it looks like he might have been in uniform:

Grandma said they met at a barn dance in Gilboa.  They married in April 1921 in Roxbury.  

I don't know a lot of their history after that.  They had seven children together.  They lived a frugal life.

I learned that Grandpa had worked as a foreman for the NYS Highway Department in highway maintenance.  This photo is from his driver's license:

Later he owned a billiards and card hall in Delhi.  That was around the time I saw him the most often.  My father told me that Grandpa had played against Willie Hoppe in one of his exposition tournaments.  They both favored a particular form of billiards, apparently.  Grandpa lost, of course.  I'd hoped that I could find a newspaper record of the match but I haven't, so far.

Grandpa made a point of keeping up with most of the family.  He had a couple of great aunts who lived nearby, including our black blood relatives, the DeWitts.  Grandma said he checked in with relatives regularly.

I regret that I didn't have more time to get to know Grandpa; I was 12 when he died.  I know he could have told me a lot about our family.

That's it for now.

                                     

News

 I think I'll occasionally use this News feature to make diary-like posts on what I'm working on.  This will be the first of this type of post.  So:

This morning, I posted a couple of photos to Dead Fred.  If you're not familiar with this site, it's a lot of fun browsing through the name index to see if there are any photos of people you know.  I added an unknown photo that I particular like and one of a couple I'm very familiar with.

This morning, I also looked through family tree @ Ancestry to see if anyone has posted photos related to Henry Flower, my great great grandfather and his immediate family:

Henry Flower, 1842-1923

married to

Martha Hayden, 1857-1919

children:

Nellie Flowers, 1874-1951, married to Albert Sager, 1873-?.

Mary Flower, 1876-?, married ?

Fanny May Flowers, 1881-1900, married George Odell, 1879-1918.

I found one obit for Henry Flower that I hadn't seen before.  

I left several messages for family tree owners to let them know about the Flower/Flowers One Name Study and the blog.  

The day before, I emailed the Town Clerk of Rockland, Sullivan County, NY, to let her know about the One Place Study of Rockland and the blog and to ask that she spread it around.  You can only ask.

Les Wormuth and I are planning a trek into Montgomery County to do some research at a couple of collections.  The "other" Wormuth family was there.  Our Peter may have been born there.  We'll see what we can find.  I have a lot of prep work to do before we go up there; it's quite a drive for me.

That's it for now.  Does anybody read this?  Please leave a comment.  Thank you.