Ancestor Soup

  Tom Graves could make just about anything.   In his home near Princeville, Illinois and later in eastern South Dakota he built numerous ho...

Years ago, I found digital copies of the 1880 Agricultural Schedule for my direct-line ancestors, William Graves and Lawson Lair in Peoria...

This blog post was inspired by Amy Johnson Crow 's " 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks " challenge.  Learn more at her blog. *******...

Many of us have one - an ancestor who was a stinker, put quite frankly.  And this can be quite a can of worms when writing and documenting o...

A year or two ago, I checked the 1880 Agricultural Census available at Ancestry.com for two of my Ancestors from Peoria County, Illino...

Those of us who deal regularly with obituaries have probably seen it all - unexpected deaths, long-expected deaths, deaths that occurred sud...

This note, written by my great-grandmother, Elvirta Knutz Graves, explains the significance of these collars she had tucked away.  The lac...

In the quiet landscape of southeastern Ross county, Ohio, sits Tweed cemetery.  Just outside of Vigo, it is nestled inside a grove of trees...

Sometimes you just know that someone has come into your life for a reason, and such is the case with Warren Throndson.  We are distant cous...

I don't know how I was lucky enough to have ended up with Grandpa Tom's rocking chair - perhaps it was just a matter of having a bab...

    On the flat prairie of eastern South Dakota, there once thrived the bustling little town of Esmond.  I had lived in the general vicini...

Any mother sending her son off to war has to do so with such mixed feelings - pride, tempered with fear; faith, battered by the reality of...

This photo depicts the Will Knutz family of rural Huron, South Dakota, enjoying their new car.  The photo was taken prior to 1918, and inc...

I would like to pay tribute to a couple of the men in our family who gave their lives in defense of their country. Being a st...