Doing Honor to Family

There are many different ways that we as genealogists and family historians find to honor the memories of our ancestors. Many of us write stories taken from the bits of information we glean from research, others of us love the joy of making beautiful scrap book pages, and still others are content to gather all available information in our software programs and make printed family trees to hand down. All are worthy endeavors to keep the memories of the past alive.

The two of us, The You Go Genealogy Girls, find many different ways to honor our loved ones. Girl #1 has made purses and bags with photos on them and Christmas tree ornaments. I love to do scrapbooking pages and wall art of various types, all with photos and trinkets of our ancestors added. I am running out of wall space to display everything and have even helped Number 1 fill up her wall space too.

We are lucky to be the proud owners of a beautiful family photo of our Great Great Grandparents and their family, The George Albert Copsey family which was taken in Custer County, Nebraska in about 1886-87. Not only do we have this treasured photo of their family and their sod house but it is also an important photo in the collection taken by the famous early photographer, Solomon D. Butcher. He made many early glass plate negative prints of the Plains, mostly in Nebraska during the later part of the 1800's and often centering around Custer County, Nebraska. This collection of glass plate negatives is at the Nebraska State Historical Society. Ours is a photograph and the original glass plate negative from the Butcher collection can be seen HERE and the plate details are available HERE. We invite you to take a look at the original glass plate, it is quite interesting and has a somewhat different look from our photo.

Many of the Solomon D.  Butcher photographs can be seen on the Library of Congress American Memory website. If you are a student of history and especially that of the early Plains and  American west those photos offer very poignant views of sod houses and the families who lived during those early years.

Cropped closeup taken from our original photograph of the George Albert Copsey family.

As many of you may already know, Ruby recently wrote a helpful new book about doing "Genealogy Research in Nebraska". Of course she had many hundreds of family photos that she could have chosen from to use on her book cover but our Copsey family is the one she wanted to use and when she suggested that to me in the pre-production stages, I was in total agreement that she had chosen well. What better way of doing honor to one of our dearest families? We are both so proud and so thankful that the Copsey's chose so many years ago to have their photo taken for posterity. Little did they know that thanks to Mr. Butcher, their Great Great Granddaughters would "make them famous" 130 years later! To us they were already a great family in our knowledge of their history and accomplishments...and were it not for them just where would we be? It is they who deserve our love and we honor them each time we look at those faces.

One of my other postings on my photo blog Taken Somewhere in Time has more early photos and information about Effie Mae Copsey, our G Grandma, the little girl with the doll in the sod house picture. "Great Grandma Gardner's Photo Timeline"

Ruby's book cover!

Ruby's book can be ordered from Roots Family Publishing: HERE.


Thanks for stopping by our blog!  ~Cheri, You Go Genealogy Girl #2

Well Planned Gone Wrong

What You Go Girl #2 didn't tell you about the Nebraska State Historical Society visit in May of 2008 was that we had to abort our original plans of doing research all day. We lasted until noon. The library-research room was unbearably hot. There is nothing worse that two energetic genealogists falling asleep on the job! In the transition between winter and spring, their AC was apparently not working.

This happens and then you have to punt or have a back-up plan in place. Fortunately we had other things to do, but it did cut our time short at the Nebraska State Historical Society building.

These things happen. I have gone to a courthouse that was unexpectedly closed because everybody employed there was attending a famous local's funeral service. Of course, these instances usually involve the small town courthouses. Even so, these instances change the schedule completely. In this case I read the sign on the door and waited it out at the town clerk's office until they opened after the services. Apparently the town clerk decided not to attend the services! Some small courthouses close all offices over lunch break. If you are there, you leave also ... or if you arrive shortly before lunch, your research just begins when you have to leave.

While it pays to have that back up plan in mind, it also pays to laugh and chalk it up to a great learning experience. The two of us laugh at a lot of things ... we'll tell you more about those instances as we go along. You Go Girl #2 snapped this picture of me last May hugging a tree ... perhaps a family tree!

You Go Girl #1, Ruby

VISITING OUR HISTORICAL SOCIETY

In the spring of 2008, The You Go Genealogy Girls packed the little red car and headed for Lincoln, Nebraska for the Nebraska State Genealogical Society meeting. Our other goal while in the capital city of Lincoln was to visit the NEBRASKA STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY to do some research. I was to have a lesson in how to use the research library from You Go Girl #1. It was great fun and the library staff was friendly and helpful. Sister-in-law, #1, showed me how to find and use the microfilm files and readers and then I was on to check out the photo section. The Historical Society houses many great old cabinet cards and photos of people and places in Nebraska. I put on the clean white gloves and looked through the many boxes of photos from my home county of Box Butte. There were many treasures to have copied and added to my personal collection.

Our wonderful Historical Society Library/Archives Research Room is closed at this time (2009) to undergo a major renovation, but the You Go Genealogy Girls are looking forward to another trip to this facility when it re-opens to the public in late 2010.

Now would be a great time to go online and spend some time on the Society's website. Get to know the facility and study their catalog to see what they offer for your genealogy/history research. They have a lot of great information online, enough to keep you busy on a snowy, spring day. If you can't wait to travel and want to start your trip today, then consider a virtual tour of some of the Nebraska Historical Societies network of historical facilities:

Chimney Rock National Historic Site
The Historic Fort Robinson museums
John G. Neihardt State Historic Site
Museum of Nebraska History
Willa Cather State Historic Site
Pres. Gerald R. Ford Conservation Center
or the Neligh Mill State Historic Site, just to name a few.

Whether you live in or outside of the state of Nebraska be sure to visit the NEBRASKA STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY website. Use it to help plan your next genealogical/historical trip to Nebraska.

The You Go Genealogy Girl #2, Cheri