The coincidences of life on the road
So The Legal Genealogist is in Seattle for the 36th annual conference of the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies and, last night, was privileged to provide one of the conference’s keynote addresses.
The talk, focusing on the women of our families, the challenges we face in tracing them, and the challenges they faced in their lives because of the law, was a lot of fun to put together, especially since it taught me a great deal about a figure in the women’s movement that I hadn’t known much about before. (More about her in the future…)
But it was also a lot of fun because it produced one of those moments that seem to happen so very often in genealogy.
One of those moments of serendipity.
Serendipity, the dictionary tells us, is “the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for; also : an instance of this.”1
Me, I much prefer the way that Ancestry Insider uses the term:
It is as though our ancestors want to be found. Uncanny coincidence. Olympian luck. Phenomenal fate. Tremendous intuition. Remarkable miracle. We call It, “Serendipity in Genealogy.”2
Either way, it was in full swing last night.
One of the examples that I used in the talk was a 1956 death certificate from the Bronx, New York. It was that of a woman who had been born in Russia, was still a citizen of Russia at the time of her death, but had lived in New York for the previous 46 years. The point I was making was that one single document gave us clues to three different women: the deceased; her mother, whose first name had appeared on the certificate; and her daughter, whose married name appeared as the informant for the certificate.
I had no sooner finished speaking than one of my genealogical colleagues came up to me. Emily Garber and I are both genealogical bloggers (her blog is (going) The Extra Yad and I strongly recommend it, especially if you have Jewish ancestry!) and we’ve been friends for some time. We had breakfast yesterday. We share a commitment to standards and to genealogical excellence.
And guess whose great grandmother was that Russian woman reflected in that death certificate?
Yup.
It was Emily’s great grandmother’s death certificate I had happened to choose out of all the examples I might have had available to make that point.
And I’ve had that happen so many times before.
Once when I went to Dallas to speak, for a lecture on private laws, I chose an act that provided a pension to a Union man who’d been killed in Texas. It turned out that he was an ancestor of the Dallas Genealogical Society member who picked me up at the airport and shepherded me throughout that trip.3
And when I went to Colorado, a member of the Colorado Genealogical Society asked me to look at a Maryland document that involved his 10th great grandfather selling the right to have some land surveyed in the 17th century. And the land was being sold to … my 9th great grandfather.4
And when I was talking about a critical DNA test for my Baker family in a keynote at RootsTech… and the one person who made that testing possible for my family turned out to be in the audience.5
Serendipity.
It’s those coincidences of life on the road that make this so much fun.
SOURCES
- Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary (http://www.m-w.com : accessed 12 Aug 2016), “serendipity.” ↩
- See, e.g., Ancestry Insider, “Serendipity in Embroidery,” posted 22 Jun 2012, Ancestry Insider (http://ancestryinsider.blogspot.com : accessed 12 Aug 2016). ↩
- See “An Act granting a Pension to Mary Ann Montgomery,” 17 Stat. 677 (1872). ↩
- See Judy G. Russell, “More Serendipity,” The Legal Genealogist, posted 9 Aug 2014 (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : accessed 12 Aug 2016). ↩
- See ibid., “The cousin who isn’t,” posted 8 Feb 2014. ↩
Great post, Judy! I was in Edinburgh in May with my genealogy tour. One participant was from Dryden Ontario and was talking about the first postman, who happened to be the gt grandfather of another participant! There is a monument to him in Dryden.
Another participant is doing a DNA study and discovered another participant is researching the same people she is studying! Love genealogy serendipity!
Not surprised it’s not just me this happens to! What a hoot!
Judy, obviously we need to get you back again to Seattle where I will pick you up at the airport, take you to your hotel, take you to the venue, back to the hotel, sing you a goodnight lullaby if needed, whisk you back to SeaTac and you can miraculously work the “missing” marriage certificate of James Ahern and Jane Graham, about 1858 in Millstone or New Brunswick, NJ into your talk. Sorry I missed you this trip. I promise I’ll be healthy next time around!
You have to promise to stay healthy, for sure!! 🙂 Hope all is well and you’re feeling better now.
Getting there. Not sure if the ProGen homework (citations) is making me feel better or worse!
How wonderful!
You have to love these moments, for sure.
Yes, this was tres cool, Judy! I am, of course, curious about how/why you came upon my ggm’s death cert. After all, a 1956 record in NYC is not a snap to acquire.
I’m sure it was one of the documents I scarfed up in a Google image search, Emily — the image is one of the first ones that pops up if you search New York death certificates — and the citation should have credited your website, in that case, as well. But I filed it away because it’s such a good example of a certificate that’s so important in researching women since it ties three generations of women together.
Ah! That makes sense. It would have been perfect if it had only included her mother’s maiden name: Kesselman. And here’s my original post. 🙂
http://extrayad.blogspot.com/2013/04/treasure-chest-thursday-death.html
I have had those serendipitous moments happen so often in my research and when helping others. Gives me goosebumps every time!
My blogged comment: http://extrayad.blogspot.com/2016/08/serendipity-nah-google.html
Great blog post!
As I zoomed in on the death certificate, I could make out that the deceased lived at 627 Manida Street. The SAME apartment house that I lived in between 1944 and 1952. Sarah Morris is not a name that I recall from my years there but I was just a tyke and there were 25 apartments in the building. So serendipity continues. Great post.