Episode 110 - America: The Penal Colony? And Black Sheep in Illinois

podcast episode Oct 26, 2015

America might have been more like Australia than you think.  This week, researcher Peggy Lauritzen explains how America also indulged in white slavery!  Then, Kathy Manker of Phoenix, AZ talks about her "black sheep" 19th century ancestor.

Fisher opens the show with David Allen Lambert, Chief Genealogist for the New England Historic Genealogical Society and AmericanAncestors.com.  With Fisher's Mets defeating the Cubs to go to the World Series, David shares a database for researching baseball players from the recent and distant past.  David also talks about an amazing find he has made for the 170th anniversary of NEHGS... a family tie between author Nathaniel Philbrick (who will be honored in Boston for the celebration) and author Herman Melville, both of whom have researched the story that resulted in "Moby Dick."  In Family Histoire news, David talks about a 450-year-old Mexican colonial church that has been revealed by the drying up of a reservoir due to the current drought.  It's a fabulous image!  Fisher and David then discuss a 100-year-old woman in Buffalo, New York, who still works six days a week, eleven hours a day... and loves it.  She's been working since 1930!  David then talks about the ongoing archaeological dig at the Boston Common that has revealed items from a Revolutionary era encampment.  He then shares his "Tech Tip," and another free database of the week from NEHGS.

In segment two, Fisher visits with researcher Peggy Lauritzen who explains the particulars of pre-colonial white slavery in America. She explains the various types, from apprentices to indentured servants, and the way many ended up in their situations.  Peggy claims America was a penal colony long before Australia!  It's a revealing discussion you won't want to miss.

Fisher then talks to Kathy Manker of Phoenix, AZ.  Kathy and her clan dug up some amazing dirt on a third great grandfather and his family from the late 1800s in Illinois.  It sounds a lot like the wild west!  You'll be amazed at what she has found.

Fisher and Tom Perry then talk about creating a special box you can use to take digital copies of your antique photographs.  It's cheap and fun!

That's all this week on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show!

Transcript of Episode 110

Host Scott Fisher with guest David Allen Lambert

Segment 1 Episode 110

Fisher: And welcome back genies, to another episode of Extreme Genes, America’s Family History Show and ExtremeGenes.com!  It is Fisher here, your Radio Roots Sleuth. On the program where we shake your family tree and watch the nuts fall out.  Well genies, we have some incredible guests today.  One of them says that America actually started out as a penal colony, which involved in part, “White Slavery.”  Peggy Lauritzen joins us in about eight minutes.  Then later in the show, well we were looking for black sheep ancestor stories, and wow did we find one! Kathy Manker from Phoenix, Arizona is going to come on and talk about a real Wild West situation, I think you’re going to really enjoy. But right now, let’s head out to Boston, Massachusetts, and my good friend the Chief Genealogist for the New England Historic Genealogical Society and AmericanAncestors.org, David Allen Lambert.

Fisher: Hello David.

David: Hey, Fish, so how are you doing this week?

Fisher: Oh what a setup is that? You know my Mets are in the World Series. How does it get any better than that?

David: Oh, congratulations. Well in 1986, I wouldn’t have said congratulations to any Mets fan, being Boston Red Sox fan!

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: My heart does go out to those Cubbies fans, I tell you 107 years is quite a drought.

Fisher: Hmm, yes. Well so was 86 years, so...

David: That was true. That’s true.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: One database I want to say, if you are looking for your Mets or Red Sox or Cubbies, is retrosheet.org, I know you used it in the past.

Fisher: Yeah absolutely, in researching old ball players.

David: If they played for twenty years or just had one cup of coffee and the majors, it’s a great resource and it’s for free!

Fisher: I’ve got to tell you a weird story. So this past week I was going to an archive to look up a death record of an ancestor who passed in the 1860s.  It was just a quick stop over and I didn’t want to bring any paper in so I thought, “I’ll just memorize the date, hopefully I can keep it in my head.”  And it was last Wednesday and I looked at it and it was, October 21st 1865. I was running in to look for the death record, on her 150th anniversary of her passing! How weird is that?

David: That’s extremely creepy.

Fisher: That’s like Halloween you know. [Laughs]

David: Well serendipity and genealogy go arm in arm.

Fisher: Oh yeah.

David: It really does. Speaking of anniversaries, NEHGS is celebrating one this year.

Fisher: Really?

David: It’s our 170th anniversary.

Fisher: You don’t look a day over a 140!

David: You know, I don’t feel that old either, and hopefully I’ll go to the 200th as well.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: Well it’s a celebration also because we reached a milestone on fundraising, we raised over $55 million as of July for our campaign for “connecting families and advancing history.”

Fisher: Awesome!

David: And to celebrate this week we’re having an event at the “Four Seasons” we’re honoring author and historian Nathanial Philbrick, who I’m sure you’ve heard of.

Fisher: Oh yeah. Wrote “Mayflower.” In fact several of my ancestors are mentioned in there.

David: Another one which is very popular and currently in the news is, “In the Heart of the Sea” which is going to be made into a movie, coming out later this year by Ron Howard.

Fisher: Ron Howard, yes.

David: That’s a wonderful story. It’s about the whale boat Essex, and one of the wonderful things about the event for Philbrick, a genealogy has been compiled for him that I wrote.

Fisher: Awesome!

David: In the book it will be revealed that he is related to Herman Melville who wrote “Moby Dick.” 6th cousins, five times removed from Herman Melville!

Fisher: Oh how fun is that!

David: It’s going to be a great way to see the connection of both their research tied together, and it’s all relative!

Fisher: Yeah. [Laughs] That’s great. Let’s find out what’s happening with the “Family Histoire News” what do you have for us today?

David: Well I’m going to go across the border and into Mexico, and share with you a story about “The Temple of Santiago.”  Built in 1564, for many years has laid under a reservoir in Mexico.

Fisher: Wow!

David: Well you’ve heard how much drought they’re having there sadly.

Fisher: Sure.

David: Well because of the water table, this building has emerged from the bottom of the reservoir, and it’s beautiful. If you Google search “Mexico, underwater church.” You’ll find images of it, it’s surreal to think that this architectural treasure has been submerged under water for so long.

Fisher: So we’re talking like 70 years after Columbus?

David: Pretty much.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: It’s one of the earliest churches and just to think, it’s underwater so unless you have scuba gear this is only time you can visit it while it’s currently available.

Fisher: Wow!

David: You know, I’ll tell you, news is a wonderful thing to share when it’s hundreds of years old.  But I have a fun story from Buffalo, New York, where Felimina Rotundo who’s a 100 years old, is still working.

Fisher: Isn’t that something? Yes, I’ve heard about this. She works like at a Laundromat or something?

David: She does. She works every day from 7am to 6pm and doesn’t want to change it. Apparently she’s been working since the Herbert Hoover administration!

Fisher: [Laughs] 1930, I think she was fifteen years old. So she’s been working eighty-five years now and has no desire to retire.

David: It’s that attitude from the Great Depression.  Probably waiting for the next thing to happen around the corner, and don’t want to lose that employment, but my hats off to anybody who’s worked as long as she has.  

Fisher: And she says she wants to keep doing this as long as she can still walk. I don’t think losing her ability to walk is going to happen any time soon.

David: No, I don’t think so at all. Closer to home here in Beantown we’ve had some exciting news. Besides it being a Family History Month for NEHGS in October, its Archaeology Month in the State of Massachusetts.  And some current work that needed to be done on Boston Common, which has been a place of archaeological treasure trove from decades, is being done now. And they found a site where an encampment from the Revolutionary War was.

Fisher: Wow!

David: So they’re digging up little bits of artifacts, and I’m sure they’ll be on display. But when you’re out in Boston for our cruise next year I’ll have to take you by where it was.

Fisher: I am looking forward to that!

David: Okay, my Tech Tip for this week is using photography and using it to better read the gravestone photographs you take.  Now, I know that you have used Billion Graves and FindAGrave in your research.  Sometimes those photographs don’t come out as clear as you want because it is a dark image.

Fisher: Right.

David: Change it from positive to negative. Reverse it. And then also do it from color to black and white.  And all of a sudden if you change the contrast, Fish, you’re actually going to see those letters and numbers coming out as brighter than the rest of the stone.  And it’s going to make it a lot easier to read the inscription and not have to go back to the cemetery again.  Using that tip has saved me a lot of headaches and going back to the same cemetery once again.

Fisher: So, are you saying you could take them off the websites Billion Graves and Find a Grave and actually flip it that way?

David: You sure can. Do it before you upload it so you’re transcribing the data in, or you can grab one off the internet and change it and clean it up a little bit better then maybe what’s already on there.

Fisher: Great stuff! Great tip!

David: And that leads me to the NEHGS free guest databases of the week. And that includes Germany, and that is from the sixteenth century to the twentieth century. For baptisms, deaths, burials, and marriages, and this is another one of our collaborated databases with FamilySearch.org, which we’re very pleased to have that partnership with.  I want to give a shout out to my sister-in-law Kelly Saunders who hears me on KTAR in Phoenix, Arizona. She didn’t even know I was on the radio!

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: And voila! We’ll save on phone calls.

Fisher: Yeah, that’s right, she stumbled on you. That’s great stuff. Thanks David! We’ll talk to you again next week.

David: Very good!

Fisher: And coming up next, we’re going to talk to Peggy Lauritzen. She says America was actually founded as a penal colony. We’re going to hear more about white slavery, coming up next in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America’s Family History Show.

Segment 2 Episode 110

Host Scott Fisher with guest Peggy Lauritzen

Fisher: Welcome back to Extreme Genes, America’s Family History Show.  It is Fisher here, the Radio Roots Sleuth, with my guest Peggy Lauritzen from Mansfield, Ohio.  She’s an accredited genealogist and an expert in an area that I don’t think a lot of people are familiar with, having to do with white slavery, European slavery.  Peggy, how did you get involved in that?

Peggy: Oh my goodness, this is from a family story. We didn’t know if it was legend or if it was truth or not, but the legend was that there had been two boys in a family situation clear back in the 1700s. And their mother had died and the stepmother never really bonded with the two boys who were known to have a family of her own with their father.  So she had arranged with the ship’s captain, to have them take, and I quote, a “tour of a ship.”

Fisher: Oh boy.

Peggy: And when they were finished with the tour, then they came up on top of the ship and they saw that the ship had actually been pulling away from the shore the whole time.  And there was their mother who was standing on the shore waving and saying, “Goodbye, boys!”

Fisher: “Ta Ta!”

Peggy: They were set sail!

Fisher: [Laughs]

Peggy: They were set sail for America like that. And I said, “Now, is that true? I mean, did that stuff really happen?”

Fisher: Sure.

Peggy: And I delved into that, and that kind of stuff really did happen! That and an awful lot more.

Fisher: Did you know which line that came through?

Peggy: I did. I actually followed the line on through here in to America, where they landed in Virginia and ventured on to a plantation in Maryland and eventually made their way on to the northeast part of Kentucky, in Fleming County, Kentucky. And there’s a village named after the family, The Goddard Village. And I visited there and had taken pictures of Covered Bridge and everything. So yeah, it did pan out.

Fisher: I think we often hear the term “indentured servant,” but I don’t think we fully understand the meaning of that.  Do you want to explain that a little bit?

Peggy: There’s actually three things that fall into it. The first one is under apprenticeship. And usually these were young, inexperienced workers that they were kind of trading out to learn a new skill.  Both would benefit because maybe a person needed help in their livelihood.

Fisher: Right.

Peggy: So they would be training someone. And then at the same time, this young person would be learning a skill to earn a living himself.  Room and board were provided and that was under a contract. So that was one type of a person.  The next one was the indentured servants. And these were under contract usually for seven years, but it was under a completely different system.  And this system helped to populate the colonies, because they were bringing them from England to help to populate, but also provide the first labor force.  It actually started even before black slavery. 

Fisher: So how did that work?

Peggy: Well, it worked awful for the people that were being indentured. It absolutely was terrible. There were six groups that came. And the first group that came were the children. They came in 1618.  So what happened is that there were so many children that were on the streets of London that they would scoop them up. And they would even go into poor people’s homes and scoop their children from there so that it would not perpetuate more poverty with poor people having more poor people.  Some of them were put into Bridewell Prison with a label. There’s even a website that you can look on there under Bridewell Prison in London and you can see the names of the people that were quote “held for Virginia.” And one of the women said, “Well if you’re going to take my child, you may as well take his cradle also,” because these children were pretty much eight years old and under.  And they were brought to work in the tobacco fields in Virginia and Maryland. That’s the sad part right there.

Fisher: Wow that is...Separated from their families.

Peggy: And most of them did not live to even see adulthood or to acquire their own property or anything like that. It really broke their backs to be worked so hard.  And they were coming from a colder climate and to some of the areas of the United States and also into Barbados that were tropical and hot and humid, and they just did not survive.

Fisher: So we’ve had apprentices, we’ve got the indentured servants, and that included these kids, what was the next group? 

Peggy: Well, the next group was the redemptioners, and this basically applied to those that were of German origins. They usually came to Pennsylvania as a type of indentured servant, which means that they sold themselves. But the thing is that the contracts were negotiated after they arrived here.

Fisher: Hmm.

Peggy: And they didn’t have much hope of ever going back.

Fisher: Not a lot of leverage, right?

Peggy: No, no leverage. Most of the other people that came, these contracts or whatever, they were bought and sold and signed and everything before they ever left the shores to come to either Barbados or the United States.  But with the German redemptioners, these were done after they came here. And they had to stay on the ship until they had their contracts negotiated.  And going back to indentureship, the reason that it is even called “indentured,” is because on the contract, there was usually a jagged line that was along the top and the bottom, so it would be several jagged pieces, peaks and things like that.  And the top half would exactly match the bottom half. So that contract was something that they really needed to hang on to in order to someday, if they lived long enough, to be able to prove their freedom.  So that the top half and the bottom half would match together. And so, if you look at the word “Indenture” in the middle of that word you have “denture’ and that meant “to cut” like you would cut with your teeth or with a knife or something.  So, those two halves of the contract needed to match.

Fisher: So they would hold the top half of the indentured contract, and who had the bottom half, the owners?

Peggy: Yeah, the owners.

Fisher: What happened if they lost that upper half?

Peggy: Then you’re out of luck. You’re out of luck.

Fisher: Oh my goodness.

Peggy: But the good thing is that there are a number of these indentured contracts that are on websites. Like at the library in Virginia and with the Maryland State Archives. You can go on there and see some of the indentureships, maybe not both halves of them, but you might be able to go on there and see where your ancestor might be mentioned as well.

Fisher: So how many years might somebody have been an indentured servant with this situation?

Peggy: Normally, it’s seven years. And there would be more added on if a woman became pregnant.  I did see the contract of a woman who became pregnant, I do believe it was from her master, but the thing is that the child then was indentured until he was twenty-one years old.

Fisher: Which kept her indentured too, right?

Peggy: Uh huh, it did. So that’s a normal time span for indentureship. There could be varying things that could be added on to that. For instance, if somebody ran away and they were caught, then you’ve got the number of days they disappeared added on to the end of their contract.  So if they were gone for nine months and you brought back home, you’ve got nine more months added on to your contract.

Fisher: Wow.

Peggy: With many of them, like the German redemptioners, if a family was coming over and let’s say the father dies, the mother is on her way over, the father dies before the end of his contract, she has to fill the rest of his contract. And if both the father and the mother die, the children would have to fill out the rest of their contract!

Fisher: So it’s really in everybody’s best interest to keep everybody breathing.

Peggy: Yeah, and stay put! [Laughs]

Fisher: [Laughs]

Peggy: Because if you’re caught, then you’re really going to be out of luck. And again, even with those that ran away, you can find really interesting advertisements in newspapers and on different websites where people were advertising.  “This person ran away. They had these distinguishing marks. They came from Ireland. They came from here. Please be on the lookout!”  So everybody was looking all the time. They did not have much recourse.

Fisher: I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that people would put these identifications in the paper. It must have been just a really fairly small population for folks to say, “Hey, maybe it’s that’s guy.” Because they would recognize somebody that’s not belonging to a community, and his story doesn’t add up something like that. But it had to be very difficult really to identify anybody back then without photos.

Peggy: Well it would have been, especially if the person who had run away was not able to read or write. They may never know that their full description was being broadcast through all of these newspapers like that too.  That’s really quite a scary thing when you think about it, because then you’re always thinking that somebody is looking for you like that.  I still think that the saddest part was these children that came. I mean these poor little children being made to work out there in these tobacco fields.  Because then after that they began to scoop up the vagrants, and the petty thieves, and the undesirables, and the prostitutes, they were also in this prison in London.  So they began to bring them over and had them serve as indentured servants. That went on until the Revolutionary War.

Fisher: Wow!

Peggy: Yeah. America was a penal colony! And at the time of the Revolutionary War, then all immigration of any kind came to a halt. So those prisoners were then sent on to Australia.

And that became the next penal colony down there.

Fisher: Interesting. So, if they couldn’t come here they would send them over there. Did most of the folks who were here, remain?  I would assume.

Peggy: They did.

Fisher: What was the situation with their contracts, then, when the United States broke away from Great Britain?

Peggy: They still were under contract. That did not negate that at all.

Fisher: Really?

Peggy: They were still under contract because the contract goes with the person who was here in America.

Fisher: I see. Okay.

Peggy: And also, these people, the indentured servants and the apprentices, some of these, their treatment from their so called masters, in actuality was a lot worse than what it was with the blacks. Because with the blacks, they wanted that to be perpetual slavery, it was going to be ongoing.  Now they were treated horribly, there’s no doubt about that, but some of the white slaves, if they lived, then they would be receiving fifty acres, and a suit of clothing and maybe some money and maybe some type of farm employment, so if they treated them so harshly and they ended up dying, “oh well!”

Fisher: Well, it’s obviously very miserable for anybody who’d be a slave. She’s Peggy Lauritzen from Mansfield, Ohio, an accredited genealogist, talking about white slavery. Something we don’t hear much about.  Thank you so much, Peggy, for coming on the show.

Peggy: Absolutely. I was happy to do it. 

Fisher: And coming up next, we’ve asked people for their black sheep family stories and wow did we find one. Wait till you hear this listener’s tale, coming up next in five minutes, on Extreme Genes, America’s Family History Show!

Segment 3 Episode 110

Host Scott Fisher with guest Kathy Manker

Fisher: And we are back! Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show and ExtremeGenes.com.  It is Fisher here, the Radio Roots Sleuth, with my guest, Kathy Manker from Phoenix, Arizona.  Hi Kathy, How are you?

Kathy: I'm doing great.

Fisher: She is on an excursion to Washington right now doing a little research. What are you looking into by the way?

Kathy: Well I've been trying to find information on various brick walls on this trip. And I started out in Boston at the New England Historic Genealogical Society. And got closer, moved things out, but as brick walls go, you know, you just kind of get the circle closer and closer, but it’s hard to actually nail it.

Fisher: Right.

Kathy: Now I'm in Washington and I decided to do something that I knew I could get. And it feels like I accomplished something, and that was to go to the National Archives and get the Civil War pension file of my great, great grandfather.

Fisher: How fun is that!

Kathy: His name is Leonidas Manker. That's my great, great grandfather. 

Fisher: Right down the name line, that's great! Well, congratulations on the find! That's always fun.  Now I understand you have quite the black sheep story going on in your background.

Kathy: Yes, I do.

Fisher: And I want to hear about it.

Kathy: Well I'll preface it by saying, "This doesn't reflect my family.”

Fisher: [Laughs]

Kathy: Because we come from long, long lines of founders of early America and everything. You know, Rhode Island and Connecticut and stuff.  And so, this is this line that's kind of amusing and very tragic you know, it happens.

Fisher: Well it happens in every family. There are black sheep in every family, don't you think?

Kathy: Yeah, yeah. This is my third great grandfather. His name is Anderson Jones. And he was half Delawarean. And he had four daughters and four sons.  And the four sons seemed to get in a lot of trouble. And it was very tragic that Anderson himself ended up killing one of his sons, William Jones, because they were out in front of this tavern in Anna, Illinois in southern Illinois.

Fisher: So you're talking about the old west basically, at that time?

Kathy: Yeah, this was in 1882.

Fisher: Okay.

Kathy: In Anna, Illinois. And so they're out in front of this tavern. And being horse traders, they kind of got in an argument with each other on swapping some horses.  And Anderson who was seventy two at the time and very short, very small man compared to his son, William who was in the prime of life and much bigger and stronger. But Anderson just kind of got fed up, went in the bar and William followed him and picked a fight.  And Anderson ended up in self defense, stabbing his son and killing him.

Fisher: Wow!

Kathy: It was obviously a very tragic thing to have happened. And he got arrested, but they refused to file charges because they said this was self defense.

Fisher: So the son had followed him in and was being aggressive?

Kathy: Um hmm. Picked a fight with him, and I guess there were no witnesses to what happened. But as it’s written up in the Jonesboro Gazette, that's how we found out about this.  Because we never heard about it passed through down in the family, but then just a few months later Anderson, who is the father, he was again in downtown Anna.  And there was a team of horses that got frightened by a train. And they went crazy and went flying up Main Street and they ran over Anderson and he died. 

Fisher: Wow!

Kathy: And the newspaper was implying, they didn't use the work karma, but that's what I would call it. You know, implying that this was kind of a divine payback for him killing his son.

Fisher: Well that had to have been the talk of the town, right? I mean, how big was this area at the time?

Kathy: Oh it's a small town. This was a big deal in the papers. But then there's more tragedy. A year later, his youngest son, Kelvin Jones was shot and killed and he was only twenty five years old at the time. And so, the guy who killed him got twenty five years in prison for murder.

Fisher: And what was their fight over?

Kathy: We don't know. It's just a one liner in the newspaper in the obituaries that we found out about that one. But then there's a lot more write up on another son who was John Jones.   And I guess he was a city marshal for a while. Then during that time, he killed a man. And he ended up serving six years in prison. And so he did his time, got out. And then in 1895, he had an eating stand at the Southern Illinois Fairground. And he got in an argument with a woman who worked for him there over fifty cents in wages and he beat her to death.

Fisher: Whoa!

Kathy: Yeah, this is real anger management issues running in the family there. And so after killing the woman he was put in jail. And they moved him around to different jails in the area, like Cahokia, Illinois and Murphysboro and stuff, because they were wanting to avoid a lynch mob. And he escaped once and then was recaptured and put back in jail. And then he escaped again. And after they put up a two hundred dollar reward, he was recaptured in Tennessee in 1896 and brought back to Murphysboro and put on trial. And he was found guilty and sentenced to death. And he was hanged on May 19th, 1896. And they have pictures of him and of the hanging in the papers in the Jonesboro Gazette there.

Fisher: Wow!

Kathy: So that's how we found out about this.

Fisher: So you got one son that was stabbed by the dad. The dad was then run over by a cart with runaway horses.  Another one shot in a dispute. Another one kills someone and winds up in prison. He gets hanged after his escapes. Whoa!

Kathy: Right. And then the fourth son, Newton Lafayette Jones died in 1895.  And the one liner obituary, says “Lafayette Jones, the son of Anderson Jones, was his only son to die a natural death.”

Fisher: [Laughs] Then there were all the sisters, everything okay with them?

Kathy: The sisters seemed to be okay. Although I kind of suspect that there's some mental health issues running in that family.

Fisher: You think?

Kathy: Um, yes. Anderson's wife died when she was very young, in her early forties. And then her dad died when he was in his early forties. And so you wonder, we don't know the circumstances of those deaths, but I kind of wonder if maybe, perhaps they were very hotheaded and had anger management control issues and who knows what else.  There was obviously something awful going on in this family in this regard. The daughters seemed to have turned out fine.  And I'm descended from one of the daughters. They raised fine families. And from what I've seen, didn't have any of those kinds of issues.

Fisher: Isn't that amazing? And you're going back how far now? This is your great, great grandmother?

Kathy: This was in the 18.... Yeah, Anderson Jones is my third great grandfather.

Fisher: So the daughters are your great greats. Just for everybody's information, because it’s always about research here on Extreme Genes, where did you find your digitized newspaper stories?

Kathy: Well they actually were not digitized. We did stuff the old fashion way and went to the libraries in… I think its Marion, Illinois is where the Southern Illinois University is. And they have all the local papers on microfilm. And so went through those various members of our family. Did that at various times, and each time someone made a trip, they came back with something even more.

Fisher: So you did it the old fashion way!

Kathy: Uh huh.

Fisher: You traveled there and you turned the crank on the microfilm machine.

Kathy: Um hmm. That's right.

Fisher: Isn't that fun? I remember making a big discovery that way myself.  And I was right in the middle of maybe the biggest find I'd ever found. And my wife called to chit chat and I'm like, "Not now! Not now!" [Laughs]  because you're right in the middle of this whole thing!  Well thank you so much for coming on, Kathy, and sharing your black sheep story.  That's right up there with any black sheep story I've ever run across. It always makes it fascinating though, doesn't it? It kind of holds you attention. And for coming on, I want to give you one of our full access, premium plus data memberships for MyHeritage.com.  My Heritage of course has the best technology in the industry. And of course we're doing a very special fifty percent off deal right now. All people have to do is go to MyHeritage.com, and use the promo code, "Extreme2015."  But for you, it's free!  Kathy thanks for coming on Extreme Genes!

Kathy: Well thank you very much.

Fisher: And coming up next, Tom Perry from TMCPlace.com, our Preservation Authority, talking about preserving your precious heirlooms, next in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show.

Segment 4 Episode 110

Host Scott Fisher with guest Tom Perry

Fisher: And welcome back to America's Family History Show, Extreme Genes and ExtremeGenes.com.  It is Fisher here, your Radio Roots Sleuth with Tom Perry, the guy from TMCPlac.com.  He is our Preservation Authority. And Tom, before we get into anything new here this week, apparently we've got a few loose ends to wrap up from last week when we were talking about this "build a box," where you could take your phone and, you know, the camera in your phone and put it on the top of this box to slip photographs under and make digital copies of antique photographs, which I think is great. And we had an email from somebody saying, "Hey wait a minute! How does this hold together under the weight?" And I think you were just starting to touch on that at the end of the show. You want to continue with that?

Tom: Yeah, that's a good idea, because I've had some people come into the store that has said the same thing like, "Hey, if I duct tape this, I've got this box. How can I take it with me when I go to a family reunion or something?" Really easy answer to that, if you go to a science shop to buy your plastic core, they have these little plastic rib things that are made to put plastic core together to make great big displays in booths.  Like if you go to a home store or something like that, they have these booths. You can buy these little things, they're not very expensive. They're a couple of bucks. So you buy four, five of those and you actually slide the plastic core into it. Not only is it going to hold plastic core really good and make it stiff so you don't even need to build a frame around it, you can slide this right out. Pop it in your suitcase, your briefcase, your computer case and take it any place you go.  So when you mount the little LEDs, what you want to do is, you want to mount those to two of the pieces. So those two pieces, you just turn them opposite so they lay flat. And then lay your other pieces on top of them. And the whole thing is going to weigh a pound, maybe two pounds at the most.

Fisher: [Laughs] Isn't that great? And what a great idea, if you missed this whole thing, you want to listen to the podcast from last week's show. It's on iTunes, iHeart Radio of course, and at ExtremeGenes.com. All right, what do you have for this week, Tom?

Tom: Okay. Another thing that is really interesting, go to Apple.com and they had a keynote speaker back in...I believe it was September… when they released the new Apple TV, the new 6S, the new iPads, several other different things. There's some really, really neat things that are going to help you a lot in your family preservation.  A few weeks ago we talked about the new iPad Pro, which is absolutely I think, one of the neatest things to help with family history, with restoring your photos, making new history. At your family reunions, this tablet is just absolutely amazing. It gives you an opportunity to take your old daguerreotypes and be able to clean them up, fix them. Any photos you have that are faded. We have people all the time that bring us in something that was hanging in their living room that the sun was directly on, that has turned pretty much red. It will allow you with this great, big, new iPad Pro and the new Adobe software to go in and clean that stuff up, fix the filters.  It takes a stylus, so you can just really easily draw just around Aunt Martha.  And fix just that part because everything else looks fine. It's just absolutely incredible thing.  Another neat thing that Apple's doing is, they're totally changing the world of TV. They have the new Apple TV that is going to be based on apps.

Fisher: Wow!

Tom: So everybody is going to be writing apps for the new Apple TV, which means, people are going to come out with apps for family history, for restoration, to creating new family history. Recording your family doing all these different kinds of things, and once you have it in this format, distribution is going to be so easy.

Fisher: No kidding, huh? I'm just thrilled that Apple's finally doing stuff with Adobe.

Tom: Oh absolutely! That was huge.

Fisher: Finally.

Tom: I mean I love Steve Jobs. He was absolutely wonderful. However, he had this chip on his shoulder with Adobe, and would not work with them.  But the new guy that's running it now, he has no problem with Adobe. So you know they're in bed together now and just doing absolutely wonderful things. It's going to help us so much in family history. So you want to get this new Apple TV. It's really small. It's wonderful. Start learning the apps. If you're a developer out there, you know, get some information. Start making things that are going to help us in the family history. We need to work together. We need to get some of these cool apps up.  Let us know on the show if you've designed an app that either on the iPhone or preferably for the new Apple TV. Let us know.  We'll promote it on the show, because we're all about preserving memories and making this stuff work for people.

Fisher: Great stuff! All right, what do we have in our next segment, Tom?

Tom: We're going to talk about a little stuff to do with the new 6S phone. How you can get some killer pictures off that at your family reunion. You also use it on "build a box."

Fisher: Wow good stuff! All right and coming up in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show.

Segment 5 Episode 110

Host Scott Fisher with guest Tom Perry

Fisher: We are back! Extreme Genes, America’s family History Show and ExtremeGenes.com.  It is Fisher here, the Radio Roots Sleuth. By the way, if you ever have a question for Tom Perry, you can email him at [email protected]  All right Tom, let’s continue this about Apple because they’re making some big changes that are going to have a real impact on preservation of family history.

Tom: Oh absolutely. Like in the first segment when we talked a little bit about the apps, and encourages people that are our genies to develop apps for family history.  There’s just so much potential out there to do stuff to help us preserve memories easier. One of the neat things that Apple announced too is the new 6S. Some people say” Oh don’t buy it wait for a year when the new 7 comes out.” Well yeah that’s fine if you want to wait a year, but you’re going to lose a lot of stuff in that year. Go buy a 6S, there’s some cool things about it.  One of the things about it that really blew my mind is when you take still photos, somehow the camera is actually taking a movie and not just a still photo.  So if you go get a still photo and you go and swipe it a certain way, it turns into a moving picture.  Like if you’re shooting a waterfall and you think that you just shot one frame of the waterfall, you can go and swipe it a certain way and it becomes a movie, and the water is actually moving.

Fisher: Really?

Tom: Oh yeah.

Fisher: You’re kidding.

Tom: No! I thought it was some of weird thing, like it just changed the frame or you know fake light was moving like an old Nickelodeon or something. But it’s actually, I’m sitting there and looking at the water and the water coming down this waterfall is actually moving!

Fisher: That’s insane.

Tom: Oh it’s crazy!

Fisher: [Laughs]

Tom: It’s like the old flip books.

Fisher: Yes.

Tom: You know they’re still pictures but you go and flip through them and it’s a movie, and somehow Apple’s pulled a rabbit out of the hat and done this. I have no idea how it works but it is cool, it is way cool. So you have these neat innovations from Apple. And another thing on the phone that’s really cool is it’s a touch sensitive screen depth not just in swiping, the harder you push on the screen it knows what you’re trying to do, you going for something different.

Fisher: It’s a different command.

Tom: Yeah exactly!

Fisher: Okay.

Tom: Exactly it changes. For instance, this has nothing to do with family history but if you’re looking up a contact, you push it and you can see the information about the contact, then you want to call him then you push it harder and it opens up all the way.  So how does this help family history?  If you have a photo and you want to do some editing on it, I can almost guarantee you that the Apple software that Adobe just made for the new iPad pro, is going to come to the iPhone.  So, say that you’re in a museum and there’s a photo that has your ancestor in which you know they’re not going to let you take it.  Shoot it with your phone right there on the spot with that little stylist which I think is going to come for the iPhone too. You can go and do some minor editing or do an overlay of it, circle this is so and so, and write notes on it, and then when you get home you’ve got all these notes and they’re on different layers.  So you can remove that layer and print it and then print the photo too. And then you’ve got this absolutely incredible family history, and then record your audio too while you’re sitting there looking at it. I mean this thing is exploding. It’s just so exciting I can’t stand it anymore.

Fisher: And you know, and it is interesting because we run into so many people, especially a lot of seniors who are very intimidated by technology.  And I tell people all the time, “You know, you’re going to have to embrace it at some point. If you’re going to take full advantage of what’s going on right now, go take a class. Go learn some of the fundamentals of this stuff so you can take advantage of these things because there’s only going to be more and more and more opportunities to preserve and to learn how to do this great artwork, it’s so much fun.”

Tom: We have people coming in the store all the time that are seniors that don’t want to deal with this kind of stuff at all, and I say, “Hey do you enjoy spending time with your grandkids?” “Oh I love my grandkids, they’re so much better than my own kids. I love to spoil them and send them home.” “Do you have any kindergartners?” “Oh yeah I’ve got a couple of kindergartners.” “Well next time they’re over visiting, sit down with them and their iPad, and have them show you these kinds of things.  So then you’re not so intimidated it’s your kindergartner, it’s your grandchild that’s teaching you these things.” It’s good quality time with them, it’s just an incredible opportunity to spend time with them and learn from them. So talk to your grandkids they’ll get you all setup.”

Fisher: All right, great stuff Tom, thanks so much! We look forward to seeing what’s coming down the line from Apple soon.

Tom: Awesome stuff!

Fisher: Talk to you next week!

Tom: Thanks!

Fisher: Hey, that wraps it up for this week. Thanks once again to Peggy Lauritzen, for coming on and sharing her expertise on the subject of “White Slavery in America.” Was America really a penal colony?  She says yes. Catch the podcast if you missed it. Also to Kathy Manker for sharing her black sheep story what a tale to find and to share.  Thanks again for joining us, talk to you again next week. And remember, as far everyone knows, we’re a nice, normal, family!

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