Episode 468 - When Germans Aren’t from Germany / Another Census Alternative: Jury Records

Host Scott Fisher opens the show with David Allen Lambert, Chief Genealogist of the New England Historic Genealogical Society and AmericanAncestors.org. The guys begin Family Histoire News with word of the identification of the remains of a World War II soldier who died in Italy. It has taken 79 years. David shares details. Then, “Ava” is back in the news. She is the Bronze Age Scottish woman whose face has now been brought back to life! Hear what was done. The Times-Union of Brooklyn has an article about how New York’s state government still hasn’t escaped the onslaught of genealogical record requests from during the pandemic. Find out how far behind they are. In Oregon, it has been learned that people were living there some 18,000 years ago… as were North American camels. Honest! And finally, there has been quite the discovery in Israel having to do with something Egyptian. Hear what it’s about.

Next, from sponsor Legacy Tree Genealogists, Melanie Torres joins the show and talks about German research. No! Most records were not destroyed in the war! Hear also how to track those Germans who didn’t live in Germany.

The show continues with another Melanie… Melanie McComb… from NEHGS. Melanie has been called to jury duty and shares how we can find out some important information on our ancestors by using jury lists.

David then returns for Ask Us Anything.

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

TRANSCRIPT

Host: Scott Fisher with guest David Allen Lambert

Segment 1 Episode 468

Fisher: And welcome America, to America's Family History Show, Extreme Genes 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. Hope you're having a great summer, Genies. We've got a couple of great experts here, both of them named Melanie today, kind of a strange thing. The first one is going to be Melanie Torres from our sponsors over at Legacy Tree Genealogists. She's going to give you all kinds of information about researching your German ancestors. And she's got a lot of great insight there, because a lot of them actually didn't come from Germany. You're going to want to hear what Melanie Torres has to say, starting in about 10 minutes. Later in the show from NEHGS, our good friend, Melanie McComb is back. Melanie, of course has long been known as the Shamrock Genealogist for her background in Irish research and Jewish research as well. And today, we're going to talk about some court records, specifically jury records. What can they tell you about your ancestors? Well, she's got some ideas to share with you, coming up later on in the show. Right now, it's time to head out to NEHGS in Boston. David Allen Lambert is standing by, the Chief Genealogist of the New England Historic Genealogical Society and AmericanAncestors.org. Hello, David.

David: Hey, Fish. How are you?

Fisher: Great, good to have you back. We got a lot of stories to cover here today.

David: We definitely do. In fact, one of them starts right here in Boston. Sad, but really exciting news for the family that the remains of a World War II veteran who died 79 years ago in Cisterna de Latina Italy during World War II, Private Wing O. Hom of the US Army went missing an action when he was just 20 years old. Well, they thought they found some remains. It may have been his, and they marked it accordingly in 1948. But because of recent DNA research, they've now been able to firmly identify the soldier from Boston. And his remains are being brought back for burial, ironically, not in Boston, but in Brooklyn, New York.

Fisher: Well, that's where his family is. And there are a lot of great cemeteries there, too, beautiful places.

David: Oh, I love Greenwood Cemetery.

Fisher: Yep.

David: Well, speaking of cemeteries, this one goes back 3800 years ago to a cemetery, where researchers had found the remains back in the ‘80s of a Bronze Age woman. They found her skull and they found her buried in a stone like coffin, called a cist. Well, they've used artificial intelligence and facial recognition to actually bring back what she would have looked like. And I'll tell you, she looks pretty much like most of the ladies that I saw were up in Scotland the other day.

Fisher: [Laughs] Interesting.

David: And she doesn't have ginger hair.

Fisher: Right.

David: But she's a brunette. Of course, we won't really know that. She could have been in ginger. But it's an amazing little piece and it's from LiveScience.com.

Fisher: Yep. Well, I'm hoping they'll do the same thing with Tjerck Claessen DeWitt, the ancestor they dug up in Kingston, New York last year.

David: Yeah, I still want to just tip off one of those people doing that and send him 20 bucks and a photograph of you from high school.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: And have him morphed into the actual one.

Fisher: Uh huh, uh huh.

David: Ah, that would be so much fun. Well, genealogy, of course, is really on the upswing with all the TV shows and with DNA and things like Ancestry.com. It's amazing how many people have been invested in it. But, some people are still having a hard time digging up their roots. In the case of New York, it's because of the State Department of Health. It's taking years for people to dig up death and birth records, for instance, because the wait in Albany.

Fisher: Really? And this is all going back to the pandemic, I assume?

David: Exactly. The wait time since the pandemic has pretty much been the cause of this. And this is an article from The Times Union, but they do sing the praises of a good friend of ours, Brooke Ganz from Reclaim The Records.

Fisher: Yes.

David: Think of the indexes she's made available, though. We never really could get online before.

Fisher: That's right. And so, now there's so many New York birth records and death records and marriage records from all throughout New York State that at least we can get the indexes, and maybe sometimes know what the certificate number is. So we know what to order.

David: We know it's a great thing that these indexes are on there. I'll even feel better when all the records are too.

Fisher: Sure.

David: Hey Fish, how long do you think it's been since there were actual wild camels in North America.

Fisher: What?! I don't think there have ever been wild camels in North America.

David: I thought the same thing until I read the news about an Oregon archeological dig that was done in a rock shelter out near Riley, Oregon. Fish, they found stone tools, you know, of the early people from North America, but within it, they found the enamel from camel’s teeth.

Fisher: Wow!

David: And it dates from the radiocarbon dating, back 18,000 years ago. So, this is one proof of camels in Oregon 18,000 years ago, and secondly, human occupation in Oregon predating what they previously thought. And it's all buried, these remains, in ash from Mount St. Helens, not from 1980. But from 15,000 years ago!

Fisher: That's crazy! I'm just looking this up. We actually did have camels in North America, and they were gone by about 11,000 years ago. That is amazing!

David: Well, you know, sometimes you don't have to be an archaeologist to discover exciting things. Olivia Marner, age 74, while walking along a beach in southern Israel, spotted something in the waves. She walked over, picked it up and was a piece of sandstone. But on it was carved an Egyptian goddess that is from 3000 years ago.

Fisher: What?!

David: She thought to herself, “Well, this is just a stone.” but no, it actually was a Egyptian goddess called Hathor, who is often depicted as a cow goddess with horns and a sun disc.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: And she was associated with love, music, dance, motherhood and beauty. Here's the sad thing, finders keepers, antiquities keepers in this case, because this artifact had to go to the country of Israel for their museum. But at least it won't be washing around on the beach anymore.

Fisher: Right. And maybe her name will be on the label there in the display. But that's an amazing thing. Does it say how far back this goes?

David: 3000 years old.

Fisher: 3000 years. Wow! That's a nice day at the beach, don't you think?

David: I think so. Well, that's all I have from Beantown and around the world for our Family Histoire News. I also invite people to learn about American Ancestors and come to our website and use coupon code “Extreme” and become a member and save $20.

Fisher: All right, David, thank you so much. We will talk at the back end of the show with Ask Us Anything. And coming up next, we're going to bring on Legacy Tree Genealogist expert, Melanie Torres talking about your German Research. How do you find those Germans who weren't actually from Germany? We'll have a little chat about that coming up, starting in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show.

Segment 2 Episode 468

Host: Scott Fisher with guest Melanie Torres

Fisher: And welcome back to America's Family History Show Extreme Genes and ExtremeGenes.com. It is Fisher here, your Radio Root Sleuth, and it is time to speak German, well not German language, but actually German research with Melanie Torres. She's with our sponsors over at Legacy Tree Genealogist, she's an editor there. She's a researcher, and Melanie, welcome to Extreme Genes.

Melanie: Hi, thank you. I'm excited to be here.

Fisher: What got you going into German Research?

Melanie: Well, I had a German class at BYU. I have a bachelor's degree in family history and genealogy. And I was able to study with Roger Minor, and I had a really good time researching Germans from Russia. And I actually did my senior thesis on that.

Fisher: Ah! Well, that'll get you started. You know, I have one German ancestor a third great grandfather took me eight years to find anything on it. And this was way back before the internet was of much help to anybody. And I had found a document where a relative had applied for a lineage society membership and he had these old family papers. He transcribed information in there. And this third great grandfather from Germany named the town he was from and his birth date. So, I went to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah and I put the microfilm on and looked at the ancient writing for the late 18th century. And it looked like elementary school scribbling to me, I mean, it's just anybody who looks at is got to be totally intimidated. I pulled the film off the machine, and I went up to the desk, and there was a little old lady named Gertrude there. I don't think she was even four foot 11. And I said, “I'm looking for the name Frederick Anspach…”  back then it was probably Anspake. And he was born on December 28, 1768 in Sobernheim, Germany. So, she put the film on the machine and I'm thinking there's no way and she goes, “Oh, ya, here it is.” And I’m like “Wait, wait, what?!” She says, “Ja, Johann Friedrich Anspach. “Geboren”, that’s born, “28th December 1768.” And then it gave the christening had the name of the father and the name of the mother, and the occupation of the father, and soon we had the marriage of the parents. And off we went. And my German line, because of some nobility, goes back to like the year 1000.

Melanie: Wow, that’s incredible!

Fisher: Well, there are so many people who think that everything was destroyed in the war over in Germany. And that's just not true, is it?

Melanie: No, it's not true. Most people have a record at least one either in civil registration, or in church records. You know, there are a handful of cities that were heavily impacted by the World Wars, but for the most part, if you have German ancestry, you're going to be able to find some evidence of them in Germany if you know their hometown, especially in those church records.

Fisher: Oh, yeah. Today so many of them have been indexed and microfilmed, you don't have to worry about the handwriting and you can get so much information and Geneanet and a lot of these European based sites have all kinds of information we haven't typically seen over here through the years.

Melanie: Yeah, absolutely. There are a lot of digitized records available online. And so many of them have been indexed, which is such a help for research. There are also some projects that have been started by the German government and also individual states and things in Germany, like the Arkiv Digital, I'm not sure if I'm saying that, right. I don't speak German. But there is a database of all Catholic records. So if you know that your ancestor was Catholic, there is a huge database of Catholic churches and parishes in Germany. And they have all of the baptisms, marriages, and deaths over there. And the website is in German, but they have an English landing page that you can switch to. It's a huge help if you have Catholic ancestry over there. There's also a big collection of civil registration on Family Search catalog, there's evangelical or Lutheran records to look through, there really is a wealth of information over in Germany, there's kind of a running joke that Germans are really good at bureaucracy, and it is true. They do document things.

Fisher: Everything. The biggest problem with German research, aside from the handwriting, I would think is, well, a couple of things. First of all, the invasion of Napoleon seemed to put an end to a lot of records that were kept in churches and the like, and then we see that the Civil Registration really wasn't that great after like, what 1811?

Melanie: Yeah, I mean, there's definitely a gap in the Civil Registration because of Napoleon until the reunification of the German states into what we now know as Germany.

Fisher: Yeah.

Melanie: Beginning in the 1870s. Before then, records were kept on a state basis. So you have like Bavaria and Prussia and Wartenberg, or Rhineland, you know, like all of those German states, they kind of acted as individual countries at the time. And so it really just kind of varied on where your ancestor was from how the records were kept.

Fisher: They were kingdoms, right? I mean, essentially.

Melanie: Yeah they were kingdoms, essentially, yes. There is definitely a gap in civil registration with different areas of what we now know as Germany, experiencing different things politically, there was like the revolutions in 1848. There's all sorts of interesting history with Germany that makes it inconsistent with the civil registration, especially because who was in charge of making the reference? It changed all the time.

Fisher: Yeah. And the borders changed all the time, right?

Melanie: All the time.

Fisher: I mean, how many people are Polish, but they're really German, and you're looking in the wrong country. I mean, it's really complicated. And that's why it's important sometimes to refer to a specialist. This is the one thing about genealogy. There's no one person who knows everything about how to find somebody. But there are a lot of people who know the right questions to ask of others who are specialized in things like this.

Melanie: Yeah, we have several German experts at Legacy Tree who are really, really good at reading that old German handwriting. They're really familiar with those old jurisdictions that gets so confusing where to find that information. And it's been really fun to learn from them and edit their work. [Laughs]

Fisher: Right. But coming over to America, they left a lot of records in the immigration process.

Melanie: Yeah, absolutely. One of the greatest things you can learn about your immigrant ancestor is if they came through the port of Hamburg, because Hamburg was really, really good at keeping records of immigrants and immigrants. And America didn't really keep track of where people came from exactly, or when they came, or why they came, or who they came with, until about the turn of the century, about 1900-1890s is when they really started to care about that information, but Hamburg was doing that as early as the 1840s or 50s.

Fisher: Oh, wow!

Melanie: And Ancestry has a really great collection of those Hamburg passenger lists. And those Hamburg passenger lists, I think the database starts at 1850 or 60. But they kept track of the name, the age, the occupation, the town that they came from, and that hometown is key to extending your ancestry.

Fisher: Yeah.

Melanie: And Hamburg was a huge port. So if you have ancestors that came from Eastern Europe, or Germany, or you know, anywhere really east of Hamburg, they probably got on a train and went to Hamburg to come to America, if they came that way.

Fisher: Possible. And you know, you mentioned this, there are other areas that are not in Germany that are still very Germanic in the way they go about things. And Scandinavia was very good about those things as well.

Melanie: Yeah, absolutely. You know, there are so many different areas in Europe that are influenced by Germany or have German settlement. That was what World War Two, had a lot to do with.

Fisher: Yes.

Melanie: Finding all those German populations and gathering them together. But there was a huge population of Germans that settled in the Russian Empire, especially in what is now Odessa, Ukraine and Crimea, Kherson kind of where everything is going on right now with the invasion, and they were known as the Black Sea Germans. There was another big population of them in the Volga region of Russia. That was all because Catherine the Great had invited the Germans to settle in the area…

Fisher: Yes, That’s right. Yeah.

Melanie: …in 1763, to kind of boost that area economically and culturally.

Fisher: Yes, yeah, we've talked about that on the show. Years ago we had a whole discussion on that. There have been many different waves of immigration through the years to the United States. And we had one in the colonial period. We had one in the late 19^th century. I mean, they brought bowling to the United States, right? It's a big thing, bowling and beer, lots of those things that are not often separated. But you were telling me before we went on that you had a story about one of the German immigrants who came across the sea, and he kind of left a little account of what his voyage was like, would you share that?

Melanie: Yeah, absolutely. So, this man, his name is Gottlieb Mitchellberger. He arrived in Pennsylvania in the American colonial period. A lot of people did that at the time. Most of them were seeking religious freedom or economic prosperity. And the Palatinate is one of the kingdoms in Germany or what is now Germany had a rule that you weren't really allowed to leave, threatened confiscation of property and had some pretty strict rules about emigration because so many people were leaving Palatinate and Wartenberg, especially, to come to what is now the United States in Pennsylvania. And so they wanted to counteract that with all sorts of penalties and things but people still did it. People still wanted to leave. So this man Gottlieb Mitchellberger in 1754 wrote a long letter to people in Germany kind of telling them why it might not be such a great idea to come to Pennsylvania, because the trip was really tough. And when he got there, it was even tougher. I can read a little bit of what he shared. So Gottlieb wrote, “This journey lasts from the beginning of May to the end of October fully half a year amid such hardships as no one is able to describe adequately with their misery. During the voyage there is onboard these ships terrible misery, stench, fumes, horror, vomiting. Many kinds of seasickness, fever, dysentery, headache, heat, constipation, boils, scurvy, cancer, mouth rot, all of which came from old and sharply salted food and meat also from very bad and foul water, so that many died miserably. When the ships have landed at Philadelphia after a long voyage, no one is permitted to leave them except those who pay for their passage or who can give good security. The others who cannot pay must remain on board the ships until they are purchased and are released from the ships by their purchasers. There are a great number there who repent and regret it while they live, that they left their native country imploring me with tears and uplifted hands and even in the name of God to make this misery and sorrow known in Germany so that not only the common people, but even princes and lords might learn how they had fared, prevent other innocent souls from leaving their fatherland.” And he goes on and talks about some pretty terrible things that happened on the boat and some people who died and what it was like to throw people overboard after they had died.

Fisher: Well, what a great account and that sure gives an idea to all of us what many immigrants went through on the trip across the ocean. I mean, I don't care if it was from Germany, or England, or France or whatever, that had to be incredibly difficult. Well, Melanie, thank you so much for your time and your expertise. It was fascinating to talk to you. She's Melanie Torres. She's with our sponsors at Legacy Tree Genealogists, a researcher and editor there and we look forward to talking to you again down the line.

Melanie: Thank you. Nice to talk to you.

Fisher: And coming up next from NEHGS, Melanie McComb rejoins us. She's been called to jury duty. We're going to talk about jury lists in five minutes.

Segment 3 Episode 468

Host: Scott Fisher with guest Melanie McComb

Fisher: All right back on the job at Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show and ExtremeGenes.com. It is Fisher here. And once again, our good friend the Shamrock genealogist Melanie McComb is back from the New England historic Genealogical Society and AmericanAncestors.org. And Melanie, we're not talking Jewish research today. We're not talking Irish research today. But we're talking about something that's kind of top of mind for you right now. Jury records!

Melanie: Yes, hello, Fisher. How are you?

Fisher: Doing well. You got called?

Melanie: Yes, I did. So I'm going to find out if I'm going to serve my civic duty here in Massachusetts.

Fisher: [Laughs] And you know, this is fascinating stuff, because jury records really tell us a lot about our ancestors, at least in certain locales.

Melanie: Yes, absolutely. Because they are a great way to find information on where someone was living at that time, since a lot of the jury records were actually being pulled from, especially here in New England called the residence list or the inhabitants list. So, it even goes up through today where you actually fill out local census records for your town and the selectmen of a town would be able to select those among them that are eligible to vote and some of them for jury duty.

Fisher: Well, let's talk about these jury records all over the place. So many Americans have ancestry in New England, and that's why we spend a fair amount of time talking about that. Also in the south, of course, how far back do the jury records go, that we can use kind of as like a census alternative, right?

Melanie: Yes. So, the jury concept here in the colonies goes all the way back to just a few years after the Mayflower, when we had the first murderer convicted here in New England. And that was John Billington, on the Mayflower.

Fisher: Yes, famously.

Melanie: Famously, yes. And so, juries were being called to handle any of these kinds of capital offenses, which could include murder, could be including trespassing, and theft, domestic violence against the spouse, all these different reasons where there would be a jury of peers that would be called as part of the trial instead of just going before the judge.

Fisher: And I would imagine you have a pretty good chance of being on a jury in the early days, because there just weren't that many people in the population.

Melanie: That's very true. But there were some restrictions in place. So especially when you go back to the early days, you had to be a white male, 21 years and older, a landowner, and even a member of your church.

Fisher: Okay, so it's pretty limited, then.

Melanie: Yes. So all of these qualify for you what's called to be a freeman. You would take what's called a freeman's oath in your local town, and one of those duties that would be part of that would be to serve on a jury.

Fisher: So if you got qualified, then you could be on a lot of juries.

Melanie: That's very true. Yes. And it was found that in a lot of cases, you might serve on a jury possibly at least twice a year.

Fisher: Wow! And you know, you think about the attitudes towards jury duty service these days, that had to be overwhelming in many cases,

Melanie: Very true. And a lot of times you would be called for maybe jury for someone you probably personally knew and not just you know, someone that was just another stranger in your community. So there was definitely I'm sure an added pressure. You might actually be responsible for convicting a neighbor or friend in some cases.

Fisher: Interesting.

Melanie: And while now there's a lot more restrictions, they really want to restrict who's going to be part of that jury pool so that you can remain impartial.

Fisher: So are there separate jury lists? Now we're just talking about New England right now, but we can talk about some other places as well, including overseas. Are there specific lists that are in court records or do you have to find them say through newspaper listings? How does this all tie together?

Melanie: Sure. So there are a lot of different lists that can be part of it, because there also are different types of juries. So there are the trial juries. Then there are the grand juries, like we saw with Billington. There are even trials for coroner's inquest. So yes, there could be a lot of different records that you need to check in the court records and the newspapers. For example, even when you're looking at family members overseas, I was researching and I found a reference to a Thomas Corcoran in an Irish newspaper in County Louth who has served on a trial for Joseph Duffy, who had stabbed a man. I'm not sure based on the year exactly if it was my great grandfather, or it was his father.

Fisher: So you have to kind of sort that a little bit?

Melanie: Exactly. So a key part of it especially is when you're looking at the overseas part or other locations is thinking about who was eligible at that time, because jury duty law has also evolved over the years where now you know, you could serve on a jury at 18 years old, you don't have to be a member of the church, you don't have to own land, women got the right to be on juries several decades ago. So a lot of things have really opened up. So yeah, it's really important that you can figure out who was eligible in your family to determine if it was them that actually were the one that joined or maybe it was another relative.

Fisher: Yeah, somebody of the same name. Absolutely. So how can you tie these in, say, to the cases these people served on?

Melanie: So often, when you find jury lists, they're going to be listed in the court records near the case. So a lot of times, they're going to be like, here's the list of jurors that were involved in this case of this party versus this party. So you'll have an idea of the date the type of court, and then you'll have usually a jury list that was involved, because those are going to be the ones part of the verdict. And if you find any court minutes, you'll often find the foreman of the jury is listed, and any other specifics, especially when you get into more modern records, where you might get into juror numbers, as well,

Fisher: Ah! So, a lot of this stuff then is really not going to be digitized. It's not the kind of thing we're going to typically find, say on Ancestry or Family Search, although I would imagine some court records are there would have that. And I seem to recall, having found some of that myself, but not commonly.

Melanie: Not all that we're going to be digitized. You're right it's going to be very hit or miss. Like, for example, we've actually at American Ancestors digitized some of the juror lists for the city of Boston in our digital archives. But you're right unless you know about the ticker location they're in, some of these are still going to be within the actual court records and you need to reach out to those local courthouses or state archives to find out more. But, out there are also different genealogists that are looking at trying to make these more readily available by reviewing these juror lists and maybe publishing a series of books in a particular location. If you could get a copy of the book at your local library, you could then check the index and see if someone is listed based on that location.

Fisher: Sure. And then digitized newspapers of course cover all kinds of cases and I would assume that they have got to be some jury list there.

Melanie: Yes. And you'll often find them in the newspaper articles amongst the case. So you're going to find a description of the case, and then you'll usually find a listing of the members on the jury.

Fisher: That would be really the end game anyway, right? I mean, finding your ancestor they were on the jury, and here's the case they were involved in. And then you can kind of follow the course of the case, especially if it was a big one or a long one, over the course of time.

Melanie: Yes, and especially with common names, you want to make sure you're paying very close attention to if they list a talent or even a full address listed for some of those jurors, that you might find. Now, they're often not going to usually put someone's full address in the newspaper. But in the court records, there may be actual more details that can really help you identify a fetcher person.

Fisher: Are there ever any comments in the court records about individual jurors?

Melanie: It really has to do with the foremen being involved, since they were really the leader that's been nominated by the rest of the jurors, they're going to be the ones that are going to be bringing up comments to the judge, and others. But sometimes you may see a note about other jurors that may have potentially disputed it, but they might not be named per se. So a lot of times you're really just going to be depending on knowing that someone had served on the jury and seeing what the verdict was and see if it wasn't unanimous or was split, and then maybe the court records could tell you if they actually identified who was the dissenting opinion.

Fisher: So, it sounds like a lot of really interesting stuff there. I have not done a lot of this myself. But it's great to know that this is just another asset out there that can help us learn more of the stories about our people and where they lived and what they did. And like you've mentioned also, it's a census alternative in the event that it was either before the census is in colonial times or overseas, it can be a real helpful tool.

Melanie: Absolutely.

Fisher: All right, she's Melanie McComb on jury duty here soon in Boston herself.

Melanie: [Laughs]

Fisher: So Mel, thank you so much for coming on again. It's always a pleasure to talk to you and we will catch up with you again down the road.

Melanie: Oh, my pleasure.

Fisher: And coming up next David Allen Lambert returns as we get about Ask Us Anything when we return in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show.

Segment 4 Episode 468

Host: Scott Fisher with guest David Allen Lambert

Fisher: All right, back on America's Family History Show, Extreme Genes and ExtremeGenes.com. And David is back to talk to us about Ask Us Anything, take another question here. And this one comes from Harriet in Virginia. And Harriet says, “Fish and Dave, a few months back, you talked about using 3D printing to recreate one of your ancestor’s possessions. How did that turn out?” That's an interesting question, Dave, and it was actually in my project.

David: Um hmm.

Fisher: I had found in a digitized newspaper article that my great grandfather had lost his fireman's badge, number 1475 in 1856. And so, with a little research, of course, I found out what the badgers of the New York City Fire Department, they were all volunteers then, what they looked like. So, I approached some people who did 3D printing and said, “Look, this is what we want to recreate and we want this number on it.” And so we've had a lot of issues with it, because it got delayed, because number one, they had some machines that were down, and then number two, it was finding the materials that it was going to be made out of that fit the right color based on when we saw in some of the photographs. So, ultimately, we are just getting it done right now. In fact, I just got a video this past week from the guy who's working on it. And it looks pretty darn good.

David: Wow, a video update, that's great!

Fisher: Yeah, well, it'll be good. We'll get this out there as soon as it's ready. But this came in. And he says, the problem with it is, in the very top of it, it says, New York City or something like that. It's very small lettering. And because it's so small, the material isn’t unable to hold it. So he's going to try some other trick he tells me he knows. And then, if not, he's just going to make the badge a little bit larger than the original actually was. So, he's got some idea in mind how to fix the lettering problem. One thing he suggested too is, if the letters were too small, use a little paintbrush and actually color them in the right way. So, I don't know how it's going to turn out. But as soon as it's available, we'll let you know. But, this is a great way to go for so many things that you may have. Did you have any item David that you thought might be fun to recreate among your ancestor’s possessions?

David: Oh, well, I mean, I could see a metal that my grandmother's uncle had when he was in the GAR. But I what I did is, I actually went and recreated it by buying one off of eBay.

Fisher: Okay.

David: So that works. I'm in the same respects of what you have. I mean, you always can hope that somebody with a metal detector will find it for you.

Fisher: [Laughs]

David: And put it on the internet or happen to hear the news story while they Google search it. And wait a second! Somebody's actually looking for this?

Fisher: [Laughs] Yeah, and then it turns out on eBay, and they want to charge me $6,000 for it, right?

David: Finders fees are crazy.

Fisher: Yeah.

David: But no, nothing that I could really speak of, other than maybe, you know, metals and things like that. I've never had a photograph where it actually has something or something that's been described. I've often wanted to recreate what my great grandfather's whaling vessel look like. But, maybe I'd have to build a ship model in a bottle or something.

Fisher: A model of it would be kind of a great way to go. And they can do those kinds of things. I mean, really, it requires nothing but a little bit of imagination, I mean, when you think about it. And you know, maybe one of your relatives has something that you would like to have and they don't want to give up the original. So, maybe they will allow you to at least photograph it enough to allow somebody to put together the pattern to recreate it and then do 3D printing, so that you can have a duplicate of it, right?

David: Exactly.

Fisher: And they can do this out of all kinds of different materials as well. I would have loved to have done this out of actual metal. But, that's an expensive way to go from what I understand. And this way, it looks pretty good. I mean, the way it's coming out. So, what I'm hoping to do is frame this 3D printing recreation of Andrew Fisher's missing fireman's badge and frame it along with a picture of him in his fireman's hat, and a copy of the ad that he ran in one of the New York papers, trying to find that missing badge. Because without the badge, he couldn't go to the fires he couldn't access them to fight with his unit. So, that was kind of his pass to get past the police line. So, good question. Hope that helps you and thanks so much for it. And we’ve got another one coming up next one we return in three minutes on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show.

Segment 5 Episode 468

Host: Scott Fisher with guest David Allen Lambert

Fisher: All right, back at it on Extreme Genes, America's Family History Show and ExtremeGenes.com. Final segment this week on Ask Us Anything. And David, our question is from Rennin in Phoenix, and Rennin writes, “Guys, I've inherited a ton of family postcards from my dad's unmarried sisters. They had them in an attic for decades. Are they useful in any way genealogically?” Interesting question. I would say, not necessarily genealogically, Dave, although I guess if, you know, you don't know who all the players were, right, cousins, aunts, uncles and all that there could be some revelations there. But I would think, mostly they'd be terrific for family history stories?

David: Well, I would think so, because remember, these aren't the postcards that these relatives sent, because those would have been sent to a variety of different people. It's what they received in.

Fisher: Yeah.

David: So now you have all these little mini mysteries.

Fisher: True.

David: Who is cousin Mary?

Fisher: Yeah.

David: Who lives in Topeka, Kansas. And now sharing that with Mary's great great granddaughter who has an account on Ancestry, she may not have the ancestor’s handwriting, she may not have any indication of a connection. And your DNA is a wonderful thing. But the postcards offer you that connection far afield. You may even find references to the relative’s early life, where they worked, where they went to school, maybe they went to college.

Fisher: Yeah.

David: You know, why would they know somebody in Hawaii? Is that person in World War II in a military base sending a postcard, because they're the next door neighbor? And then, sometimes these postcards that are received, maybe you don't need them for your own personal family history, but think of how valuable it would be to return it to the sender’s descendants.

Fisher: Yeah, good point. I can think of a couple of instances that were really interesting that I ran into. My wife's side revealed a postcard that was sent to her great grandfather, and he referenced being in school with him when they were boys. And named the school! Now, that's not always easy to find for the 19th century, right?

David: Not at all.

Fisher: This guy was born in 1872. So, they talked about those connections there. The other thing was a postcard that I found on eBay, years ago from Tottenville, Staten Island in New York. And it actually had a picture of my great grandfather's brother's restaurant, which also served as kind of a hotel. I guess it was like an early version of a bed and breakfast.

David: Oh!

Fisher: And, yeah, it looked right down the road to a ferry launching that went across to New Jersey. And so, I was able to buy one of these things online that somebody had written about staying there in 1907. So, you know, that was a family connection, because it had the name on the sign outside the restaurant, and it was on this postcard. So that's one I actually kept. But if you go on eBay, you can actually find postcards relating to your grandfather's hometown or your grandmother's hometown, and maybe other places, like schools. I found postcards of the hospital that my mother was born in, for instance, in the 1920s, and what they looked like in Albany, Oregon. I mean, who knew? So, there are all kinds of things you can do with postcards, but I love the idea of sharing them with other descendants.

David: I mean, if you always say to yourself, “Oh, I'm done with my genealogy.” not that anybody ever says that. Now you can do the genealogy and the postcards and do some genealogical karma, and get them back to the other family.

Fisher: Yeah, that's right. And you know what this is such a give and take thing, right? I mean, how many times in our lives have we been surprised by somebody who stepped up and said, “Hey, I have something that I think may interest you.” And at the same time, how many times have we done that in reverse? It's always fun to give. And it's also fun to receive. So, you know, spread the joy a little bit and enjoy those postcards. That's a great thing. Dave, thanks so much. Good to talk to you. And we will catch up with you again next week.

David: Talk to you soon.

Fisher: All right. And that is our show for this week, Genies. Thanks so much for joining us. And thanks once again, to our guests, Melanie Torres and Melanie McComb, the two Melanie's talking about German Research and the 50th anniversary of that fire in St. Louis that has caused so many problems for World War II researchers. If you missed any of the show, of course catch the podcast on Apple Media, TuneIn Radio, ExtremeGenes.com, Spotify, we're all over the place. Talk to you next week. And remember, as far as everyone knows, we're a nice normal family!