Louise's Lost Files - Cancelled Checks

This is part of my Louise's Lost Files Series in which I share with my readers some of the items I am inventorying, scanning and posting that came from my great-grandmother, Louise Lasiter's house in Fort Smith, Arkansas.

Last week I sifted through the two small drawers of paperwork belonging to my great-grandmother. They contained basic household mail items such as bank statements, bills, and tax statements. Almost everything was in their original envelops. The bank statements were from the two years prior to her death: 1995-1997. Inside the envelops containing the bank statements were also her cancelled checks. Among the cancelled checks I found this one:

It was addressed to me. My great-grandmother had sent me this check in 1995 when I was in my 2nd year of college in Burlington, Vermont. It was very nice of her to remember me.

This check is significant not only because it had been addressed to me, but also because it contains valuable genealogical information.

• It contains my great-grandmother's address
• It has my great-grandmother's Signature on it
• It has my name on it
• It has my signature on the back of the check along with the name of the bank I used in Burlington, VT (and the date it was cashed by me)
• It also has the name of the bank my great-grandmother used

I think the signatures are the big things that interest most genealogists. How many of your ancestors' signatures do you have?

The rest of the genealogically relevant information gleaned from this cancelled check ties in to the lives of both myself and my great-grandmother. It goes beyond just the genealogical facts that we are first interested in. It helps to build a picture of what life was like for those involved. 

So my tip of the day is, don't throw away things just because they don't tell you when someone was born, died, or married. Some day, this document might be the one piece of evidence you need to prove something! 

Louise's Lost Files

In December of 2014, my mother and I returned to Arkansas to clean out my grandfather's house. While we were there, my mother's maternal cousin brought over 3 boxes of family files that had come from my great-grandmother Louise Lasiter's house.

Louise Lasiter, 1955

My great-grandmother was born Thelma Louise Benson, January 1st, 1912 in Avant, Osage County, Oklahoma. She was the first child born to Barney Benson and Eva Dennis and became the oldest of eight children. She was a strong and independent young woman who graduated from Spiro High School in 1929. In the early 1930s she married James Putman Lasiter and they had 3 children: the oldest was Barbara Jean Lasiter, the middle child was James Putman Lasiter, Jr, and the youngest child was my grandmother, Sue Carolyn Lasiter. Unfortunately they have all passed away now. Louise and James "Put" Lasiter raised their three children in Fort Smith, Arkansas. They lived in the same house their whole life at 3720 Park Avenue. My great-grandmother lived in this house until she died in 1997. "Put" had already been gone for 20 years by then.

When my great-grandmother died, I was away at college. There had just been a big Christmas celebration and then she passed shortly after on the 27th of December.  After her death, her estate was divided between her three children, her personal belongings distributed or sold, and the house was sold and the profits also distributed between the three children. When my grandmother died in 2003, I helped my  mother clean out her house. Surprisingly I did not find anything from her mother, my great-grandmother's house. I assumed at the time that my grandmother had simply thrown everything out.

I did not become interested in genealogy until many years later. Then my mother showed me a couple of boxes of family photos that she had retrieved from my great-grandmother's house. She gave them to me in 2009. I inventoried and scanned all the contents and was able to extend the Lasiter tree out one more generation based on some writing on the back of a photo. But there were things missing. These boxes contained photos of my grandmother when she was young and of my mother and I throughout the years, and a few of my great-grandmother and her siblings, but nothing more from her Benson side of the family. I knew if my great-grandmother had kept any keepsakes from her childhood or from her parents, then they had to be in the boxes that were distributed to the other two children. And I was pretty darn sure my great-grandmother had kept some keepsakes. She kept everything and she wrote on everything!

Well you better believe that I sent letters to the children of my grandmother's oldest sister, Barbara. But they went unanswered. I queried her brother, but he too, said he didn't have anything. Now they are both gone. But his son surprised me. And guess what? His son is now interested in genealogy. Yep, he got the bug now too! And he decided to help me out.

I had found the genealogy gold mine!

I found room for 2 bankers sized boxes (they were bigger back then, by the way) and one small box that has two drawers in it on the trailer for the drive back to Georgia and then to North Carolina. I opened the boxes and you wouldn't believe what I found!

Photos of course! 

Bibles!

Bills! 

Letters!

School Report Cards!

More Photos! 

Three Boxes of Photos, Letters, and Family Memorabilia 

from my great-grandmother's house. 

Photo taken by Ginger R. Smith, 17 January 2015. 

My goal is to inventory all the items in these three boxes, preserve them, and scan the items of genealogical and historical value and post about them here, under Louise's Lost Files and share them on my Ancestry.com tree.  I will also be extracting genealogical data from the items and saving it to my genealogy software. My goal is to two-fold: to share the genealogy gold mine and to show how I can apply research methodology to extract genealogical data from the items within.

All posts relating to my great-grandmother's materials will be labeled with "Louise's Lost Files" followed by a brief description of their contents. I am estimating this project will take the better part of a year to complete. So stay tuned for more details! 

My AncestryDNA Test, Part 2, The Shaky Leafs

FGS Report of my Lang Ancestors

This is the second post in a series about my AncestryDNA results. In Part 1, I discussed a 3rd cousin match I had found. I found him by looking at my top matches and clicking on one. He was one of two 3rd cousin matches. I clicked on his name, glanced at his tree which contained only 9 people, and immediately identified the connection. Even though I knew right off the bat what our connection was, AncestryDNA did not provide a Shaky Leaf "Hint" because he had not added enough people to his tree (remember I said he had only 9 people in it?). I'm sure that once he starts adding people to his tree, including his 1st, 2nd, and 3rd great-grandparents, whose names I gave to him, a shaky leaf will eventually appear.


The Shaky Leaf and How I found My Next Match

My DNA matches are sorted by relationship by default, with the closest relationships at the top of the list. Although a relationship is predicted, it is not guaranteed that a connection will be found and I will be able to place my match on my family tree. Another way to look at my valuable matches, is to sort by "Hints" represented by, you guessed it, those shaky leafs! In order to see my "Hints" I clicked on the "Hint" filter at the top of the page. This resulted in two pages of matches - about 100 total matches. I found my match to S.A.T. on page 2.


The Relationship Report

When I clicked on S.A.T.'s name, I got a report that told me the following:

• Our predicted relationship was Distant Cousins
• There was a Possible Range of 5th - 8th cousins
• There was a Confidence of Very Low

This looked pretty dreary at first. But then I scrolled down. This is where the Ancestor "Hint" came in. I was presented with a Relationship Report showing me how I was related to my match and who our common ancestor was based on that relationship. According to this relationship report, our common ancestor was John Lang, my 6th Great-Grandfather.

This comparison was run by the Ancestry.com servers (in the background - Ancestry.com people say it's an algorithm). For every match that has a tree, the servers run a side by side comparison between their tree and mine and when they find someone in both trees that looks like the same person and it is a direct ancestor of both people, they determine it to be a "shared ancestor."

Relationship Report with Ginger Smith on the left and my Match S.A.T. on the right

Finding DNA evidence linking my 5th great-grandmother to John Lang has been pretty instrumental to my research. And evidently, it was instrumental to my match's research as well, so she was pretty excited to learn of the match. We both had conflicting evidence about our Lang/Long ancestors that had yet to be resolved.

My Research Problem - the Lang/Long Conundrum

My 4th great-grandmother, Lucinda Phelps, and her husband, Burwell Binns, moved with their families from Talbot County, Georgia to Drew County, Arkansas about 1856. Lucinda's mother, Basheba Lang/Long and step-father, Green Berry Jackson also moved with them. Burwell died there in 1866 and his wife Lucinda died shortly after in 1870. Both Burwell and Lucinda were buried in Beulah Cemetery in Veasey, Drew County, Arkansas on land they donated to the Beulah Baptist Church.

Basheba and Green Berry died after Lucinda and Burwell, however, their final burial place is unknown at this time, but presumed to also be in the Beulah Church Cemetery. There is a piece of paper that someone tacked up behind the glass at the Beulah Church Cemetery entrance that talks about Lucinda's parents, including her mother, Basheba LONG:

Here is a transcript of this informative paper:

"Basheba LONG married Washington Phelps 21 April 1816 at Randolph GA. We have knowledge of one daughter, Lucinda Phelps, being born to them. 

I. Lucinda Phelps (born 22 Oct 1818 in Jasper Co GA) Lucinda married Burwell Binns II in GA on 29 Oct 1835. The had ten children and this is the Binns family who settled in the Beulah Community of Drew County. The children were: Milton, Sarah, Elizabeth, Lucinda, Matilda, Edna, Mary Jane, Christopher, and Burwell III.

Basheba Phelps married Green Berry (sometimes called Greenberry) Jackson 21 March 1823 in Jasper Co GA. Court records show Green Berry Jackson as being appointed guardian of Lucinda Phelps (dau of Washington Phelps) sometime after 1823. We have knowledge of 4 children belonging to Green Berry and Basheba Jackson and the names of 3. By the time Green Berry and Basheba Jackson got to Arkansas, Basheba was spelling her name Barshaby. We don't know when this family arrived in Drew County; but they were here by 1857. Children of Green Berry and Barshaby Jackson are: ...."

In this write up, Basheba's last name is "LONG." However, on Basheba and Washington's marriage record recorded in Jasper County, Georgia, she is listed as Basheba LANG.

Washington Phelps & Basheba LANG Marriage Record Jasper Co GA, 1816

Here is the transcript of the marriage record filed in Jasper Co., Georgia:

Georgia       ))

Jasper County ))

     I certify the within named persons Washington Phelps and Bersheba Lang were duly Solemnized in the holy bond of wedlock by me this 21st day of April 1816. 

                                                              Luke Williams, J. P.

Robert Robey, C.C.O

So far, we now have two conflicting pieces of documentation for Basheba's surname. The paper posted at the cemetery said her last name was LONG and the marriage record said her last name was LANG.

But I wasn't the only one with conflicting documentation. My match had run into similar issues with her family.

My Match Has the Same Lang/Long Conundrum

According to my match, her 2nd great-grandmother was Temperance Lang who was born 1850 in Stone Mountain, DeKalb Co., GA and died 1928 in DeKalb Co., GA. On her death certificate, the informant listed her father's name as John C. LONG, however, on every other record she encountered, including the death certificates of Temperance's siblings, her father's name was listed as John C. LANG.

With DNA testing, we were able to confirm that our two lines were related and that her John C. LANG was the sibling of my Basheba LONG. I had previously connected to another sibling, Lydia Lang via a DNA match as well, so I knew we were on the right path.

In this case, DNA helped to solve two mysteries and hopefully put the Lang/Long conundrum to rest.

As you can guess, I will be looking for additional documentation on my Basheba Long/Lang in order to determine if she changed her name, went by both names, or just didn't bother correcting the county clerks who wrote up various documents for her.

I would love to hear if DNA has helped to resolve any of your name conflicts. Please leave a comment below or email me directly.

My Smith Family: putting Y-DNA to work!

I’m very excited to report on the progress of our Smith Y-DNA results!

The DNA Journey

As you are probably aware, researching the Smith Surname has its challenges. It is, after all, the most common surname in America! [1]

Wikipedia.com - Smith is the No. 1 Surname in America

In order to gain insight into our Smith ancestry, my grandfather took the Y-DNA test back in 2005 with Family Tree DNA. He went several years without a single match. He transferred his results to Ancestry.com a couple of years later and got a match to two people with different surnames. I found it very surprising that he had no matches to anyone with the Smith surname since the Smith Surname Project was boasting to have well over 2000 members at the time. I began to wonder if we really were Smiths after all.

Then one day he got a couple of matches through Ancestry.com – one to an A. Smith in Perry County, Kentucky and one to an M. Smith in Utah. Mr. M. Smith, however, claimed he was a Smith from an adoption that happened a couple of generations back. (I will come back to this later).

M. Smith was a missionary at the time that I contacted him, so he was unavailable to discuss our match further. I was able to exchange information with A. Smith from Kentucky though. Unfortunately, I was not able to find a connection. And how in the world were we able to find an exact match to a man in Kentucky at the same time as finding one to a man in Utah? These two locations are no where close to each other! 

Google Maps – says it would take 27 hours to drive from Kentucky to Utah

The Genealogy

According to the 1850 Johnson County, Arkansas census report, my ancestor, Richard Smith, was living with his parents, David and Sarah Smith. David Smith was born about 1789 in Tennessee. His wife Sarah Smith was born about 1790 in TN. [2]

 1850 Johnson Co., AR census report showing David Smith and his family

The Cherokee Citizenship Application file of their daughter Sarah Smith Grider indicated that David’s

father’s name was James Smith and that he was a Cherokee Indian. It also listed her mother’s name as Sarah Gallymore, daughter of “Jennie Gallymore, nee Lee.” [3], [4]

According to my grandfather, Richard Smith was born about 18 December 1838 in Blue Springs Cove, Jackson County, Alabama. Unfortunately, I have been able to find any source to prove this and we have been unable to identify either a David Smith or James Smith living in Jackson Co., AL during the 1830s and 40s who fits our family.[5] You can check out my research endeavors in my Alabama Smith References blog post.

Here is a summary of what we are looking for:

·         James Smith born ca 1760

·         James Smith who was in TN about 1790 with a wife and new born son David Smith

·         James Smith who was a Cherokee Indian

·         James and/or David Smith who was in Jackson Co., AL between 1830-1840

The Y-DNA Bandwagon

Fast forward to the future and now we have 3 additional matches on the Y-DNA with Family Tree DNA. Unfortunately, Ancestry.com has decided to throw away all of their Y-DNA kits, so unless my grandfather’s two matches from Ancestry.com (M Smith and A Smith) transfer their results to Family Tree DNA before September 5^th, we are out of luck in using their results to help us determine our Smith ancestry. We managed to get M Smith’s results transferred over, but still waiting for A Smith to make the transfer. In a way, Ancestry’s decision to shut down their Y-DNA support is actually beneficial to us in that now all of our Y-DNA results will be in one place (ftDNA), making management of the results much easier for the Project Administrators.

If A Smith transfers his results from Ancestry to Family Tree DNA, we will have a total of 6 Y-DNA results to compare and use in determining our Smith ancestry. Here is the breakdown of the Smith testees and their genealogies:

#s 1 and 2 are from Alabama

#s 3 and 4 represent the Mormon population, but they disagree somewhat on their origins from Kentucky

#s 5 and 6 are from Kentucky, but they too disagree somewhat

1.      Darrel Smith (my grandfather) - descends from David Edison Smith, b. abt 1789 in TN; was probably residing in Jackson Co., AL between 1830-1840; Was in Johnson Co., AR by 1850. His father was listed as James Smith on his daughter's Cherokee Application.

2.      Descendant of Patrick Smith, b. abt 1788 AL married a female Lindsay. Possible parentage from James Smith.

3.      Descendant of Thomas Smith and Leah Agee - (unproven - many people claim this is George Thomas Smith from NC but this testee disagrees with this)

1.      Richard Smith married to Diana Braswell - I believe this line moved to Utah?

He is the brother of James Agee Smith who moved to Utah and who is the ancestor of M Smith (# 4 below)

4.      M Smith – Descendant of John W Stephens, though he was given the Smith surname through adoption a couple of generations back. Here is what he claims his ancestry to be: [6]

1. Joshua Stephens

2. Hesekiah Stephens md Margaret Love; (Margaret married also to James Agee Smith)

3. Wm G Stephens md Susan Reynolds

4. John W Stephens*

Margaret was married to both Hesekiah Stephens and James Agee Smith

with Hesekiah Stephens, she had son Wm G Stephens

with James Agee Smith, she had son Thomas Washington Smith

Therefore Wm G Stephens and Thomas Washington Smith are HALF BROTHERS (same mother)

Supposedly, Wm G Stephens died, leaving his widow Susan Reynolds.

Thomas Washington Smith then marries Susan Reynolds who had 3 children with previous husband Wm Stephens. (he was also married to Sarah Bolen)

Thomas adopts the 3 children, thus giving them the Smith surname.

So M Smith is named as a Smith, but he claims he's really a Stephens.

However, he matches my grandfather and he matches to # 3 above!

I did some research and learned that Thomas W Smith was polygamous and was living with 4 wives in 1880.

·        I think that either Thomas Smith and Susan Reynolds really were the parents of John Stephens Smith 

OR

·        James Agee Smith and Margaret Love really were the parents of Wm G Stephens.

5.      Descendant of William Smith and Elizabeth Eunice Ritchie – KY born and bred:

1. Willam Smith - Elizabeth Eunice Ritchie

2. Richard Smith b. 1771 KY - Alicia Combs

3. William Smith

4. William Med Smith, etc.

6.       Descendant of Samuel Smith and Eunice Joliff – KY born and bred:

1.      Samuel Smith and Eunice Joliff - He refutes # 5s line 1 above and claims William was NOT the father of Richard Smith. He has good proof that Samuel Smith was the father and that Eunice JOLIFF was the mother. I agree with his documentation and conclusions and wrote about them in my “Will of Richard Joliff” blog post on my Smith and Fox blog.

2.      Richard Smith, b. 1771 KY - Etiticia Combs - # 5 above had Richard’s wife as Alicia Combs

Conclusion

So it looks like the Y-DNA is matching up except two of these lines are arguing with each other :-) and the other two (David and Patrick) are kind of left out in the wind. I guess they decided they didn't want to go to Utah to become Mormons or stay behind in Kentucky arguing over whether their ancestor was Samuel or William (I have yet to find a shred of proof of William being said ancestor except that Richard named his first son William).

I am very excited by these results. Even though we have not yet tied these 3 lines together, I am confident that we will find the connection somewhere. Researching the Smith surname is hard enough, but adding James to the mix makes it even more challenging. 

These results are also helping me narrow my research focus in the following ways: 

1. Looking for a connection between the Alabama Smiths (David and Patrick) and their Kentucky roots
2. Looking for a connection between the Alabama Smiths (David and Patrick)
3. Looking more closely at the records in Utah to solve the Smith-Stephens conundrum
4. Looking for more Smiths to test in these 3 geographical areas

This is just a start! 

I'm sure you are wondering if we have started incorporating autosomal DNA to our research and the answer is YES! we are. The key to using autosomal DNA is ORGANIZATION. Check back for updates on this endeavor. 

  

---

Sources: 

[1] Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.com), “List of most common surnames in North America,” rev. 30 Jun 2014.

[2] 1850 US Federal Census, Johnson County, Arkansas, population schedule, Horsehead Township, Page 268 (penned), dwelling 98, family 100, David Smith; digital image, Ancestry.com (www.ancestry.com : downloaded 2 May 2010); NARA Film M432, Roll 27.

[3] Cherokee Citizenship Application of Sarah Smith Grider, 1896, Arkansas, National Archives. Copies mailed to me by Mike Freels, 2008.

[4] Surprisingly enough, the surname of the two men that my grandfather initially matched to on the Y-DNA in Ancestry.com was “Lee.”

[5] Personal correspondence with Darrel Smith, 2008. He said his date and place of birth were recorded in Richard Smith’s enlistment files but I have been unable to locate them.

[6] Mark Smith, [email withheld for privacy], to Ginger R Smith, grs3275[at]yahoo.com, Email, “Smith DNA,” 15 April 2011.

Distribution of Property of David McCoy of Greenville, SC

My great-grandmother, Blanche Kathryne Hill, was the granddaughter of Josephine F Cox and Joseph Watson Hill of Greenville, South Carolina. Josephine and Joseph Hill moved from Greenville, South Carolina to Center Point, Howard County, Arkansas in 1869.

Josephine had been left an orphan at a young age. Her father, Robert Cox, died when she was just 8 years old and her mother, Basheba McCoy Cox, followed a couple of years later in 1852.  Josephine's mother, Basheba McCoy, had also been left without a father at a young age. Her father, David McCoy, had died when Basheba was only 16 years of age. However Basheba and her sisters were already married off with husbands by the time their father passed away.

The following distribution of property from David McCoy's estate file provides a list of names of his 4 daughters - Louisa, Teeley, Shaloma and Basheba in addition to their husbands' names:


Amount of Property Advanced in the lifetime of David McCoy late deceased:

Ezekial Spriggs Husband of his 1st Daughter Louisa
4 Negros $975
and other property to the amount of $55 -- total $1030

Benjamin McKenzie Husband of his 2nd Daughter Teeley
2 Negroes & other property $553 - 2 = $551
deduct $2 for bedsted

Robert Cox Husband of his 3 Daughter Barsheba
2 Negroes & other property to the amt $774

Asa May Husband of his 4 Daughter Shaloma
2 Negroes and other property to the amount $755

Estimated by us this 29th of November 1822

Geo Salmon
Joseph Cobbs
Thos Blyth

David McCoy died around 1822 in Greenville County, South Carolina. No will was found for him in Greenville County. He preceded his wife Susan McCoy in Death (last name unknown). 

His estate was managed by his administrator, Robert Cox (husband of his daughter, Basheba McCoy Cox). David McCoy's estate files were downloaded from the FamilySearch.org website, "South Carolina Probate Records, Files and Loose Papers, 1732-1964." These records were microfilmed by FamilySearch at the Greenville County Probate Court. David McCoy's estate papers were contained in File no. 339. 

From this page, we learned the following: 

Basheba McCoy married Robert Cox

Louisa McCoy married Ezekial Spriggs

Teeley McCoy married Benjamin McKenzie

Shaloma McCoy married Asa May

I have several Family Finder DNA matches to people with the Cox surname in their family trees. I also am a match to a couple of McKenzies. This might be the connection to them.

Here is my line to my Great-Grandmother Blanche (father's side):
Me
Dad (Tim Smith)
Grandmother (Barbara Binns)
Great-Grandmother (Blanche Hill)

Tombstone Tuesday: Jesse and Nathan “Gus” Hill

MOTHER FATHER

JESSIE N GUS

1875-1950 1873-1944

HILL

N Gus or Nathaniel Gustaves Hill and Jessie Inez Barton were my 2^nd great-grandparents. They were the parents of my great-grandmother, Blanche Kathryn Hill. You can see photos of my Hill family here.

Their headstone was placed in a family plot in Center Point Cemetery (Center Point, Howard County, Arkansas). Nathan Gus and Jessie Hill’s headstone is the short one on the left. The middle stone belongs to Nathan’s mother, Josie Hill pictured below and the one on the right belongs to Nathan’s son-in-law, Barnard Maggard, also pictured below.

Hill Family Plot, Center Point Cemetery, Center Point, AR

JOSIE

________

J W HILL

Born

In Greenville Dist SC

July 11, 1841

Died

Jan 12, 1887

Josie Hill was Josephine F Cox who married Joseph Watson Hill, 16 January 1861 in Newberry, South Carolina. She predeceased her husband by about 26 years.  Joseph Hill died in 1913 in Annona, Texas, so he is not buried in the Hill family plot. Josie and Joseph Hill were the parents of Nathaniel Gustaves Hill and were my 3rd great-grandparents.  

BARNUM MAGGARD

SEPT. 16, 1894

APRIL 5, 1937

AT REST

Barnum Maggard married Doris Hill, my great-grandmother’s oldest sister. Barnard predeceased Doris by about 31 years. They did not have any children. Doris moved to Klamath Falls, Oregon and married her 2^nd husband, Roscoe Hines. She is buried in Klamath Falls.

Here is a picture of the Centerpoint Cemetery in Centerpoint, Howard County, Arkansas:

Photos taken courtesy of Doyle Wester, Nov 2010. Centerpoint Cemetery, Centerpoint, Howard Co., Arkansas.

Photo of Centerpoint Cemetery Sign was copied from FindAGrave.com website and was originally uploaded by D. Ann on 30 July 2006. 

Keeping Track of My 2nd Great-Grandparents

I have 8 sets of 2^nd great-grandparents with a total of 16 individuals.

Paternal Line:

Set # 1: Claude Rual Smith (1896 - 1975) and Willie Harriet Riddle (1899 – 1985)

Set # 2: Fred Fox (1884 – 1974) and Melvina West (1882 – 1978)

Set # 3: John Milton Binns (1868 – 1961) and Perthinia “Pert” Eula Brooks (1873 – 1942)

Set # 4: Nathaniel Gustaves Hill (1873 – 1944) and Jessie Inez Barton (1875 – 1950)

Maternal Line:

Set # 1: Alvin Theodore Godwin (1879 – 1950) and Louella Davis (1882 – 1947)

Set # 2: William Edward Peters (1874 – 1948) and Dora King (1875 – 1912)

Set # 3: James Franklin Lasiter (1876 – 1968) and Rosalie Putman (1875 – 1961)

Set # 4: Barney Sheron Benson (1884 – 1952) and Eva Mae Dennis (1889 – 1983)

I was born in 1976. As you can see, two of my paternal 2^nd great-grandfathers died 1 or 2 years before I was born and 2 of my paternal 2^nd great-grandmothers lived to hold me in their arms (The obituary of one of my 2^nd great-grandmothers, Willie Harriet Riddle Smith, mentioned that she had 18 2^nd great-grandchildren!)

One of my maternal 2^nd great-grandmothers lived to hold me. I wasn’t the only one though. She had several other 2^nd great-grandchildren that she travelled around to visit with. Check out my 5-generation photos:

 Back Row: Sue Lasiter (my grandmother), Marilyn Godwin (my mother), Louise Benson Lasiter (my great-grandmother); Front: Eva Dennis Benson (my 2nd great-grandmother), Ginger R. Smith (me!). Taken March 1976, Fort Smith, Arkansas. From personal collection of Ginger R. Smith, inherited from Louise Lasiter. Copyright 2012. 

Back Row: Claude Rual Smith, Jr (my great-grandfather) and Willie Harriet Riddle Smith (my 2nd great-grandmother); Front: Tim D. Smith (my father), Ginger R. Smith (me), Darrel E. Smith (my grandfather). Taken 1976, Fort Smith, Arkansas. From personal collection of Ginger R. Smith, scanned from photo album of Barbara J. Smith, Copyright 2012. 

L to R: Reba Fox Smith (my great-grandmother), Ginger R. Smith (me),  Melvina West Fox (my 2nd great-grandmother), Tim D. Smith (my father), Darrel E. Smith. Taken March 1976, Fort Smith, Arkansas. From personal collection of Ginger R. Smith, scanned from photo album of Barbara J. Smith, Copyright 2012. 

Most all of my sets of 2^nd great-grandparents lived in Arkansas with the exception of the Bensons. I’m pretty lucky because the Arkansas death certificates started about 1914. I can actually probably take my ancestry back another generation to 3^rd or even 4^th great-grandparents just by using death certificate research!

As I said in my last post about requesting death certificates from the Arkansas Department of Health, it can become quite addicting and difficult to keep up with all of the requests and processing of incoming certificates. I try to space them out. I have employed the following two tables to help me with my research. They track my progress in securing and processing death certificates and obituaries. From looking at these tables I can see from a glance what I am missing.

From the tables I have filled out below, I can see that I have the obituaries and death certificates of 8 of my 16 great-grandparents. I am half way there! The obituaries I obtained either from family members or from various newspapers. My cousin, Doris Hamblin Smith, sent me copies of a bunch of Smith family obituaries in 2010 before she passed away.

In order to understand what the headers Scanned?, Transcribed?, FTF Notes?, and FTF Source? refer to, you must first know my genealogy work flow:

1.       Scan and save obituary and death certificate as a PDF, TIF, and JPG file

2.       Transcribe and save to Word document or Notepad File

3.       Copy the Transcript to the notes file for that person in my genealogy software

4.       Enter the Birth, Death, Burial, Occupation, Marital, etc facts into my genealogy software, including the parents' names

5.       Create a source and attach to the Facts (some call these "Events")

Nos. 3 and 4 are included under the FTF Notes heading in the table. FTF stands for “Family Tree File.”

As I collect more obituaries and death certificates, I can  update this table. I already know which death certificate I plan to order next – that of Rosalie Putman. However, since 6 of the remaining 8 died in Arkansas, I can go ahead and order them all at once.

Dora King died in 1912 in Missouri. I have not found a death record for her yet, probably because she died before deaths were required to be recorded. Family stories say she died of a snake bite. I might be able to find a death notice for her in a local newspaper. But I've found this to be difficult; or at least time consuming when you don't know the month and day. 

Barney Benson died while visiting his son in California. I have not yet ordered a death certificate from California, so this will be my first experience.

Obituary Resources
Name	Scanned?	Transcribed?	FTF Notes?	FTF Source?
Claude Smith Sr	yes	yes	yes	yes
Willie Riddle	yes	yes	yes	yes
Fred Fox	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Melvina West	No	No	No	No
John M Binns	No	No	No	No
Eula Brooks	No	No	No	No
Gus Hill	No	No	No	No
Jessie Barton	No	No	No	No
Alvin Godwin	No	No	No	No
Louella Davis	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
William E Peters	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Dora King	No	No	No	No
James F Lasiter	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Rosalie Putman	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Barney Benson	No	No	No	No
Eva Dennis	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

Death Certificates
Name	Scanned?	Transcribed?	FTF Notes?	FTF Source?
Claude Smith Sr	yes	yes	yes	yes
Willie Riddle	No	No	No	No
Fred Fox	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Melvina West	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
John M Binns	No	No	No	No
Eula Brooks	No	No	No	No
Gus Hill	No	No	No	No
Jessie Barton	No	No	No	No
Alvin Godwin	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Louella Davis	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
William E Peters	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Dora King	No	No	No	No
James F Lasiter	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Rosalie Putman	No	No	No	No
Barney Benson	No	No	No	No
Eva Dennis	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

How do you stay organized? Does your genealogy work flow look like mine? If not, how does it differ? How is it similar? I’m looking forward to hearing how other people process the obituaries and death certificates they receive.