Category: Ancestor Stories
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The Records Got Me This Far: Now It’s Time for a Cemetery Visit
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For more than twenty-five years, I have traced my Plunkett, Dowling, and Marcisak ancestors through census records, death certificates, and newspaper notices. I found them on Find a Grave, built virtual cemeteries, and confirmed plot numbers. But not one of my Plunkett or Dowling ancestors at Holy Cross Cemetery in…
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Two Brothers, One Vocation: The Lives of the Plunkett Priests
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Two of my great-granduncles, Reverend Bernard Plunkett and Reverend Peter H. Plunkett, grew up in the same Red Hook, Brooklyn household and both became Catholic priests in the 1870s and 1880s. Both died young. Bernard at thirty-two in 1883. Peter H. at thirty, on his birthday, in 1886. Three years…
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How a Simple Tradition Became 45 Years of Christmas Memories
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I am not entirely sure when the tradition started, but the why is pretty clear. Sometime around age eleven or twelve, when our family was still living in my childhood home in Lynbrook, New York, my mom hatched a quiet plan. My dad always meant well at Christmas. He had…
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40 Years: A Lifelong Genealogist in Disguise
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This week’s #52Ancestors prompt asks me to write about an ancestor’s livelihood. I am writing about my own instead. Somewhere along the way, I realized I had been doing the same job my entire career. I just kept changing what I called it. Thirteen years in estates and probate. Ten…
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He Stayed: One Man’s Quiet Life in Sweden
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Not every ancestor chased adventure. Some stayed. Sven Svensson lived a quiet life in rural Sweden for ninety-two years, and without it, none of the dramatic stories in my family tree exist. Born illegitimate in 1867 in Näsum parish, he spent decades as a farmhand and stone worker, moving between…
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A Box, Two Extracts, One Unexpected Discovery
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I inherited a box of family papers from my uncle, Eva Marcisak Dubinsky’s son, and set it aside for two years. In early April 2026, I finally went through it. What I found was an unexpected discovery I wasn’t prepared for: two formal church-issued baptismal extracts for children of my…
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A Brick Wall Revisited: Ten Hours, Seven Suspects, One Direction
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The mystery of Clifford Max’s father has been one of my most stubborn brick wall revisited genealogy cases for years. Clifford was born June 18, 1929, to Myrtle June Thompson in Edwardsville, Illinois. His father was never named on any record. DNA testing points clearly to the Pitts family of…
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The Family Pattern I Didn’t See Until Now
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The theme for Week 13 of the #52Ancestors challenge is “A Family Pattern.” I have been turning that phrase over since I first read it. Naming patterns are everywhere in my family tree. Occupations repeat. Migration routes repeat. But none of that is what has been on my mind. What…
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Strong Women: What My Grandmothers Left Behind
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I have always called it the “strong women” photo. It was taken three days after I was born: four generations of women in one frame. Even before I had the language for it, I understood what I was looking at. This week’s StoryTeller Tuesday prompt asks about inheritance — the…
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My Childhood Home in Lynbrook, New York
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My childhood home in Lynbrook, New York wasn’t the oldest house in my family’s story — that distinction belongs to the Brooklyn duplex my great-great-grandparents bought in 1905. But it was the first place I remember. A white clapboard house on the south shore of Long Island, where I lived…