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News from Bird Bottom Farm
Books on "People History"
By Ursula B.G. Kilner, Salisbury
Quite a few years ago in another state (Massachusetts), I was appointed Chairman of Heraldry—about which I knew little beyond "quartering" and the importance of flags and crests. Now, as Christmas approaches, I am asked to review Handbook of Heraldry by John E. Cussans, which is available for $34 (including postage and handling) from Heritage Books, Inc., 1540E Pointer Ridge Place, Bowie, MD 20716. (Checks, MasterCard, Visa, or money order are accepted.)
This book is a reprint from 1893, and I doubt that you could find a copy except in a library devoted to research books. Heraldry really is the root of genealogy as we know it today, as the symbols in basic heraldry (Accidence of Armory, Tinctures, Charges, Blazoning, Coronets and Helmets, Crests, Seals, and Flags) reveal who married whom and who were the parents.
We now generally know that a flag flying over some noble's castle means he (rarely she) is in residence. In my rather brief stay as heraldry chief in a hereditary society, I had not one query. I must admit I was disappointed, as I had studied up on the subject, and this book would have been very helpful. If you have the desire to play one-upmanship in the heraldry game, this is the book for you!
A very recently published book (i.e., this year of 2001) is also available from Heritage Books, for $25.50. Adventures in Genealogy by Patrick G. Wardell portrays the author’s interesting experiences in finding information on his own family members, as well as when he was working to find ancestors for other folks. He gives many avenues to follow, such as Social Security, local genealogical organizations, and finding lists of libraries that may have persons interested in the history of individuals. When one starts hunting for family lines going back even a couple hundred years, this book can indeed help in guiding one's faltering attempts to find information. I wish I had had this book when I started hunting out relatives over twenty years ago—it would have given me a head start that I sorely needed!
Yet another book from Heritage Books, also published in 2001, can be purchased for $47 as described above. Farmington, New Hampshire Vital Records 1887-1938 has been compiled by Richard P. Roberts. If you have family roots in this area of New Hampshire, this 580-page book sure beats traveling there and hunting all the different sources Mr. Roberts has put together. All names are listed alphabetically in sections of Births, Marriages and Deaths, which makes looking up any family member (up to 1938, when Farmington stopped keeping detailed records) very easy. The marriage list gives the husband's age, birthplace and parents as well as his occupation, and does the same for the wife. Sometimes these pieces of information are very difficult to find, as time has a way of obscuring what "everyone knows." (In small towns it can be assumed that everyone knows about family members and neighbors, so the information may not get written down.) This book is particularly helpful, as many of the persons listed were born in Canada or their parents were, and Canadian records are not easy game for the family history hunter. As this was an area of cloth manufacture, it is interesting to note that one fellow's occupation is "Loom Fixer." I guess nowadays we would call him a "Loom Engineer," but "Fixer" says it all.
These three books cover a great deal of territory concerning the histories of people. Whether the information contained in them is personally applicable or of interest for researching someone else's family, I think all three could be of great value to the genealogical investigator.
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