Pictures of Tombstones

Have you ever heard of Find A Grave? You can do a search for certain people, depending if someone contributed information. There are people who visit cemeteries and upload pictures of tombstones along with any possible information.


I learned where my great great grandmother, Blanch Josephine Chase, was buried so I went and looked to see if anyone submitted any information. No luck. What I did was I looked at most of the submissions in the specific cemetery and found out that most of it was contributed by one woman so I decided to contact her and ask if she was willing to take pictures of my great great grandmother's tombstone.

She replied and said that she was more than willing to look. Two days later, she sent me photos of her tombstone - as well as a tombstone next to it with two names of boys that died at very young ages - and posted it on the site. I thought that was incredibly nice of her. It finally verified that Donald really did exist and did die at a young age. The other name, Earl, caught me offguard because I didn't know about him.

McEvila / Greenwood

A cousin (I'm not sure exactly yet how she is related but she is! A somewhat distant cousin most likely) sent me papers that filled in some gaps when it came to the McEvila / Greenwood part of my family tree.

She sent me information on James McEvila and Charlotte Greenwood and their five children, Jessie, William, Anna, John, and Eugenia. Anna was my Great Grandmother and judging from this piece of paper, I believe the cousin descended from William.

She also sent me a scan of James McEvila's Certificate of Naturalization. His last name was written as McVeilla though. The other one is of James Greenwood's discharge from the service for reason of expiration of service.

Charlotte Greenwood's parents both came from Ireland. The cousin said that McEvila also came from Ireland and she has someone over there trying to find more information on both of them.

Discovering an Aunt

My mother called a Great Grand Aunt, who is the daughter of Zenas Wood, to get information about her children and her siblings. We knew at least of twelve siblings that this Great Grand Aunt had. She said that there was actually fifteen of them altogether. Unfortunately, she came along so late that she has no idea who her earlier siblings were.

This got me to talking with my mother. If I discovered that I had fourteen siblings or more, I'd sit her down with a great big notepad and get all the information I could out of her on who they were and when they were born. Not because of genealogy but because this is my family.

Suddenly, my mother revealed something that was a total surprise for me. Apparently, she had a sister named Linda who was born after her. She died a few months old from crib death. My mother said she never thought about it until now.

Genealogy Frustrations

My Great Uncle-in-Law was gathering information for the family tree awhile back and my mother helped as much as she could. He told us, "No one cares about the family tree and won't help you.. but they'll want to see it after." This comes from relatives who don't want to take the time to tell him information about their families.

My mother came to the rescue and talked to her many siblings and relatives to try to get information from them and it was passed back to my great uncle-in-law.

Daresay, what frustrates me now? Family photos. I have one relative who said she had a wedding photo of Zenas Wood and Blanch Chase on their wedding day and naturally I want a copy of it. She said she'd make a copy and send it to me. This occurred a few months ago when I first gained an interest. I also asked an aunt-in-law to make copies from her husband's photo album that contains really old photos. She said she would gather the photos and send what she can. The photos/copies still have not arrived and I just can't bring myself to annoy anyone into doing it.

I have already printed out information and sent them to several relatives.

Londonderry, Windham County, Vermont

Today I received some birth and death registration scans from a town clerk in Londonderry, VT. I was looking for more information on my Great Great Grandfather, Zenas Turner Wood, and I am surprised at what I got.

Zenas had two sisters. Minnie Eva Wood and Edith E. Wood. Also included was two death registrations of two male stillborns. The sad thing is that after the last Stillborn on October 24th, Eva L Thompson (their mother) had died a week later on October 31st, 1896 from consumption.

That must've been very crushing for the family.

Subscription to Ancestry.com

Today, I purchased one month subscription to Ancestry.com. I managed to dig up three WWI registration cards of my great grandfathers (Zenas Turner Wood, Stephen Joseph Rivait, and Wilbur Earl Smith).

Unfortunately, I am lacking information on my great grandfather, James Edward Hayes.

Looking through censuses have been helpful because that's when I can discover who their parents are but it's still difficult if no one can verify them.

Starting my Research

The interest to look up information on my family tree is a very recent thing. Unfortunately, my grandparents on my father's side died in the 80's and my grandmother on my mother's side died in 2003. My surviving grandfather doesn't seem to know much about the family. I know it will require much effort to uncover what I can.