Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Your Paternal Grandfather's Matrilineal Line

 From Randy (a cousin discovery!!) over at Genea-Musings:

it's Saturday Night - 

time for more Genealogy Fun!!!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

(1)  Who is in your paternal grandfather's matrilineal line (i.e., the mother of your paternal grandfather, her mother, her mother, and so on)?

(2)  Tell us all about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, in a post on Facebook, or on Twitter.  

Here's mine:

My paternal grandfather was Lusion Keman Tapley (1870-1935).

His mother, my great-grandmother, was Elizabeth Rebecca "Becky" Page (1844-1924) who married James Madison "Jim" Tapley (1847-1912) in Johnson County, Georgia in 1866.

Her mother, my 2nd great-grandmother, was Elizabeth Carolina "Betsy" Scoggins (1802-1880) who married Solomon Page (1800-1860) in Washington County, Georgia on July 14, 1839. 

Her mother, my 3rd great-grandmother, was Nancy E McClammy* (1777-1838) who married Wright Scoggins (unknown-1837).  Their marriage date and location are unknown.  

    *The identities of Wright Scoggins and Nancy E McClammy have not been proven.  This information has been gleaned from other family trees, but I have been unable to prove the information to be absolutely true.  

And that is the end of the line.  That is all I know for sure about my paternal grandfather's matrilineal line.  I have searched for Scoggins and McClammy information before, but as it is getting back to the 18th century, where entire families were not listed on the census, information has been harder to come by.  

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Your Grandmother Memories

  From Randy (a cousin discovery!!) over at Genea-Musings:

it's Saturday Night - 

time for more Genealogy Fun!!!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

(1)  

(2)  Tell us all about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, in a post on Facebook, or on Twitter.  

Here's mine:

Unfortunately, I was very  young when I lost both of my grandmothers.

I was just 3 years old when my paternal grandmother, Nealie Drake Tapley (1895-1970) passed away.  I only remember seeing her once.  She lived in a high rise apartment building in Augusta, and my mom took me to see her.  All I remember is her giving me a cookie, and being very tall and intimidating.  

My maternal grandmother, Ethel Ranney Tapley (1913-1973) passed away when I was 6 years old.  She and Pop Pop lived in Swainsboro, and I know that we went to visit them fairly often.  Honestly, I don't really remember her.  I have tons of pictures so I know things happened and we shared occasions, but I don't have a memory of them at all.  I only have two actual memories that include Grandma.  The first is my mom telling me that Pop Pop had passed away, and we needed to go to Swainsboro. (We lived in Jacksonville, Florida then.)  Then I remember vividly when we went to pick  up Grandma and her passing away in my father's arms right there in the parking lot.  (I wrote about this in a previous blog post.  If interested, you can read it here:  Sympathy Saturday: Charles Morgan Tapley and Ethel Ranney Tapley.  

So I really missed out on a couple of special relationships. I hope to see them again one day, and they will tell me all about their lives.

A Time Line for James Madison "Jim" Tapley (1847-1912)

        

 

Our connection:

Liz (that's me!)

↓↓↓

Gilbert Earl Tapley, 1928-2008 (my father)

↓↓↓

Lusion Keman Tapley, 1870-1935 (my grandfather)

↓↓ 

James Madison 'Jim' Tapley, 1847-1912 (my great-grandfather)

Time Line for the life of James Madison "Jim" Tapley:  

1847 Age 0	Birth	April 29 Emanuel County, Georgia, USA
1850 Age 2	Residence	Laurens County, Georgia, USA
1858 Age 11	Historical Event	Johnson County is formed from parts of Laurens and Emanuel County.
1860 Age 12	Residence	Johnson County, Georgia, USA
1861 Age 13	Historical Event	Civil War – Some 11,000 Georgians gave their lives in defense of their state – a state that suffered immense destruction.
1864-1865 Age 17-18	Military Service	March 15, 1864 – April 19, 1865 Private with Company F, 48th Regiment, Johnson County (GA) Battleground Guards.  Fought in the battles of Chancellorsville, Spotsylvania, The Battle of the Wilderness, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg (Battle of the Crater).  Surrendered at Appomattox, Virginia on April 9, 1865.  Walked back home to Georgia.
1864 Age 17	Death of Brother	July 30 Jim’s oldest brother, Francis “Frank”, died in the Battle of the Crater at Petersburg, Virginia.  Frank was a 1st Corporal in the same company as Jim.
1866 Age 18	Marriage	February 18 Jim married Elizabeth Rebecca ‘Becky’ Page (1844-1924) in Johnson County, Georgia, USA.
1867 Age 19	Birth of 1st Child	Franklin Morgan “Frank” Tapley was born on April 7 in Johnson County.
1868 Age 20	Historical Event	The Fourteenth Amendment.  As one of the Reconstruction Amendments, the Fourteenth Amendment addressed the rights and protections that all citizens of the United States have. The amendment also limits actions of state and local officials in all states.
1868 Age 21	Birth of Child	A second boy, James “Jim”, was born July 17 in Johnson County.
1870 Age 22	Historical Event	The Fifteenth Amendment.  Prohibits the federal government and each state from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen’s race, color, or previous condition of servitude.  It was the last of the Reconstruction Amendments.
1870 Age 22	Birth of Child	A third boy, Lusion Keman, was born on March 31.
1873 Age 25	Birth of Child	A Girl!  Elizabeth Virginia “Lizzie” was born on February 12th.
1874 Age 27	Birth of Child	Their second daughter, Magdaline, was born.
1875 Age 32	Historical Event	A New Civil Rights Act. During the response to civil rights violations to African Americans, the bill was passed giving African Americans equal treatment in public accommodations, public transportation, and to prohibit exclusion from jury duty. While many in the public opposed this law, the African Americans greatly favored it.
1875 Age 27	Birth of Child	A daughter, Tabitha “Bosch” was born on March 10.
1876 Age 28	Historical Event	The First World’s Fair in the U.S.  The first official World’s Fair was held to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia. 37 countries provided venues for all to see.
1876 Age 29	Historical Event	The Battle of Little Bighorn. An armed conflict between the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes and the 7th Cavalry of the U.S. Army. The battle was the most significant action of the Great Sioux War of 1876.
1876 Age 29	Birth of Child	George Washington Sentell “Tell” was born July 5th.
1878 Age 30	Birth of Child	On April 10, Bennett Olin “Ol” was born.
1880 Age 32	Birth of Child	A girl, Marry, was born February 10.
1881 Age 33	Birth of Child	Solomon was born on March 5.
1885 Age 37	Death of Child	Daughter, Marry, died on February 25, at age 5.
1886 Age 39	Birth of Child	Vianna Bell was born October 4th.
Abt 1886 Age 39-40	Death of Child	Daughter, Magdaline, passed away when she was about 12 years old.  Jim was out of town, selling timber at the time.  He did not find out until he returned and disembarked the train in Bartow.
1889 Age 42	Birth of last child	On August 5, Bascom Bishop Tapley was born in Johnson County.
Between 1880 and 1900	Death of Parents	Sometime between the 1880 and 1900 censuses, Jim’s parents, Georgia Washington Tapley (1814-) and Elizabeth Hicks (1824-) passed away.
1910 Age 62	Residence	Johnson County, Georgia, USA
1912 Age 65	Death	Jim passed away on November 5 in Johnson County, Georgia, USA. He was buried at Oaky Grove Primitive Baptist Church cemetery right down the road from where he had lived most of his life.

 Jim and Becky had a total of 12 children; 10 of which lived to adulthood.  Jim was a farmer and had enough land to split it between all of his children.  My father used to tell many stories about his aunts and uncles.  

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - What Genealogy Search/Research Did You Do Last Week?

 From Randy (a cousin discovery!!) over at Genea-Musings:

it's Saturday Night - 

time for more Genealogy Fun!!!

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

(1)  What genealogy search/research did you do last week? Did you have a research goal or  plan? Tell us about one or more search/research session(s).

(2)  Tell us all about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, in a post on Facebook, or on Twitter.  

Here's mine:

First of all, let me say how happy I am that Randy came through his bypass operation splendidly and is back home, recuperating.  And writing blog posts!

As far as my research, as always, I have been all over the place.  I have dabbled in several different genealogy plans.

My usual habit is to pick a line, either randomly or being lured by an obituary, and trace that line on Find A Grave and then Ancestry using their hints.  For over a month, I have been tracing the Ozmun/Osman/Osmun line in this way.  It seems that every line has many, many children.  So I go down many rabbit holes and must fight my way back.  My 8th great-grandparents were John Osman and Mary Wines, born in about the 1630s-1640s.  I have been working through their descendants on Find A Grave, and when I get bored with that, I switch over to Ancestry, search for those I have found, and use the hints feature to add to my research.

The hints feature at Ancestry.com is great, BUT you have to stay vigilant and make sure the hint they provide is actually for the person you are working on.   I have found that there is no name that is not a duplicate.  There are many Liz or Elizabeth Tapleys out there.  Even with a not-so-common name like Ozmun, there are many Isaacs or Marys or Abrahams in that line.  So each and every hint provided by Ancestry must be looked at and deemed whether it is actually for your person.  Even if it is, you must examine each piece of information to decide whether it is accurate or not.  For instance, your person's birthdate is January 16, but a social security record says it is January 23.  Well, I know that Social Security records are notoriously incorrect.  

Doing this research has added many people and information to my database.  However, it is time-consuming and seems to be taking FOREVER.  So I've been a little more bored with it as time goes on.  However, I am going to stick it out, because once I finish this Ozmun line, I am going to start working on Ranneys.  

Another way I am drawn into using Ancestry.com hints is when they send me an email about hints from the 1950 census or what is new in their record collections (These emails also come with hints.).  So I will follow those hints, which are about different family lines, and that helps ease my boredom.  This happened today, and I found out some interesting things.

My grandmother, Ethel Ranney Tapley (1913-1973) was married to Avery Hazel Plumlee (1911-1997).  He was her first husband.  They had one son together, my uncle, Robert Avery "Bob" Plumlee (1937-1999).  Grandma and Hazel divorced, and he married 4 more times in his lifetime.  In my grandmother's diary from the 1930's, she talks about Hazel a lot, since they were dating and married during this time.  She also talked often about his parents, his brother, Earl, and sister, Delma.  Earl was married to Verda and they had a little girl named Dorothy, who my grandmother seemed quite fond of.  Earl was killed in a car accident in 1933, when little Dorothy was only 3 years old. 

Today, in one of my Ancestry emails, I received a hint about Hazel.  When I followed it, I found that someone from the Plumlee line had been posting new and interesting information. Now I don't normally keep up with in-laws in my family tree.  I add the spouse, but I don't add their parents or other spouses, or any children from other spouses UNLESS it is someone(s) interesting to me.  For instance, the Plumlees.  I guess it's because my grandmother knew them, was close with them, and wrote so much about them.  So I was interested in this hint even though it is not a direct line for me.  

In the hints, I found a picture of Hazel from his later years.  Even more interestingly, I found that Earl and Verda actually had a second child, Donald, that I don't remember my grandmother mentioning at all.  He would have been about 2 when Earl died.  Then I discovered that Verda remarried, moved to Nevada, began going by her middle name, Viola, or "Vi", and her new husband adopted Dorothy and Donald.  So without these hints, I never would have known that Dorothy and Donald Plumlee were Dorothy and Donald Ferris. I was able to submit edits on Donald's Find A Grave memorial to show who his biological father was and explain his adoption by his stepfather.  

Tomorrow I will get back to work on those Ozmuns...