This week’s discovery

I have been in the process of writing my first ancestor profile all week. I’m a first-time mama to a very busy toddler and a freelance journalist, so time to compose comes in bite-sized chunks of a few sleepy minutes here and there.

But it was a discovery of a newspaper article containing some bit of scandal that has really caused the delay.   Because such a find, of course, always leads to more research.

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Alternate sources: pew rentals and coffin receipts

What can you do when the records that surely would contain a wealth of information about your ancestors no longer exist?

My 4th great-grandfather, Charles Bender, has long been one of the more elusive members of my family tree.

One of the big reasons why is that the church he joined as an adult is defunct and its records seemingly lost.