[This is Part 3 in a series of posts about how I was able to use Twitter and genealogy resources to reunite a baby book from 1926 with the original owner's family]
Previous posts:
Search For The Living - Honing Your Research Skills
The Search for Marjorie Pauline Frost
Continued posts:
A Bar Room Brawl
A Tripple Play
Do's and Don'ts When Researching the Living
Interview with Forgotten Bookmarks
Well I now had a maiden name for Pauline's mother - Crossway - and thought I should try to find a marriage announcement for Pauline in the newspapers using the Old Fulton NY Postcards site. This way I'd have a name to use when searching the white pages and seeing if Pauline was still alive.
One note on the timeline of this process - some readers have already asked, "How long did it take from start to finish to find Pauline or her family?" Well, I don't want to give that away right yet, but remember from our first post that on Twitter this all started at 9:12 am (CDT) as shown here. I'll summarize the timeline so far at the end of this post but let's just say that by 10:37 am, phones calls were being made!
* * *
The next challenge was coming up with a search syntax that would allow me to easily locate marriage information for Pauline. I figured I could use "Marjorie Frost" +daughter + marriage +Pauline but perhaps "Devere Frost" would be better. Women would have been referred to as "Mrs. Devere Frost" and not "Mrs. Marjorie Frost" unless she were widowed. Also as for time, if Pauline were born in 1926, I assume the marriage could have been anywhere from 1944 onward.
Well using "Devere Frost" . . . I only found four newspaper articles, all 1936 or earlier. I also made certain to try "De Vere" and "Devere." No luck.
But I did stumble upon an obituary which mentioned "daughter Mrs. Marjorie Frost" and was dated 1953. Well it appears Devere would have died and perhaps the death notice had the married name for Pauline.
Previous posts:
Search For The Living - Honing Your Research Skills
The Search for Marjorie Pauline Frost
Continued posts:
A Bar Room Brawl
A Tripple Play
Do's and Don'ts When Researching the Living
Interview with Forgotten Bookmarks
Well I now had a maiden name for Pauline's mother - Crossway - and thought I should try to find a marriage announcement for Pauline in the newspapers using the Old Fulton NY Postcards site. This way I'd have a name to use when searching the white pages and seeing if Pauline was still alive.
One note on the timeline of this process - some readers have already asked, "How long did it take from start to finish to find Pauline or her family?" Well, I don't want to give that away right yet, but remember from our first post that on Twitter this all started at 9:12 am (CDT) as shown here. I'll summarize the timeline so far at the end of this post but let's just say that by 10:37 am, phones calls were being made!
* * *
The next challenge was coming up with a search syntax that would allow me to easily locate marriage information for Pauline. I figured I could use "Marjorie Frost" +daughter + marriage +Pauline but perhaps "Devere Frost" would be better. Women would have been referred to as "Mrs. Devere Frost" and not "Mrs. Marjorie Frost" unless she were widowed. Also as for time, if Pauline were born in 1926, I assume the marriage could have been anywhere from 1944 onward.
Well using "Devere Frost" . . . I only found four newspaper articles, all 1936 or earlier. I also made certain to try "De Vere" and "Devere." No luck.
But I did stumble upon an obituary which mentioned "daughter Mrs. Marjorie Frost" and was dated 1953. Well it appears Devere would have died and perhaps the death notice had the married name for Pauline.
"Warren," Richfield Springs Mercury, 1953 August 13, online archives (http://www.fultonhistory.com/Newspaper%202/Richfield%20Springs%20NY%20Mercury/Richfield%20Springs%20NY%20Mercury%201953-1954.pdf/Richfield%20Springs%20NY%20Mercury%201953-1954%20-%200251.pdf: accessed 22 October 2009), Col. 4, para. 1; citing original p. 4.
Well on the plus side, the fact that Louis Crossway was born in Germany matches up with the 1930 US Federal Census sheet for Marjorie Frost where the census enumerator listed Germany as her father's birth place. So Pauline should be listed as one of the grand children right?
Well to make a long story short, much time was wasted trying to find a Pauline Pullman or a Pauline Petriski. I won't go into the details but I am going to surmise that either our Pauline was omitted from the obituary or erroneously listed as a great-grandchild which were listed without names.
* * *
Where to go next? Well I thought a syntax of "Marjorie Frost" +announces +wed to see if that picked up something. And it did - but not what I expected.
A birth announcement for the son of Mr. and Mrs. J. Tripple: "The mother is is the former Pauline Frost, daughter of Mrs. Marjorie Frost of Mohawk."
Well on the plus side, the fact that Louis Crossway was born in Germany matches up with the 1930 US Federal Census sheet for Marjorie Frost where the census enumerator listed Germany as her father's birth place. So Pauline should be listed as one of the grand children right?
Well to make a long story short, much time was wasted trying to find a Pauline Pullman or a Pauline Petriski. I won't go into the details but I am going to surmise that either our Pauline was omitted from the obituary or erroneously listed as a great-grandchild which were listed without names.
* * *
Where to go next? Well I thought a syntax of "Marjorie Frost" +announces +wed to see if that picked up something. And it did - but not what I expected.
A birth announcement for the son of Mr. and Mrs. J. Tripple: "The mother is is the former Pauline Frost, daughter of Mrs. Marjorie Frost of Mohawk."
"Warren," The Otsego Farmer, 1943 August 27, online archives (http://www.fultonhistory.com/Newspapers%20Disk3/Cooperstown%20NY%20Otsego%20Farmer/Cooperstown%20NY%20Otsego%20Farmer%20&%20Republican%20Grayscale%201942%20-%201943/Cooperstown%20NY%20Otsego%20Farmer%20&%20Republican%20Grayscale%201942%20-%201943%20-%200711.pdf: accessed 22 October 2009), Col. 3; citing original p. 2.
So, this would mean Pauline had her child at age 17? And would have been married at barely 17 or earlier?
* * *
I think I need a break, need to regroup my strategy and see what the next step is. The problem is that as I am finding items, I am "tweeting" them live. So @forgottenbkmrks is a little ahead of me in terms of contacting the living:
So, this would mean Pauline had her child at age 17? And would have been married at barely 17 or earlier?
* * *
I think I need a break, need to regroup my strategy and see what the next step is. The problem is that as I am finding items, I am "tweeting" them live. So @forgottenbkmrks is a little ahead of me in terms of contacting the living:
The tweets show other articles that we've found as well. Note the time - it is 10:37 am which means we've only been at it for about 90 minutes.
Stay tuned . . .
Stay tuned . . .
© 2009, copyright Thomas MacEntee
2 comments:
Fabulous detective work! I am going to go read parts 1 and 2 now...
I can't wait for the next installment! You are doing an incredible job!
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