Blog

CGS member Mary Mettler is still on the road. This is her fifth installment:

We finished up our wonderful week at the beach to celebrate my sister-in-law’s 90th birthday. The weather was great, and her birthday party turned out to be a grand blast with about 50 or 60 people. I stopped in Bealeton, Virginia for my niece’s 46th birthday and headed to Washington, D.C. to stay with friends, Sadye and Mel Doxie. The genealogy goal was to spend two days at the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Library and do a bit of sightseeing on the third day.

The DAR Library is a worthwhile stop for genealogists. I was disappointed that not much information was in my various Patriots’ files. In the “old” days, the DAR genealogists either sent the supporting information back to the applicant or threw it away! Gasp! Recently, however, the Library has scanned everything; and all applications and supporting documents are available on computer terminals at the Library. For older Patriots, the best I could do was to go through each application for a Patriot and look for the sources of their information. I found this to be quite tedious!

The second day I used the computer lookups for a number of my ancestors, both Patriots and non-Patriots, and found quite a number of information sources. I also browsed their very extensive book collections and found some, which are not at the Family History Library, including a very interesting Revolutionary War diary of a distant cousin, Amos Farnsworth. He fought at Bunker Hill and in several other battles. I did have a fun surprise for the second day, as Henriette Gordon, a San Francisco DAR friend joined me at the Library.

Mary Mettler and Eleanor Roosevelt

The last day in Washington, D.C., Sadye and I toured all the new monuments that have been built since I lived there (1960 – 1963). I was most impressed with the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial and The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. The Wall is amazingly emotional and seemed to have the biggest crowds. Washington, D.C. is very beautiful and should be on all of your agendas for a visit if you haven’t been recently. I am at my nephew’s in Ellicott City, Maryland. We just got back from seeing Mama Mia – great fun! You didn’t think this was all work, did you?

Mary and FDR

I am going to add one more item to my itinerary. My grandnephew, Stephen Schnorf, is in the midst of CBT (Cadet Basic Training) for incoming freshmen at the United States Military Academy at West Point. August 24th is A-Day (Acceptance Day) where they will march and join the rest of the Corps of Cadets. By shaving part of a day in Dorset, Vermont, I will be able to join his family in watching this exciting event. Well, that’s the latest from the Road. Next week begins several weeks of solid genealogy, starting in Suffield, Connecticut.

From Your Roving Reporter,
Mary

Photographs courtesy of Mary Mettler.

Read the entire series:
Part One: Salt Lake City
Part Two: Indiana
Part Three: Pennsylvania
Part Four: More From Pennsylvania
Part Five: Washington D.C.
Part Six: Suffield, Connecticut
Part Seven: Vermont
Part Eight: Dorset, Vermont
Part Nine: West Point and Back to Pennsylvania
Part Ten: Some Final Thoughts From Home

Sometimes there’s an advantage being three hours behind the East Coast. This morning as I reviewed feed from the genealogy blogs, I read Maureen Taylor’s post Today Show News about how she missed hearing and seeing the acknowledgment she received on the show. I was able to turn on the television in time for the broadcast’s second hour and see the 13-minute segment on host Meredith Vieira’s Azorian roots and her trip this summer to learn about her family.

The segment was the first of a week-long series “Today Looks Back: Discovering Our Roots.” Tomorrow’s piece is a look at Matt Lauer’s ancestry. Later this week Al Roker will visit the Bahamas to learn about his family and Ann Curry will look at her Japanese roots.

You can view today’s piece in its entirety on the Today Show Web site: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/26389261#26389261.

The California Genealogical Society has embarked on an ambitious new project with The Peralta Hacienda Historical Park. The six-acre park, in the Fruitvale district of Oakland, includes the restored 1870 home of Antonio Peralta and preserves the lost legacy of the 44,800-acre Peralta rancho that once covered nearly all of present-day Alameda County. The park site is a city and state landmark and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

Chris Pattillo, principal of the landscape firm, PGA Design, has been working with the Friends of Peralta Hacienda on the implementation of the landscape masterplan for the last three years. Chris also sits on the CGS board of directors, so when she learned the next phase of the renovation project included a Peralta family tree, she knew it was time to marry two of her pet projects. Pattillo arranged for Holly Alonso, Executive Director of the Park, to visit the California Genealogical Society and the alliance was born.

Graphic artist Gordan Chan has been commissioned to create the large wall mural featuring the Peralta family tree. The work of art will reside in the 1864 Victorian building on the site and is to be an accurate depiction of some of the genealogy of the family.

Lavinia Grace Schwarz agreed to coordinate the team of CGS volunteers who stepped forward to tackle the enormous project. Judy Bodycote has contributed countless hours of research time and is in charge of creating the database. Dick Rees and Marilyn Willats concentrated on some of the well-known “celebrity” descendants. Some preliminary work was done by Arlene Miles and Verne Deubler.

I’ll have lots more to report on the project in the coming weeks.