Archival Notes, April 2020
Historical Trivia, March 2020
Why A Brides Bouquet Here are some facts about the 1500s: Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still smelled pretty good by June. However, since they were starting to smell brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence, that is why […]
President’s Message, March & April, 2020
Greetings to all members We have had to cancel our society’s meetings for these two months due to the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak. The city of Caribou has requested that the Library, where we normally gather, cancel all meetings that are normally serviced by the Library. This is to help stop the spread of Coronavirus. […]
Historical Trivia, February 2020
Eavesdroppers Was the Term “Eavesdroppers” Coined From a Misunderstanding of Architecture? In Secrets of Henry VIII’s Palace: Hampton Court, it is claimed that little painted figures of human faces carved into the ornate ceiling beams of Hampton Palace as though surreptitiously observing the people below inspired the term “eavesdroppers” uninvited listeners to other people’s conversations […]
President’s Message, February 2020
My theme for everyone is to make use of the time when the weather is nasty and outside activities are at a stop. Use some of that time to update your various genealogy programs or to read some of the back issues of genealogical magazines that you have lying around the house. Once I finished […]
Surname Backgrounds
Here are some names of old occupations that may give you an idea of the history of your surname: Surname Occupation Backman/Backster/Baxter/Beck/Becker baker Barker One who strips bark from trees prepares leather with bark = tanner Bauer German for farmer Beadle/Bedel/Bedell town crier or someone who keeps order Boniface innkeeper Brewster female brewer Burgess represented […]
Historical Trivia, January 2020
The Upper Crust Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust. Orlan Smith
President’s Message, January 2020
Greeting and Happy New Years, As the New Year starts, take a minute to reflect on the past year. I hope you made some genealogical headway. Now is the start of a New Year and new plans. My plans are to try to fill in missing death dates for the many cousins I have. Here […]
This Old Tree, January 2020
“Find a Grave” has Wills!!! This column is about the value of finding copies of the wills of your ancestors. Today, on January 11, 2020, I was fortunate enough to run across a copy of the wills of a man and his wife from Culpeper County, Virginia. Both wills were found on the “Find a […]