12th Edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy

The twelfth edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy is finally here! This edition happens to be the Halloween edition, and as such, the topic for this edition was on folklore, myths, legends, ghost stories or stories from Central and Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, this edition is smaller than others in the past, but here are the submissions:

First off, we have an article from Jessica Oswalt of Jessica's Genejournal. In A Brothers Grimm Fairy Tale That Goes Well With Halloween ..., she writes about a fairy tale (and of other fairy tales similar to it) that fits more with Halloween than it does with a person's stereotype of the typical fairy tale.

Well, that is it for this edition. The next edition will be hosted by Elizabeth O'Neal of Little Bytes of Life, and the topic for this edition is will be on "What resources are you thankful for in your Central/Eastern European genealogical research?" as a topic, in honor of Thanksgiving. A "resource" could be a web site, book, family member, or anything that has helped with one's research." Submissions are due on November 23, and the edition will be published on Thanksgiving, November 27. You can submit your articles here.

(Anyhow, on a side note, I just realized that I did not create a facebook notice for this carnival, and that is probably why the turnout for this submission was poor. If anyone has any other suggestions for ways that I can increase the number of submissions or suggestions for topics please e-mail me at: jess_history at yahoo dot com. Also, if anyone is interested in hosting future editions of this carnival, please contact me at the e-mail above. Thanks!)

Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy Submissions Are Due Wednesday!

I just want to remind everyone that Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy submissions are due Wednesday. (If you need an extra day, please let me know.) The topic for this edition is on folklore, legends, ghost stories, myths, etc, and the edition will be posted on Halloween. Enjoy!

Now, if I could just get my submission done ...

Just A Quick Reminder!

I just want to remind everyone that entries for the 12th edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy are due in a week from today (on October 29). The topic for this edition is on "folklore, myths, legends, and ghost stories. Since this edition will be posted around Halloween, I thought that this would be a good time to have a carnival on area folklore, myths, legends, ghost stories, traditions or festivals of the countries in Central and Eastern Europe. The submissions do not necessarily have to be a part of your family tradition; it could be a submission on a historical event or it could just have been a part of the culture of your ancestor." You can submit your article here.

Irish Ghost Tales: A Book ...

Although I now know that I have some Irish or Scot-Irish ancestors, I cannot report about any family traditions or superstitions from those ancestors since very little was passed in my family. So, in lieu of not having any family tales to share, I'll just write about a book I read several years ago instead.

Several years ago (when I was probably in Middle school), I visited a used bookstore, and bought a book that had caught my eye. The book I bought was True Irish Ghost Stories by St. John D. Seymour, and it was a thick paperback. (I forget what year my version was printed, but it was probably of a reprint of the second edition, since the book included the first ans second edition prefaces in it.) Obviously, one can tell from the title, the book is about Irish ghost stories, and the stories come from different areas of Ireland. As I think about this book, I'm starting to realize that is a really strange book. In the first preface, the author, who turns out to be a Catholic priest, writes that he wrote the book primarily because he could not find any books on Irish ghost stories while he could find books on English ghost stories. I find it highly unusual that a priest would have written this book, let alone have an interest in this subject, and because of that fact, I find the book to be very odd.

As I haven't read this book in several years (probably since I was a freshman in high school), I don't recall all of the stories in this book, but I can still recall some details of some stories. Of course, I really do not like thinking about this book or the stories in it due to the fact that the stories will bother me for some time after I've read them. I do not know what it is, but every time I read this book, I have this creepy feeling that I'm being watched by something, and I don't like the feeling. Since I become frightened every single time that I read the book, I have stopped reading it. (Yes, this type of stuff never fails to scare me.) When I told my dad about how the book scarred me, he mentioned that the Irish were known to be heavy drinkers and that I should keep that in mind when I read the stories. Even though I tried to keep that in mind, I still could not, and can't, keep the book from giving me the creeps. So, as you can imagine, I do not recommend this book for children as it could give children nightmares, and I do not read the book anymore. (I'm not kidding.) So, that's my caveat about this book.

Since I do not have any family tales of Irish ghost stories to tell, this is the best I could do for this topic.

Update - 12th Edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy

I have been unable to find anyone who wants to host the October edition, I have decided that I will host the edition. (I got the inspiration for my topic from Lisa's topic for the 9th edition of the Carnival of Irish Heritage and Culture.) The topic for this upcoming edition will be on folklore, myths, legends, and ghost stories. Since this edition will be posted around Halloween, I thought that this would be a good time to have a carnival on area folklore, myths, legends, ghost stories, traditions or festivals of the countries in Central and Eastern Europe. The submissions do not necessarily have to be a part of your family tradition; it could be a submission on a historical event or it could just have been a part of the culture of your ancestor. The deadline for submissions is October 29, and I will post the edition on October 31. You can submit your articles here.

What Happened To Harvey?

I've written about a missing person in my family before, but I've only written in general terms, not specifics. (Anyhow, I am writing this in the hopes that someone might be able to suggest other areas I should look for information.)In fact, I did not even mention the name of the person that I am looking for, and since I did not do that in the first place, I'll start by giving the name of the person I'm searching for: Harvey Benjamin Oswalt.

What I know about Harvey

I don't know very much about Harvey, but here is what I know so far:

Harvey was born in December of 1861 in Michigan, according to his father's pension file, and was Adam's oldest son and child. In the 1870 census he was living with his parents, and his age was given as 10. (All the ages of the children were rounded up by a year.) Sometime between 1872 and 1880, Harvey's mother died. (I still do not know when she died exactly, but his youngest brother's biography suggests about 1875-1876 as a death year.) Between the 1870 and 1900 censuses, I do not know where he was. I cannot find him in the 1880 census, and I also checked the social statistics schedule for St. Joseph County, Michigan for him. Yet, I could not find him. In the 1900 census, I found him living in Three Rivers and working as a day laborer. After 1900, I cannot find him in any other federal censuses. All I know is that when Adam died in September of 1910, Harvey's youngest sister did not have a clue as to where he was.

Could some family traditions be clues to Harvey's whereabouts?

My grandfather's aunt apparently never told my grandpa about Harvey. She did mention, though, that Henry (another one of Harvey's younger brothers) supposedly went to New Mexico or Texas and died out there between 1925-1929. At the moment, I have only been able to prove that Henry lived as far west as Clinton, Iowa, and that Henry died in 1927 in Michigan. I sometimes wonder, though, if it was Harvey who went out west and died between those years as well. The other family story that my grandpa's aunt passed down was that there was an Oswalt who was a horse rustler. I have not been able to prove or disprove this family legend, but I sometimes wonder if she was referring to Harvey.

Some possible records I could look for Information

• 1884 Michigan State census - I've looked for other Oswalt family members in this census, but I have not done so for Harvey. My first guess as to which county to look at is St. Joseph County.
• 1894 Michigan State census - I still have not checked this census for any of my Oswalt family.
• Other state censuses - I might need to the state censuses for Illinois, and see if any censuses for the 1880s and 1890s exist. Why? Adam and his son, Henry, lived in Rockford, Illinois sometime between the late 1880s and 1890s. (Henry continued to live there until 1910.) Could Harvey have moved out there with them?
• Probate packet - I still have not had a chance to obtain Harvey's probate packet in the St. Joseph County, Michigan's probate office. All I know is that the reason for the packer is given as missing. (I hope to be able to get a copy of the packer sometime in the future.)
• Other records - I'm not sure what other records I should check. The only record source that I can think of is court minutes for St. Joseph County, Michigan. I'm at a loss as to obtain or find the court minutes. Does anyone know how to obtain court minutes? Other than that, I have no idea as to what records I should look at.

Which record should I look through first? Any suggestions or advice is welcome. Thanks.

Celebrating Christmas Eve ...

On Christmas Eve, my family usually goes over to my grandparent's house. Usually we have dinner, and then we open gifts that they bought for us. We would spend several hours at their house, eating and talking. In all, I don't believe our Christmas Eve tradition is very much different from other families' celebrations.

2nd Edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy

Here is the second edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy. The topic for this carnival was on Christmas traditions of Central and Eastern European countries. Unfortunately, this carnival is short since I did not receive very many entries.

First off, we have Russian Holy Supper written by Marcie of A Child Chosen. This article is about the traditions of a Russian Christmas dinner.

Next, we have Getting Across Germany Cheaply, Part One written by poetloverrebelspy of Less Than a Shoestring. This article is on how a person can ride the trains in Germany cheaply. Although this article does not fit with the subject, I added it as I did not have any other articles to post.

Well, that is it for this carnival. The topic for the next carnival is on stories. Do any of your ancestors have stories of their homelands from Central or Eastern Europe? Are you familiar with any stories or folklore of countries from Central or Eastern Europe? The Next edition of the carnival will be due on January 25. You can submit your article here.

Day 23 Posted!

Day 23 of the Advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

Day 22 Posted!

Day 22 of the Advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

About the Next Edition of the Carnival of Central and Eastern European Genealogy ...

So far, I have only had one submission for this upcoming carnival. I realize that today is supposed to be the deadline for the carnival. Since I haven't received very many submissions, I will still accept submissions that are submitted tomorrow as well.

Christmas Catch-up ...

As I haven't had time to write posts for the last five days, I've decided to play catch-up with this entry and include the past entries in this post.

When I was in elementary school, each classroom would have a Christmas party on one of the last few days before the Christmas break. Usually, we would make Christmas ornaments for our parents, and maybe have some snacks. As I got older and went to Middle and High school, I didn't have classrooms that had parties. Instead, my classmates and I would either watch a movie or would make stuff such as Christmas decorations or little Christmas boxes. In my German classes, we would make Christmas cards in German for our parents. As far as I can remember, most of the schools that I attended did not have any Christmas pageants. When I attended my second high school, the school had a Christmas concert in the gym. I don't know if one would consider it a Christmas pageant, but I believe that is the closest that I have come to one. ...

As for Christmas celebrations or Christmas services, the churches that my family attended always had a Christmas Eve service. I have only been to a couple of Christmas Eve services. At Ward's, the first church my family attended, they had an evening service. The pews would be decorated with garland-wrapped poles and lit candles on top. From what I can remember of the service I attended, the sermon was on Jesus' birth. In addition to a Christmas Eve service, Ward's had a Midnight New Year's Eve service, but I never went to one of the services. After my family moved, we attended another church. This church had at least two evening Christmas Eve services. Again, the sermon was on Jesus' birth, but there would be music at the services. A couple of times, my mom played the piano for the services. Another difference was that all of the attendees held candles that were lit during the service. (Yes, even kids were allowed to hold candles, but the parents kept an eye on them. They were only lit for a couple of minutes, and then they were blown out.) In addition to holding candles, we would also sing songs. ...

As for stockings, both my brother and I had stockings. We did not hang our stocking up every year, but when we did, we hung on the mantle of the fireplace. The few times that we did hang up our stockings, our stockings were filled with small presents, like socks or movies. Of course, the presents in our stockings were not the only the presents we got. We did get other presents. ...

Speaking of presents, they had to be bought. Until the past couple of years, I didn't really buy Christmas presents. I don't know when my parents went shopping as I never went looking for my parents' hiding place for the presents. I only started to buy gifts a few years ago, and when I did, I bought gifts at book sales on my school's campus. I guess you could say that I bought gifts early since the sales were at least a couple of weeks before my school went on Christmas break. ...

When it comes to Christmas, though, I don't associate remembering dead relatives with Christmas. I don't visit cemeteries at Christmas time, since my ancestors are buried in cemeteries to far away from home. As for remembering deceased relatives, we would talk about fond memories that we had of them. Of course, we did not just talk about relatives. At one Christmas dinner, we reminisced about one of the pastors at Ward's who had passed away just a few days before that Christmas. ...

As for music, we listened to Christmas music in the car and on the radio on days before Christmas and on Christmas. (I don't have a favorite Christmas song, but I like several of the Christmas songs.) We did not go caroling, although one year a group of neighborhood children went door to door caroling. ...

As you can see, I've had quite a bit of catching up to do. Hopefully, I'll be able to contribute to the next two entries.

Day 21 Posted!

Day 21 of the Advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

20th Day of the Avent Meme Posted!

The advent meme for day twenty has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

Day 19 of the Advent Meme Posted!

The 19th entry of the advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

Day 18 of the Advent Meme Posted!

The 18th day of the advent meme has been posted. You can read it here. Enjoy!
(Again, I did not have time to write an article for this day.)

Day 17 of the Advent Meme Posted!

The 17th day of the advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!
(Again, I did not have time to write an entry.)

Day 16 of the Advent Meme Posted!

The entry for day sixteen of the advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy! (I didn't submit an entry this time. I would have liked to submit one, but I did not have time.)

Day 15 of the Advent Meme Posted!

Day 15 of the Advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!

Day 14 of Advent Meme Posted!

Day 14 of the Advent meme has been posted! You can read it here. Enjoy!