Sep 8, 2023 —Of Stoops, Decks and Family

Happy September! I don’t know about where you live, but it seems to be cooling off here. I need to get a few new long sleeve shirts, and it is almost time to start wearing them exclusively. In fact, this morning I realized I will soon have to put new batteries in the thermostat that controls the boiler (the one that heats the house). It seems too early for that, but the thought did wander through my mind.

Also, in an interesting twist, I know where most of last week actually went! What a unique situation: to actually have a clue about how my time was spent. Amazing.

The big project was the back stoop. (And yes, I think I’ve settled on the term “stoop” even though it doesn’t match what I thought the word meant. I am expanding that definition in my head and moving on.)

Here’s a photo of the installation in progress:

And here are two that show the nearly final install:

I say “nearly final” because I ran out of screws that match the colour of the deck. Monday was Labour Day which meant the building supply store I use was closed, so I picked up more screws on Tuesday. Sadly, I have yet to finish that. Soon, I hope. But in the meantime it is perfectly serviceable and even the dogs seem to know it is safe and ready for use.

Monday and Tuesday were largely spent online, and there is little to show for that time. Some of it was related to the Community Association and some was just me wasting time or following the news (doomscrolling). But I also worked on removing the deck over the front door and starting to prepare it for the new install.

Here’s what it looked like:

For reference, the entire thing is about six by eight feet. (For my Canadian readers, call it two by two and a half metres. But since lumber is measured in feet up here, the dimensions that matter are imperial, not metric.) The painter powerwashed it as part of prepping the house for paint and a lot of the old stain came up. In addition, the colour doesn’t really go with the house and the wood is splitting. It needs replacing.

So I removed it. Here’s a shot of the removal in progress:

And here’s how it looks at the moment:

As you can see, the rubber protective layer that was under the deck was also removed. It will be put back down when I start on the new deck. In addition, the flashing all the way around is now painted black, which looks better, or at least more consistent.

I plan to keep working on the new deck this weekend, but I still need to determine the exact nature of the stringers I’m going to use and get the wood for them purchased. We’ll just have to see how far I get.

Wednesday I spent at a friend’s place, helping them repair some drywall and trim issues that were leftover from having a contractor re-hang a door the other way around. (That is, switching which side the hinges are on.) With the commute and socialization, that used the entire day. It was good to spend time with friends. (Hi Ducky and Jim!)

And that brings us up to today, Friday. All caught up, and nearly all my time accounted for. Amazing.

On the genealogy project, there has been little relevant progress, and no exciting new stories found. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t things to share.

Last week I presented you with a loop in my family tree. Within three hours of that post going live I had at least two different answers to the relationship between Zilpha Hawkes and Samuel Allen, the married couple in question. It was also pointed out that there exist charts that help explain the relationship between people, like this one:

The idea is to start with the person in question (“YOU” as it appears in the chart) and then follow the relationships around the tree.

So I created a chart for Zilpha Hawkes:

In her case, Deacon and Judith are her great grandparents, and Samuel — her husband — is her first cousin, once removed.

To confirm that, I created a similar chart from Samuel’s point of view:

In his case, Deacon and Judith are his grandparents, and Zilpha is one generation farther out (rather than one behind). But the end result is the same: his wife is also his first cousin, once removed.

This lead down the rabbit hole into other things: double cousins, half cousins, and so on, as well as what the rules for marrying cousins might have been at the time. I leave all of those as exercises for the interested reader.

In a fascinating turn, a reader (Hi Carolyn!) pointed out that Zilpha’s son (yet another Samuel Allen, not shown on the charts above) is also her own second cousin. And here the comment of yet another reader (Hi Sue!) really started to come into focus. She reminded me of the song I am My Own Grandpa. It’s definitely worth a listen if you’re not familiar with it.

An aside: does anyone remember the jokes about certain eastern European countries suffering from a vowel shortage? I think my family was suffering from a serious name shortage at this point in time. Far too many Samuels and Eleazers in just a couple of generations. Get some new names, people!

And the fun continues. Yet another reader (Hi Amy!) shared the wonderful term “Pedigree Collapse” with me. It’s what happens when “reproduction between two individuals who share an ancestor causes the number of distinct ancestors in the family tree of their offspring to be smaller than it could otherwise be.” (Taken from Wikipedia.) That’s the case in the example of Zilpha and Samuel. They have fewer ancestors in their family tree than is possible. And technically so do I as a result of their marriage.

Amy also shared the term “Endogamy” which is pedigree collapse on steroids. It’s the result of living in an area or group with few enough people that there is a lot of close marriage going on. Everyone’s family tree is reduced, and genetic issues become more common, or at least more possible.

Given my mother’s love of jargon, I can already hear her objecting to those terms. (Hi mom!)

Anyway, all of the above is based on what I knew when last week’s post went out. This week I did some more data entry, and I have a cautionary tale to share for those doing this kind of research.

At some point my great grandmother — named Edna Ellen Findlay — did a bunch of genealogy research and wrote it all down, by hand. A copy of those documents got to my mother, and eventually I got a scan of that copy.

The first problem is that Edna’s handwriting … er … leaves something to be desired. In most cases it’s clear, but in her particular cursive, the letters e, n, u, and even w all look pretty similar, so determining someone’s name can be a bit tricky at times. (Cursive writing is a curse and should never have been invented, but that’s only my opinion.)

The second problem is that she assumed everyone knew who she was talking about. So we have pages that look like this:

John Doe
b. June 22, 1887
m. Aug 4, 1901
d.
married Jane Smith
b. Oct 14, 1889
m. Aug 4, 1901
d. Dec 12, 1955
To this union was born
1. Bob Doe — born some date
2. Bessie Doe — born some other date

Then she goes off to list Bob Doe in the same way, followed by Bessie Doe.

The problem? I have no clue who John Doe is. There is no one with the last name “Doe” in my family tree so far, and she didn’t tell me who John’s parents were. Obviously I know Bob’s parents, but in some cases she gives names that don’t connect with anything or anyone.

In years past I would have been completely at a loss, but with Ancestry I can search for Bob Doe born in 1887 and the number of matches is rather limited. A quick check of a few of them and I can discover who his parents were, and — voila! — they are in my tree.

I cannot fully explain why the data is not clearly documented. In some cases the names unknown to me turned out to be Edna’s siblings. I think she listed them by their married names rather than their maiden names, so suddenly there’s an “Omer” line to the family where there hadn’t previously been one. In other cases I suspect I am dealing with multiple marriages. If a woman remarries, her children from the second marriage will have a different last name. And again, if Edna wasn’t careful about specifying married vs. maiden names, suddenly a whole new branch of the tree shows up and I have no clue who it connects to.

In all these cases so far, the people in question are not in my direct bloodline. Instead they are cousins of one degree or another. I’m adding them into the tree as I figure this stuff out — but it would have made my life easier if Edna hadn’t assumed her readers would already know who everyone in her document is.

And that is the point: if you are doing research like this, don’t make that mistake. Assume your reader is a Martian — someone completely unrelated who doesn’t know anything about you or your family — and document it so they can understand it. In just a few generations that assumption will pay off, so take the time to write it all down.

And with that, we are at the end of this week’s news. It was reasonably productive and pleasant. I hope the same was true for you!