Dear Long-Lost Uncle Ough, I know that you are dead—in fact, you died more than 130 years ago—but that’s no excuse for not writing to you about my recent fact-finding trip to your old hometown of Sacramento. Things have certainly changed since you lived there, and not all for the better. But I think you […]
Margaret Maguire’s Parents Hated That She Married a Tailor
Though we know very little about the life of my third great grandmother Margaret Maguire (1794-1880), this much has been passed down: Her parents were pretty pissed when she took a tailor, John Robinson, for a first husband in Belfast Northern Ireland. Tailoring may seem like a pretty noble occupation today. But Maguire’s father, a […]
The Magnate Came Up Largely Empty Handed in His Genealogy Research
Stop the digital press–this blogger recently obtained copies of genealogy reports commissioned by William Boyce Thompson that shed light on the family’s distant past. Unfortunately, researchers working for The Magnate ran into the same dead-ends that befuddle family researchers today. That said, The Thompson Reports include some exciting new information. H.H. Plate, Thompson’s secretary who in 1923 was sent on a fact-finding mission to […]
Joseph Ough Made a Big Impression on Great Grandfather Thompson
My great-grandfather, J.E. Thompson, really admired his uncle, architect and builder Joseph Ough. The respect didn’t stem from Ough’s financial success. It was due to the man’s artistic and spiritual achievements. “In your mother’s family, and mine, there were those that were stars in a financial way,” wrote J.E. Thompson in a letter to his son, “but the man […]
Thompson Line Seems to End at William Thompson, Sr.
Like most amateur genealogists, I have reached a maddening dead-end in the quest to trace my family roots. The end of the line is William Thompson, Sr., who appears to have lived most his life in Ontario, Canada, but was probably born in Scotland. Thompson’s very common name, which shows up often in Census counts, church […]