Civil War Stories

The Revolutionary War was a battle for the establishment of what we would later call the United States of America – the Civil War was fight to try to preserve that union.  So many expectations of mine have been proven false when I have looked at my Civil War ancestors.  My mother’s family primarily lived in the South so I expected them to probably be Confederates and I expected my father’s family to be fighting for the Union and to be fairly numerous because of their history of fighting in our countries battles.  I found that I was mostly wrong.

My great grandfather’s Gage and Gallup ancestors stayed primarily out of the Civil War from what I have been able to ascertain.  Perhaps they were needed for their farming or manufacturing ability.  I don’t find evidence that my great grandmother’s Shawver and Pitsenbarger family were involved either.  They lived in Nicholas Co., VA which later became Nicholas Co., WV – and there must have been other forces that caused problems.  However, my father’s one line that was in the South was involved…just not in the Confederacy. 

When I was in Carter Co., TN several years ago, I found a book written about the 13^th TN Calvary…I picked it up wanting to find information about my mother’s great grandfather who I know was in that unit and found that my 4^th great grandfather Moses Johnson along with his son Nicholas and son-in-law, Green Walker.  They were involved in the bridge burning that the 13^th TN Calvary did to slow the Confederate troops down. They and their families were mentioned specifically for protecting and providing for the soldiers who were hiding from the Confederate troops who were pursuing them.

Moses Friddles

Moses Friddles was an Artificer in 13^th TN Calvary.  His job was to repair muskets and artillery and keep track of the company ordinance.  The story goes in the family that his young son, Albert, spent part of the war with him.  Moses had left his two children with a family and the family had gotten sick and died of small pox.  Albert took his sister and found somewhere for her to stay and then went looking for his father.  He would have only been about 10 years old at the time.  Albert found his father and spent the remainder of the war helping out by holding the reins of the horses for visiting soldiers.  Moses survived the war as did Albert and married Mary Ann Crosswhite (his 3^rd marriage) which didn’t last.  In 1878, he married 16 year old Martha “Mattie” Brown.  He was 36 years older than she.  Their youngest son was my great grandfather, David Carl Friddle.  According to his pension, Moses was afflicted with chronic diarrhea, rheumatism, and piles.  Sounds like a pretty miserable life to me!

Jasper Bailey

Jasper Bailey was my mother’s great great grandfather.  His daughter Buena Vista Bailey was my great grandmother, Sophia (Mom Friddle’s) mother.  Jasper was a member of the 3^rd NC Infantry – a Union division.  He fought at Morgantown, Bulls Gap, and the Red Banks of the Chucky River which is where he was injured in his leg.  Jasper’s injury didn’t affect him much as a young man because he made his living as a bear hunter, but by the time he was an old man he was so crippled that he couldn’t walk very much.  He died on 1 Jan 1928 in Washington Co., VA.

My one Confederate ancestor was Alexander Monroe Dollar.  He was my great grandmother’s (Mom Friddle) other grandfather.  He was a member of the 58^th Infantry of North Carolina.  He enlisted on 20 Jul 1862, deserted on 9 Feb 1863 at Big Creek Gap, TN and then returned for duty on 10 Dec 1863.  Monroe Dollar then deserted from camp near Dalton, GA on 19 Mar 1864 and went over to the enemy on an unspecified date.  He took the oath of Allegiance at Knoxville, TN on 10 Oct 1864.  From what I have read, the 58^th North Carolina had one of the worst desertion records of any group in the Confederacy.

My last Civil War ancestor is John Lyons Tannahill.  He and his brother, Henry, found in the 7^th IA Calvary.  They enlisted in March 1864 and were mustered out in 1866.  Their primary duty during the war was guarding telegraph lines, and those traveling, escorting trains and protecting immigrants.  They primarily battled attains the Sioux Indians.  I don’t think he spent any of the war battling the Confederates just the warring Sioux along the Nebraska and the Dakotas.

My five Civil War ancestor all had unique experiences that covered the realm of experience for Civil War soldiers.  One worked as guard & protection duty, while another helped keep the artillery in working condition, another helped sabotage bridges to prevent the enemy from utilizing them for transport and still another was serving in battle and wounded and the last deserted his post and returned home.  Most of them lived to be old men except John Lyons Tannahill.   I still don’t know what he died from – he was only 33 when he died and he left behind a widow and three sons.  All of them died in their 60’s or 70’s.  I’m sure they had lots of tales to tell about their experiences…I wish I could go back in time to hear them!

Revolutionary War Veterans

Seeing that it is Veteran’s Day on Friday…I thought it would be a good opportunity to talk about some of my ancestors who were Veterans.  On my father’s side there are several mostly from the New England/New York area and Virginia:

·         Probably my oldest American Veteran who fought on American soil was my 9^th great grandfather, John Gallup.  He died storming the fort in the Great Swamp fight at Narragansett on 19 Dec 1675.  He was buried in a mass grave alongside his soldiers.
·         His son John Gallup b. 1646 was also with him at the battle but survived.   (8^th great grandfather)
·         Col. Nathan Gallup fought in the Revolutionary War.  (6^th great grandfather)
·         John Macomber fought on the Massachusetts line despite being a Quaker. (6^th great grandfather)
·         Abel Willey – fought in the a company from Plymouth to reinforce Ft. Ticonderoga (5^th great grandfather)
·         Asa Wheelock served in Ebenezer Learned’s regiment during the Lexington Alarm of 19 Apr 1775. (5^th great grandfather)
·         Edward Montanye fought in Captain Ten Eyck’s Company in the New Jersey militia. (6^th great grandfather)
·          Abraham Pitzenberger served as Private in Michael Reader's Co., from Virginia. (6^th great grandfather)

My mother’s family were pretty well entrenched in the south for the most part and the majority of her Revolutionary ancestors fought in the Battle of King’s Mountain in North Carolina.

·        James Tannehill served as a private on the Maryland line and spent a lot of his time as POW in the Revolutionary War. (4^th great grandfather)
·         Isaac Harrington served in NY under Captain Jonathan Hallett. (5^th great grandfather)
·         William Harrington in the 6^th & 10^th Berkshire Co., of Massachusetts. (6^th great grandfather)
·         David Allen, who was Adoniram’s father also fought in the Revolutionary war at the Battle of Moores Creek despite being in his late 60’s.  (6^th great grandfather)
·         Julius Ceasar Robertson fought at the Battle of Kings Mountain and the Battle of Point Pleasant. (5^th great grandfather)
·         Roderick Shelton also fought at the Battle of Kings Mountain. (5^th great grandfather)
·         William Dollar fought in the NC militia and was also involved in the Battle of King’s Mountain. (5^th great grandfather)
·         Adoniram “Teges” Allen served as a Captain in the South Carolina Partisan rangers in the battle of King’s Mountain.  (5^th great grandfather)

The likelihood is that there are probably several more that were Revolutionary War ancestors or veterans of the early wars from the 1600’s and 1700’s.  I must admit that one of my favorite ancestors that I have researched is Adoniram “Teges” Allen.  The story goes that he was born in 1734 in New Hampshire near the Vermont border.  He immigrated south to North Carolina with his father David and fought in the Revolutionary War.  Adoniram was recorded in Georgia and South Carolina before he decided at the age of 72 to make yet another move – to Clay Co., KY.  He built a water-powered saw and grist mill in 1807 on the south fork of the Kentucky River. He was nicknamed “Teges” which was shortened from “Tedious” which was known by, because he was so particular.  If you look at a map of Kentucky today, you will find a Teges river, which was named for Adoniram Allen.  He lived to the age of 104 and died in 1838…having retired only a few years before. I have heard that Adoniram Allen was closely related to Ethan Allen, of the Green Mountain Boys.  I always thought that the tie in was with Allen side…a few years ago, I discovered that they Adoniram & Ethan weren’t related through the Allen side but rather through their mothers – who were sisters. 

I’m sure that there are probably a few more Revolutionary War Veterans in my family that I do not yet know about.  I’ve studied history for most of my life.  I have always tried to imagine the difficulties that a Revolutionary Veteran faced – by fighting for the colonies – the choices that they made helped build our nation.  I’m proud of their sacrifice and those of their families.  They fought for the idea of the United States of America and defeated the superpower, the British Empire.  What a proud heritage that we have as Americans!

Goodbye Our Lady of Lourdes

Our Lady of Lourdes Church celebrated its last mass yesterday. It has been in existence in Lewiston for nearly a hundred years…and now it is closing its doors.  I never really attended Our Lady of Lourdes but I have many family members and friends who have.  My family attended St. James Catholic Church and it too will be closing its doors.  The have combined the three parishes in Lewiston, ID.

 

Before I was born, my mother was working as a music teacher at the Lourdes School.  She taught 1^st through 8^th grades and among her students was my sister, who was in 1^st grade.  Mom found out that she was pregnant with me before the school year in 1966.  She talked to Father Phelan, who the principal at the school, to let him know that she was pregnant.  Mom was prepared to lose her job, because pregnant teachers weren’t all that common.  Father Phelen told her that these were a bunch of Catholic kids and they were used to seeing pregnant women and didn’t see a problem.

Mom said that as her pregnancy became known, the kids would show up at her car in the morning and wouldn’t allow her to carry anything.  She said that even the nuns used her pregnancy as a teaching moment telling the kids about the development of a baby.  The big moment of the school year was always the Christmas concert.  Since Mom was starting to get pretty big, Father Phelen was getting a bit concerned that Mom might have me before Christmas.  Since the concert consisted of the band and the children’s choir – Mom’s role was pretty important.  They decided to hold the concert in the old Lourdes Church was located at the location of the present day Salvation Army.  Parents took charge to clean up the old church and make sure everything was ready for the concert.  Father Phelen made a special prayer on Mom to make sure that she didn’t deliver me before the Christmas concert.  Mom made it to the concert.  Her biggest problem was the interference she got when trying to conduct the children’s choir.  She wasn’t getting the attention from the kids has she expected and saw that their eyes kept wandering.  Mom turned around and saw her almost 3 year old son standing on a chair and imitating his mother by waving his arms.

Father Phelen’s prayer worked a bit too well.  I was expected in January but wasn’t born until February.  Father Phelen put Mom on maternity leave at the first of February.  Mom was receiving daily calls from her grandmothers, Dad’s grandmother, her mother, Father Phelen, and Dad while he was at work – checking on her and seeing if her contractions had started.  After a difficult delivery, Mom had me on the 9^th.  One of the first bunches of flowers that arrived was a huge horseshoe of roses.  All of her students had put together their nickels and dimes to buy the roses for Mom.  She let them give me my middle name.  Mom thought I looked like a little Spanish baby so with my black hair and so she named me Carmen and the Mom’s students gave me the middle name of Maria. 

My Baptism with my parents holding me.  Father Phelen baptized me at  Our Lady of Lourdes Church.

Mom went back to work and finished out the year after her maternity leave.  She missed the students, the nuns she taught with, and Father Phelen after she left Our Lady of Lourdes.  It is sad to see it close, and it will be sad to see St James and St. Stanilaus close their doors as well.  They have been a part of my life for my lifetime.

He is His Own Grandpa

My great grandmother knew who her ancestors were on both maternal and paternal sides of the family…so we never had a difficult time researching the direct lines. As we started taking the family back a few generations we heard from other distant family members.  One of these distant cousins was researching the Zopp family.  With such an unusual name it was fairly easy to add the information about the family from various census records.  We also found an unexpected connection!

My great grandmother was the granddaughter of George William Shawver – and he was the 2^nd oldest of 9 children born to Robert S. Shawver and Mary Jane Callison.  Robert Shawver was b. abt 1798 in Botetourt Co., VA and d. Oct 1871 on Mill Creek Mountain, Greenbrier Co., WV.  He was the son of George Shawver and Mary Gillespie.  Mary Jane Callison was b. 1804 in Greenbrier Co., VA and d. 5 May 1854 Mill Creek Mountain, Greenbrier Co., WV.  She was the daughter of Isaac Callison and Mary Cavendish and married Robert Shawver on 25 Apr 1820.  When she died in 1854, Robert married a much younger woman in 1856 named Cynthia Jones.   He was 58 years old and she was 21.  Robert fathered 4 more children with his younger wife and died in 1871. 

Robert Shawver’s daughter, Abigail Shawver, had married Benjamin R. Zopp in 1850 and quickly had their first son Joseph H. Zopp (they had 7 children).  As I was searching through the census records to find out what happened to these children – I found Joseph Zopp in 1880 with a wife named Cynthia and with 7 children in the household half of whom were Zopps and the other half were Shawvers.  It turns out that 2 years after Robert Shawver’s death, Cynthia remarried.  Just as she was a young wife to a much older man – she now married a much younger man.  At the time she married Joseph Zopp in 1873, he was 22 years old and she was 38 years old.  There was no blood relationship between Joseph Zopp and Cynthia Jones Shawver – but it didn't take me long to figure out the other relationship that they shared.  Cynthia was Joseph Zopp’s step grandmother – so when he married her, you could say that he was his own step grandfather.  Not only that, consider that the 4 children that he probably helped raise of hers were also his uncles and aunt…his children were siblings to Cynthia’s older children and also their nieces and nephews. 

I have come to the conclusion that some of these ancestor’s connections may not bear too close of scrutiny…and if you do – don’t be too shocked at what you might find!  

A Wedding Getaway?

I never really had a chance to talk to my grandmother about her “romantic” entanglements when I was a teenager and she passed away when I was 18.  Frankly, it was hard to think of your grandmother having much of a love life…and wasn’t really something I wanted to think about too closely J  I don’t know for sure when my grandmother met her first husband, O. Richard Tannahill.  I’m sure they knew each other in high school and I imagine they started going out together around 1932 or 1933.  I know that when my grandmother was teaching at the Snow School in 1933 that she was going out with Richard.  I do know that when they decided to get married…they had to be sneaky about it!

Richard & Cappy - taken about 1933

I don’t know if it was a common rule, but evidently school board members didn’t like the idea of their female teachers being married – at least in 1934 in Idaho.  I know that my father’s grandmother was a teacher and taught during the first year of her marriage in Nebraska.  Capitola, my grandmother, and Richard decided to go to Portland, OR to get married.  Grandma Cappy’s older brother, Jack and his wife lived in Portland.  My great grandmother (Mom Friddle) and Uncle Claude (Cappy’s younger brother) would travel to Portland by bus and return with Cappy & Richard by car.  It sounded like a good plan at least until they tried to get married in Portland, OR.  Later I found out that there was a waiting period between when you got the marriage license and when you could get married –so they married in nearby Vancouver, WA instead.  After their marriage, they traveled to Multnomah Falls and stayed in the lodge there for a short honeymoon.  They then returned to Portland to pick up Mom Friddle and Claude for the trip home.

I have often wondered why they traveled so far to get married.  They probably could have accomplished the same goal much closer to home.  I suppose it was important for Grandma Cappy to have both of her brothers there that day!  Today with a modern car and modern roads, it is a 6 hour drive from Lewiston to Portland on a good day with good weather.  Making that trip in a Model T back the early 1930’s in the dead of winter couldn’t have been an easy or fun trip.  The bus ride down had to be somewhat hairy as well and a super long trip.  When I was a teenager, I rode the bus home from Portland after visiting my grandmother and great grandparents in Canby, OR.  The trip home ended up to be about 10 hours rather than the normal 6 hours.  Several years ago, I asked my uncle Claude about the trip.  With a smile on his face, he began to relate the story coming home.

The old road between Portland and Multnomah Falls is now a historical road that winds around numerous hills, waterfalls, and beautiful vista points.  It is a wonderfully scenic drive that requires a good amount of concentration and skill driving the car.  Back in 1934, it probably had the same beauty, but was probably also much busier and probably not in quite as good of shape.  Richard brought Claude up front with him and sat him in his lap.  Richard let 10 year old Claude drive the car from his lap.  Claude told me it was great fun for him.  I asked Claude if he would allow a 10 year old to do the same from his lap – Claude told me NO WAY!

What is Behind the Dates?

There is a human element to genealogy research that sometimes we forget as we input data into our genealogy programs.  Sometimes it is important to stop and look at the dates and think about the human impact of them.  Even though they occurred outside most of our collective memory – there are some things that make one stop and think. 

My great-grandfather (Ora Silas Gage) grew up in Esperance, NY in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s.  There were a number of tragedies in his parents’ lives that bears closer examination.  Orlando Gage – Ora’s father, married as a young man to Charity Hotaling on 12 Jan 1875 – she was 19 and he was 25.  They had three sons and then a daughter when Charity died about a month later of quick consumption.  Orlando was left a widower at 35 years old and four children, including a baby daughter.  I believe that Orlando’s mother, Phebe Allen Gage took care of the baby and the boys were boarded with Orlando’s sisters so Orlando could continue to work.  Orlando married 28 year old Edith Gallup on 5 May 1886.  Edith had been a schoolteacher and taught at the Quaker Street Academy.  Her family had left in the 1880’s for Nebraska and Edith refused to go because she was frightened of Indians – so she stayed back in NY while her parents and siblings left.  As a teacher, she boarded with different families of the students that she taught, changing locations every few weeks.   It must have been quite lonely for her and by the standards of the time; she was probably considered an “old maid schoolteacher.”

After Edith and Orlando married, they had their first child in 1888, a son they named Allen.  Allen  died at almost 2 years old in a tragic accident.  He was in a walker and went under the kitchen table and stood up under the table and pierced his skull with a nail sticking through the table.  Granddad Gage remembered that story and cautioned all of his family to never let a baby walk under a table due to the tragic results from his own brother.  Granddad Gage was born two years later in 1892, his siblings Pete & Phebe followed two years later.  They were afraid that Pete wouldn’t survive.  He was an exceptionally tiny baby - I’ve heard about 4 pounds.  They kept him a dresser drawer surrounded by clothes and near a stove to keep him as warm as possible.  He survived and did well for himself – but Pete was always a rather small man probably due to his rocky start in life. The last child, Alice, was born in 1896.  By this time Orlando was 46 years old and Edith was 36 years old – they ended up buying the farm that Edith’s parents had rented and must have been a happy family.  They worked hard at their farm and Orlando continued to work for the Pullman Car Company as a carpenter.  (Pullman Car made railroad cars)  Tragedy then struck once more – sometime in late 1907.  I’ve never heard the entire story – but apparently Edith had a very bad fall and was pretty severely injured.  She was unable to walk much and certainly couldn’t do the hard work of a farm wife.  She wrote this letter to her mother, Phebe Montanye Gallup on Oct 23, 1907.

Dear Mother:

My twins are 13 years old today and a great deal of help to me. Monday night after school the girls washed a large washing besides getting supper. (I don't pretend to do anything only what I can do sitting down.) Tuesday morning they rinsed and starch the clothes done, did the morning work even to making beds and mopping and got things ready for dinner. They backed (2 apple pies) and got to school in time they were up at half past four. Orlando killed 5 pigs yesterday, 4 for market. They only dressed 102 lbs. a price. We kept one, sold them at Esperance and got 9 cents a lbs. They were late pigs, the last of April and only skim milk, so it was not so bad. He thrashed in the afternoon, earning $5 and moved his machine today. He is digging potatoes for us. He won't have any nuts to send to send you as the squirrels and friends of ours are taking them when the children are gone. Orlando is away thrashing and I can't stop them. I can only teeter backward and forward when I try to walk so I don't try much any more, the sides, back, and belly burns like fire when I try although the flesh feels ice cold, Orlando says, when you touch it. I do not feel heat nor cold just comfortable when I lay still that is something to be thankful and I do not worry. It will be and is all for the best.

I hope you are better. Here is a slip of a pretty red geranium. It is near time for the mail so I must quit with love to all.

Edith

By late 1907 or early 1908, Edith was very sick with pneumonia and died on 8 Jan 1908.  Orlando took care of her best as he could and when she died he took care of the burial arrangements and then went home and fell sick himself.  He was so sick that he wasn’t able to go to her funeral and died himself on 16 Jan 1908.  All of Granddad Gage’s older siblings were married and had homes of their own and Orlando Gage’s mother was too elderly to care for the children, so Granddad, Pete & Phebe, and Alice traveled across country to Nebraska to live with their Grandmother Gallup (Phebe Montanye Gallup) Granddad was 15, the twins were 13 and Alice was 12 and in the space of 8 days they had been orphaned. 

Orlando Gage Family - Abt 1896.  Edith is holding Pete & Phebe and Alice.  Ora is standing between is parents, Orlando on the far right.  I think this was actually two photos and were possibly stitched together at some point.

I think often of the sad journey that my great grandfather must have faced – traveling by railroad across the country to their grandmother.  Granddad Gage and his siblings lost their parents and their home.  They probably knew that there were many family members such as their grandmother, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends that they would never see again.  They were facing a completely foreign place in Nebraska and were to be living with a grandmother and other family members that they probably didn’t know very well.    Every one of the significant dates in our lives has a ripple effect.  Whether they are births, deaths, marriages or divorces – the human impact of these events needs to be considered.

Pennington Research Lessons...

In 1997, I decided to spend the big money and get dial up internet service.   I lived in the little town of Cottonwood, ID and this was an expensive monthly purchase for me.  At that time, most of my correspondence took place through email messages.  One of the first genealogy organizations I became involved in was the Pennington Research Association.  I had a name to research and I figured that they were the best place to start.

 

We had a family tree that had been embroidered and was hanging on the wall in our hallway.  I knew that my great grandmother’s grandmother was a Pennington and that her first name was Elizabeth from that family tree.  I started out with what I knew and started asking questions.  Elizabeth Pennington was born around 1840 in Ashe Co., NC.  She married Alexander Monroe Dollar and had at least one son, John Dooley Dollar, my great grandmother’s father.  One of the first people that emailed me back from the queries that I had placed was John French.  He told me that Elizabeth Pennington was the daughter of Levi Pennington, granddaughter of Levi Pennington and great granddaughter of Micajah Pennington.  This was my first “aha” moment in genealogy.  I now had a line that stretched back into the 1700’s.  I became an enthusiastic researcher in all things “Pennington” and joined the Pennington Research Association based on that one query that had been answered.

John French was the Research Director for the PRA (Pennington Research Association) and was a great researcher.  He did something that was quite forward thinking at the time – he took all of those paper notes on families and individuals and put them in a genealogy database.  Computers were still pretty new to a lot of people doing genealogy research so this was a pretty meaningful activity.  John French took people’s info and entered it into the database and then tried to connect the families and information as best he could.  Everything that we take for granted was not easily available through the internet back in 1997 and certainly wasn’t easy to research if it was available.  So his data became a great starting point to be able to help any researcher who only had a little information.  Very soon after my joining the PRA, I became the Group Leader for Group 7 – the descendants of Micajah Pennington.  Not too long after my initial contact, John French passed away.  This was a blow to a lot of Pennington researchers because John had pioneered a lot of research and there was a fear that it would be lost.  The PRA quickly appointed a new Research Director (Gene Pennington) and the data that John French had put together was saved and accessible by the Research Director.

Fast forward several years – the JFMF or John French Master File, as it was now called, still seemed to be to a lot researchers a depository of all Pennington knowledge.  By this point, I had a lot more experience with the JFMF because I had been managing it for a while as the Asst. Research Director for the JFMF.  Everyone wanted access to it on their own.  It was hard to communicate too many of the members what the JFMF really signified.  It was essentially a data file with a lot of theories but not much evidence.  It wasn’t necessarily a common practice to put sources down when John French compiled that information and now much of it was suspect because we didn’t know the source.  Not only that, further research had shown that some of the conclusions made were inaccurate.  What John French had accomplished was wonderful for its time – but the fact of the matter it was too difficult to modify and correct so the PRA decided to leave it as it was…So it became a source of clues rather than a reliable source and it became accessible to all interested PRA members through the www.myfamily.com website.

One only has to look at my line to understand what I mean by the statement that new research had changed some of the conclusions that John French had made.  My Elizabeth Pennington was the daughter of Levi Pennington b. 1794 and Elizabeth Henson.  However, she was not the granddaughter of Levi Pennington b. 1767.  Instead, Levi b. 1794 was the son of Ephraim Pennington.  I had never stopped researching my Pennington line and had gathered a lot of interesting materials because I was the Group 7 Leader.  One of these items was a letter written by a Daniel Pennington that referenced a brother who lived in Laurel Bloomery, TN and talked about visiting his son’s uncle Levi the next day.  That Levi was Elizabeth’s father.  You might have noticed that I use dates to differentiate the names.  That is because there a multitudes of Levis in Pennington research.  It makes it easier to figure out who you are talking about. 

So…what is the lesson here?  First of all, do your own research.  If you are really interested in a family – use other people’s data as clues but confirm it with your own research.  Just because you think you know the family well – don’t stop checking research as new data becomes available.  That new data can change your conclusions.  Correspond with other researchers.  Many of them are looking at the same families and they may have stories, pictures, letters, etc. that might enhance the genealogy that you are researching.  Add stories to your research about individual people.  Some of those stories or small facts enrich your history and may give either you or someone else one of those “aha” moments that really make research fun.  Lastly, join a genealogical one name association or genealogy society in an area that you researching.  Joining the PRA all those years ago has made me a much better researcher.  My research has expanded beyond just the research into the descendants of Micajah Pennington but now includes all Ashe Co., NC Penningtons.  These Penningtons ended up in VA, TN, KY, MO and many other states including my home state of Idaho.  The PRA has given me contact with other researchers who are exploring the same families but has also given me many close friendships.  The internet is a marvelous tool.  Primary data is now available online through free and paid for websites. Email correspondence can allow researchers from clear across the country trade information and documents at the click of a mouse.  I think of the marvelous work that John French did so many years ago.  He had the foresight to record what he knew and has left a marvelous record of clues for future researchers.