Other than all of us being Children of God (below, top left), at first glimpse very little. Weren't the occupants all monks? Guess again. They were priests, religious brothers - the 3 on the far right, below - their students, and local employees. Some, like the 3rd man from the right, joined the Franciscans late in life (51.) Many were immigrants, including the 4 Irishmen, Spaniard, and Canadian in the group shot below. The second man from the right had come to CA from Ireland as a gold miner and "eventually" joined the Franciscans in the 1860s. Probably all of these men had brothers and sisters, too. One way to move past a brick wall is to step back a generation and find siblings, then look for THEIR vital records, obituaries, etc. In the case of Catholic immigrants, it was extremely common to have siblings who were sisters/nuns and religious brothers or priests.

Also, as a religious order whose members take vows of poverty, Franciscans relied on the generosity of parishioners, many of whom were later buried on mission grounds. The birth record of Daniel Hill (b. Billerica, MA 1797) is easily found on the NEHGS site. Based on nearby gravestones, Daniel and his descendants intermarried with the local Spanish-speaking population and the family picked up some new surnames and a new religion. I saw gravestones of Rickards and Fitz Randolphs, too, names found in the Warren and E Fuller silver books. Daniel's stone said he had lived in CA since 1823, 11 years before Richard Henry Dana of Boston voyaged there, as told in his memoir Two Years Before the Mast. A generation later, New Englanders were part of the CA Gold Rush of 1849, some remaining in the Golden State. The Santa Barbara mission would have registered its parishioners, listing all family members, and  today it has a large archive. If you have alta California ancestry, think about inquiring at the closest mission.

And with Mayflower genealogy specifically? More than I would ever have guessed. To start with, did you know that Jell-O has its own museum?

It does, in LeRoy, Genesee Co, New York, which we took a special detour on our Erie Canal journey to see. LeRoy is the birthplace of Jell-O - AND of the stringless green bean.  In its farming heyday (1800s) hundreds of seasonal workers from the surrounding area came to LeRoy (originally Bellona and previously part of Caledonia in Livingston Co, and sometimes referred to as the Ganson Settlement) every year to do the laborious work of shelling beans and assorted other tasks. They were male & female, young & old, but apparently from a relatively limited area, central NY. If you have a Mayflower relative you cannot find, consider looking for him or her in LeRoy / Le Roy, which was on a major migration path out of New England and to NY, MI and elsewhere in the Upper Midwest.

Look for them at the LeRoy Historical Society, 23 East Main St., in the old house in front of the Jell-O Museum (which is around the back). The two work together and visitors to the Jell-O Museum are actually supporting the work of the Historical Society, including the LeRoy House, originally the tiny home of land agent Jacob LeRoy but later expanded to be large enough to hold the first college for women in the U.S., Ingham University. It ran from the 1830s to the 1890s and expanded across Main St. and part of the property is now the Woodward Memorial Library. If you have a female ancestor who was noted at the time for being well-educated, particularly in the arts, look for her in LeRoy, NY.

Tucked away in a corner  of LeRoy House (below) was a framed collection of "head shots" labeled something like "Class of 1880." Another item was a bookcase with shelves of plain gray-bound books labeled "lineage books." Who knows, maybe it was someone's records of livestock pedigrees, but the guide thought they had been donated by a group, maybe the DAR, making them human pedigrees. The Society does have a collection of records and will do genealogical research for you, so do contact them or better yet support them with a membership, just $25.00.

I have just finished Week One of the Boston University online genealogy course and turned in my first assignment for grading. It is extremely interesting so far with a ton of new information to learn, even for someone with a doctorate in history, and very challenging assignments requiring a serious commitment of time and energy. There is a large staff of helpful instructors who don't miss a chance to present us with something new to learn from a variety of sources. The student population is (to me) surprisingly varied in background, skill sets, experience level, and goals. Please wish all of them luck as well.

If you are tracking ancestors who left the east coast for the center of the country in the early-mid 1800s, hopefully you know to check for them on the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM)'s General Land Office (GLO) records site, https://glorecords.blm.gov. This is a database of sales, grants, bounty land warrant use (whether by the veteran or someone to whom he or an heir gave or sold the warrant), Indian land allotments to individual tribal members, and other transactions in which U.S. land was transferred out of federal hands. The GLO has a new section highlighting "story maps" selected from their immense holdings. It's in the green box on the home page as "Check out GLO's Survey of the Week!" links. (Stories appear to be more "occasional" than "weekly.") The August 17th "fascinating story of the Neutral Strip in Louisiana" is helpful for genealogists researching ancestors in the Lake Charles, LA area circa 1792-1836. Originally it was contested by Louisiana and Texas when both were controlled by the Spanish government, then decreed "neutral ground" in 1806, making it a magnet for "outlaws, settlers, fugitive slaves, and displaced Native Americans." (Sound like any of your ancestors?) After joining the U.S.,   Congress acted in 1823 and 1824 to survey the land holdings to see who its newest citizens were. Residents testified as to how they acquired the land, when, whose land bordered theirs, what they did with the land, and then neighbors testified in their support. This information is available as Survey Plats and supporting documents. (To see Survey Plats, first find the grant using the "Search Documents" feature on the home page. Back at the home page, click on "Survey Plats and Field Notes" and enter the coordinates for the land as shown on the grant. This will bring up the hand-drawn map with notes. There may be more data on the grant that will allow you to use the "Land Status Records," "Control Document Index Records," "Tract Books," and "Land Catalog" search features on the home page.) Records not yet digitized are held by the National Archives (archives.gov).

I posted one message from my iPad while chugging along the Erie Canal at 6 mph last week or the week before but all that actually showed up was the heading. I'll try again now that I'm home and have my computer. Below is a picture of the mighty Seneca which your webmaster and companions piloted from the stern, using the tiller you can see to the left of the American flag. The first thing I asked, though, was how to pronounce "Skaneateles," where the boat is registered, and which those of you doing central NY genealogy may also have wondered about. Turns out that today they say it "Skinny Atlas" but I would guess that 250 years ago it was something closer to "Skanny AT ah las."

Since returning I've posted an image of Brewster descendant Henry Stanton that I made in Seneca Falls and some photos of Bradford descendants George Eastman and family that I took at his mansion in Rochester, and I dutifully updated the All-Name Index. Stay tuned for more.