THOUGHTS FOR TODAY.

It is 7:10 PM and I am at work and it has wound down. I am actually waiting to go home. So I thought I would do a bit of writing but no pictures since I do not have my computer here.

My recent finds have been on my husband line. His cousin Helen Jean had already did his mothers line, so I went to do the fathers. My husband was surprised, he said I knew more about his family than he did. I just laughed.

I have found on my short journey that sometime you just happen to stubble up all sorts of knowledge and facts. Then other times you will go for months of finding nothing. He had told me that his great grandmother was pregnant with his grandfather when she came to this country. I have always said "To every rumor is a hint of truth." I found this to be true because it was not his great grandmother, it was his great great grandmother who had a child the summer after their arrival in Baltimore.

I have met the most interesting people on the Roots Web List and Ancestry.com. People who are from the same town as my husband Before I started this research I had never heard of Bohemia as a country, but indeed it was. That is where his fathers line is from. When we were first married we had gone to the cemetery and their tombstone was written in German.

I could not read it, but many years later after in contact with Julie, a newly found cousin of his, I revisited and took the pictures. She had posted a family tree on Ancestry and I sent her an email. My husband remembered her mother as a babysitter from his childhood. Julie had email me information on the family, information that I did not have at that time. My part in it was the name of the great grandfather. She asked how did I know that, "It's on the tombstone" said I. "What tombstone?" asked Julie. Guess I should take a trip to the cemetery and take some more, and so my quest began.

I have met a few other relatives from his town Millvale PA. The town was settled by German Bohemians, and I am thinking his great great grandfather, Christof Sperl was one of the first to come to America. He and his wife and two children came in 1869. I have recently joined the German Bohemian Society. What was interesting is the fact that a lot of the same family names are in the families in Minnesota. I know there is a connection but at this time I do not know how. A few months ago I got an email from Ed who was at a Family Reunion and some cousin had an old (1880ish) picture of the Sperl Family. There were no names and no one knew who they were. I have tentatively identified some of the people. I guess after this work we could all qualify as detectives.....

I have met some Irish cousins researching the same two families. The Dowd and O'Rourke Families. The ones I am lacking are the ones in Germany. The Schridde, Hackmann, Korbach and Bartel. I am working on that but first I think I need to take some German lessons.

Guess that is enough for tonight, it is snowing and blowing and I will be glad to go home where it is warm.