Contagious Genealogy: A Pandemic

I think it's possible that without my 5th great grandfather, Isaac Wilcox, I may never have become as infatuated with genealogy as I am. He was supposed to be my ticket into the lineage society, Daughters of the American Revolution. My great grandmother, Ethel (Hinman) Eggenberger, and her daughter, Vera, had become members based on his alleged participation as a patriot in the war for independence. However, when his records didn't hold up under the scrutiny of modern day genealogical standards, he became that enigma for me that has held my interest ever since. While I did, eventually, gain admittance into the DAR (via another ancestor's service), Isaac has remained a constant question mark for me. Upon submitting my original application to DAR's offices in D.C., the genealogist assigned to verify my case, wrote me a kind rejection letter explaining why Isaac Wilcox was no longer considered a "valid" patriot. It turned out that when this registrar did their d...

After my maternal great aunt, Frances (Dean) Wise, passed away in 2019, her daughter saw it fit to ship me two of the enlarged, framed photographs that had adorned her walls in Tulsa, Oklahoma. They had hung above the ancestral bed that had once belonged to her great grandmother, Elizabeth (Pitcock) Rockwell, who happened to be my 3rd great grandmother. I was already well acquainted with the two pictures, seeing as I was already in possession of much smaller versions in the photo albums I had inherited from my grandmother (Frances' sister). But I was stoked to add the framed stills to my personal collection, all the same. The frames themselves are pretty unique as they are made with sturdy wood and convex bubble glass over the picture. My best guess is that the frame may date back to the 1930s or '40s. The other thing that makes the photographs interesting is the fact they were hand-painted to bring color to minute details within the image, such as rosy cheeks. The smaller vers...

At the June 2018 Southern California Genealogical Society's Genealogy Jamboree event in Burbank, California, I had the pleasure of sitting down with The Photo Detective, Maureen Taylor, on the convention floor. She was offering immediate, in-person consultations on two photos for just $20. I couldn't pass up this opportunity to get her expertise on a photo of my 3rd great grandmother (actually two of my 3rd great grandmothers!). I admit I was a little intimidated. Although I had been studying my tree for years, I was still a baby genealogist and was rather green when it came to doing research the right way. Maureen was already well-known and established, so this was kind of like meeting a celebrity in genealogy circles. And I could tell she meant business when we began our session and she broke out her audio-set with a microphone that helped amplify her voice above the buzz of the expo floor. I asked if it was okay to record our session and her response was, "Absolutely!...