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Memorial Day 2023

Remember and honor In so many ways, they were so much the same. And yet … in so many ways, so different. What they had in common — both were born to pioneering families. Both chose to fight to protect what they believed in. Both were 23 years old when they...

Welcome to Number 11!

A new Archivist of the United States It’s one of the most important titles in the American genealogical and historical world. The title of Archivist of the United States. Until yesterday, only 10 people had ever held the title: • Robert D. W. Connor, 1934-1941 •...

PTP finally!!!

GREAT news about 1812 pensions Yeah, The Legal Genealogist is late with the news, but this news is so good, it’s worth repeating even if you’ve already heard it. The project is back. Back on track. Back digitizing records. And not just plain old ordinary...

About that milestone…

Missing Tim He came into this world 50 years ago yesterday, a tiny little boy fighting desperately for his life. Born with hydrocephalus and spina bifida, the odds were very long against his survival — and even if he did make it, his lifespan at the time was...

Coming up: May-June 2023

Upcoming presentations The Legal Genealogist is way behind in posting — about upcoming events, genealogy news, or just about anything. Sigh… That’s because things are busy. Which is an explanation, not an excuse. So… here’s the scoop on...

Attention NY researchers!

Free from the NY State Archives It may be the single best guide to a single state’s court records that’s ever been produced. Authored and compiled by Dr. James D. Folts of the New York State Archives, it bears the unwieldy title: “Duely & Constantly...

Fixing a mess

Separating the Johnsons Wish The Legal Genealogist well. I’ve just emerged from the bowels of the FamilySearch Family Tree where I have been fighting with the entry for — allegedly — one man. He was born in two different southern states, died in two...

Coming up: April-May 2023

Upcoming presentations The Legal Genealogist is so looking forward to getting out and about more this spring… and there are lots of things coming up both online and in person. And, as before, I want to invite you to come along, to the extent possible, on the...

Revisiting the storms of spring

Remembering Thelma Note: Yesterday’s weather news has my cousin Thelma so front-and-center for me, her story so much in my mind. Her long life — we lost her in 2016, just shy of her 97th birthday — reminds us all that there is not always an unhappy...

Obeying the rule

… the one against perpetuities So… the eagle-eyed genealogists out there surely noticed that quirk in the legal story. The one about the dust-up between the Disney Corporation and the State of Florida. Where Disney did an end-run around a new governing...