Randy Seaver's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Goals for 2026

 Time once again for Randy Seaver's  Saturday Night Genealogy Fun in which we are encouraged to state our genealogy goals for 2026.  My list is rather short. 

1.  Finish my revision of my family history on my father's side, Richards Packard, His Ancestors and Descendants in Direct Line to Arden Packard (1911-1954), Together with Some Notes on Selected Collateral Relatives.  Yes, that's a mouthful.  I am revising it, as I have found a good deal of additional information, and I need to correct some errors in the earlier edition.  I plan to send copies to the Georgeville, Quebec, Historical Society, the Library of Congress, the New England Historic and Genealogical Society, the Southern California Genealogical Society, and to provide a copy to my local genealogical and historical societies. 

2.  Continue filling out my contributions to WikiTree.  

3.  Finish with success the Profile Improvement Project on WikiTree.

4.  Do more in filling out my genealogy on my computer, using Legacy Family Tree.

5.  I bought a copy of Planning a Future for Your Family's Past, by Marian Burk Wood.  As I'm 78 in a family not generally known for long lives, I need to start preparing for preservation of my family history.  WikiTree is part of this planning, for me.  

That about does it, because another goal for 2026, covering my life in general, is to practice the practical art of saying, "No."  I don't have the time or the energy to be overcommitted, as I have had a habit of doing in the past.  

 

Randy Seaver's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Goals

This week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun asks:

1)  What are your genealogy goals for 2025?  Consider genealogy research, education, organizing, service, writing, and whatever else you care to share.

My main genealogy goal this year is to enroll in the non-credit courses in genealogy offered by Boston University.  I'd like to sharpen my skills.

Another goal is to finish my revision of Richards Packard: His Ancestors and Descendants, a family history of my direct line from my fourth great-grandfather.  I have found much more information, so a revision is needed.  I will deposit copies with the Georgeville, Quebec, Canada, Historical Society, the Library of Congress, and the New England Historic Genealogical Society.

I need to finish investigating land ownership in East Tennessee by my mother's ancestor, Teter Nave.  I'm hoping to be able to go back far enough and, with other information, apply to the First Families of Franklin lineage society.

I'm thinking of contacting my county's board of education to see if they'd be interested in a course on genealogy in their continuing education program.

 I think that's probably enough.  These, alone, will make for a busy year.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: 2025 Week 1 -- Start at the Beginning

With the new year come another 52 weeks to blog on our genealogy adventures, prompted weekly by Amy Johnson Crow's long-running series, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.  The questions in this prompt are:  "Who was the first person you wanted to find when you began your genealogy journey? Was there a family member who sparked your interest, perhaps by giving you a treasure trove of genealogy 'stuff'?"

The family member who sparked this interest . . . h'mmm, let's go ahead and call it what it is: obsession . . . was my late sister-in-law, Kathy [Allred] Packard.  She was of the LDS persuasion, and my brother converted to that faith in their marriage.  She had traced things all the way back to the original immigrant, who came from Suffolk to the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts, and who sparked my interest, in Amy Johnson Crow's words, and who was the focus of my budding research.  

My research, however, soon revealed that the derivative sources Kathy had depended on had errors.  I set about to investigate and, I hoped, correct the errors.  So the subsequent 40 years since have been an interesting journey.  I took courses by mail and online from the National Institute for Genealogical Studies of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  They were offering a non-degree course of study through the Faculty for Information Studies, the virtual outlet for course offerings through the University of Toronto.  The completion of this course of study earned the participant a certificate of completion rather than a degree, as the courses were all non-credit courses.  My area of study under this program was in American Records.  The instructors for these courses are either certified genealogists or Ph.D.s in their fields.

I attended what conferences I could, what with work, family responsibilities, and an often-limited budget.  I have been able in recent years to attend webinars and conferences virtually, which is wonderful, as my travel options are limited (I can't fly due to medical issues), and a serious illness of one of our children limits our budget.

One of the exercises for one of the classes from the National Institute was to find relatives you hadn't had previous contact with.  I found out that my father's line, surname Packard, had gone into Canada from Massachusetts.  Richards Packard, my fourth-great-grandfather, fought in a couple of Massachusetts regiments in the American Revolution.  I obtained his Revolutionary War pension file and found out a great mass of information about him, and a good deal less about his wife, Sarah "Sally" Coates/Coats, including where in Canada they settled.  I placed an advertisement in the local newspaper in the area of Canada where Richards Packard had settled.  The ad was answered by a non-relative, a member of the Georgeville, Quebec, Historical Society who put me in touch with my Canadian cousins.  We corresponded for a while, but with all the sturm und drang of getting old, problems and difficulties of one sort and another, we fell out of touch.

But I learned a good deal more about my family history.  The adventure since has turned up a collateral relative from the Revolutionary period who for some reason, turned his coat and became a "rascally Tory."  I found that a family related on my mother's side is also related on my father's side, kinda like what people say here in the south where I grew up: "I'm so southern, I'm related to myself."

I'm looking forward to more discoveries.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 20: Taking Care of Business

This week's title phrase can mean a variety of things.  It can literally mean taking care of one's means of supporting self and family.  Here on this blog, I've discussed businessmen and businesswomen in the family:  Emily [Hoyt] Packard, who was a milliner; Nelson Reed McKee, a jeweler and watchmaker; Frank A. Packard, Bloomington, Illinois, merchant; Perry Wilmer Reed, head of the Pensacola, Florida, Chamber of Commerce; my father, Arden Packard, and his brother Jack, advertising agency owners; Oscar Merry Packard, builder and developer; Walter Hetherington Packard, builder and developer, and stockbroker.

The phrase can also mean buckling down and taking care of the serious stuff in life.  Samuel Packard's religious convictions caused him to take his wife and their firstborn, a daughter, on a risky and most probably quite uncomfortable sea voyage in 1638, from their home in Suffolk, England to a hardscrabble new settlement in a wild land called Massachusetts.  There was Richards Packard, who did his part in taking care of a certain dispute with England at the end of the 1700s.  After that was settled, Richards began a northward migration that left him disappointed in Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire, on up into Canada, which was practically giving land away and not being terribly picky about who they were giving it to, even to those who had previously taken up arms against His Majesty, George III.  The succeeding three generations of my line were born in Canada.  Mathew Hale Packard, a member of that third generation, took a chance on what I call "retro-migration," going from Canada back to the U.S.  He took care of other grim business from 1860 to 1865, serving in two regiments of New York cavalry.  Farther west, at the same time, Charles Reed did the same in a regiment of Indiana infantry.  My father took care of the business of serving in the U.S. Navy, from his education at the Naval Academy to World War II service.

They all, with their brothers and sisters and cousins and aunts and all else, took care of the business of living, as best they could.

A to Z Challenge 2024 - Professionally Speaking - M is for Military

 From the very first English emigrations to the New World, my family has had individuals in it who did military service of one form or another.

As with most men in early colonial times, Samuel Packard, my eighth great-grandfather, served in the militia of his town of residence.  He came to the New World first at Hingham, Massachusetts, shown in some records as New Hingham, named for a town in England.  From there, he moved to Weymouth, and eventually settled in Bridgewater, the part that is now known as Brockton.  A town in New England at that time was centered around the church; and it was the church.  Church membership was required for a man to be considered a "freeman," to be able to vote and hold office.  Now and then, there would be a squabble in a church over something-or-other, and a group would break off and set up another church in another part of town, creating thereby a new town.  Bridgewater eventually split into East Bridgewater, West Bridgewater, and North Bridgewater.  It was in the latter town that Samuel Packard lived, and which later became Brockton.

Samuel's fourth-great-grandson Richards Packard served in the American Revolution.  His name was Richards; he signed several documents, including at least one in his Revolutionary War Pension file, as Richards.  He was probably so named after his mother's maiden name; her name was Mercy Richards.  I have written a booklet on Richards, his ancestors, and his descendants.  In it, I describe his military service:

"Richards Packard’s original enlistment was at Western, Massachusetts, for a term of six months. Western is in Middlesex County, north and west of Bridgewater. Richards mustered in at Springfield, Hampshire County (that part which is now Hampden County), in Captain Wade’s company, Colonel Jackson’s regiment. The company went to West Point, New York; Richards was at Kings Ferry and, as Richards says in his sworn statement, at Haverstraw “when Andre was hung,” referring to the execution of Major John Andre, the British spy who was hanged 2 October 1780 at Tappan, New York. Richards Packard was discharged in the fall of 1780. 

"He enlisted again in February, 1782, at Leverett, Massachusetts and again was at West Point, this time under Captain Smith in Colonel Rufus Putnam’s regiment. During this time, he suffered from smallpox, but apparently recovered. The troops went to Verplank’s Point in the spring of 1783, and were there until fall, when they retired to winter quarters at Newburgh, New York. He was discharged in February of 1783."

I have two direct ancestors who served the Union in the Civil War.  My paternal great-great grandfather, Mathew Hale Packard (not a typo; there was only one "t" in Mathew's name) served in two different regiments of New York Cavalry, the 15th New York Cavalry, and the 2nd Regiment, New York Provisional Cavalry.  My maternal great-great grandfather, Charles Reed, served in the 140th Indiana Infantry.  Both survived, but were disabled by disease.  

My father, Arden Packard, enlisted in the Navy and was admitted to the U.S. Naval Academy in 1930, having passed a competitive exam offered to enlisted personnel.  He graduated from the academy in 1934.  He took flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station in 1937, and that is where he met my mother and they got married in July of 1937.  He received exemplary fitness reports, placing him in the top 5% of Naval aviators -- "Top Gun" territory.  But he was grounded due to medical problems, and became a flight instructor.  In that capacity, he was sent by the Navy Department to the Empire Central Flying School, outside of London, England, to learn the tactics the British were using against the Germans.  He brought that knowledge home and taught these tactics to his students, who would be shipping out with the Atlantic Fleet to English waters to fight the Germans.

Inspired by our father's service, my brother enlisted in the U.S. Marines after high school, and I enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve when I saw how much my husband was enjoying his Coast Guard service.  Our family very much has a military tradition.

 

A to Z Challenge On the Move: C is for Canada and California

The origin of my Packard line in the United States is Massachusetts, the Plymouth Colony, the town of Hingham.  Samuel Packard brought his wife Elizabeth and their infant daughter Mary there in 1638.  Not long after, they went to Weymouth, and even later to Bridgewater.

The next subsequent two generations pretty well stayed put.  Eleazer, Samuel's great-grandson, went west.  Though Richards Packard, Eleazer's son, grew up there in western Massachusetts, he was born in Bridgewater.  

The American Revolution turned things upside down.  Richards, at 17, enlisted in a Massachusetts regiment and ended up serving two enlistments in two different regiments.  After the Revolution, he began a fairly long migration north.  He settled first in Winchester, New Hampshire, where he met and married Sarah "Sally" Coates.  I do not have much information on her as yet.  In Winchester, Richards worked in a foundry.

His feet feeling the need to wander once again, he and Sally took up their anchor and headed north.  They ended up in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, where their son John Allen Packard, my 3x-great grandfather, was born.  It wasn't long after when Richards and Sally sold their farm in Vermont and headed north again, this time ending up in Canada.  They settled in Stanstead, in Quebec, in an area known as the English Townships.  This was their final migration.

This was also where John Allen Packard grew up, and married.  He married Miriam Bullock, and together they had a pack of children.  John Allen was a Methodist preacher.  One of their children, Mathew Hale Packard, also grew up in the English Townships, and married Emily Hoyt.

Mathew Hale and about half of his siblings ended up going back into the United States around 1850.  Mathew and his wife, and their son Oscar Merry, born probably in Hamilton, Ontario in 1848, ended up in Chautauqua County, New York, across Lake Erie where they were enumerated in the 1855 New York State Census in Harmony Township.  They also had a daughter, Augusta, born in New York, probably in Harmony Township, Chautauqua County.  Members of Emily Hoyt's family had settled there, and the Packards had followed.

It was from here the Mathew enlisted in a New York regiment of cavalry for the Civil War.  He served in two different regiments.  As with most who fought on either side in that war, Mathew suffered more from ailments than from war wounds.

After the war, Mathew and his family migrated to Bloomington, Illinois, where a number of his siblings had settled.  This is where Mathew, by occupation a carpenter, and Emily, a milliner, lived the rest of their lives.

Their son, Oscar Merry, became a real estate agent.  He married Augusta Hetherington, born in Chicago in 1851.  They had four children:  Herbert Roy Packard, Ruby Packard, Walter Hetherington Packard, and Hale Boring Packard.  Once he became established in real estate, Oscar packed up his family and migrated to the best place for real estate agents in the late 19th and early 20th centuries -- California.

It was in California that Walter Hetherington Packard grew up, and where he met and married Elizabeth Jane "Bessie" (later "Betty") Reynolds, who was born in Atlantic, Cass County, Iowa.  They, like Walter's parents, had four children:  Walter Reynolds ("Ren"), John Creighton ("Jack"), Arden (no middle name), and Sarah Virginia ("Sally").  

This long enough tale ends here, for the story of Arden and his migrations can be found in my blog entry On the Move: A is for Arden.

A to Z Challenge On the Move: B is for Bicoastal

My father's family line in America began with Samuel Packard, born around 1610 in Stonham Asphal, Suffolk, England.  He became a separatist and left England for the Plymouth Colony in 1638.  With him were his wife Elizabeth and their infant daughter Mary.  Elizabeth's maiden surname has never been discovered.

Samuel and his family settled first in Hingham, Massachusetts, then removed to Weymouth and finally ended up in Bridgewater.  As towns were organized in those colonial days, it all revolved around the church.  There was a squabble in Samuel's church, and one part of the congregation broke away and renamed their part of the town North Bridgewater, which today is known as Brockton.  Samuel was a farmer, and he also kept a tavern, known as an ordinary, in his home.  This was a common colonial practice, and not just in the English colonies, but also in the Spanish colonies in Florida, as my studies of one of those colonies, St. Augustine, Florida, have revealed.

Samuel was also at one time or another the Keeper of Minister's Rates (tax collector) and Surveyor of Highways.  He was obviously literate and worked well with numbers.

Descendants of Samuel, through several generations, scattered to the four winds.  My fourth great-grandfather, Samuel's great-grandson Richards, served in the American Revolution and afterwards, went north in search of land.  He went up into New Hampshire, where he met and married Sarah ("Sally") Coates.  They continued their migration up into Vermont, where my third great-grandfather, John Allen Packard, was born.  And apparently Richards was not satisfied with the land he tried to farm in Vermont, and he heard that the Canadians were giving away land and were not being particular about who they were giving it to.  He eventually settled near Georgeville, Quebec, in an area known as the English Townships, because so many Anglophones settled there.  My great-great grandfather Mathew Hale Packard was born there.*

Mathew Hale Packard married Emily Hoyt in Canada.  Their son Oscar Merry Packard, my great-grandfather, was most likely, by everthing I have found so far, born in Hamilton, Ontario.  His happy-sounding middle name came from the Merry family, close friends of the Packards in Georgeville.  Mathew and Emily also later had a daughter, Sarah Augusta.  This family migrated from Canada to Chautauqua County, New York, after the Civil War, in which Mathew served from two different regiments of New York cavalry.

Another migration was in store for this family, as they ended up in Bloomington, McLean County, Illinois, with a few of Mathew's brothers and sisters, and their families.  It was in Bloomington that Mathew Hale Packard died.

His son, Oscar Merry, continued the peripatetic Packard tradition, and after becoming a real estate agent, took that career to the perfect place for it at the perfect time -- southern California in the early 20th century.  Before leaving Illinois, however, he married Agusta Hetherington.  They had several children, among them my grandfather Walter Hetherington Packard.

It was in California that my grandfather met and married my grandmother, Elizabeth Jane Reynolds.  Their children were Walter Reynolds Packard, Arden Packard, Sarah Packard, and John Creighton Packard.

In my previous post, A is for Arden, the story is told of my father's migrations, which went from California to Maryland to Virginia to Florida, and back to California.  We have been a very bicoastal family.


*Be it noted that, yes, my fourth great-grandfather's name was Richards, with the s.  His mother's maiden name was Mercy Richards, and that is probably where his name came from.  And my great-great grandfather Mathew Hale Packard had only one t in his first name.

Armed Forces Day: A Family History

Today is Armed Forces Day, so I am going to talk about ancestors and other relatives who have served in the military forces of the United States.

On my father's side, I can trace back to a Revolutionary War ancestor, Richards Packard.  He enlisted in Massachusetts at the age of 17, in 1780, and serve two enlistments.  We don't have any War of 1812 ancestors in this line, because in around 1796, Richards Packard headed up to Canada, not because of any change of heart after the war, but because in Canada, in Quebec, the government was giving land away without much worry about who they were giving it to!  He found farmland to his liking, and settled in the area of present-day Georgeville.  His movements after the Revolution had a northward trend, from Massachusetts to New Hampshire, up into Northern Vermont, and then into Canada.  I guess he was more picky about his land than about the winter climate!

My great-great grandfather Mathew Hale Packard "retro-migrated" back to the U.S. in around 1850, settling first in Chautauqua County, New York.  He is enumerated there in the federal 1850 and 1860 censuses and in the 1855 New York state census.  He was still in New York in the 1860s, and there enlisted in a cavalry regiment for the Civil War.  On the other side of the family, another great-great grandfather, Charles Reed, served in an Indiana infantry regiment.  Both men suffered more from illness than from combat action, neither having been wounded, but both feeling effects of disease.  Both received pensions based on disability; Matthew Hale Packard didn't benefit from his for long, for he died in 1881.  Charles Reed lived, in poverty, until 1920.

I don't have any record of anyone in World War I.  My maternal grandfather Perry Reed was a railroad freight agent, and therefore in an occupation of national security importance, so he wasn't drafted.  My paternal grandfather ran a dairy; I don't know if he had any particular deferment; I haven't looked for the draft  registration status of either one of these yet.  Just haven't had time.

My father, Arden Packard, enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1929, right out of high school.  A year later, he took a competitive exam and won entrance to the U.S. Naval Academy (the way serving sailors got in).  He graduated from the Academy in 1934, served on aircraft carriers, and finally got to indulge a passion of his childhood and youth -- he entered flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station in 1937.  It was in Pensacola that he met my mother.  He was medically retired in about 1939; in 1941 -- several months before Pearl Harbor -- he was called back to active duty.  He was restricted to limited flying because of his medical condition, but became a flight instructor.  Despite the limitations on his flying, he was rated in one fitness report among the top 5% of Naval aviators!

My brother, Arden Packard II ("Ned"), enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1960, after he graduated from high school.  I can imagine what our father, who died in 1954, would have thought of that.  Daddy taught his dog, Smoky (registered name Ceiling Zero) a couple tricks which indicated his opinion.  He would set two identical bowls of dog food down, calling one "Navy chow" and the other "Marine chow."  Smoky went for the "Navy chow" every time.  He would say to the dog, "Smoky, which would you rather be -- a dead dog or a Marine?"  The dog would roll over on her back, all four legs in the air.

When I was a little girl back in the 1950s, I was unconventional.  Alas, I grew up in an all-too-conventional family.  When I expressed a desire to go into the Navy, my mother and brother were aghast and absolutely prohibited it.  "Nice" girls didn't do such things.  When my husband and I got married, he was in the Coast Guard.  I saw what fun he was having -- he really did enjoy it -- and said I wanted to share in the fun.  "Sure," he said.  His confidence in me (and in my sense of honor and self-respect) enabled me to do what I had been blocked from doing earlier on.  I enlisted in the Coast Guard Reserve 3 February 1976 as a yeoman third class, becoming the first woman in my family to serve in the military. When I had to stand down in 1991 because I had developed arthritis, I was a lieutenant (junior grade).  I had been selected for lieutenant, but did not get to advance.

Happy Armed Forces day to all serving members and to all veterans!
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Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Six Degrees of Separation

One thing that will probably help me blog through a busy April, when I do have time, will be the blogging memes that appear in various places, such as Genea-musing's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun, from Randy Seaver. Tonight's task:


1) Find an ancestral line that atretches back to the time of the US Revolutionary War (1775-1783), about 230 years. Define your person-to-person connection (the person actually met the next person on the list) back to a historical figure from that time.

2) Tell us about it on your blog, in a note or comment on Facebook, or in a comment on this post.

My father was Arden Packard (1911-1954). He died when I was seven years old, but I do remember him.

His father was Walter Hetherington Packard (1879-1937) is shown along with his wife, Elizabeth Jane Reynolds (1879-1939) in a photograph with my father in about 1930 0r 1931.

Walter H. Packard's father was Oscar Merry Packard (ca. 1848-ca. 1930) who is enumerated in the 1930 U.S. census living with Walter H. Packard's family.

Oscar Packard's father was Matthew Hale Packard (1822-1881), with whom Oscar is enumerated in the 1850 U.S. Census and the 1855 New York census living in Chautauqua County, New York.

Matthew Packard's father was John Allen Packard, shown in Canadian records with his family, including Matthew, in Stanstead County, Quebec, Canada.

John Packard's father was Richards Packard, who served in a Massachusetts regiment, and whose cousin, though the line of John Alden and Priscilla Mullins, was John Adams.

Though I cannot be absolutely sure that Richards Packard ever met his cousin John face-to-face, it is possible. And there was some familial resemblance -- both men were short in stature!
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Carnival of Genealogy 75: Justice and Independence -- Richards Packard, Revolutionary Soldier

My fourth great-grandfather Richards Packard enlisted for the American Revolution when he was only 17. He was born, son of Eleazer Packard and Mercy Richards, 7 April 1763 in Bridgewater, Massachusetts (the part that is now Brockton). In his Revolutionary War pension file, he is described as standing 5' 2" in height. He was short, even in those days. I picture him as a feisty bantam rooster of a young man.

Richards mustered in at Springfield, then in Hampshire County, in Captain Wade's Company, Colonel Jackson's Regiment. According to his pension file, the company went to West Pont, New York, and to King's Ferry. As he himself says in his pension application papers, he was at Haverstraw "when Andre was hung," referring to the execution of British spy Major John Andre on 2 October 1780.

He re-enlisted in February of 1782, at Leverett, Massachusetts, and again ended up in New York, at West Point, this time in Captain Smith's Company in Colonel Rufus Putnam's Regiment. During this time, he suffered from smallpox, but apparently recovered. Richards Packard was discharged in February o f1783.

His pension application was filed from Vermont, and by the time he applied for the pension, he was raising his family in Canada. No, he didn't decide to become a Tory, and it is a myth that those American colonists who ended up in Canada after the Revolution were all Tories. Richards Packard engaged in an ever-northward migration searching for land. He went first to Winchester, New Hampshire, where he worked in a foundry, and where he met and married his wife, Sarah (Sally) Coats/Coates. They removed to Vermont, where Richards tried a couple different plots of land but apparently was not happy with them. Canada was practically giving land away, and he settled near Georgeville. Packard cousins still live on the same plot of land Richards Packard settled in around 1798.

Richards Packard died 25 February 1840.

Sources:

Richards Packard and Sarah Coats/Coates Packard, widow, Revolutionary War, Application for Pension, W21886, Records of the Veterans Administration, Record Group 15, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.

"The Globe May Be Sold on the 'L' Word, but Earlier Bostonians Knew Better," The Georgeville Enterprise: An Occasional Publication. Georgeville, Quebec: The Georgeville Historical Society, Vol. 12, Number 1, Summer 2003, pages 1-3. [The 'L' word in question is 'Loyalist.']

Carnival of Genealogy 73: The Good Earth Belongs to Someone Else

I do not have any particular ties to any particular plot of land, unless you include cemetery lots where relatives are buried.

My parents did not have any ties to any land, either. My father's family moved a few times during the early 20th century in the Los Angeles area. My mother's family occupied a couple different houses in Pensacola, Florida. Together, my mother and father never owned a house. They always rented. Rats to that, because I can not use property records and tax records to locate them in any particular place. I've had to depend on city directories, for the most part. And even that is not terribly accurate, as they were known to move a couple times within a year. I know they were in Florida at the time of the 1945 state census, but I have not found them in that enumeration yet. I am waiting to see where I might find them in the 1940 census.

My husband and I now have an acre in the country that backs up to a state forest. It is nice for the most part -- until the deer meander out of the forest into the yard and eat every edible and ornamental plant I ever planted. So these days, I do not even have a garden.

I have not found that my ancestors were landed, either, to any great extent. There were some farmers, but it was a tradition that did not continue in the subsequent generations. My great-great grandfather Nelson Reed McKee, about whose disappearance I blogged the other week, is shown in the 1860 census as a farmer in Allen County, Indiana. He apparently did not make much of a go of it, because in the next census he is listed as a silversmith living in Portland, Jay County, Indiana.

Through a query in a Canadian newspaper, as I reported in my blog on cousins the other day, I contacted distant cousins in Quebec who still live on land settled by our mutual ancestor, my fourth great-grandfather Richards Packard, sometime around 1798. Reading his revolutionary war pension file reveals a constant northward trend from his native Massachusetts (he was born in Bridgewater, that portion of which is now Brockton), up to New Hampshire, where he met his wife Sally Coats, thence to Vermont, where my third great-grandfather John Allen Packard was born, and on into Quebec, where they were giving land away. He did not want to remain in New Hampshire, where he worked in a foundry. Apparently he was not satisfied with the lands he found in Vermont. He seems to have been more content with the plot he settled in Quebec, near present-day Georgeville.

My husband's father's family did not seem to be tied to the land very closely, either, though I do not have too many facts about his great-grandfather Samuel Rhoades. My husband's grandfather was a railroad conductor, as was my great-grandfather Francis Harvey ("Frank") Reed. My grandfather, Benjamin Franklin Reed, also called Frank, was a railroad switchman.

In my husband's mother's family there is a farm, no longer active as one, near Darien, GA, which is still in the family. My husband's maiden aunt Lil lives there now, and the property has been divided among some of her siblings. That is the closest thing I've seen, up close and personal, to a plot of land which has been handed down over a century and a half, the original family members having settled the land around the time of the Civil War.

There is not a real tradition of landholding in my family, certainly not as far back as nearly 200 years. I sprang from city and suburban folk, in neat little houses with neat little yards.

But even the humblest plot is home, and was to our ancestors who were not large or even modest landholders.

Where are YOUR cousins?

I'm not talking about your first cousins, whose whereabouts you probably know. I'm talking about those distant cousins, descendants of your great-great (or further back) grandparents in one line or another. They pop up when you least expect it.

Like this:

As an exercise for a class in Canadian genealogy I took as part of my studies with the National Institute of Genealogical Studies/University of Toronto, I placed a query in a Canadian newspaper which had a genealogical column. This one was in Quebec, in the English-speaking enclave known as the Eastern Townships, where I have ancestral ties. Lo and behold, I got an answer, which led me to cousins there. They are descendants of my 4x great-grandfather Richards Packard, and they live on the same land he settled around 1798!

Or this:

As indicated in my "About Me" blurb to the left, I am, at the tender age of 62, a student at the University of North Florida. One day in the fall of 2007, as I sat in Spanish grammar class, we were discussing a phrase that does not literally translate from Spanish to English. Unfortunately, I do not remember the phrase, and I apparently did not make note of it. I had just figured out the English equivalent, a phrase my Appalachian-bred friend taught me, when a deep male voice off to my left said it first: "The apple don't fall far from the tree."

After class, I talked to the fellow, a big burly bear of a young man, probably in his 30s. I said, "You're from the Appalachians." He replied, "Yes, ma'am, I shore am," with a wink. Where was he from? East Tennessee. I asked him if he had any Carter relations -- the line of my friend who taught me that phrase, and who also hails from East Tennessee. He didn't think so, but he'd find out. Learning that his surname is Bowers, I asked my friend if she had any Bowers kin. She didn't think so.

During that time, I had done a little research on my mother's line, the Naves. It did not dawn on me that there might be a connection, for the Naves were also from East Tennessee. About two weeks after that event in class, having found out that young Mr. Bowers had no Carter connections, and my friend had no Bowers kin, I received a copy of a book I had ordered from its author. The book is Teter Nave: East Tennessee Pioneer -- His Ancestors and Descendants, by Robert T. Nave and Margaret W. Houghland. When I traced my mother's line back in the lineages in the book, I was stunned.

I had to go back to class the next session and let the young man know that it was not my friend to whom he was related. It was me. My great-great grandfather's name was John Teter Bowers Nave! Oh, yes, young Bowers told me, they had Naves all over the place in their line, too.

Now, that is an example of small world! So -- where are YOUR cousins?