>> Candice Buchanan: Hello.
My name is Candice Buchanan,
and I am a Reference Librarian
in the Local History
and Genealogy section
of the Library of Congress.
Today's presentation
is called Look Locally:
Finding the Women
in Our History.
Local and family
history go hand in hand.
To really know one, we
need to know the other.
This is particularly true
when we want to learn
about ancestors who
are hard to find.
Women are in that category.
So during this talk, we
will visit the history
of one particular community.
We will meet the women
who called it home.
And see how a variety of
records across a range
of repositories allows us to
reconstruct their stories.
Many of the primary source
documents we will examine today
are not physically archived
at the Library of Congress.
But the publications,
collections, resources,
and staff at the Library
will help you to find
out what records exist
for your ancestors
and where you can discover them.
Women represent roughly half the
population throughout history
and definitely half the
ancestors in our family tree.
But researching them
poses unique challenges.
Throughout much of our history,
women have held a secondary
status compared to the men
in their families
and communities.
The traditions and laws of their
societies limited their access
to education, employment,
citizenship, and public roles.
Often, it's difficult to
even discover something
so foundational as
a woman's name.
Her identity is often
intertwined
with the men in her life.
She is her father's
daughter, her husband's wife.
It is not uncommon for
researchers to come
across something like this
when a newspaper article,
courthouse record, or even a
tombstone says the husband's
name and then Mrs.
husband's name.
Fortunately, with
research and determination,
those mysteries can be solved.
We can go from L. D. Hunnell
and Mrs. L. D. Hunnell
to Alcinda Grove Hunnell,
identity restored and the facts
of her life coming together.
Hidden behind her husband's
name, we find a woman
who graduated from a
coeducational college
in the 1870s at a time when few
women had such an opportunity.
Representing the women
equally in our local
and family history
is a challenge
because they are not equally
represented in the records.
However, every ancestor
deserves honest, accurate,
and exhaustive research.
As with any ancestor
who poses a challenge,
we must think creatively
and broaden our perspective.
We want to firmly
establish names and dates
with reliable records, but we
also want to go beyond names
and dates to tell the story.
Women are often identified
based on their relationships
and connections to men.
So we must study the
men and their families
and communities for clues.
We must also look at their FAN
Network, friends, associates,
and neighbors who were
a part of their lives.
And it is so important
to put women
into their historical context.
What was happening when
and where they lived?
What laws impacted their
rights to marry, divorce,
maintain custody of their
children, vote, speak publicly,
own property, own a business,
or receive an education?
Did she live during abolition,
temperance, or suffrage?
What responsibilities did
she take on during war?
How did her community support or
treat her if she were orphaned,
widowed, single, or rebellious?
So, how do we find these women?
We want to start with the
genealogy go-to records
that we usually consult
in the course of research.
We're going to look for
the women in these records.
But even more importantly,
we are going
to make sure we pull
every single possible clue
out of these records.
This is always important
in the case of genealogy.
But it's even more
important when you're looking
for ancestors who aren't
as well-represented
or who don't appear as
often as you'd like.
You want to make sure
that when they do appear,
you are getting every
last bit of information
that you can from that material.
We want to also look
specifically at the community
where these female
ancestors lived.
What were the opportunities
for women at the time
when your ancestor was there?
Where might she have
left records behind?
Was there a school that
offered female education?
Were there unique
job opportunities?
Think about the textile
mills of New England,
where many women
worked outside the home.
Were there social
causes or activities
that drew out the women?
What did people do
there for fun?
Now we'll let the women
tell their stories.
We hope these examples
will lay a foundation
to help find the
women in your family
and community, wherever
they lived.
To demonstrate that the
identities and stories
of the women in our past are
not lost, we will take a look
at a small community in rural
Southwestern Pennsylvania.
When it comes to local research,
one of the first things you want
to do is discover
what repositories are
in the community, genealogy
societies, historical societies,
local libraries,
university libraries,
projects within the
community to preserve history.
Any of these will be a
great starting point.
You want to talk to local
researchers who can tell you
about resources that are
unique to their community,
things that you may
not discover online,
or you may not know to look for.
One of the most important
repositories
in any community is the
courthouse or county office,
where local records are kept.
And so we are going to begin
with a marriage record,
one of the most foundational
records,
especially when we
are researching women.
After an unsuccessful
effort in the 1850s
to keep marriage records
at the county level,
Pennsylvania tried
again in 1885.
So from 1885 forward, you will
find marriage records on file
at county courthouses
in Pennsylvania.
This is the marriage
certificate of Francis M. Wade
and Mary E. Myers, who were
married on 29 October 1889
in Waynesburg, Greene
County, Pennsylvania.
Already, this is a wonderful
record, but we never want
to just settle for
the final certificate.
We always want to ask
for the complete file.
So here is the Application for
Marriage License, full names,
birthdays, residences,
parents' names.
These are amazing details.
We always celebrate
a marriage record.
We've gone from good to
better, now on to best.
This record is a great example
of how we need to
mine every clue.
As we carefully read each line,
we can see something
that doesn't fit.
Legal age for marriage
at the time was 21.
The bride, Mary Elizabeth
Myers, was 17.
So she required consent
of a parent or guardian.
We see that her parents
are Elroy and Nancy Myers.
But instead of a parent,
a guardian named J. V.
Mariner signed the form.
Guardians don't just volunteer.
They must be legally
appointed by the court.
This means that at some point in
Mary's life, J. V. Mariner had
to be legally appointed
her guardian.
In Pennsylvania, legal
guardians are appointed
by the Orphan's Court.
Thanks to the prompting of the
clue in the marriage record,
we find Mary's petition
to the Orphan's Court
filed the same day
as her marriage license.
The petition of Mary
Elizabeth Myers, a minor child
of Elroy Myers and Nancy
Myers, respectfully represents:
That her father is in the state
of Ohio and has lived there
for a number of years.
That her mother is
of unsound mind
and resides in West Virginia.
That your petitioner is now
between 17 and 18 years of age
and resides with J. V.
Mariner of Perry Township,
Greene County, Pennsylvania,
and has resided with him
since her earliest recollection.
That her father has,
for the last 12 years,
neglected to provide
for her support.
And that her mother, by
reason of lunacy, is unable,
unsuitable, and unfit to care
for the person of
your petitioner.
That your petitioner desires to
join in marriage one F. M. Wade
of Perry Township, Greene
County, Pennsylvania
and has no one legally
authorized
to consent as guardian thereto.
We've just learned
about Mary's family,
childhood, and upbringing.
We can follow up on these
new clues in other records.
For example, here is the 1880
census of Perry Township.
We see the Mariner
family and, with them,
Mary E. Myers, eight years old.
She's listed as adopted, which
is indicative of her place
in the family socially.
But in the 1800s, that term did
not indicate the legal adoption
process we have today.
We know from the last document
that J. V. Mariner was not
legally appointed Mary's
guardian until her
wedding day in 1889.
Further on this census page,
we see adopted Myers
children in other households.
Additional research shows
these are Mary's siblings.
So a clue in her marriage record
has opened up a research pathway
to her childhood and family.
There are so many
records waiting
for you at the courthouse.
Get to know as many as you can.
There are all kinds
of clues to be found.
Deeds are awesome.
First of all, they
usually tell us when
and where our ancestors
lived or owned land,
describe their property,
identify their neighbors,
and potentially reveal
family relationships.
For women, when looking
at deeds and estates,
we must pay attention to
law regarding dower rights.
A dower right is the
provision that would be taken
from the husband's
estate to provide
for a widow and children.
In Pennsylvania, at the time
of the deed, we see here,
when a married couple
sold land, the wife had
to release her dower right.
This is the signature
page of the deed.
Of course, this is not the
original handwritten deed.
This is a page from a
courthouse deed book.
And so it is a derivative
that would have been
copied by a clerk.
Nevertheless, clerks
copied the original records
as they were written.
So here we see that William
Staggers made his mark,
but his wife, Elizabeth M.
Staggers signed her name.
This in itself is
a worthy detail.
This 1860s woman appears to be
more educated than her husband.
This is one of several deeds
they authorized together
in the early 1860s.
On all of them he marked,
she signed her name.
This is not the reason
we looked for the deed,
but look at what we have
learned from the details.
Between 1861 and 1868,
Elizabeth had four children,
three survived infancy.
We see those three with William
and Elizabeth in
the 1870 census.
Note that unlike the
Staggers family next door,
Elizabeth does not have the
standard female occupation
of keeping house.
Following her line across,
we see a notation of insane.
Health, especially mental
health, and particularly
as regards women in the 1800s,
was a dramatically
different field from today.
Learning more about mental
health in Elizabeth's time
and place will be a critical
part of telling her story
and putting her life
into context.
In Pennsylvania during
Elizabeth's lifetime,
the civil court was responsible
to legally declare
someone a lunatic.
In 1885 Elizabeth's husband
wanted to sell more land.
And Elizabeth either could
not or would not sign the deed
to release her dower right.
So he asked the court
to declare her a lunatic
so that her legal power
to release her dower
right could be transferred
and he could carry on
with his transaction.
The lunacy docket entry
from her hearing states
that three men appointed
by the court
to examine her reported
she takes no concerns
about her household
affairs, wades the creek,
and wanders over the
fields, talking to herself
and picking her fingers.
We are, therefore, of opinion
that the said Elizabeth
Staggers is insane.
In 1890 after her daughter,
Emma attempted suicide,
both Elizabeth and
Emma were sent
to the Western Pennsylvania
Hospital for the Insane,
later known as Dixmont
State Hospital.
Emma was released
after a short stay,
but Elizabeth never came home.
She died there in 1904 and
is buried with a number.
The hospital records are at the
Pennsylvania State Archives.
Elizabeth's diagnosis
was chronic mania.
The medical records say she
was well behaved and bright.
She was temperate and had no
vices such as tobacco or opium,
nor was she a threat
to herself or others.
But she slept and ate poorly,
was not tidy, tore her clothes,
broke things, and had
always been eccentric.
The questionable diagnoses
and practices at the turn
of the century make it
difficult to say whether
or not Elizabeth was
legitimately ill.
Her husband, William, died in
1892 while she was at Dixmont.
His property, real and personal,
was sold to settle his debts.
In case of any person,
particularly any woman
institutionalized during this
era, we must look at what
was going on in their family,
community, and even legally
in their state and country.
Elizabeth may have suffered
from a legitimate condition.
But even so, we have to ask how
that condition would have been
treated if she were a man.
Whether it applies to Elizabeth
or not, we also have to consider
that historically women
who stepped outside
of their socially accepted roles
regarding education, occupation,
activism, income, anything,
those women were in jeopardy
of labels like lunacy, hysteria,
or in older days, witchcraft.
These scenarios may sound
dramatic or extreme,
but in a small county,
Elizabeth's case is not
the only one of its kind.
From another angle, among the
many revelations and details,
Elizabeth's brother Thornton
Garber was identified
by the court and hospital
records as a guardian
and contact for Elizabeth.
This clue revealed Elizabeth's
maiden name and led us
to records of her own
childhood and family.
Cases like Elizabeth's emphasize
the limited rights of women
and the reason that women needed
the right to vote so badly.
They needed to become
involved in the laws
that governed their lives.
We just celebrated
the 100th anniversary
of the 19th Amendment,
which gave women the
right to vote in 1920.
The passage of the 19th
Amendment mostly benefited
white women.
For women of color, like men of
color, it would be a much longer
and more arduous struggle to
exercise their right to vote.
The movement toward the 19th
Amendment began at Seneca Falls,
New York, in 1848 when
a convention was held
to discuss women's rights.
The right to vote was the most
controversial point to come
out of the whole convention.
As researchers, we should
be examining every woman
in our family tree or community
who lived during the years
of the struggle for women's
rights from 1848 to 1920
to determine their position
and role in this movement.
Not all women supported the
women's rights movement.
And for many years, even
fewer supported suffrage,
which was considered an
extremely radical idea
for a very long time.
Whether the women in
our history were for
or against these ideas
is a part of their story.
Between 1848 and 1920,
many strategies were used
to win popular opinion
and persuade legislatures
to support women's
voting rights.
One of these approaches was to
gain suffrage state by state.
In 1915, Pennsylvania put
women's suffrage on the ballot.
Men across the state got to
vote to decide whether or not
to give women the
same opportunity.
They chose to keep that
power to themselves.
This outstanding map shared
by the Historical Society
of Pennsylvania and
the Encyclopedia
of Greater Philadelphia
shows how each county voted
in the 1915 state referendum.
The darkened counties
voted against.
As you can see, Greene County,
in the very Southwestern corner
of the state, is shaded dark.
Men in Greene County voted
1,694 for women to vote,
and 2,070 against women to vote.
Fortunately, the fight for the
federal amendment finally made
history in 1919 and 1920, as
it went through the process
of becoming an addition to the
United States Constitution.
After passing the US House
and Senate in Spring 1919,
Pennsylvania became
the seventh state
to ratify the Amendment
on June 24th, 1919.
Over a year later,
on August 18th, 1920,
the 36th necessary
state, Tennessee,
ratified the Amendment.
And on August 26th, the
Amendment was certified
and became part of
the US Constitution.
1920 was a presidential
election year.
In Pennsylvania,
women who wanted
to use their new
right had to register
to vote by September 1st.
They had just those few
days to get registered,
but in Greene County,
7,074 women registered
to vote compared to 8,082 men
who were already on the rolls.
Suffrage activities for or
against often made the news.
These articles are excellent
sources of biographical details.
In Greene County, we have this
wonderful article noting the
women who showed up to
be the first at the polls
on November 2nd,
1920, election day.
In spite of nasty
weather, these ladies lined
up to exercise their rights.
Several of them were over 70
years old and had been alive
when the movement began in 1848.
Among these was Elizabeth
McDonald Workman, Aunt Betsy,
a former slave born
in Virginia in 1841.
Since the 19th Amendment
disproportionately benefited
white women, Betsy's
story is truly remarkable.
The details of her life are even
harder to research than those
of most of her Greene
County neighbors.
So this fact in her
biography is such a find.
Pennsylvania required not only
that women register to vote
but also that they
pay a poll tax.
This is the special Greene
County tax assessment record
created in response
to the 19th Amendment
to collect the poll tax
from eligible female voters.
The poll tax had to be paid by
October 2nd in order to be able
to vote on November 2nd.
So women had to register
to vote by September 1st
and pay their poll
tax by October 2nd.
We see Elizabeth Workman
here on the Waynesburg list.
It is critical to know what
the requirements to vote were
in the areas where your
female ancestors lived.
If they do not show
up on the voter rolls,
is there a reason beyond
their personal choice?
What were the laws
and circumstances
in their community?
All of this is a
part of their story.
It is no coincidence that
women finally got the right
to vote just after
World War I ended.
When we think of war, we
rightfully envision soldiers
who in our history were
mostly men, political leaders
who in our history
were mostly men.
But of course, women lived
through, participated,
and were impacted by these
major monumental events too.
This is not a comparison of
roles of men versus women,
but an acknowledgment of how
important these events were
to her story, as well as to his.
On September 30th, 1918, a
month and a half before the end
of World War I, President Wilson
publicly changed his position
to boldly support
women's suffrage.
Before a joint session
of Congress, he said,
we have made partners of
the women in this war.
Shall we admit them only to
a partnership of suffering
and sacrifice and toil
and not to a partnership
of privilege and right?
I think this is a pretty
profound study sentiment.
Look at the major events in
the lifetime of every ancestor,
consider how they were affected.
We must be careful not
to limit what we think
of as men's history to men.
Women lived it too.
The stories that I'm going
to share show perspectives
of the war's social
and personal impact.
But there are also many stories
of its impact on occupations,
vocations, community roles,
and other very unique
experiences generated
by the extremes of war.
In 1918 Francis Moore sent this
postcard to his girlfriend,
Elizabeth Taylor, back home
to let her know that the ship
on which I sailed has
arrived safely overseas.
Francis Moore was a member
of Company K, 110th Infantry,
28th Division American
Expeditionary Forces.
This was the hometown
unit that drilled
at the armory in Waynesburg.
Between July 28th
and 29th, 1918,
this company lost 18 young men
on a battlefield in France.
Francis was among them.
His correspondence, photos,
and keepsakes were preserved
by Elizabeth, who never married.
A single woman buried
with her parents,
she is in a category often
neglected by genealogy.
She did not get to
become a wife or mother.
Like many other women
who lived through war,
this may not have
been her choice.
Another Greene County
woman, close in age
to Elizabeth named Josephine
Denny, [assumed spelling]
when asked why she had never
married, replied that all
of her boyfriends
were buried in France.
Pennsylvania had an initiative
to collect information
about every soldier who
served during World War I.
They published this
form in local newspapers
so that families could
clip it out and send it in.
These forms, along
with any attachments,
are at the Pennsylvania
State Archives
and digitally on ancestry.com.
We find this particular form
filled in on February 3rd, 1919,
by Susan Davis Grinage and her
oldest son, Thomas Grinage,
on behalf of her youngest
son, Edward Grinage,
who died of the flu
epidemic while
in active service
during World War I.
Attached to this form is a
letter expanding on his life
and service and this beautiful
photograph of him in uniform.
While this submission does not
tell us about Susan's own life,
it does tell us about
the initiative of herself
as a mother and her
older son as a brother
to preserve Edward's story.
Military service leaves
an assortment of records
that provide excellent
opportunities to treasure hunt
for those genealogical
and biographical details.
Certainly, if a woman
served in any capacity,
you absolutely want to get
her records and the records
of the group in which
she served.
Likewise, you want to get the
records of any men in her life.
This is a strong example
of how we can learn
about the women by
studying the men.
These wonderful photographs
of John
and Elizabeth Boyd Meek were
identified and preserved
in a family photo collection.
One part of the extensive
due diligence research
to confirm the identities
was to review John Meek's War
of 1812 pension record.
The original records are
at the National Archives,
but thanks to a massive effort,
these records are also available
to view for free
digitally at foldthree.com.
Among the fascinating
details of John's service
on Lake Erie during the
war, we find this statement
that his wife's name
was Elizabeth Boyd,
to whom he was married
at Greene County
on the 20th day of April 1820.
Remember that Pennsylvania
did not keep marriage records
until 1885.
So this is a significant
document for the family history
and for Elizabeth's identity.
Civil War pension, service,
and many other types
of records are also available
at the National Archives.
If you are requesting
copies of records,
be sure to ask for
complete files.
Don't miss any clues.
This is the Civil War
soldier's pension of Cyrus Pyle.
He lived in Greene County
for a period after the war,
where he ran a planing
mill and built houses.
His children were born in
Waynesburg during those years.
In addition to details of his
service and physical condition,
we see the date of his marriage,
his wife's maiden name,
Sue Hertzog, and the names
and birthdays of his child.
In addition to soldiers,
widows, parents, and children
of soldiers could
apply for pensions.
The application required
proof of relationships.
Accordingly, these files may
include family Bible pages,
personal wartime letters,
and numerous depositions.
Susan Hertzog Pyle,
Cyrus's widow,
had a particularly difficult
time proving her relationship.
She provided proof of
marriage, but the record reveals
that Cyrus had deserted
her and lived
with another woman
before his death.
So to receive the pension,
Susan had the additional burden
of proving that she and
Cyrus had not divorced.
In the thick packet of papers
are testimonies from Cyrus
and Susan's children, relatives
present at their wedding,
and even the other woman
Cyrus had gone to live with.
One of Susan's statements
includes this explanation:
"The cause of separation was
my husband's unfaithfulness,
as to proof, he made no
attempt to hide his badness.
It was generally known that
he spent everything he made
on drink and bad women, would
lay drunk for a week at a time.
Through all this, I struggled
to raise our four children.
In 1906 he deserted us.
Less than two months
before my husband died,
he told my son I
was not to blame
in any way for the separation.
Said it was all his own folly.
As to my character, can give
you all the proof you want
that I have always lived
a good Christian life."
If education was an option
at any level for the women
in the community,
find out about it.
Look not only for the actual
school records but also
for who was involved in
creating and leading the school.
These are the people
who influenced
and shaped the minds
of your ancestors.
What were the inspirations
and challenges,
successes and failures?
These events will
have impacted children
and families associated
with the school too.
In Greene County, Waynesburg
College was established
by the Cumberland
Presbyterian Church in 1849,
one year after the Seneca
Falls Convention kicked off the
women's rights movement.
Initially, there was a
college proper for men
and a female seminary for women.
Men at the college would
earn bachelor's degrees.
Women at the seminary
would earn lesser diplomas.
This would have been outstanding
in itself, but early records
of the school leaders
and students indicate
that from the beginning,
there were plans to do more.
The school's charter
called for three positions,
one of which was to be the
leader of the female seminary.
The young lady selected
was Margaret Bell
of neighboring Washington
County, who had graduated
from that community's
female seminary in 1846.
Her teacher had been
Sarah Foster Hanna,
a graduate of Emma Hart
Willard's famous Troy Female
Seminary in New York.
In 1850, before classes at
Waynesburg College began,
the school's first
president said
to the incoming student
body and community,
wait till Ms. Bell comes.
And then we will
do great things.
For one year, while the
school's first building,
later known as Hanna Hall, was
under construction, the male
and female students
studied separately.
But in 1851, when the doors
opened, the students mixed.
There are two separate and
highly controversial things
that happened in
these early years.
The female seminary concept
evolved almost immediately
into an option for the
women to study with the men
and earn bachelor's degrees.
This meant one, providing
coeducation
at the college level, and two,
providing equal education
for men and women.
Both points were cutting edge.
Only Oberlin College in
Ohio was offering that kind
of opportunity at the time.
Yet, this little school in this
little town was ready to try it.
Debates held at the
courthouse almost came to blows.
Why would you give a
woman a bachelor's degree?
They are for bachelor's,
not maids.
Women will not be able to
handle the physical strain
or the mental strain.
Women will become masculine, and
no man will want to marry them.
Women will distract the men.
Perhaps worst of all,
what if these young men
and women formed romantic
attachments outside
of the parlors and
watchful eyes of the parents
who had heretofore
been instrumental
in arranging such partnerships.
Of all of these,
the only concern
that had real merit
was this last one.
Couples did form, and a new
kind of courtship took shape
in classrooms and at blackboards
where men and women got
to know each other
very differently
than in ballrooms or parlors.
By 1857, Waynesburg College
graduated three women
who were hand-picked
to lead the way
to equal degrees at the school.
With such an opportunity
in the community,
it would be a real
shortcoming not
to examine Waynesburg
College records for girls
in the community
from 1850 forward.
Of the many alumni
we could meet,
I would like to introduce
you to Lucy Lazear.
Lucy does have an
exceptional beginning
because her father
was Jesse Lazear,
Greene County's Congressman
during the Civil War.
However, she could
easily be lost to history
as Jesse's daughter,
without a story of her own.
Lucy is particularly
susceptible to this limited fate
because she died very young.
She lived long enough to marry
but not to have children.
She is buried with her parents.
Her husband went on to remarry
and have a family
apart from her.
Fortunately, we know that Lucy's
life, though tragically short,
intersected with the opportunity
to attend Waynesburg College.
She's the right age at
the right place and time.
So we look for her in the
early school catalogs.
This is the Catalog of 1855.
I chose it because we
see Lucy as an alumna
of the school's early female
seminary, Class of 1853.
But we also see that in
1855, she was on the faculty,
teaching instrumental music.
Further digging in the
school records reveals
that Lucy was valedictorian
of her female seminary
class in 1853.
And her brother donated
her handwritten speech
to the school's archives
after her death.
In it, she talks about
her classmates sent
from other communities
to Waynesburg
for this unique educational
opportunity
and how the community will
miss them as they return home.
She also pays special tribute
to Miss Bell, the beloved
and admired teacher of
the girls' education.
Then she speaks directly
to the trustees,
who in 1853 were still
debating the way forward
to equal coeducation
and degrees for women.
She says, "Open the fields
of literature to the female
as to the male, then
the world more refined
and elevated will
acknowledge you."
All early graduates of
Waynesburg College have simple
but often amazing entries in a
card file created in the 1930s
by the school's industrious
President, Prexy Stewart.
Many early alumni had
already died, but Prexy
and his committee sought
out relatives and friends
to collect their
stories and photos.
Lucy's family provided
this account of her.
She attended college in
Cambridge, Massachusetts,
in the years 1854
to '55 together
with her brother,
Thomas C. Lazear.
And there, she became
acquainted with Mr. Stephenson,
a student whom she
married January 1st, 1856.
On their bridal trip, the
Ohio River being frozen over,
they made the trip from
Wheeling in an open sleigh.
She contracted a cold and
returned to Waynesburg.
She died April 6th, 1856.
In 1855 Lucy's beloved
teacher, Margaret Bell,
had married Lucy's counterpart
at Waynesburg College,
Alfred Bashear Miller, who had
been valedictorian of the men
at the college in 1853,
while Lucy was valedictorian
of the women.
He became a professor
after graduation,
and in 1859 in partnership
with Margaret,
he would become the
school's president.
The power couple of Alfred
and Margaret enabled the
equal coeducation goals
and guided the school
through the Civil War
when so many others failed.
On January 1st, 1857, on what
would have been Lucy's first
wedding anniversary,
Alfred visited her grave
and wrote this entry
and his diary.
"Went up to the cemetery
and visited the grave
of Mrs. Lucy Stephenson, who was
married on last New Year's Day.
Now over her lifeless remains
stands a beautiful monument
telling the beholder
that youth and beauty
and amiability were no
safety against death."
When Margaret Bell Miller
gave birth to a daughter later
that year, she was
affectionately named Lucy Lazear
Miller for the couple's friend.
All this biography stemmed
from Lucy's school records,
an often-overlooked resource.
Historical context for
school, churches, businesses,
social events, and so
much more can be found
in community newspapers.
Yes, you want obituaries
and marriage announcements.
But if you want the
real day-to-day life
of your ancestors or
community, read the news.
In 1896, Greene County
celebrated its Centennial
with a number of special
edition newspapers
that celebrated the
community's history.
Outstanding among them
is a special, one issue,
Women's Centennial Paper,
written by and for women
about the women in the
community over the last century.
Featured on the first
page is Lucy's teacher,
Margaret Bell Miller.
Lucy's mother, Frances Burbridge
Lazear, is also included along
with many other community women.
While this is exceptional, if
your community had something
like it, you don't
want to miss it.
Find out what newspapers
your community printed during
what years.
The Library of Congress
has a free online tool
for exactly this purpose.
The Directory of US Newspapers
in American Libraries allows you
to search by community.
The results will list
titles, years printed,
and where the archives are kept
so that you can access them.
Many communities, including
Greene County, are included
in the library's free
historic newspaper database,
Chronicling America.
Chronicling America
is word searchable.
So if your newspapers are
included, you can search it
for families and subjects.
Or you can just read
page by page and get
to know what was happening
in your ancestor's community.
Newspapers are an
excellent source
for business advertisements.
When researching women, we
can study the businesses
that would have been a
part of their daily lives.
We can also look for the
working women in our family
and community who ran
some of those businesses.
This postcard from
the late 1800s
or very early 1900s advertises
the hair weaving business
of Belle Dowerty
[phonetic] Rogers.
Belle was the wife of
Thomas Wilson Rogers,
a successful photographer
in Carmichaels,
Greene County, Pennsylvania.
One could imagine that
Belle styled the women up
and sent them to her
husband for a photo.
Another place to find businesses
enumerated is city directories.
Unfortunately, the only
city directory we have
for Greene County in this
era was Caldwell's Atlas,
published in 1876.
Thomas's photography
business is listed at length.
But Belle's hair shop
was not mentioned.
Postcards like this one
may be archived in family
or local repository collections.
And as we draw to an end,
I saved one of my favorites
for last, photo collections.
Photos are not just
illustrations.
They are historic records.
They should be evaluated
and studied
as you would any other
record in your research.
Of particular importance
is the ownership history,
original order, and
context of a collection.
Clues are all over the place.
Albums maintained in original
order are stories waiting
to be told.
This album includes Carter
Davis Seat [phonetic] images
from the 1870s of five
young men, all identified.
If they had been lose
in the collection,
we would have taken each one
individually on its own merit,
which would have been great.
But these pictures are in an
album with captioned pages,
labeling them as the beaus
of Katherine Miranda
Staggers Bowlby,
the album's original owner.
Seeing Kate's boyfriends,
her future husband is not
in the album, brings
her youth to life.
We can imagine dances,
walks, and talks,
but we can also learn
a great deal.
By researching each of
these men, we discovered
that they are all
from farming families
in the same area
where Kate lived.
They are all of similar
socioeconomic status.
We have just gained incredible
insight into Kate's life
as a girl and young woman.
We get a glimpse into
her social circle.
So now it's your turn.
Begin by determining
when and where the women
in your history lived and then
dig into their communities.
Get to know them, the
repositories and the resources,
both online and in person
with boots on the ground.
The Library of Congress is one
of the repositories you
should explore and come back
to as you do your research.
We have over 50,000 genealogies
and over 100,000 local histories
from communities
across the country.
We have the amazing historic
newspaper collection online
for Chronicling America.
But our Newspaper
Division has even more
on microfilm and in print.
Our online digital collections
include manuscripts, maps,
and photographs that
you can search
and access for free from home.
On our website, we also have
research guides prepared
by our specialist
librarians to provide you
with background information,
quick links, and reading lists
for hundreds of special topics,
including women's history,
how to find and identify
photographs, and state
and local history
genealogy resource guides.
As you complete and
share your research.
We encourage you to
donate your books on family
and local history topics
to the Library of Congress
so that they are here
for future researchers
and preserve your work.
Finally, as you seek out the
women in your past, please reach
out to us at the
Library anytime.
Our Ask a Librarian
service is here for you.
We can help you to develop
research strategies,
do lookups in our collections,
and discuss your discoveries.
Thank you so much
for being here.
I hope you leave
inspired to learn.
The women are waiting
to be found.