Looking for a NC Cemetery?
Then you may be interested in one of the latest offerings from the North Carolina State Archives & State Library of North Carolina. In the past several weeks, they have added scans of the cemetery surveys done across the state by the Works Progress Administration (now called Works Projects Administration).
example cemetery survey listing
Done as part of the WPA Historical Records Survey, these files are a great resource as they focused on recording burials that occurred before 1914. The surveys were conducted over a several year time span ( I think the 1930s and 1940s) and have thousands of names included.
Granted, not all the information will be accurate - typos abound, some cemeteries are not listed, some are listed with erroneous locations, etc., but it will not hurt to check. There are records for 97 counties – you have to check these out! You can find them at http://goo.gl/2vdCJ. More information about the project can be read on the NC State Archives blog.
If you want to stay on top of new things as added, you may wish to follow Ashley, an archivist there, who posts regularly to Twitter as items are added. Wouldn’t it be great if more states put their WPA files online? Do you know of any others that do? If so, please share by leaving a comment.
You Never Know What You’ll Find
Have you been following all the great records FamilySearch has been adding to their website? There are many NC related record sets for you to search and/or browse. To see what records are available, visit the page of North America collections and scroll down to those titles that begin with “North Carolina,” — collections are listed in alphabetical order.
Tonight, while browsing the Wake County Death Certificates 1900-1909 death certificates recently added, I found an interesting record that made me pause. It was a hand-written note on letterhead from the Elmington Manor estate in Gloucester County, Virginia noting that a 90 year-old black woman named Sallie Heywood (possibly Haywood) had passed way on the property, the home of Reverend Thomas Dixon, in March 1900. Her death was due to natural causes. Dr. Phillip Taliaferro wrote the note and affirmed that her body was safe for transportation back to Raleigh for burial. She was interred in the City Cemetery March 3, 1900.
Given the note and my curiosity, I sought to see what I could learn about Sallie and Elmington Manor.
A few moments after searching for the manor and owner Thomas Dixon, I quickly learned that he was the author of the screenplay for the movie Birth of A Nation. He was a native of Cleveland County and his uncle was a Ku Klux Clan leader. Elmington Manor was described in the August 15, 1903 issue of the New York Times as “the most beautiful estate in the South.” Some of his papers are held at my alma mater no less, Emory University.
Given Rev. Dixon’s viewpoints on the relationship between blacks and whites I then reflected on what Sallie was doing there at his manor and what life may have been like for her. Was she visiting family? Did she have an existing relationship with the Dixon family? I wonder if she has descendants? Do they know about the tie to Thomas Dixon? I have not yet found any information about Sallie but finding this record and her association to Thomas Dixon was interesting.
Check the collections at FamilySearch – you never know what you’ll find.
Update: The Wake County Death Certificates are part of the North Carolina, County Records, 1833-1970 database.
Celebrating Births!
When James Earl Dillard was born January 7, 1911 in Caswell County, NC , his father, James Edgar Dillard caused some upward eyebrows:
Some thought Ed DILLARD was having fits the other morning. They said he went out and turned over his buggy, then climbed on top of the house and crowed like a rooster. Closer enquiring revealed that a little stranger had come to Ed’s home, and he was rejoicing. Ed lives at Corbett. — pg. 1 of the January 12, 1911 issue of the Mebane Leader newspaper of Alamance County, NC.
That’s a way to celebrate! 
This birth announcement appeared in the January 12, 1911 issue of the Mebane Leader newspaper of Alamance County, North Carolina. It is one of many articles I’ve abstracted for the NCGenWeb NC People in the Papers database. This newspaper, along with several others, have recently been added to the DigitalNC.org website to their North Carolina Newspapers collection. Full-text issues are up and can be searched or browsed so you definitely will want to check them out.
Also of interest for those seeking birth records in the state is that FamilySearch.org’s North Carolina Birth Index which spans 1800-2000. Records are from the NC State Library and while not all counties are included, it is definitely worthwhile to consult. In fact, young baby boy Dillard’s birth record is included.
North Carolina Directories
If you ask me, I think we have one of the best overall digitization programs ever. The North Carolina Digital Heritage Center is building a robust collection of digital items – photos, yearbooks, scrapbooks and more. The latest addition is their City Directories collection.
They are still continually adding to the site, so you will want to check often. You can browse by the city, by the county, or by the date of the directory. Directories are valuable sources of genealogical information so you will definitely wish to take a look. So far, the counties with the largest collections of directories are Buncombe, Forsyth, Wake, New Hanover and Durham. If you have family that you’ve been looking for try here.
National Register of Historic Places – Nomination Files
Did you know that the North Carolina State Preservation Office is adding the full application files of properties nominated for the National Register of Historic Places?
Announced on their website, PDF nomination files are currently available for all properties listed since 2009. The files are worth checking out for all those doing family history research. The nominations are several pages in length and include pictures and detailed histories. Below is an example for the William A. Curtis home in Raleigh.
Home of William A. Curtis, an African-American resident of Raleigh, Wake County. The home was built ca. 1915. Photo from the nomination file.
Statement of Significance for the William A. Curtis House
The list of sites with nomination files attached may be found online at http://www.hpo.ncdcr.gov/nr/nrlinks.html. At the time of this writing, approximately 230 were available. North Carolina has more than 2700 properties listed on the Register and the Office does plan to add older ones as time allows. Meanwhile, if you are interested in the nomination of any particular property and it is not available online, contact the Office for details on how to order.
NCGenWeb Adopts NC Pages on FamilySearch Research Wiki
In the last post, we shared information about transfer of the FamilySearch website to their new online domain – www.familysearch.org and highlighted some of the new features. One such feature included their Research Wiki – a site designed to help guide you to resources for locality searching and also to provide information on a wide array of genealogy resources. Think of it like a Wikipedia for genealogy.
The FamilySearch Research Wiki team has been actively trying to grow the wiki so that it as effective as possible. Part of this initiative includes their Adopt-A-Wiki program whereby societies, archives or other family history organizations can sign up to help enrich and monitor specific pages.
Joining other USGenWeb State Projects, the NCGenWeb is pleased to announce our sponsorship of the North Carolina pages on the Wiki. Now when you visit one of the county pages, you’ll find a badge identifying the NCGenWeb as the adopter. Our goals as adopters are to help round out the pages with basic information to help get you started; similar to what we do anyway here at the NCGenWeb. Our collaboration with the Family History Library on this project provides you more access points for your research.
Beaufort County, NC Research Wiki Page
The benefit of the Wiki is that YOU can contribute directly to the page. A registration is required in order to make changes, but editing is as simple as using today’s standard Word processing programs. Here are some helpful links if you’d like to get started:
Bear with us as we spend the next few weeks enhancing the pages, but visit the wiki site to explore. If you have knowledge to share – add it! Others will benefit.
New FamilySearch Website
This week, the FamilySearch officially transitioned their old site, www.familysearch.org, to their NEW SITE!
The new FamilySearch Website
The new site offers a very appealing update in design and functionality. The new site has been available for many months now as FamilySearch wanted to unveil the new site in stages. This allowed them the opportunity to work out bugs along the way. A description on the site detailing why they’ve made the change explains:
The updated version of the FamilySearch website gives you a richer family history experience by putting all FamilySearch content, services, and products on the same site.
Major areas of the new site include:
- Learning Resources – offers a Research Wiki that can be edited by anyone to share knowledge, a long list of online research videos & tutorials to help you learn family history research methods, & a special section on how to get started doing family history research
- Family Search Centers – search for a Family History Library near you – complete with a fancy Google-map like image for locating it. Tree icons on the map help you find the closest locations and directions, hours and contact information are included.
- Give Back - help contribute to the rapidly increasing online database collections as a member of the indexing community, contribute to the Research Wiki, or sign up to help evaluate FamilySearch resources
- Historical Records — if you haven’t checked out the MANY databases coming online from FamilySearch this is your opportunity to do so now. Amazing what the combined efforts of many can achieve. Collections are international in scope. There are several NC related collections that we’ve blogged about before.
- Family Trees – search user-submitted pedigree files. Remember the limitations of such files, yet, they can offer useful clues if you locate a person of interest
- Library Catalog - with a completely revamped and snazzier interface. As you type a search term, it auto-completes for you a-la Google, and results returned by subject headings make it easy to locate exactly the kind of item you need. In the old search, the list of specific film rolls required an extra click, but now it’s all consolidated on one screen.
There is plenty to explore in the new interface to keep you busy for awhile. Read the blog announcement for more information, including a guide to the new site in PDF format. Also, the Ancestry Insider blog has a very detailed comparison of the old and new sites.
North Carolina Treasures
The North Carolina State Archives announced a new site this week – their “Treasures” collection.
Treasures is an online exhibit of some of the most priceless items from the collections at the North Carolina State Archives, with supplemental materials from the State Library of North Carolina to be added later. These archival documents are not available for public viewing except at specifically designated times due to their importance to the state’s history and, in some cases, their fragile condition. Also included in this online collection are some examples of presidential signatures that the State Archives has collected over time.
Upon visiting the site you’ll quickly understand why these are very much state treasures. Having them digitized for online viewing will certainly increase their accessibility and many a researcher will be thankful. The site is easy to navigate with content clearly presented in 12 time periods that spans 1600-present day.
Treasures web site
There are many interesting items to be found here – as an example of one among many is the will of John Penn (of Granville County) - one of the NC representatives to sign the Declaration of Independence. John died in September of 1788 and his will, dated 1 Mar 1784, divides his estate between his two children – a son and a daughter. What a great document for a descendant, or Penn family researcher, to know about and access. Spend some time exploring the stie and see what you find.
Civil War Resource: Sons of the South
Recently added to the Military section of the NC Statewide information section is a link to the Sons of the South website – a collection of information about the Civil War.
Sons of the South website - http://www.sonofthesouth.net/
The Sons of the South has a plethora of resources about the Civil War, including images from the 1861-1865 issues of Harpers Weekly newspapers during this time period. There is a detailed overview of events by year, as well as information about the battles, the generals, and other significant figures & events.
The images from the Harpers Weekly are really worth looking at – they are quite detailed with many of them done by Thomas Nast, considered to be the “father of the American cartoon. ” You could spend hours browsing these issues, but in the process you will learn a lot. For example, here are two images I found from Plymouth, Washington County, North Carolina that appeared in the December 24, 1864 issue of Harper’s Weekly.
The North Carolina specific images from the magazine run are included in the University of North Carolina’s Civil War Image Portfolio if you’d like to browse by specific subject areas.
Two New Resources
As we head into summer here in the NCGenWeb project we have been busy working on resources to help facilitate your family history research. Here are two new resources for the NCGenWeb Project that you should explore:
- NCGenWeb Digital Bookshelf – brings together full-text books available for free online that have relevance to NC genealogy. Initially, this focuses on books at the Internet Archive, but over time will expand to be more inclusive. Check the pages for resources for your county of interest. The inspiration for the layout of the site is drawn from the ever-so-useful deathindexes.com. Expect to see more items added in the upcoming months. Subscribe to the blog feed to stay up-to-date.
- North Carolina Yearbook Index – yours truly graduated this past May and as graduation approach I began to direct my available free time to complete phase I of the North Carolina Yearbook Index. We’ve posted before about the North Carolina yearbooks being added to the Internet Archive by the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center. To date, hundreds of yearbooks from the 1800-present have been added. However, even though it is great to have access to such a wonderful resource, finding all those students from any particular county is a daunting task. Therefore, I created an index of students (mostly seniors at this point) listed in these yearbooks. Phase I’s focus of this project are on the 1930 and earlier yearbooks. To date, more than 16,000 names are in the searchable database. Phase II will include the integration of 1931-1940 yearbooks – look for more news within the next couple of months. Look for county-specific links to be added to various NCGenWeb project pages during the upcoming weeks.
