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ANCESTRY.COM - Access available at Northborough Public Library

4/28/2011

NORTHBOROUGH FREE LIBRARY

I thought it would be important and timely to announce that the town library also subscribes to Ancestry.com. This database is available only in the library and has no remote access.

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BOOK REPORT - To read or not to read? That is my question. (revised 4/28)

4/23/2011

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Every Day Life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony by George Francis Dow
(Dover Publications, New York, 1988)

It started quite innocently enough; our local Borders store was closing and the clearance sale sucked me in like a magnet. I love bookstores anyway, as the smell of newly printed pages brings images of yet undiscovered knowledge.

And then there's that old saying, "The book finds you." Sitting on the shelf, the last copy left, was a book written for the everyday man about the colonial everyday man. The gist of the book is to illuminate what is not usually included in books written about the more exciting events of our young country. You know, the daily routines and decisions that may be rather unremarkable? To me, however, to get a clue about what John Brigham's family dealt with on a daily basis was the responsible thing to do. So I shelled out the $12.

You also have to understand I am also a VERY fickle reader. As a parent of three children and person in charge of my own family's everyday routines, I have no time or patience to read a book that isn't "good." And right off the bat, a red flag went up about this book...making me struggle to even read a few more pages:

1677 Map of New England by William Hubbard

Inside the cover was an early map of Massachusetts showing the settlements and waterways on which they were built. The rendering, while not to scale, was fun to look at and find the places I've been writing about. Watertown, Cambridge, Sudbury, Marlborough...all there and labeled. What wasn't there was any documentation. WHEN was this map made? WHO created it? How can I put any of the history I've learned in to perspective with this thing without that information? When no documentation is included in a non-fiction publication, I can't really use it responsibly. Lucky for Mr. Dow, the map he reproduced in his book is also on display in the museum of the Massachusetts State Archives. Lucky for Mr. Dow, I figured out it was made in 1677 and fit with the settlement patterns I have learned so far.

So I gave the first chapter a go. The information about the first Atlantic crossings wasn't new, so I went along with it. Even though his writing style wasn't exactly clear and I found it challenging to grasp what he was trying to point out, I finished Chapter 1 with only a few speed bumps. On to Chapter 2.

Did I tell you I was fickle? And a stickler for proper documentation of facts? Well, I never made it past the 3rd page of that chapter. While Mr. Dow properly identified his source for an event in 1630's Watertown, Massachusetts, he completely booted a quote he included in his book. On page 16, Mr. Dow writes about an entry in John WInthrop's Journal, which I found in The History of New England from 1630 to 1649, Volume 1 (p. 36) by John Winthrop, Esq. Mr. Dow quotes, "Fitch of Watertown had his wigwam burnt and all of his goods." Not bad for making a point about the use of wigwams, their flammability, or the reference to a famous journal.

BIG problem, however, when my very well-documented and very own 11th great uncle, Daniel FINCH, is discussed, under no circumstances is it proper to call him FITCH. Yes, it was Daniel Finch's wigwam burned, although there was one settler with the name Fitch. (To be fair, Winthrop attributed the event to John Finch, but the Great Migration research done by the NEHGS corrected the record to Daniel.) The remainder of the book is probably full of wonderful stories and interesting tidbits about colonial life, but I'm afraid my faith in the author has disappeared. I'll simply close the book and tuck it away, considering it a loss of dollar equivalent of 3 lattes that I shouldn't have indulged in anyway. (revised section on 4/28)

SOURCES:
Anderson, Robert Charles. The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633. Vol. 1-3. Boston, MA, USA: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1995.

Dow, George Francis. Every Day Life in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. New York: Dover Publications, 1988.

Winthrop, John, Esq. The History of New England from 1630 to 1649, Volume 1. Boston: Phelps and Farnham, 1825.

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Methodology of Research Posted to "Early Northborough, MA Settlers"

3/23/2011

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ONLINE FAMILY TREE (Ancestry.com)

(Revised 4/1/2011)
As I discover the possible burials at Brigham Street Burial Ground, I post the working research notes (complete with documentation and notations) on Ancestry.com. For subscribers to the site, the tree to view is listed as Early Northborough, MA Settlers. My notations are fairly clear and if any life events do not have attached citations, it means that I have either yet to locate a source or the event is irrelevant to my project. Finding aids and online databases are not cited as sources, but the clues they provide are detailed under the appropriate event in a profile's timeline; the original records will be located and transcribed during future research.

Please bear in mind that I am primarily adding events from online sources to the Ancestry tree, partially due to the accuracy and convenience of copy-and-paste. Offline, I am keeping additional notes and copies of records that may not make it to the public tree, at least for the time being. Conflicting evidence for events are noted and will be resolved during future research.

As the focus of the research is to establish whether or not a particular person died during the period 1727-1750, the biographical information I post to the tree is only that which I evaluated as part of determining a person's date of death during those years. (There are many more stories and details about the settlers and I hope to include them at a later date.) Those persons who are "known" burials at Brigham Street can be quickly identified on the "List of All People" page with their names in all CAPS (example: "ADAM HOLLOWAY"). The "probable" names will have capitilized surnames only (example: "Hannah OAKE"). "Possible" names will be noted on their individual profile pages. Those settlers found to have died before 1727 or after 1750 will have either a recorded death date or a note that they died outside the research period (example: "died after 1757 when last child was born.")

Finally, the town of record in any event closely follows the historical timeline of how the land was known at that time. In other words, if a person lived in what is Northborough today their life events will be recorded on the tree as:

- Marlborough (1660-1717)
- Westborough (1717-1744)
- Westborough Precinct 2 (1744-1766)
- Northborough (after 1766)

ONLINE SOURCES

During the curent stage of the Brigham Street Burial Ground project, the publications and records I am researching are also available online through a variety of sites:

(1) Ancestry.com has digitized histories and vital record compilations.
(2) American Ancestors (NEHGS site) has digital publications and records, in addition to those on Ancestry.com.
(3) Google Books has many of the same digital publications as Ancestry.com, as well as other rare and limited release books.
(4) The Library of Congress has a selection of its holdings accessible online (see also The Internet Archive).
(5) The Internet Archive has digital book uploads, comparable to Google Books, from a variety of institutions and users.

I use a combination of the above, along with hardcopies of the publications not available digitally, to document the evidence for the research. Ideally, the original copies of any of the works and documents should be located and cited. If you are interested in any of the sources I have accessed to date, they are listed on my SOURCES page. Hardcopies can be ordered online through sites such as Amazon.com and rare/used booksellers.

WORDS OF CAUTION

OCR front cover

I have found that some uploaded digital books are of poor image quality or are simply OCR versions of scanned originals. In both instances, material is either missing or illegible. Therefore, I do not use anything except "exact copies" of the original texts as to stay true in my documentation. (Note: In the illustration to the right, the company that published this OCR copy sells a digital [PDF] exact copy of the original book for a fee and can be bought from them directly.)

4=James Eager, his son, grandson #1 (died 1749), and grandson #2

Westborough, MA Birth Records for James Eager

When using the search function to locate names in digital books (basically PDF files), a problem arises when two or more people have the same name. For example, "James Eager" of colonial Westborough is actually 4 different people. Only by reading texts thoroughly and in chronological order can the confusion be avoided. Additionally, using the history books in conjuction with vital records is imperative to evaluate a person's age and circumstance (living, married, or dead) at the time of a given event and whether or not it makes sense.

Note that not all information in history books and family genealogies is documented and should be used with discretion. Family lore and local stories are often passed down through the ages like the "telephone game", where details get modified or added as the story gets retold. Therefore, my goal is to find more than one independent and reliable source of evidence before classifying an event as probable. Furthermore, known will be a very rare label, used only when an event is reported by an eyewitness.

Corrections to text noted at end of book

Author's note on last page of publication.

A final note of advice for using any publication (print or electronic) is you should read the work in its entirety before using its information for research. Footnotes, endnotes, and appendices can contain corrections or clarifications to the text and must be considered before citing the evidence. In my case, it wasn't until I reached the end of the Topographical and Historical Sketches of the Town of Northborough (Allen, 1826) that I found his "Errata" containing corrections to names, dates, and places. Any information I cite will be noted as the corrected version.

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RESEARCH METHODOLOGY - Create Historical Timeline for Reference

2/28/2011

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When conducting research of a specific time and a specific place, it is imperative to understand how the events described fit into a bigger historical picture. By plotting out the local and national historical events that are commonly accepted as fact, a researcher can better understand the context of new evidence as it is uncovered. For example, the circumstances leading up to the settlement of the Marlborough Plantation indicated that the founding fathers were concerned that their home town of Sudbury was becoming overcrowded. These proprietors, seeking open land for their families on which to farm, were motivated by reasons common to most families in the growing colonies at that time.

Another example of greater events being played out on a local level was relationships with neighboring native tribes. The dealings between the early American pioneers and the Indian natives were sensitive and often contentious. In New England during the years before and after King Philip's War (1675-76), conflicts both small and large were common on the Marlborough Plantation. Skirmishes, mediation, raids, and evacuations also occured in all 13 colonies and it is important to our understanding of local history to see how our local ancestors encountered the same.

While not covered in the scope of the current Brigham Street Burial Ground project, local Northborough, MA lore also tells of how a peddler, several months before the heralded Boston Tea Party in 1773, encountered a group of men dressed as Indians who burned his large bag of tea publicly. In this case, the small acts of local men foreshadowed a grander, more notable rebellion and illustrated how the "big" events were a culmination of what was happening on a smaller local scale.