Michael John Neill's Genealogy Website
It’s probably not correct. The probability that in the 1880s a man travels across the state of Illinois from the village of Altona to the city of Joliet is minimal. It is possible? Yes. But any court of record could naturalize in 1880 in the United States. An immigrant would not have had to travel […]
It took some doing to find this 1938 aerial photograph of my grandparents’ farm in Hancock County, Illinois. The original images are located at the University of Illinois Map and Geography Library (https://clearinghouse.isgs.illinois.edu/webdocs/ilhap/county/). That web page was located via a Google search for historical aerial photographs of Hancock County, Illinois. When using the overview of […]
It’s often referred to as “correlation and analysis” in genealogical methods courses, but a certain aspect of it is fairly simple: Is this record really my people? When genealogists gather records, saving them in an organized fashion is crucial. How can you later find it otherwise? It is also important to capture enough information about […]
Genealogists often lament errors in census records. I’m not certain census records contain any more errors than any other record where there’s not really a punishment for providing incorrect information. The errors are easier to notice and remember because virtually every American researching their ancestry in the US before 1940 has a census enumeration on […]
The search results for Ger* Miller in FamilySearch.org‘s “Illinois, County Naturalization Records, 1800-1998” lists several entries. The ones from Adams County, Illinois, were of particular interest. But the year given is referred to as an immigration year. They are not. While some declarations of intention do provide a year of arrival in the United States, […]
I usually hate the phrase “Yes, but…” because the “but” is often followed by an excuse. However there are times. The image in this illustration shows that “Penn” and “Tenn” could easily be confused by a transcriptionist or indexer. I realize that reading the entire page of entries would probably make it clear how the […]
There’s a school of genealogical thought that essentially says “writing about the genealogy research process is not what matters. It is the finished product that matters.” While the finished product (the compiled genealogy or the analysis and correlation of records to make the case that a conjecture has been established) is important, the research process […]
I can almost see a barefoot Grandma Neill in the backyard of this picture, headed towards the chicken house to gather the eggs. But my favorite part of this image is my Grandpa’s truck sitting in the driveway. The magnified illustration focusing on the house and the truck is only a portion of the picture […]
We’ve released the recorded version of our 2020 “Genealogy Brick Walls from A to Z” webinar. There’s more information on ordering on our announcement page. The coupon code will work through 19 Dec. Individuals who did not receive pre-ordered recordings should contact me at the email address given in their receipt.
