"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Cindy Crawford

Instead of playing on the idea that she was very much like her ancestors (à la Kelly Clarkson and Chris O'Donnell), this episode of Who Do You Think You Are? went in the opposite direction.  It was emphasized several times that Cindy Crawford is just an ordinary girl-next-door from the Midwest, but we learn that she has ancestors who were extraordinary.  They did, however, maintain the trend of no pretense that the celebrities are doing any real research; at every location Crawford said that she had requested someone to do research for her.  That in itself is still a sham, of course — the program sets everything up with the researchers — but it is an improvement.

Crawford's introductory biography tells us that she was one of the first true supermodels, when they went "from mannequins to superstars."  At one point she was the highest-paid model in the world.  She has been on the cover of more than 400 magazines and has fronted for several brands of merchandise.  She now lives in Malibu, California with her husband and two children.

Crawford tells us she was born in DeKalb, Illinois, a small town about 60 miles west of Chicago.  She still thinks of herself as a small-town girl and grew up surrounded by her family, cousins, and extended family.  She was extremely fortunate that all four of her great-grandmothers and two of her great-grandfathers were still alive when she was a child (wow, that is fortunate!); they lived in Minnesota, and she visited them two or three times a year growing up.  She doesn't know anything about her family prior to them and considers herself a mutt.  She is pretty sure all of her grandparents and even her great-grandparents were born in the U.S.

The rationale for her to investigate her genealogy is that one of her children has a 6th-grade family history project.  She thinks it would be cool if she had an ancestor who was historically relevant (foreshadowing!), both for herself and her family.  Being American is great, but we all had to come from somewhere before that, and it would be nice to have a connection to history.  So we know there will be at least one important ancestor, and we'll be leaving the U.S.

Her father's mother was Ramona Hemingway, and she has a photo of Ramona and herself taken at a Hemingway family reunion, probably in Mankato, Minnesota.  She's always wondered if she might be related to Ernest Hemingway.  Ramona's parents were Frank Hemingway and Hazel Brown.  Apparently Frank, a popcorn farmer, wanted a son, but he and Hazel had eight daughters.  Frank's parents were called Grandpa Lou and Grandma Lou, and she thinks they probably both weren't named Lou (why couldn't it be short for Louise?).  That's as far back as she knows, so she decides to start with them.

Crawford goes to Ancestry.com, which is expected, but I was pleasantly surprised by a couple of her comments.  She says she's going to assume that her great-great-grandfather Lou's name was short for Louis — very nice to hear someone admit that a search is based on an assumption.  Then, when she sees the results, she says there sure are a lot of Louis Hemingways — this is the first time I can remember on this program that the person searching didn't just go unerringly to the right person.  Crawford even vocalized how she was choosing which person to look at — she focused on the Louis in Vernon, Blue Earth County, Minnesota, which is where her family lived.  Wow, an actual example of the research process!  Who would have thought?

That said, she clicks on an 1880 census result.  The page shows Louis was born in Minnesota, but his father Frank was born in New Hampshire.  Frank makes sense for Lou's father's name, because he named one of his own sons Frank.

Then we stray from reality.  Crawford decides that since Frank was born in New Hampshire, she should look for him in New England, and she's going to go to the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston.  Um, say what?  Let's see, she found one record — one measly record — that says Frank was from New Hampshire.  She doesn't even try looking for earlier or later censuses to see if they agree on Frank's birthplace.  She just says Frank "was actually born in New Hampshire."  And then she doesn't go to New Hampshire.  Nope, let's just take off for Boston!  On top of which, how does someone with no experience doing genealogy even know about NEHGS?  Geez, I wish I had this travel budget ....

As she is walking toward NEHGS, Crawford wonders how far back she can go with her research.  She says she has asked genealogist Chris (Christopher) Child to do some research for her.  At NEHGS, the first thing Child tells her is that he traced her Hemingway line back and that she is indeed distantly related to Ernest Hemingway.  Her grandmother Ramona is Hemingway's 8th cousin (yup, that's distant), so Crawford is an 8th cousin twice removed.  Considering all the suicides in that branch of the Hemingway family, though, best not to dwell on that side so much, so Child tells her he found a more impressive ancestor, in her Trowbridge line.  He has a basic family tree which shows Crawford's 5th-great-grandfather Ebenezer Hemingway married Ruth Gates.  Ruth's parents were Amos Gates and Mary Trowbridge (born 1788).  Skipping back four more generations (magic!), Crawford's 10th-great-grandfather was Thomas Trowbridge, born 1600 in Taunton, England.

The Trowbridge family is well known, and Child hands Crawford a book about the family, History of the Trowbridge Family in America (available as a free download from Google Books).  She is surprised that the entire book is about just the Trowbridges.  The book indicates that Thomas Trowbridge married Elizabeth Marshall on March 24, 1627, they had four children in England, and their son James (Crawford's ancestor) was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts in 1636.  So between 1633–1636 the Trowbridges must have moved to North America.

Crawford asks for some historical context on why the Trowbridges would have made such a big move.  Child explains that during the 1620's and 1630's many people left England due to religious reasons, and it was a time of political upheaval.  It is known as the time of the Great Migration, when many Puritans, including Trowbridge, were seeking escape from religious persecution.  They moved to North America to establish a church and practice religion as they wished (they did not extend that privilege to other religions, by the way).  In 1636 many Puritans, among them Trowbridge, moved to the Massachusetts Bay Colony.  Soon after that, however, there was dissension among the settlers on religion, and a group who thought religious practices should be stricter created a colony at New Haven.  Trowbridge moved with that stricter group.  New Haven was an ideal religious community for these Puritans.

Crawford asks if the Puritans were like the Quakers (please!).  Child tells her that they were more like Congregationalists.  (Seriously, if you were going to describe Puritans, is that the first term you would think of?)  Crawford immediately identifies with this because she grew up Congregationalist (nothing like a leading question).  Religion and the church had been important for the Hemingway family, so Trowbridge's Puritan family values had trickled down through the centuries.

Crawford asks where she should go next.  Child suggests the Connecticut State Library, which has a lot of original records about the New Haven Colony.  In the outro to this scene, Crawford comments that she's amazed at what she's done in her "first day doing this" — going back to 1633 has set the bar high (why not 1600, when Trowbridge was born?).  Well, yeah, maybe it was her first day, but how many days and weeks and months before that were the researchers working so that Child could show her that big family tree?!  Geez!

And then we go to Hartford, Connecticut.  Crawford wonders what happened to Trowbridge in New Haven after 1636.  At the library she meets Judith Schiff, chief research archivist at Yale University Library, whom she says she asked to "pull any records she could find" (researchers just love requests like that).  Schiff has found some New Haven court records relating to Trowbridge.  The first she points out is from November 3, 1641 and says that Trowbridge owed taxes and was not paying them.  The second, from April 5, 1644, states that his estate is being taken to pay debts and his family is to be "dissolved", which means that the children are being placed with other families, similar to foster care.  No mention is made of Mrs. Trowbridge in the court records; Schiff says that "no record of Mrs. Trowbridge" was found.  Crawford says she probably died, but Schiff replies only that it's possible.  Either way, it appeared that Trowbridge had left New Haven and not returned.

The next document shown is for a wedding, between Trowbridge and a Frances Shattuck in 1641, back in Taunton, England!  (Hey, that isn't in New Haven!)  Crawford points to the word "weddings" on the page, but the year shown where she points is 1640.  The hypothesis is that Mrs. Trowbridge died, and Trowbridge needed to find a new wife to take care of his children.  Since most of the colonists came as family groups, it would have been difficult for him to find someone to marry in New Haven.  The only unmarried women would have been servants (not an appropriate social class for Trowbridge) or elderly.  So he returned to England to look for someone, but then didn't come back.

Crawford wants to find out more, so Schiff says she should go to England.  Crawford wants to know why Trowbridge would move his family from England if all he was going to do was abandon them.  She does not look happy at the prospect of her ancestor having been a deadbeat dad but says there must be a reason why he left his children.

In Taunton, which is in Somerset (formerly Somersetshire), Crawford visits the Somerset Heritage Centre, where she speaks with Dr. Susan Hardman Moore, a professor of early modern religion at the University of Edinburgh.  (Something that surprised me with this scene was that other people were actually in the room doing research during the filming; maybe British facilities can't be bought off as easily as American ones to clear them for celebrity film crews.)  Moore explains that it was not uncommon at the time for people to go back to England, either temporarily or permanently.  She goes on to talk about how King Charles I had ruled without Parliament for eleven years but reinstated it in 1640 because he wanted to raise money to wage a war.  Many people returned to England between 1640–1641 because of this.

Crawford sits through the history lesson and then asks, "What have you found?"  Moore has her put on conservator's gloves and shows her a document from the Taunton Quarter Session, a local court.  Crawford gamely stumbles along trying to read it and finally admits, "I can only read about every third word," at which point Moore hands her a transcription of the record.  The document, dated October 6, 1652, is a petition for the award of a pension to a man who fought with Captain Trowbridge (yes, our Trowbridge) under Colonel Robert Blake in the Parliamentary Army.  The petition is signed at the bottom by Trowbridge (which Crawford didn't get nearly enthusiastic enough about).  This was during the time of Oliver Cromwell, and Taunton was a center of resistance to King Charles in the events leading up to the English Civil War.

Putting the best spin on the situation, Trowbridge left England in 1636 to escape the tyranny of King Charles, but when given a second chance, he stayed to fight.  He helped defend the council in Taunton for Parliament.  The petition in the Quarter Session indicated that he stood by the men who had fought for him.  As for leaving his children in the New World, Moore says that it was not unusual at the time for families to be separated by the Atlantic.  It is possible that Trowbridge intended to return to New Haven or to bring his children to England, but the war would have made either plan impossible.  After the war he apparently just didn't follow up on it, and the children remained in North America.  (I wonder if he had more children with his second wife?)

Crawford, now caught up in learning about the Civil War, asks what Trowbridge did during the Siege of Taunton.  (This was poor editing, because Moore doesn't use that phrase before Crawford does, and Crawford wouldn't have known about it before meeting Moore.)  Moore suggests she go to Taunton Castle and meet with a colleague.  As she leaves Crawford says that when she travels she has always tried to get cultural experiences, but the fact that this is about her ancestor humanizes the history, which is a great point.

At Taunton Castle Crawford meets Bernard Capp, an emeritus professor of history at the University of Warwick.  He explains that in 1664 Taunton was the only Parliamentary holdout in Somersetshire.  Royalist forces laid siege to the town for seven months.  The town's residents had supplies for only three months but managed to survive; at the end horses were being fed thatch from roofs.  In 1656 the Royalists broke through and gave an ultimatum to Colonel Blake to surrender or be massacred, but they suddenly had to withdraw to face Cromwell, so Taunton survived.  Trowbridge helped protect the people of the town during the siege.  A report written after the siege described the townspeople as being in awe of the soldiers.

Crawford says that Taunton must have been a decisive victory in the war, but Capp corrects her and says it was just one siege.  In 1646 the war ended and King Charles surrendered.  (Capp didn't mention that that was merely the end of the First Civil War; it wasn't until the end of the Second Civil War that the Parliamentarians really won.  Well, until the monarchy was restored with Charles II.)  Trowbridge stayed in Taunton to help the town start again, because there had been a lot of destruction during the siege.

Being at the castle, Crawford imagines what life was like for Trowbridge, who took the opportunity to fight when it was presented to him.  She decides it is an "honor to be descended from such a brave and committed man" (just not commited to his children, apparently).  And then, of course, she wants to know if she can go farther back than Trowbridge.  Capp tells her she should go to London.  That's it — just go to London.  Nowhere specific to go, no one mentioned by name.  Can you imagine wandering around in London hoping to find someone who can help you research your family past 1600?

Charlemagne

Somehow in the huge city of London Crawford ends up at the Banqueting House of Whitehall Palace, where she is greeted by Charles Mosley, a "royal author."  He tells her that he has traced her family beyond Thomas Trowbridge.  He unrolls a massive scroll that shows Thomas' father, John, whom we heard about back at NEHGS, married a Prowse, who was gentry.  Going up the tree, Crawford finds counts, dukes, and a king of Italy (probably not actually Italy, but rather one of the Italian states, considering that Italy as a country didn't exist until beginning about 1859; so maybe he wasn't even really a king?).  Then she starts counting up the generations on the tree, until she's gone back twelve centuries and 41 generations, to — wait for it — Charlemagne!

The narrator said at the beginning of the episode that Crawford would find an "unbelievable connection to early European royalty."  But as Dick Eastman has explained, pretty much anyone alive today with Western European ancestry is descended from Charlemagne.  So it is eminently believable that Crawford is descended from him also.  What is more impressive is that she can actually trace her connection to Charlemagne.  (And what caught my attention on the family scroll was the name Walter de Gant of Lincolnshire, because in my family I have Gants and Gaunts floating around England.  I watched that scene again a couple of times to catch more details.)

Charlemagne is listed as being born April 2, 748 in Aachen, Germany (which wasn't really Germany, either, because it also was a bunch of city-states), and Crawford is amazed.  Mosley tells her she is "off to Germany" to find out more.  She wants to learn more about Charlemagne and says she learned about this stuff when she was studying history, but a lot of it she remembered just for tests.  Then she makes a great comment:  "You listen differently when it's connected to you."  This is what really gets people hooked on genealogy:  finding the connections between themselves and historical people and events.

In Aachen Crawford goes to Aachen Cathedral, where she finds Rosamond McKitterick, a professor of Medieval history at the University of Cambridge.  McKitterick tells Crawford that Charlemagne was the king of Frankia (France) and expanded his kingdom by conquering a lot of Europe.  By around A.D. 800 he ruled most of Western Europe.  As a father he was very protective of his daughters and wouldn't let them marry, but they were educated equally with his sons.  He had 20 children from several different mothers.

McKitterick gives Crawford a passage from Einhard's Life of Charlemagne (a translation of which is available on Google Books).  Einhard was at Charlemagne's court and wrote the biography after Charlemagne had died.  The passage McKitterick chose describes Charlemagne as a person.  Einhard wrote that he was tall and healthy, with long fair hair and large animated eyes.  He walked with a firm gait and had a manly carriage.  Toward the end of his life he had some health problems and his physician wanted him to give up roast meat.  Crawford is excited to learn personal, rather than just historical, information about the man.  She then wants to know what people actually thought of him.  McKitterick says he wasn't just a conqueror or a bully, but that he promoted culture and learning.  She points out that his empire must have been peaceful, because his palaces were not fortified, and that people could travel throughout the kingdom.

Crawford asks about the cathedral they're standing in.  McKitterick explains it was Charlemagne's palace chapel.  From about A.D. 796 he was a Christian ruler, after his conversion.  He went to mass every day in the cathedral, and toward the end of his life spent most of his time there.  Crawford is happy to have more understanding of Charlemagne's legacy and now thinks about him as a person, not just a name.

In her wrap-up, Crawford says again that she's always thought of herself as just a Midwestern girl, but now she has this connection to Charlemagne, her 41st-great-grandfather.  She's looking forward to sharing what she's learned with her children, husband, and family and sounds pretty enthusiastic about history.  She had thought that maybe she'd be able to get back to around 1600 with the research and never imagined she'd go back so far, and that real people like her are linked to history.  She feels very fortunate to have participated in this experience.

The example of the research process at the beginning was good, and it was nice to hear Crawford sound excited when talking about history, but some of her comments, such as how far she had gotten on her "first day doing this", were unbelievable.  And I realized during this episode that the way the celebrity goes from expert to expert collecting information reminds me of computer games where the character has to run around and pick up puzzle pieces to get to the next level.

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Chris O'Donnell

The emphasis on this episode of Who Do You Think You Are? was on family.  The message was delivered in almost as heavy-handed a fashion as the "strong women" in the Kelly Clarkson episode, though Chris O'Donnell was far more believable than Clarkson.  In the introduction O'Donnell says that he's doing research on his father's family in honor of his father, who recently passed away, and that there's a legacy of courage, patriotism, and devotion to family.

The overview of Chris O'Donnell says that he's an actor, producer, and director.  He is mainly known as one of the stars of NCIS:  Los Angeles, and he's been in this career for more than 25 years.  Some of his important roles over the years have been in Men Don't Leave, Scent of a Woman, and Batman Forever.  He had the opportunity to be part of the Hollywood scene but family was more important to him.  At the age of 26 he met the "right person"; they have been married 16 years and have five children.

O'Donnell is the youngest of seven children.  His father, William O'Donnell, was born in 1922 in St. Louis, Missouri.  His father passed away two years ago (actually 2010, I think; later in the episode we get something about the filming being done in 2012) and by researching his father's family history he can maintain a connection with him.  William O'Donnell was a self-made man who put family first.  O'Donnell gets a little choked up when he speaks about his father and is obviously very emotional.  William was a solid role model and was proud of O'Donnell and his accomplishments.  O'Donnell's mother is still alive, so he can ask her questions about her side of the family, but can't do the same for his father's side.

Even though his mother is still alive, O'Donnell doesn't meet with her to start his reearch.  Instead he sits down with his sister Libby's middle daughter, Tory Berner, who currently (for the summer) is living with O'Donnell and his family.  Berner is this family's amateur genealogist, and she has put some information together.  (I'm really starting to wonder about all these celebrities who just happen to have someone in the family who's been doing genealogy work.)  She says right up front that she's been doing all of her research online, which should raise alarm bells, but off we blithely go.

Berner starts by saying that they know William's parents were Sarah Regina McCabe and John O'Donnell.  Berner has an 1886 baptismal certificate for Sarah from St. Louis; it says Sarah's parents were Henry McCabe and Mary McEnnis.  Berner suggests they find out more about the McEnnises and tells O'Donnell to look up McEnnis in St. Louis.  In the 1850 census he finds a 1-year-old Mary McEnnis in a household with Michael and Eliza McEnnis, probably Mary's parents — but since no relationships are listed in the 1850 census, this is just a supposition.  Without saying where she has found any verification of these people's identities, we immediately leap to the conclusion that Michael McEnnis is definitely O'Donnell's great-great-grandfather.

O'Donnell says he recognizes the name McCabe but has never heard of McEnnis before, so he wants to know more that side (how convenient).  Berner says she has looked at some local history sites and suggests O'Donnell look on the Missouri History Museum Web site.  (What?!  Ancestry.com allowed another company's Web site to be shown on the program?  I wonder how high the promotional fee was.)  O'Donnell dutifully searches for McEnnis and finds a reference to a cholera epidemic in 1849 in an online guide.  Berner says there's nothing else online, but since Michael McEnnis wrote the report, O'Donnell should go to St. Louis to find out what it says.  (When I searched I actually found online images of the report; page 1 is to the left.  Admittedly, they're low resolution, because they want you to buy copies, but I was able to read them.  I will concede that the museum may have posted the images online because of the filming of the program.  But they've never heard of interlibrary loan?)

O'Donnell travels to the Missouri History Museum Library in St. Louis, where he meets archivist Dennis Northcott.  O'Donnell explains that his ancestor Michael McEnnis wrote about the cholera epidemic in St. Louis and that he would like to find out more information.  Northcott says that he must have found the reference in the online guide and that he will get the item from the stacks.  (How refreshingly realistic!  Not everything is already pulled, and the admission that some things are stored in back and have to be retrieved!)  The manuscript is an original recollection written by Michael McEnnis.  Northcott says it was probably donated by McEnnis or a family member.  (Another refreshing change -- no conservator's gloves!  Maybe whether they wear them depends on the individual repository's policies.)

O'Donnell asks about the cholera epidemic.  The 1849 cholera epidemic came to the U.S. from Europe.  St. Louis was one of the hardest hit cities.  The epidemic killed about 10% of the population.  At its height 88 people were buried each day; 4,500 people died in three months.  (This doesn't quite add up, but that's what he said.)  At the time people didn't know what caused cholera, so it spread easily and rapidly.

Michael's father John McEnnis was the superintendent of a graveyard in St. Louis (a Catholic graveyard according to the document, though they didn't state the denomination in the episode).  Michael was off fighting in the Mexican War when he received a letter from his family.  His father had died and his brother had taken charge of the cemetery, but his brother had become very sick.  No one else was available to take care of the burials, and the family needed Michael's help.

One of Michael's reminiscences was the story of a woman who came to the cemetery with a bundle.  She asked for a poor ticket for a 12-year-old child's burial.  The bundle was the child in question, and she had already buried her husband and her other child.  She was the last of her people, and when she died they would all be gone.  (It wasn't stated in the program, but this must have been after Michael's return to St. Louis from the war.)

Northcott shows O'Donnell a photograph of Michael, who looks like a serious young man.  The 1850's are fairly early for photography, so it is uncommon to have a photograph of someone, much less have it survive.  O'Donnell wants to know where he can find more information about Michael in the Mexican War, and Northcott says he should go to Washington, D.C.  As he leaves, O'Donnell says that he has no written account of his own father's life, but now he has one for his great-great-grandfather.  So far he finds Michael's life to be amazing and wonders what else he will find.

In DC, O'Donnell goes to the Georgetown Neighborhood Library and talks with Amy S. Greenberg of Pennsylvania State University, listed as an expert on the Mexican War (though it does not appear to be the main focus of her research).  She has Michael McEnnis' compiled military service record (CMSR) from the National Archives, so the Georgetown library is yet more window dressing.  O'Donnell gives a lame cue — "Can you give me a synopsis about the Mexican-American War?  Refresh my memory from my senior year in high school." — and Greenberg explains that in May 1846 the United States extended only to the Midwest but believed in manifest destiny, so we declared war on Mexico, which controlled the continent from Texas west to California.

Michael's service record jacket showed that he was in the 1st Regiment of the Missouri Mounted Infantry.  (If Michael's records are at NARA, I would normally think he was in the regular U.S. Army, not in a state volunteer unit, as those records are generally held in state archives.  But I've researched the Mexican-American War — in fact, a Missouri mounted unit — and I recall that most units were state volunteers, and this sounds like a state unit.)  Greenberg explained that he was a 12-month volunteer.  His first muster card, for June 11–August 31, 1846, showed that he signed up less than one month after President Polk had called for volunteers.  His unit's orders were to go to New Mexico, capture the enemy, then go to California and capture the enemy there.  (This is a weird coincidence.  This is exactly what the orders were for the person I researched for this war.  I'm pretty sure Michael's unit was under General Kearny.)  This was during two months of the summer in Oklahoma and New Mexico, when the weather would have been broiling.  Michael's muster card for January–February 1847, though, shows that he was absent on furlough in St. Louis.  For some reason, O'Donnell comments that "he disappears", but later corrects it to saying he was on furlough, and wants to know why.  Greenburg has him look online on Fold3.com (owned by Ancestry.com!), where he finds a letter from Michael to the Adjutant General dated December 21, 1846, applying for a discharge.  Michael stated that on June 7 he had left St. Louis/Fort Leavenworth and then arrived in Santa Fe, where he had learned of the death of his father.  He had a large and helpless family and needed to return to them.  For some reason O'Donnell asks whether the discharge was dishonorable.  Greenberg immediately responds, "No!" and says that it was an honorable discharge.  She then mentions that the Smithsonian has an amazing collection of Mexican War artifacts and suggests that O'Donnell should check it out while he is in town.  This immediately implied that the research team had found something there about Michael McEnnis.

O'Donnell talks about how Michael had volunteered to serve his country right away but went back to St. Louis to take care of his family.  His duty to his family was his priority, more important than his military career.  O'Donnell relates to that, as his own family is his priority also.

O'Donnell heads off with Greenberg to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.  Curator David Miller (this page says he's the Gun Room curator) meets them at a display about the Mexican War.  On a table are a cavalry saber and scabbard.  Miller hands O'Donnell a letter and says it came with the saber.  The letter is dated June 5, 1905 and was written by Michael McEnnis.  Michael said he "accidentally retained" the old saber and was now donating it at the request of a friend (perhaps someone associated with the museum).  To handle the saber, the conservator's gloves do come out.  Miller explains it is a Model 1813 horseman's saber and that it's been in storage.  (Apparently the Smithsonian has an excellent listing of its storage items!  How in the world did the show's researchers find out about this?)  O'Donnell wonders whether Michael would have thought that his great-great-grandson would be holding it 107 years later (which is how we can tell this was shot in 2012).  O'Donnell mentions that he also "accidentally" kept his sword from The Three Musketeers, so apparently it runs in the family.

Greenberg says she had done some additional research and they also found a photo of Michael.  Michael looks to be about 80 years old, so they've estimated it dates to about 1905, the time of the letter.  Michael looks rather distinguished, with a full head of gray hair; O'Donnell wonders if he'll get gray hair also.

A St. Louis Post-Dispatch article from May 14, 1911 talked about Michael as the only man still living in St. Louis of the 8,600 men from the city who were in the Mexican War.  The article said he came from fighting stock and was the ninth generation of his family in this country.  In the War of 1812 88 members of the family fought, including Michael's grandfather George McNeir, a lieutenant in the sea fencibles who participated in the bombardment of Ft. McHenry.  From the cholera epidemic manuscript, O'Donnell knows that Michael's father was John, so assumes that John's wife must have been a McNeir and George was her father.  O'Donnell makes an unusual comment:  "Looks like I'm going to find out something about George McNeir."  (Maybe he's psychic.)  To find out more about George, O'Donnell is told to look for records at the National Archives.

O'Donnell starts adding up the numbers — if Michael was the ninth generation in this country, that makes O'Donnell the thirteenth, and his children the fourteenth.  Then he starts thinking about George McNeir, his fourth great-grandfather, who was in the War of 1812, and wondering what he will learn.

Now he goes to the National Archives (that's probably why they shot the first scene with Greenberg somewhere else) and talks to historical researcher Vonnie Zullo.  (We also saw her on the Kelly Clarkson episode.)  Zullo tells O'Donnell he's "in luck" becuase George McNeir's original CMSR for the War of 1812 still exists.  The War of 1812 was fought between the United States and Great Britain.  Great Britain was at war with France, and the U.S. had been trading with France, so Great Britain started attacking U.S. ships and impressing sailors.  At the beginning the U.S. was being crushed.

McNeir was a third lieutenant in Captain John Gill's company of sea fencibles.  O'Donnell says, "I've never heard of a sea fencible."  (Neither had I; thank heavens for Wikipedia!)  They were local men who protected key U.S. ports.  O'Donnell asks what a third lieutenant did.  Zullo responds that he would have been in charge of the cannoneers, and they joke that he probably would have had bad hearing.  The first of McNeir's muster cards shown is for February 28–March 31, 1814.  At that time the war was not going well for the U.S.  The British had more ships and men and were destroying towns by burning them to the ground.  The next muster card, for April 30–June 30, 1914, showed McNeir in Ft. McHenry in Baltimore.  (No muster card was shown for June 30–August 31, during which period the British burned Washington, on August 24.)  The final muster card shown was for August 31–October 31, 1814, which did not list a location but indicated McNeir was discharged.

Zullo again says that O'Donnell is very lucky, because she was able to find a few more documents.  She emphasized this was uncommon.  One is a letter from McNeir dated October 22, 1814.  He wrote to the Secretary of War asking to resign his position as third lieutenant, citing a situation with his family that required his presence.  The similarity with O'Donnell's second great-grandfather Michael McEnnis is rather striking.  O'Donnell asks whether the resignation was accepted.  (I couldn't believe that O'Donnell didn't comment on the fact that he was holding a piece of paper with his fourth great-grandfather's original signature on it.  I would have been doing the genealogy happy dance!)

Zullo pulls out one more document.  It states that George McNeir accepted his appointment on March 22, 1814 and that his resignation was effective November 24, 1814.  His resignation was accepted.  Zullo says that this type of request was not necessarily normal.  She stresses again that O'Donnell is lucky because most often documents such as these have not survived.

Then O'Donnell wonders what the situation was with McNeir's family that caused him to submit his resignation.  Zullo says that since McNeir was from Baltimore, the Maryland State Archives in Annapolis would be the place to look for more information, as it would have records about people from Baltimore.  O'Donnell says he has to find out more.  His ancestors chose family, as he and his own father did.  He wonders if maybe someone in the family was sick or had died, or maybe if McNeir was just sick of hearing cannons.

At the Maryland State Archives O'Donnell is met by genealogist Michael Hait (I know him!).  O'Donnell tells Hait that he has muster rolls for his fourth great-grandfather George McNeir, who had to leave the army due to family reasons.  Hait says he has "done a little bit of research already" and has to finish up, but in the meantime suggests that O'Donnell look at the 1810 census to get an idea of the McNeir houshold composition and dynamics.  He leaves O'Donnell with an iPad and says he'll be back in a few minutes.  (Another time the researcher goes away to retrieve records — definitely different for this show.)

Now, O'Donnell is a decent actor, and he made most of the scenes in this episode believable.  But I have trouble believing that he could look at the 1810 census and make immediate sense of it.  I routinely have to explain how to read the early U.S. censuses to people who have already been doing some level of genealogical research.  How likely is it that someone with no experience could just up and understand it?  Well, I guess it isn't impossible, but I'm a little suspicious.

Inexperience notwithstanding, O'Donnell finds the relevant census page (even though it's indexed on Ancestry.com and appears on the page as McNier) and goes to George's name.  He sees that the household has two parents and four children.

Hait returns and shows O'Donnell a page from the 1812 Baltimore city directory, which he says will give more details.  McNeir is listed as a tailor.  O'Donnell extrapolates that if the British win the war, McNeir's business will be destroyed.  He asks Hait if the address is near the water.  Hait points out that Baltimore is a port city and that everything is near the water and would be affected by the war.

Hait then shows O'Donnell some "poor papers."  O'Donnell is stunned that these are originals and that he can touch them (but weren't the muster cards originals also?).  Hait tells him to go to #72.  There he finds George McNeir listed with house rent of $21.10.  On April 21, 1813 McNeir's goods and chattels (which O'Donnell asks Hait to define; chattels are personal property) were seized and taken in payment for his house rent.  Eighty-eight great coats worth $704 (according to Hait, about $11,000 today) were taken, which probably would have been his complete inventory.  As for why this would have happened, trade with Europe had been hampered because of the war, and most of McNeir's customers would probably have been upper-class people in Europe.  So the war destroyed his business.

McNeir's inventory was gone, but he had a wife and four children, so he needed a job.  That would be a good incentive to sign up for the military.  O'Donnell asks how much a sea fencible would have earned, and Hait says about $23/month, equal to about $300–$400 today.  So now we know why McNeir enlisted, but why would he have resigned?  Hait points out that McNeir was serving at Ft. McHenry during September 1914, when a significant military event took place.  He says that might give more information but doesn't actually say where O'Donnell should go (or at least if he did it didn't survive the editing process).  Something I noticed during the scene with Hait was that O'Donnell was the person leading most of the dialogue, unlike the scenes with the other researchers.

O'Donnell says that McNeir had lots of problems but that his first priority was to provide for his family.  He doesn't know why McNeir resigned but thinks that visiting Ft. McHenry might help him learn.

At Ft. McHenry O'Donnell meets Vince Vaise, a historian and park ranger with the Ft. McHenry National Monument.  Vaise is a hoot.  He is so enthusiastic about history, it's contagious.  It's worth watching this episode again just to see him.

Vaise tells O'Donnell that in late 1814 Washington had been burned, and Baltimore was next on the list for the British.  On September 12 the British navy was seen on the horizon, so the men at Ft. McHenry prepared for battle.  The next morning, September 13, it was pouring rain.  The ships were out of range for the Americans because the British had a "secret weapon", a 194-pound shell that had a 2-mile range.  The Americans were ordered to cease fire because they couldn't reach the ships and there was no reason to waste ammunition, so they were just sitting there.  One captain later reported that they "felt like pigeons."  The British bombarded the fort for 25 hours, and the battle could be heard in the city of Baltimore.  On the morning of September 14, the British ceased fire.  They had the advantage, but apparently they had used all their ammunition.  Their secret weapon hadn't taken down the fort, and if they moved in closer, they would be within range of the American guns.  So at 9:00 a.m. they sailed away.

The original "Star-Spangled Banner"

When everything became quiet people in Baltimore wondered who had won the battle.  After the British left, the morning cannons fired and the small flag that had been flying was taken down.  In its place a 42' by 30' flag was raised over the fort.  This flag was seen by Francis Scott Key, who was a lawyer in town to negotiate the release of a prisoner.  He was so inspired by the sight of the flag that he composed the poem that was later renamed "The Star-Spangled Banner" and became the U.S. national anthem when set to the tune of "To Anacreon in Heaven."

The Battle of Baltimore became the turning point of the war for the U.S.  It also had an impact on the treaty that ended the war.

After educating O'Donnell about the importance of Ft. McHenry, Vaise asks if he would like to help change the flag, to which he of course agrees.  He looks very proud as he helps raise the flag over the fort.

In his wrap-up (the third one without the family member from the beginning), O'Donnell talks about how his ancestors felt the call to service but had more important things like their families that took precedence.  His ancestors helped with the cholera epidemic and the battle that inspired "The Star-Spangled Banner."  His father would have been inspired and proud at the amazing stories he's learned about.  These past generations helped instill the love of family that he has.

This episode had some fantastic stories.  It is an amazing coincidence that both George McNeir and his grandson Michael McEnnis joined the military and then very shortly afterward resigned to return to and help their families.  It's incredible that the Smithsonian has McEnnis' saber and the letter he sent when he donated it.  (And I'm still amazed they know their storage inventory that well.)  Like the Zooey Deschanel episode, the producers must have been thrilled to be able to connect their celebrity so closely to such a major historical event.  But the one thing they never actually demonstrated in the episode was why McNeir resigned his position as a third lieutenant.

The inference in the episode was that McNeir might have resigned because of his incredibly stressful experience at Ft. McHenry.  But if the reason McNeir enlisted was to support his family because of the problems with his business, the fact that the battle at Ft. McHenry went in favor of the Americans wasn't enough to solve those problems.  They probably didn't know at the time that the battle was the turning point in the war.  The war itself didn't officially end until 1815 — but it was mostly over by the end of 1814.  I think it's more likely that McNeir resigned because the war was ending and he thought it was time he could start to rebuild his business.  But that doesn't sound as dramatic, does it?

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Kelly Clarkson

It was kind of weird watching Who Do You Think You Are? again.  It's been off the air for a while now, and I guess I got out of the habit (also evidenced by my lack of reporting on the last episodes of season 3).  The first episode of the new season on TLC was available as a download early, but I wanted to wait to see it on television so I could enjoy the whole experience, complete with Ancestry.com commercials.

The first thing that struck me was that when I looked for the show in the online TV guide, it showed as only a half-hour program.  That turned out to be incorrect, but I was initially wondering if cutting the length of the show had been part of a compromise to bring it back on the air.

When the episode began, the intro showed the eight celebrities to be profiled this season.  I noticed that it's a very different kind of group than we had seen on NBC.  During the last season on NBC, Thomas Macentee had been reporting that ratings were dropping with each episode, and I'm sure that was an extremely important factor in NBC's decision to drop the program.  But the new list of celebrities also makes me wonder whether they were starting to see a lack of compelling stories, and/or whether the celebrities with stories no longer fit NBC's demographic as well, which skews a little older.  Six of this season's celebrities are decidedly younger than what we've seen previously, and the oldest is only 48:  Christina Applegate (41), Kelly Clarkson (31), Cindy Crawford (47), Zooey Deschanel (33), Chelsea Handler (38), Chris O'Donnell (43), Jim Parsons (40), Trisha Yearwood (48).  So this is a pretty big shift.  I also noticed there is no black celebrity this season, which surprised me, and the only Jewish representative is Handler, who is half Jewish and half Mormon (now there's an interesting combination).

But on to Kelly Clarkson, our first celebrity for this year.  She was the winner of the first season of American Idol in 2002 and has carved out a successful singing career.  She has won three Grammys, has had multiple songs go platinum, and sang at President Barack Obama's second inauguration.  In her description of herself, she said that she was very strong and that she stood up for what she wanted, which she had to get from someone in the family, which set the theme for the rest of the show.  She repeated it so many times during the episode I wondered if it was the only line she had memorized.  Admittedly, she is a singer, not an actress, but I found her to be very "fakey" throughout the episode.  Most of her lines seemed very strained.

Clarkson is engaged and decided it would be nice to learn about her past.  For the past two years her mother has been working on the family's genealogy, so she wanted to talk to her about what she has found already.  Her mother, Jeanne Ann Taylor, lives in North Carolina, but came to visit Clarkson in Nashville.  Clarkson asked Taylor why she had become interested in genealogy; Taylor said it was because she had had no connection to her family roots and wanted to know what kind of people her ancestors had been.  She told Clarkson she had found some things online and (of course) said to look on Ancestry.com.  She pointed Clarkson to the Rose family tree she has created.  The oldest ancestor on the tree was Isaiah Rose (1842–1916), Clarkson's third-great-grandfather.  Taylor told Clarkson that's where she should start.

Even though Taylor had already created the tree, and one would hope she had done some research to come up with her information (okay, maybe hope in vain), the first thing Clarkson did was look for Rose in the 1870 census.  Of course she found him:  He was 28 years old, living in Coal Run, Washington County, Ohio, working as a "coal diger" [sic].  Also in the household were Malissa (20 years old) and Leslie (1 year old).  Amazingly enough, she immediately commented that he would have been about the right age to be in the Civil War and noted that being from Ohio he probably would have been a Yankee.  At first she didn't sound happy about that, but her tone changed a little later and she said it was a relief that he would have been fighting for the Union and freedom.  When she looked for Rose in military records, she found him listed with two units, the 18th Ohio and the 63rd Ohio, both times as a private.  (She ignored the Isaiah Rose from Tennessee who fought for the Confederacy.)  She wondered why he was listed with two different units.  She and her mother decided the best place for her to start her research was in Ohio.

In Columbus, Ohio, Clarkson went to the Ohio Historical Society and met with Vonnie Zullo, a researcher who specializes in military records at the National Archives and Library of Congress — in other words, in Washington, D.C.  The compiled military service record (CMSR) of Isaiah Rose that Zullo showed Clarkson is stored at Archives I in DC.  As often happens, the location shoot was nothing but window dressing.

Zullo showed Clarkson the first card in the file, which indicated Rose had enlisted in October 1861.  Even though this was six months after the first shots of the Civil War had been fired, somehow Clarkson decided it was "right after" the war started.  She also said she just "had to know" why he would have "enrolled" (her word, not mine).  Zullo explained that there was a lot of patriotic feeling in Ohio because it had a long history of abolitionism and was an important part of the Underground Railroad.  She said it was one of the top three states for volunteers.  When Clarkson asked why Rose was in two different regiments, Zullo said that after he was mustered out of his first unit there was still a need for soldiers, so he could have re-enlisted to continue supporting the cause.  Then Zullo showed Clarkson a card (with the name spelled as Isaih Rose) that stated Rose had been taken prisoner after the Battle of Decatur.  Clarkson of course wanted to know what had happened, so Zullo told her she should go to Decatur and find out.  It's amazing how Ancestry.com says that all you need to do is look on their Web site for all the information you need for your genealogy, but then they send people all over the world to find information that just doesn't happen to be on the site.

But Clarkson dutifully traveled to Decatur (just outside Atlanta), apparently by car, a trip of about eight and a half hours and almost 600 miles.  Maybe Clarkson doesn't like to fly?  At the DeKalb History Center she met with Timothy Orr of Old Dominion University.  Clarkson "caught him up" with what she knew about Rose (as if he didn't already know), and he explained how the Battle of Decatur was part of Sherman's Atlanta Campaign, which led to his March to the Sea.  He showed her a battlefield map indicating positions of Union and Confederate forces, to which Clarkson commented that the battle was "kind of" an important supply one.  Yeah (sigh).  So the Confederate cavalry came up behind the Unions lines and took several men prisoner.  The report of the battle indicated 31 men were missing, including Isaiah Rose.

Oh, but now relevent records were available on Ancestry again, so when Clarkson wanted to know what camp Rose was taken to as a prisoner, Orr said she should look online.  Clarkson went to Ancestry and said, "Let's see what comes up" (good heavens, who scripts this stuff?).  She found Rose listed in the Andersonville Prisoners of War database and that he was exchanged in Atlanta on September 19, 1864.  (Coincidentally, this same information is available for free on the National Park Service Web site, in the Civil War Soldiers and Sailors database.  Unlike the entry on Ancestry, the CWSS site includes that Rose survived Andersonville.)  Orr told her that Andersonville had held 45,000 prisoners, to which her response was, "Wow!" (Sigh again.)  Orr said, "I'll ... see what I can find" in the way of original documents and sent Clarkson to Andersonville to get a feeling for what her ancestor's experience would have been like.

At the Andersonville National Historic Site Clarkson was met at the gates by Park Ranger Chris Barr.  He told her that the camp structures were mostly gone and that the gates themselves had been reconstructed, so practically nothing was actually left of the prison Rose had been held in.  The original Andersonville was a fenced-in stockade with no housing; prisoners made their own tents for shelter.  The prison was constructed to hold 10,000 men, but became home to 45,000.  (This number, given by both Orr and Barr, is actually misleading.  Over the course of its use Andersonville housed a total of 45,000 men, but not all at once.  According to one site, the maximum number of men there at one time was about 33,000, which is horrific enough that the presenters did not need to misrepresent the total.)

A former Andersonville prisoner named Robert H. Kellogg wrote a description of his experience at the camp from May 1864.  Clarkson read aloud a page of his book.  (Kellogg's book, Life and Death in Rebel Prisons, is available as a free download at Google Books.)  Orr showed Clarkson a photograph of an Andersonville prisoner who was barely skin and bones.  He told her that a swamp was within the camp confines and that many prisoners caught diseases while there.  Almost 13,000 prisoners died at Andersonville, making it the deadliest place of the Civil War.  Clarkson wanted to know how the prisoners left at the end of the war.  Barr showed her a record with a list of prisoners who escaped, which included Isaiah Rose.  He explained Rose probably ran away while he was in transit to a different prison.  Clarkson asked what happened then, but Barr said he didn't know.  Clarkson drove away from Andersonville, talking about how her discoveries had made her feel.  I was stunned to see that she drove past Andersonville National Cemetery and didn't say a single word about it; there wasn't even a caption on screen to identify it.

From Andersonville Clarkson headed back to the Atlanta area.  She met again with Timothy Orr, this time at the National Archives at Atlanta (actually in Morrow).  He had found Isaiah Rose's invalid pension file.  During his escape from Andersonville he had been wounded by friendly fire.  Someone in the 33rd Indiana had mistaken him for a Rebel and shot him in the left leg.  He had a 3" scar and a permanent disability.  Clarkson gave a tearful soliloquy about how Rose's legacy was four million people freed and the union kept together.  She had performed at Obama's inauguration, but he wouldn't been president if not for the Union winning the war.  This was another time she said she had to have come from a long line of people who were willing to stand up for what they believed.  They were great sentiments, but she just didn't deliver them believably.

Now Clarkson wanted to know what Rose had done after the war, so she went to Marietta, Ohio (the Washington County seat), where she met with Josh Taylor (who seems to have put on a little weight; I guess all of his success is going straight to his hips) at the Washington County Public Library.  Clarkson wondered if Rose's disability had affected his life.  Taylor had a folder about Rose.  An article from August 31, 1886 showed he had been elected to the position of county sheriff.  An article from the Marietta Daily Leader of November 8, 1905 congratulated Rose on being elected a state senator as a Republican (which Taylor explained was Lincoln's party) and included a photograph.  Clarkson's reaction?  "Oh my gosh."  And then she went on (again) about "how far back that strength came from" in her family.  Taylor suggested Clarkson go to the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus to learn more about Rose's political career.

At the Ohio Statehouse Tom Pegram, a professor of history at Loyola University in Maryland, was waiting to meet Clarkson.  She explained he had "been doing research for me" (finally an honest comment!), but then asked if there was "any way to find out" more information.  (If there weren't, why would you be here?)  Anyway, Pegram said that newspapers had a lot of political commentary about Rose and his opinions on temperance.  (One of Pegrams's research focuses is the American temperance movement.)  Rose was firmly in favor of temperance and more regulation of saloons.  Clarkson called this a "hiccup in the ancestor department", her best comment during the episode.  When Pegram explained that the temperance movement also involved women's rights, because of the number of men who would come home drunk and beat their wives, Clarkson decided, "I'm glad he [Rose] was for women."  Rose backed a bill that would allow counties to regulate saloons more; the bill passed on February 27, 1908 and was signed by the governor.  Clarkson asked whether Rose, as a freshman senator (how in the world did she know that term?), had made enemies with his support of the temperance movement.  Pegram showed her an article from the Marion Weekly Star of November 11, 1908 which said that Rose had become a target of the liquor industry and had missed being re-elected by 32 votes.  To add insult to injury, the county bill was rescinded.

Lastly, Pegram showed Clarkson the book Washington County, Ohio to 1980, which had a section on the Isaiah Rose family.  It included a photo of the family and mentioned that Rose had died on Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 1916 and was buried in Round Bottom Cemetery.  Clarkson wanted to see where he was buried and said (again) this is "why I stand up for things, it's in my blood."  (Do her songs repeat a refrain this many times?)

At Round Bottom Cemetery, which is near Coal Run, Clarkson found the Rose family plot fairly easily.  She seemed genuinely excited to see all the names, including Isaiah's.  She talked to his stone and told him, "I'm your three times great-granddaughter."  (Now that's something I can empathize with.  When I visit cemeteries I always talk to the people I visit.  I remember going to the Jesuit cemetery in Santa Clara, California and having a nice half-hour discussion with Father John.)  As Clarkson left the cemetery she said, "I think everyone should do this.  Now it's back to Nashville to tell Mom what I've learned."

In Nashville there was a short wrap-up with Clarkson and her mother.  They talked about Rose being a pillar of strength and how they hadn't been connected with their families but now had learned about them.  And as a final chorus, Clarkson said, "It's in our blood."

I found this an underwhelming episode because of Clarkson's on-screen persona (even all of her hugs seemed scripted), but the research held together very well, which was great to see.  I was happy that Ancestry.com did not air its horrible "you don't need to know what you're looking for" commercial, but the new "simply type in the name" isn't that much of an improvement.