Learning More about My Cousin Billie

I've written previously about the photo bonanza that my sister sent to me after her niece had scanned thousands of photographs that were left in the house after our father passed away.  I've made many discoveries and unearthed several childhood memories by going through the photos, and I still have a long way to go to identify all of them.

Now that bonanza has to compete with another one.

About a year and a half ago, I was contacted out of the blue by a woman named Wendi Shaw, who looks for family items for sale in auctions and the like.  She called herself an heirloom hunter, which she does as a hobby.  She goes through the items, puts them in binders, does some research, tries to find family members, and offers to send the items back to them.

She told me she was trying to reach the Brainin family, because she had acquired several of Billie Brainin's items.

I recognized the name right away.  Billie was the daughter of David Brainin, a younger brother of my great-grandmother Sarah Brainin.

Wendi included four photos of the pile of letters.  Three photographs were visible in the collection.

So I shouted out loud, jumped up and down, did the genealogy happy dance, and told her I would love to have the items.

I discovered that she had found me through my blog (this one!), where I had written about Billie a couple of times.

I sent her my address and looked forward to receiving this new family history bonanza.  I even posted the photo of Billie that she had sent me.

And I waited.

After several months, I sent another message, asking if something had happened.  Which it had:  Real life had interfered.

But Wendi was glad I had written again, because she apparently had lost my contact information.  And said she would be sending me the items soon, with one catch:  She wanted me to confirm when I received everything (I already did that) and to let her know when I blogged about this discovery.  And hey, that's what I'm doing now!

It was clear when I started looking at all the items that Wendi had already done some sorting and that they were not in the order in which they had been in the storage unit; she had told me that she had gone through them and put them into plastic sleeves.  So I did not feel compelled to keep them in the order in which I had received them, something that should be considered from an archival perspective.  Since the original order was already lost, I have chosen to put everything in chronological order as much as possible.  So far I have found six items with no dates on them.  Two of those (a music program and a piece of a newspaper) I have determined the dates by searching for text that appears.  That leaves me only four undated items:  two cards and two letters.  Maybe I'll be able to figure out where they fit by context.

The earliest item is a funeral bill from 1924.  The most recent so far is a letter from 1964.

I've only begun to go through the items and actually read them.  Some of what I have found already in this amazing gift:

I learned that Billie, the only name I had ever heard for my cousin, was not actually her given name at birth!  A couple of the letters were addressed to Mildred Brainin, and when I looked for that name in the New York City birth index on Ancestry, I found her.  Totally news to me!  I had not searched for her birth previously because Billie was born late enough that I know New York City won't send me a copy of her birth certificate, even though she died more than 30 years ago.  They're just not a friendly jurisdiction to work with.

Among the letters were four from my cousin Sam Brainin (whom I knew personally) to Billie, his sister, while he was in the Navy.  I have been in contact with Sam's children for several years, so I wrote to one of them to ask if she would like to have the letters.

I'm looking forward to reading all of the letters and learning more about Billie.  I don't know yet how personal any of the information is, so I can't tell how much I might feel comfortable posting.  But it's going to be a fascinating adventure, I'm sure.

William Brainin, Victim of the Spanish Flu

Although cases occurred before this date, a generally accepted start date for the Influenza Pandemic of 1918 (commonly called the Spanish flu epidemic) is March 4, when a U.S. Army cook by the name of Albert Gitchell at Camp Funston, Kansas was recorded as being ill.  In a very short time more than 500 men at the camp had been reported sick.  Only one week later, on March 11, the flu had reached Queens, New York.

One of the groups that was hit hard by the flu was men being inducted into the U.S. Army and attending boot camp, where close quarters and the effects of physical activity helped the virus spread quickly.  My great-granduncle William Brainin was one of those men.

I don't know much about Uncle Willie, as Bubbie (my grandmother) called him.  He was born about 1892 (he used the birthdate October 23, 1892 here), possibly in Kreuzberg, Russia (now Krustpils, Latvia).  He immigrated to the United States as Wolf Brainin with his mother, Ruchel Dvojre (Jaffe) Brainin, and three siblings — Chase Leah Brainin, Pesche Brainin, and Kosriel Brainin — aboard the Caronia, arriving at Ellis Island on October 3, 1906.

The Brainin family was enumerated in the census on April 20, 1910, living at 236 East 103rd Street, Manhattan, New York.  In the household were parents Morris [Mendel Hertz] and Rose Dorothy [Ruchel Dvojre] with children Lena [Chase Leah], Sarah [Sora Leibe], William [Wolf or Welwel], Bessie [Pesche], and Benjamin [Kosriel], everyone having chosen American names to use here.  William's occupation was ladies' tailor, a common job for young male Jewish immigrants at that time.

I have not found William in the 1915 New York census, but he might have already moved to New Bedford, Massachusetts, to live with his older brother Max Joseph [Nachman] Brainin and his family.  Certainly he was there by June 1, 1917, where he registered for the Army draft.  I don't know when he entered the Army, but I have seen a photo which Bubbie identified as, "That's my Uncle Willie in his Army uniform."  (Unfortunately, the photo disappeared soon after that identification.  I'm still trying to figure out where it went.)

By the time of the 1920 census, William had returned to live with his parents in Manhattan.  They were enumerated there on January 12, 1920.

William had no occupation listed in the census, suggesting that he was probably already sick when the census taker came by.  Two weeks later, on January 26, William Brainin died in Manhattan.  His cause of death was given as pneumonia caused by influenza.  He was buried in the Workmen's Circle plot of Mt. Hebron Cemetery in Flushing, Queens on January 27.

I'm fortunate that some of Bubbie's memories, which were usually spot on, have proven to be inaccurate.  She told me that Uncle Willie had come home sick from the Army while my great-grandmother Sarah was pregnant with my grandmother, that my great-grandmother became ill, and that Uncle Willie died before Bubbie was born in 1919.  But that is Uncle Willie with his family in the 1920 census, and it's definitely his death certificate, so he absolutely did not die before Bubbie was born.  Finding him with the family in 1920 made it easier to identify him in the death index and get a copy of his death certificate.

So far Uncle Willie is the only member of my family I have found to have died due to the Influenza Pandemic.

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day

Baby Boy Brainin

Stillborn, January 1, 1915

Manhattan, New York County, New York

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Your Very Best Genealogy Finds in 2023

I didn't find much in 2023, but I did find a few things to write about for Randy Seaver's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge this week.

Come on, everybody, join in and accept the mission and execute it with precision. 

1.  Ellen Thompson-Jennings posted an interesting question last week in Best Genealogy Find of 2023.

2.  What were your very best genealogy finds in 2023?  Elusive ancestors?  Hard-to-find records?  Family photographs?  Family stories?  Family artifacts?  New cousins?  What else?

3. Tell us about one or more of them in your own blog post, in a comment on this post, or in a Facebook Status  post.  Please leave a link on this post if you write your own post.

* Elusive Ancestor:  Not actually an elusive ancestor, but I may have come closer to finding an elusive relative.  I wrote on December 30 about someone having brought to my attention a person who could be the son my aunt gave up for adoption in 1945.  The man looks absolutely right and knew he was adopted, but he isn't the age expected.  I'm trying to pursue additional information about him to figure out what's going on.  I hope I'm able to determine what his connection is to our family.  Because of the very strong resemblance to one family member, I'm positive there has to be a connection.

* Hard-to-find Records:  I was able to take advantage of two new releases of digitized records:  The Maryland birth/marriage/death records (the Maryland Motherlode!) that were acquired by Reclaim the Records and placed online for free, and the New York City Historical Vital Records Project, a release of a lot of digitized birth/marriage/death records (but with some periods missing).  These weren't necessarily hard to find per se, but they're more easily searchable and accessed now, and I have found many records for my family.  There are still some that don't want to be found, of course, but great progress has been made!

* Family Photographs:  I didn't find the photographs, but my sister sent me scans of my father's photos that were in his house when he passed away.  I have been spending a lot of time trying to identify as many as possible.  I'm going to need help with all the photos of cars.

There's a National Subway Day, You Say?

Novoslobodskaya Station, Russian Metro
by Alex 'Florstein' Fedorov, CC BY-SA 4.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46392339

I was talking with a friend a couple of months ago and we started comparing notes on which subway systems we had each traveled on.  Somehow my mind went from that to thinking that could be a fun subject to blog about, then to wondering whether there was any sort of official "national subway day."  I Googled it and found that yes, indeed, someone had declared a National Subway Day on November 3, 2015.  That also seems to have been the only day it was celebrated, but I took it as an excuse to blog on the topic anyway.

I'm not sure that subways are my favorite form of transportation, but I don't mind using them, and I've been on several.  In no particular order:

Moscow, Russia Metro, 1982:  At the time I was there, it was still the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic, one constituent member of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.  And the Metro (pronounced mye-tro) was beautiful.  Each station was a work of art, and we were told that was the intention.  I don't recall that it ran late.  One incident that happened to me when using the system was when a friend and I were leaving the station and standing on the escalator as it gently took us back to fresh air.  For some reason I had my friend's passport in my hand and was looking at it in detail, when one of the people ahead of us, who appeared to have been drinking heavily, suddenly stumbled backward and fell onto me.  Not only did I catch him and not fall myself, I didn't even drop the passport.  But my friend and I took a few steps backward, just in case it should happen again (it didn't).

Paris, France Métro, 1983:  I don't remember as much detail about the Métro in Paris, probably because whlie I was there I was dead broke and walked almost everywhere rather than pay for transportation.  But I did ride it a couple of times.  I don't recall that it was awful or great, just kind of there.

London, England Underground, 1996:  The Tube, as it is commonly called, has a reputation all its own.  People ride it just to say they've done so.  I rode it to get from one point to another, but I did notice the signs saying, "Mind the Gap," which are well known.  When I was going from the Prime Meridian to the Tower of London, I should have taken the Tube, but I didn't realize how far I was going to have to walk.  By the time I got to the Tower, it was closing for the day, and all I did was walk around it.  So that was one time I really blew it by not taking the subway.

New York City Subway, 1997 and 2005:  Another transportation system famous in its own way, the New York City Subway has the most stations and is one of the busiest and longest in the world.  In 2005 I wanted to visit a cousin who lived in the heart of Manhattan, and she convinced me not to even think of driving but to take the subway instead.  So I did.  It was a nice trip there and back.  I also took it once with my sister when I was visiting her in New Jersey, because she found out I had never been on it.  So we rode into The City and walked around for a while.  We somehow fortuitously ended up on 57th Avenue and I was able to show her around The Compleat Strategist, an adventure games store that carried products from the company I was working for at the time (this was in 1997).  She is still the only family member who actually got excited to see my name in print, jumping up and down in the store.

Washington, D.C. Metro, 2000 and 2011:  The outstanding feature of the Metro in DC is how huge the tunnels are.  They are absolutely cavernous.  I was told that the reason for their ridiculous size is that they're supposed to be emergency shelters for people if something really horrible happens outside.  But that doesn't make sense, unless the people are supposed to stand on each others' shoulders, because most of the space is up.  So I suspect the real reason is something else entirely.  But it's a nice system, and I definitely enjoyed riding it.

Montreal, Quebec Metro, about 1999:  I traveled to Montreal once for work, and while there I learned about the underground transportation systems.  Not only is there a subway, but there are underground walkways between buildings so that people can move around in the dead of winter.  I thought that was pretty smart of them.  I don't remember anything in particular about the Metro, so it couldn't have been bad.

Boston, Massachusetts Subway, 1991, 1992, 1993:  The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) looks and feels ancient, or at least it did when I was using it.  I used to go to Boston at least once a year and took the subway a lot.  The cars always felt rickety, and when they careened around curves you worried whether you were going to go airborne.  The cars seem to just barely fit in the tunnels.  I heard rumors (never substantiated) that some people who were working had been crushed.  Not a friendly system.  I have one friend who knew the system inside out, backward and forward, to the extent that he could figure out in his head that if we went two stops past where we wanted and then came back one stop, we could walk far fewer stairs to get to the street.  He was amazing.

San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit:  The subway system with which I am most familiar is BART (I love acronyms!).  Not only did I live in the Bay Area for 28 years, but I worked as a train operator at BART.  I have to admit, I loved riding BART around, especially in San Francisco, because I hated driving in San Francisco.  BART is a great system.  I even wrote two blog posts about using BART to get to genealogically important research sites (in San Francisco and in the East Bay)!

So that comes to eight systems.  Hmm, I thought it was more than that.  I guess I need to get out there and ride a few more!

=========

Late Addition, December 31, 2024

San Francisco Muni Metro:  For some reason, it recently occurred to me that I had ridden not only BART in San Francisco, but also San Francisco's Muni Metro, the light rail vehicle system that is partly a subway and partly above ground.  So in the interest of completeness, I'm adding it now.  The main reason I used the system was when Sutro Library, the genealogy-focused branch of the California State Library system, was moved from a location to which you almost had to drive to two floors in the CSU San Francisco library, which was reachable by, you guessed it, Muni Metro.  And as I mentioned above when writing about BART, I hated driving in San Francisco, so given an option to avoid that, I very quickly did so.  I was never a fan of Muni buses, but I liked the rail system.  I probably took it about half a dozen times out to Sutro.  And it is a totally different system from BART, so that brings my total to nine.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Your Plans to Travel for On-site Genealogy Research

I keep falling behind on my genealogy posts!  I have all these great plans, and they somehow don't materialize.  But I can always start again at catching up, as I am doing tonight with Randy Seaver's post for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun.

Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission:  Impossible! music here), is:

1.  Do you have plans to travel to do on-site genealogy research?  [Thank you to Linda Stufflebean for suggesting topics!]

2.  Write your own blog post, or add your response as a comment to this blog post or in a Facebook Status post or note.

Here are my thoughts.

Let me start off by saying that I definitely don't believe I can do all my research online.  That means I have to look at doing on-site research myself or hiring someone else to do it.  And I really like doing my own research.

I have so much New Jersey research where I am sure that the archives will have information that is helpful; not everything has been filmed by the LDS Church.  So many of my family lines (my paternal grandmother's side of the family) were in New Jersey for centuries.  I still have to find my great-grandmother Amelia Gibson's parents and family, and my 4x-great-grandfather Joel Armstrong's parents (is he my connection to practicing Quakers?).  And I want to see the farm schedules from the census to learn more details about what my farming ancestors were doing.  It wouldn't be practical to hire someone for this research because there's so much to do, with one piece of information leading to another and another.  I need to find some time to go back east, stay at my sister's, and make daily trips to the state archives.

Notwithstanding how many records and indices Reclaim the Records has managed to get from New York City, there's still a lot more to see, and my mother's side of the family lived there for more than a century.  In some ways it might be more practical to hire someone who is more experienced with the repositories to do that research, but it would be far more enjoyable to do it myself.  I think I still have cousins in NYC; maybe I can sleep on a couch and make that my base of operations.

Those are my big chunks of research where there's a lot to be done.  I could do research in just about every state in this country because I have cousins everywhere, but most states have only a few relatives to research.

Do I have actual plans for any of this research?  No, not currently, but I could and I probably should.

Now, the Ukrainian research I would like to conduct on my mother's side, maybe that I don't want to do on site myself.  I think that's a good candidate for hiring a researcher to do it for me, at least for the immediate future.  The research in Moldova and Belarus also might be served better by hiring someone, rather than going in person.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Your Best Genealogy Vacation

So while most of us are responsibly staying at home and not going anywhere, for this week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun Randy Seaver has us remembering about when we were traveling!  What a cruel, cruel man . . . .

Here is your assignment, should you decide to accept it (you ARE reading this, so I assume that you really want to play along; cue the Mission:  Impossible! music!):

(1) Think about your genealogy career — have you taken a genealogy or family history "vacation?"

(2) Tell us about one (or more) of them:  Where did you go, what research did you do, did you meet family members, etc.?

(3) Tell us about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook Status post.  Please leave a link in a comment to this post.

I took an unusual family history "vacation" in 2005.  I had been offered a trip to the Bahamas, and I realized that was going to put me on the eastern side of the country.  So I squeezed in a visit to see family members and sites on the front end before leaving the country (it worked well with the manner in which the trip was being funded).  I was able to fit five days into my trip.

I had been in postal and e-mail communication with several cousins in New York City, and I thought it would be great to actually meet a lot of them in person.  So I told them all I was coming and worked out a social calendar.

I stayed at my sister's house in Titusville, New Jersey (at least I think that's where it was).

During the five days I was there, I drove in all five New York City boroughs (yes, including Manhattan) and the additional two counties on Long Island.  I put 700 miles on my sister's car driving back and forth on the Jersey Turnpike.  (The most exciting part of that was the day I saw a car fully engulfed in flames on the other side of the turnpike.  No one stopped or even slowed down to look.)  If I remember correctly, I met about two dozen cousins in New York and had a few lunches with them.  I took lots of photos, but I don't know where they are currently, other than "somewhere in the house."

I also visited several cemeteries.  I went to Mount Hebron in Flushing and Mount Zion in Maspeth, both in Queens.  At Mount Hebron, several relatives, including my Brainin great-great-grandparents, are buried in the Kreuzburger-Jacobstadter Benevolent Association section.

Mount Zion is the resting place of my Novitsky great-great-grandparents.  It's a very creepy cemetery, with black smoke belching in the background from factories and a pall hanging over everything.  The Novitskys are buried in the Stepiner section, which I haven't yet figured out the reason for, as they were from Porozovo.

I think I went to a third cemetery in New York, but I can't remember the name now.  But another cemetery I know I visited during this trip was Brotherhood Cemetery near Mount Holly, New Jersey.  I wrote about that adventure for a Saturday Night Genealogy Fun in December 2017.  It took me three visits to the cemtery to find the tombstone of my great-grandfather Elmer Sellers.

In that same post I also wrote about visiting the house where my paternal grandmother was born and took a photo of the sign on it, which states that the original deed was dated 1842.

And, of course, I was able to see my sister on this trip, and that's certainly a good thing to do on a family history vacation.

So I had a really busy five days doing nothing but family history!

The Triangle Fire 110th Anniversary

On March 25, 1911, the fire at New York City's Triangle Shirtwaist Company caused the deaths of 146 workers, mostly female immigrants.  The outcry after the fire and deaths helped change labor laws in New York and across the United States.

I wrote about the Triangle Fire on its 100th anniversary and told the story of Frieda Welikowsky, a cousin of a friend of mine.  My friend had been told that Frieda had died in the fire and had asked me to research whether the claim was true as part of a larger family history project.  I was able to verify that Frieda was one of the fire's victims, although she did not die in the fire itself but from injuries caused by jumping out of the building to escape the flames.

This year, for the 110th anniversary, the lives of two survivors of the fire were highlighted and commemorated in a new podcast.  Fin Dwyer of the Irish History Podcast worked with Hope C. Tarr, a historical fiction author, to create a three-part podcast series highlighting the lives of Annie Doherty and Celia Walker, an Irish and a Polish immigrant, reespectively.

The first episode discusses the lives of the two women and why they immigrated to the United States.  The second episode covers the Triangle Fire itself and the experiences of Annie and Celia, who were trapped in the building with many other workers.  The third and final episode looks at the aftermath of the fire and the lives of Annie and Celia after the fire.

Wordless Wednesday

 

Wedding Wednesday

Mirta and Max

I learned via the New York City marriage index, which became available through the efforts of Brooke Schreier Ganz and Reclaim the Records, that my 4th cousin Max Szocherman married Mirta Mata in New York (probably Manhattan) in 1959, 59 years ago.  (Max and I share 3rd-great-grandparents Avram Yaakov Nowicki and SIrke.)  After consulting with other cousins on that side of the family,  I have been told that the wedding was about October 2, so I'm commemorating it today with photos that were shared with me by those cousins.

Max and Mirta were both born in Cuba, Max probably in Guanabacoa and Mirta in Habana.  I know the Szocherman family had already been traveling to and from New York prior to Castro coming to power, but they apparently moved there permanently after that event.  Max and Mirta likely knew each other already in Cuba.

Max, Tania, Julia, Louis, Mirta (face mostly hidden), ?, ?; Foreground: back of rabbi's head

Front row:  Julia, ?, Mirta; Left/middle:  ?, ?, Tania, Fanny, Welwel; Back:  Max, Honey, ?, ?

Left:  Julia, Honey, Eli; Right:  hat, Fanny, Louis; Back:  ?, ?

Left:  Julia, Honey, Eli;  Right:  hair, back of head with hat, Louis, Fanny, ?

Julia, Tania, Honey, Eli

?, Louis, Fanny, ?, ?, ?

Wordless Wednesday

My Left-handed Grandmother

Today, March 6, was the birthday of my maternal grandmother, born Esther Lillian Gordon in 1919.  She was never called Esther; she and her three 1st cousins who had the same given names (all were named after their deceased grandmother, Esther Leah Schneiderman Gorodetsky) were called Lily.  Even so, she didn't like the Esther and later changed her name, possibly legally (she told me she had), to Lillyan E.  I don't know if she changed it before or after she married my grandfather in 1939, or where the change took place.

One of the things I found most interesting about Bubbie (Yiddish for "grandmother") was that she was left-handed.  During the period in which she grew up, it was common for teachers to try to force left-handers to write with their right hands, due to historic societal and cultural perceptions against left-handedness.  It took many years, but it finally dawned on me to wonder how my grandmother had escaped that pervasive social pressure.

I'm lucky in that my light-bulb moment came while Bubbie was still alive, so I asked her about it.  She told me that the teachers in her elementary school had indeed tried to force her to use her right hand for writing and other tasks.  Apparently she mentioned this to her mother, who she said then angrily walked down to the school and informed those teachers that her daughter was left-handed and that was the way she was going to stay!

Sometimes my mind works slowly to assimilate all the pieces of information with which it is presented.  While I appreciated my great-grandmother's desire to stand up for her daughter, it took a while longer for me to realize that another story I had been told about my great-grandmother was that she never learned to speak English, even though she arrived in the United States in 1905, became a naturalized American citizen in 1945, and lived until 1963.  My mother used to tell me that she communicated with her grandmother by speaking English and her grandmother responded in German, and the two managed to make themselves understood somehow.  So if she never learned English, how did she convey to little Lily's teachers that they should no longer try to force Lily to use her right hand?  Unfortunately, that question did not coalesce in my brain until after my grandmother had passed away, so I will probably never know the answer.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Your Genea-Bucket List

Wish lists are always fun to create, because you can really go nuts with what you would like to do.  And that's what Randy Seaver is asking us to do for this week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun:

For this week's mission (should you decide to accept it), I challenge you:

Knowing that a "Bucket List" is a wish list of things to do before death:

(1) What is on your Genealogy Bucket List?  What research locations do you want to visit?  Are there genea-people that you want to meet and share with?  What do you want to accomplish with your genealogy research?  List a minimum of three items, more if you want!

(2) Tell us about it in a blog post of your own (please give me a link in Comments), a comment to this post in Comments, or a status line or comment on Facebook.

Think big!  Have fun!  Life is short - do genealogy first!

Ok, here's mine:

1.  Locations I want to visit:
• Burlington County, New Jersey for an extended research visit, because that's where most of my father's family was from:  Armstrong, Gauntt, Gibson, Sellers, Stackhouse, and other families
• Trenton, New Jersey, because it's the location of the New Jersey State Archives
• Research repositories in New York City and extended area, because that's where most of my mother's ancestors lived after they immigrated to the United States
• Kamenets Litovsk (now Kamyanyets), Porozowo, and Kobrin (minimum), Belarus, all locations from which members of the Meckler and Nowicki branches of my family came
• Kreuzburg (now Krustpils, Latvia), the (claimed) origin of my Brainin family line
• Kamenets Podolsky (now Kamyenets Podilskiiy, Ukraine) and Kishinev (now Chisinau, Modolva), where Gorodetsky family members were born and lived
• Khotin, now in Ukraine (I think), where one branch of the Gorodetsky-Kardish family lived
• Manchester, England, home to my Dunstan line for several generations
• County Cork, Ireland, particularly Ballyvourney, home to my stepsons' paternal ancestors on the mother's side
• Punjab, India, particularly Khatkar Kolan and Patiala, home to my stepsons' paternal ancestors on the father's side

That's the short list.  I can come up with even more if I try.

2.  People I want to meet and share information with:
• Any relatives I can find in the above-mentioned locations :)
• Relatives with whom I am in electronic contact but whom I have not yet met
• Relatives whose names I have from previous research but whom I have not yet met
• Anyone else I find I'm related to
• After I determine who my grandfather's biological father was (see below), people from that branch of the family

3.  What I want to accomplish with my genealogy research:
• Determine who my grandfather's biological father was
• Meet as many relatives as possible
• Collect photographs of as many ancestors as possible
• Learn as much as possible about my ancestors and other relatives as individuals
• Create books or other collections to share with family members
• Document family members who perished in the Holocaust for Yad Vashem
• Find someone else in the family to carry on my work after I'm gone, because I'm going to assume I can't resolve all the questions before I go

Wordless Wednesday

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Katey Sagal

I'm still running behind on posting my comments! for Who Do You Think You Are?  Right now it seems no matter what I do, I can't catch up, especially with two episodes coming this Sunday.  But I'm still trying!

The teaser for the Katey Sagal episode says that she will make an unexpected discovery about her mother and then take a deep dive into that side of her family tree.  She will find brave relatives who stood by their beliefs even when their own lives were threatened.

The intro then tells us that Katey Sagal is a charismatic actress who began her performance career as a back-up singer.  It was not long before she was launched into the spotlight due to her role in 1987 as Peg Bundy on Married with Children (which I watched, but oh, those characters were mean).  Since then she has had nonstop success with appearances in more than 30 television shows.  Her most recent series, and where most people watching WDYTYA probably recognize her from nowadays, is the FX program Sons of Anarchy, for which she won a Golden Globe award.  She lives with her husband, writer/director Kurt Sutter, and three children.

Katey tells us that she was born in Hollywood.  Her parents were part of the leftie Hollywood community, against the Vietnam War and that type of thing.  Her father, Boris Sagal, was a TV director.  Her mother was born in Lombard, Illinois but lived most of her life in the South.  Her mother was a singer who started performing at the age of 11 on a radio program.  Her birth name was Sara Zwilling, but she used the stage name Sara Macon.  She was known as the Singing Sweetheart of Cherokee County (South Carolina, to be specific).  (And she appears in the Internet Broadway Database!)

Sara moved to New York for her career.  During World War II she sang in USO shows.  After she married, she gave up her career to be a stay-at-home mother.  She put her creative life on the shelf, and Sagal thinks it's one of the reasons Sara was so supportive of Sagal's own desire to be a singer.  Sara really advocated for her.

Sara died when Sagal was only 19 years old.  Sagal's father, Boris, lost his life five years later.  Sagal has questions about her family but no parents left to ask.  She doesn't want that to happen to her own children; she wants them to know where they came from.  She wants to learn about her mother's singing career and about her years in the USO, but she has no living relatives.  She hopes this journey will change that.  She's decided to start in New York, where her mother lived when she joined the USO (or, more accurately, she was told by the producers that's where she would be starting).

Sagal goes to the New York Public Library, where she meets Kara Dixon Vuic, an Associate Professor of History at Texas Christian University.  (Now there's an uncommon name.  Where does the name Vuic hail from?  Slavic?  Has it been modified from something else?)  Vuic barely opens her mouth before there's a cut to the narrator (this editor actually has an active union card and gets paid for this?).

The narrator tells us a little about the USO (United Service Organizations, Inc.).  It was started by six civilian nonprofit organizations in 1941 and was created to help boost the morale of military servicemen serving during World War II.  As many as 7,000 performers appeared in live shows at home and abroad during the war.

When we return to the talking head . . . ahem, expert whom the producers took the time to hire for the program, she suggests to Sagal that they look for information about Sara in the Billy Rose Theatre Division at the library.  A lot of USO archival material is housed at the library.  Vuic tells Sagal to start with newspapers.  The Palm Springs Desert Sun of November 3, 1944 (available free online at the California Digital Newspaper Collection) appears to have had a section dedicated to the USO.  Across the top of the page is "With the Boys in the Service."  At the bottom of the page, an article titled "USO Camp Show" mentions Sara Macon, Sagal's mother.

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Desert Sun
November 3, 1944,
page 9

"Smooth Sailing", a new USO Camp Show's production bursting with mirth, melody and novelty treats came breezing along to Torney General Hospital yesterday, strictly for GI enjoyment.  The show was given at the Post Theatre at 12:30 p. m.

The cast included Sid Marlo, phonograph pantomimist, Hart and Bynes [sic], comedy jugglers, Mary Beth, vocalist, The Swingtette, four young lovely singers of jivy tunes, Rudy Miller and Nikki Chandler, magic act, Sara Macon, singer, Wayne Sander, pianist and Pat Lane, comedian who M. C.'d the show.

Hart and Dynes, juggling comedians, have been at it ten years now playing New England clubs and theaters over and over.  A super-song salesman, Mary Beth, has numerous nightclub audiences applauding for more of her sweet and smooth tunes.  During the past five years, she has appeared at Club Ball, Philadelphia; Club Charles, Baltimore; Latin Quarter, Hit Hat and 5100 Clubs, all in Chicago, and the El Morocco, Montreal.

Servicemen at the Stage Door Canteen found nothing dull about Sid Marlo's act, whether he was acting as M. C., comedian or pantomimist.  Pantomime with records is his most popular feature.

In her not yet 18 years pretty Sara Macon has crowded more excitement and accomplishment than most women have in a lifetime.  At the age of 12 she was singing on her own radio program in Spartenburtg [sic], giving the entire 14-minute entertainment, three times a week.  She stayed there two years.  Then she came to New York and NBC hired her after her first audition for two of their prorams [sic].

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After reading the article, Vuic shows Sagal a handbook with instructions that the USO performers had to follow.  Sagal reads parts of a section titled "Data for Artists (Cont'd)."

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1 - Do not mention anything about their wounds, sickness, or condition, nor notice that they have lost a limb.  Talk to them as you would to a friend or a healthy stranger.  If they mention their sickness, listen attentively, and gradually try and get into another subject.

2 - Try to avoid controversial subjects, such as strikes, unions, how much money is being made by civilians from this war, and r—

3 - Try and get into neutral subjects such as:

[Sections a, b, c, and d were not shown on screen at all.]

     e.  The marvelous education programs the U.S. Armed Forces Institute (USAIF) at Madison, Wisconsin, offers them through correspondence, available to all servicemen.

— attempting to arrive at a subject of interest to both of you.

4 - Do not sympathize with him as he does not want sympathy, and his morale is high.

5 - Do not ask about his COMBAT experiences or how he got wounded, because they usually want to forget.

6 - Do not tell him he will get well quickly for he does not like to be kidded.

7 - Do not ask to see the sickest boys, for they are all sick.

In conclusion, you are wanted and needed.  Appreciation will run high.

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If you want to see the complete information, the two pages are online here and here.

It obviously was an intense experience, and Sara would have grown up fast.  Vuic then reveals that she (really, the producers) found an 87-year-old former USO performer who will be able to talk to Sagal about her mother's experiences.  As Sagal leaves the library and goes to meet the performer, she says she hopes that the person knew her mother.

At P. J. Clarke's (I believe it's the one at Lincoln Square), Hilda "Tinker" Rautenberg is waiting for Sagal.  She has a photo album from her time performing with the USO.  As Sagal pages through it, she comes across a photo with five girls and recognizes her mother as one of them.  She starts crying, because she has never known anyone who knew her mother.  Rautenberg tells her she and the other girls were four green college kids.  Sagal asks if all the girls hung out together, and Rautenberg says they even helped push pianos around in hospital wings.  They were doing their duty for the country during the war.

Rautenberg explains that Sara was already a professional and that the other four girls looked up to her.  She taught them a lot and helped them grow, and they had a good time together.  To be initiated into the club, you had to smoke a cigar, which makes Sagal laugh.  Then Rautenberg says that Sara was half actress and that she used to do one song (which happens to be from Oklahoma!):

I'm just a girl who cain't say no

I'm in a terrible fix

I always say, "Come on, let's go!"

Just when I oughta say nix

Sagal says that her mother taught her to play the guitar and sing, and now Sagal has taught her children; her children all play music.  Sagal sounds concerned when she asks Rautenberg whether Sara was happy.  Rautenberg responds immediately with an emphatic "yes!"  As Sagal gets up to leave, the two women hug and Rautenberg is glad that she brought "a little joy to fulfill your dream a little bit."  Sagal has a new friend, and I suspect that after the filming was done she has stayed in touch with Rautenberg.  (Rautenberg was one of the Swingtettes mentioned in the Desert Sun article.)

Sagal loves hearing that her mother was happy.  She remembers her mother singing the song from Oklahoma!.  Sara had ended up as the rebellious one in her somewhat conservative Southern family.  Now Sagal wants to know more about her mother's family; currently she knows almost nothing beyond the fact that her father's name was Daniel Zwilling.

Still in New York, Sagal next goes to the New York Genealogical & Biographical Society, where she meets professional genealogist Vonnie Zullo (whom we have seen previously with Kelly Clarkson, Chris O'Donnell, and Cynthia Nixon  Zullo explains that there has been an explosion of research online and that Ancestry has made it easy to do (um, what about FamilySearch, Find My Past, and MyHeritage?  better yet, how does Zullo feel about being a shill?).  She suggests that a good place to start is looking in birth, marriage, and death (BMD) records.  (Well, I would probably start with the census.)  She has Sagal go to the BMD page on Ancestry and enter Daniel Zwilling in Illinois, where he lived.  The record they latch onto is Zwilling's entry on FindAGrave (second-hand information, anyone?).  It seems to be the right person, because the transcribed obituary on the page includes Sara Sagal as a surviving child.  The page lists Zwilling's parents as Daniel Zwilling and Alda Miller.  Zullo points out that knowing the mother's maiden name is key to opening research on that side of the family.

Sagal decides, "Now I'm curious.  I want to find more about her."  (So much for the Zwilling side of the family.)  Zullo says they should find her on the census to learn more about her.  Zwilling's page says that she was born in 1866, so now Zullo has Sagal use the Ancestry census search page for Alda B. Miller born in 1866.  No need to look for Daniel as a child with his family, of course, just trust what's online.  And searching with a middle initial is not recommended, because it appears very inconsistently on censuses, but the results are already known, so go ahead and throw it in!  And yes, results come up for the 1870 and 1880 censuses in State Center, Iowa.  They look at both censuses and find Alda with parents Abraham and Elizabeth Miller, and Abraham's parents Jacob and Rebecca Miller, all of them born in Pennsylvania.  Now that she knows their names, Sagal wants to dig deeper and find out who her ancestors were, and whether she might have inherited any of their traits.

United States 1870 Census, State Center, Marshall County, Iowa, July 20, 1870, page 2, lines 9–15

United States 1880 Census, State Centre Township, Marshall County, Iowa, June 1, 1880,
page 11 (written)/206C (printed), lines 35–44

With just this tiny amount of information (who needs a complete census survey?), Zullo now says that as a professional researcher, she looks for anyone who might have been in the military (which is her actual specialization), because military records can have great info.  The 1870 census was the first one after the Civil War; does anyone in the family look to be the right age to have served?  Of course someone is, and that is Alda's father, Abraham Miller.

Sagal searches for Abraham H. Miller born 1842 in Pennsylvania and lived in Ohio in draft records (here we go with the middle initial again).   They know he lived in Ohio at some point because that's where Alda was born.  And Abraham H. Miller shows up in the U.S. Civil War draft registrations in Chester Township, Wayne County, Ohio.  The page shows that he was 21 years old, born in Pennsylvania, and "furnished [a] substitute."  (In the image below, his is the last name on the list.)  Sagal misinterprets this, thinking that Miller took the place of another man, but Zullo explains the notation means that Miller paid someone else to take his place.  This was a legal alternative to serving in the military.  The obvious question, of course, is why would Miller do that?

At this point the program cut to a commercial.  When it returned, the narrator said that Sagal had just learned the "shocking revelation" that her ancestor had paid for a substitute to fight in the Civil War.  I thought that was a little out of line.  It was perfectly legal to do so.  The attempt to make it a huge, dramatic item was overblown, unnecessary, and tasteless.

In a classic WDYTYA non sequitur, Zullo then suggests that to help find the answer to that question Sagal should look on Newspapers.com, where they "might" be able to find an obituary for Miller.  That means, of course, an obituary is available, and indeed the search finds it.

State Center (Iowa) Enterprise, December 4, 1903, page 4

The first item to be jumped on in the obituary is that Miller was buried in the Dunkard cemetery.  Not surprisingly, Sagal has never heard of the Dunkards, and Zullo explains that they were also called the German Baptist Brethren and were an early pacifist church, similar to the Amish and Quakers.  (I know about the Dunkards!  The Sellerses are descendants of Alexander Mack, founder of the religion.)  Sagal says, "I like that.  I'm a peacemonger myself."

Based on this, Zullo tells Sagal that to learn more about her family she should see Zullo's colleague in Pennsylvania, where Miller was born.  All the obituary has is that Miller was born in Somerset County.  Doesn't sound like much to go on, does it?

As she leaves the building, Sagal says it would be awesome if Miller was a peace activist.  She is, and her mother was also.  Maybe it's something in their genes.

The next leg of Sagal's journey takes her to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania State Archives.  Philip Otterness, a professor of 18th-century migration at Warren Wilson College, tells Sagal that by using early censuses, wills, land deeds, and family records he was able to construct a family tree for her.  The one he produces is on an oversize piece of paper, but not the fancy calligraphed scroll we're used to seeing.  Not all of it was shown on screen long enough to see what was written, so I filled in the few gaps with data from other sources.

The tree begins at the bottom with Catherine "Katey" Sagal with no birthday.  Her parents were Boris Sagal, born October 18, 1923 in Ekaterinoslav, Ukrainian SSR, died May 22, 1981 in Portland, Oregon; and Sara Elizabeth Zwilling, born December 15, 1927 in Geneva, Illinois, died September 1, 1975 in Los Angeles, California.  Sara's parents were Daniel F. Zwilling, Jr., born March 27, 1895 in State Center, Iowa, died October 5, 1968 in Lombard, Illinois; and Virginia Lee Thompson, September 7, 1895 in Citronelle, Alabama, died May 10, 1987 in Arlington Heights, Illinois.  Zwilling's parents were Daniel F. Zwilling, Sr., born October 18, 1844 in Ohio, died June 19, 1918 in Citronelle, Alabama; and Alda B. Miller, born December 23, 1866 in Pittsburg Junction, Ohio, died June 11, 1895 in State Center, Iowa.  Alda's parents were Abraham H. Miller, born April 17, 1842 in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, died December 18, 1903 in Melbourne, Iowa; and Elizabeth Fleming, born December 21, 1841 in Pennsylvania, died May 11, 1891 in State Center, Iowa.  Abraham's parents were Jacob A. Miller, born October 4, 1812 in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, died January 23, 1890 in Melbourne, Iowa; and Rebecca Horner, born March 20, 1815 in Pennsylvania, died April 16, 1891 in State Center, Iowa.  Jacob's parents were Abraham Miller, born June 15, 1780 in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, died September 4, 1849 in Somerset County; and Maria Sayler, born December 12, 1780 in Pennsylvania, died November 15, 1846 in Somerset County.  This Abraham's parents were Peter Miller, born 1756 in Berks County, Pennsylvania, died November 1, 1818 in Somerset County, Pennsylvania; and Mary Stutzman, born 1756 in Berks County, died March 13, 1838 in Somerset County.  Mary's parents were Christian Stutzman, born about 1732 in Berks County, Pennsylvania, died before November 17, 1770 in Berks County; and Barbara Hochstetler, born about 1732, died before 1787 in Berks County.  The final generation shown is Barbara's parents, Jacob Hochstetler, born about 1712, died before 1776 in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and an unnamed mother.

Sagal starts near the bottom and works her way up.  When she hits Jacob Miller, Otterness points out that he and his father were born in Somerset County, Pennsylvania (so was Abraham H. Miller, by the way), a center of Amish settlements.  From the family records he has seen, the family appears to have been Amish.  Sagal is amused and says, "I'm gonna get a buggy."  Then she admits she doesn't know anything about the Amish and asks Otterness to tell her about them.  He says they are similar to the German Baptist Brethren.

The narrator steps in to say that the Amish religion was founded in Switzerland in 1693.  Three primary tenets were adult baptism, pacifism, and strict separation of church and state.  These ideas were considered radical at the time, and the Amish refusal to join the military challenged the established authorities in Europe.  The Amish were persecuted because they wouldn't fight.

Returning to the family tree, Otterness points out that the name Stutzman, as in Sagal's 5x-great-grandmother, is definitely an Amish name, as is Hochstetler, the name of Sagal's 7x-great-grandfather, Jacob Hochstetler.  Otterness then says that at the archives there is a relevant record.  Sagal reads the top of the page:  "List of Men's Names Imported in the Charming Nancy November 9, 1738."  She asks what a "Charming Nancy" is and is told it was the name of a ship.  She looks down the list of names and finds Jacob Hostedler but apparently has no trouble recognizing that spelling as an alternative for Hochstetler (after an appropriate cue, I'm sure).  Otterness explains that Hochstetler was her first ancestor to immigrate to America.  This particular ship went to Philadelphia and was during the first couple of years that the Amish came to North America.

Sagal wonders why they came to Pennsylvania.  Otterness says that European records show that there was lots of propaganda about Pennsylvania and that is was promoted a land of milk and honey.  It gave the Amith an opportunity to live in an environment where they could practice their religion openly, without persecution.

Sagal says she wants to learn more about her Hochstetler ancestor, including how to pronounce his name correctly, as she stumbles over it a couple of times.  Otterness tells her she should go to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, where Tim Shannon will be happy to tell her more.

Leaving the archives, Sagal is still amused about learning she might be Amish, which she never thought about previously.  She says she'll buy a buggy and a bonnet.

The Historical Society of Pennsylvania is in Philadelphia.  Inside, Tim Shannon, a professor of history at Gettysburg College, is ready for Sagal.  He starts out by telling Sagal that people who study Pennsylvania history know the name Hochstetler well; he is not an obscure person.  He then brings out a bound volume of the Pennsylvania Journal and Weekly Advertiser newspaper.  He has Sagal page through the Thursday, October 6, 1757 issue (I can find only 1757 one issue of the newspaper online, that from May) and then instructs her to read a small item in the left column of one page:

From Reading we have Advice, that last Wednesday the Enemy burnt the House of one Hochsteller, and killed Hochstelle's Wife and a Young Man, and Himself, and three of his Children are missing.

Sagal pronounces the name as Hochsteller both times, even though the name is spelled two different ways.  She seems to have no problem understanding that it's referring to Hochstetler.  In addition to being horrified at what the story says, she asks Shannon who the enemy was and is surprised to learn it was Indians.

The narrator elaborates that Jacob and his fellow Amish were considered British subjects after settling in the North American colonies.  There had been relative peace with the Indians until 1754, when tensions between Great Britain and France erupted into the Seven Years War, or French and Indian War.  Many Indian tribes sided with the French because they hoped to recover land that had been taken by the British.  Indians began making attacks against settlements on the British frontier, which included where the Hochstetler family was living.

Focusing on the fact that Hochstetler and three of his children were missing, Sagal asks if they escaped.  Shannon says it was possible, or they might have been taken captive.  The good news is that the British Army in the 1750's keep good records, and he has a military document for Sagal to look at.  The document is "Intelligence given by John Hochstetler."  Sagal asks if that's still Jacob, and Shannon says that John could be an English translation of Jacob.  (No, not really.  They're two different names.  But I have found references online that indicate Hochstetler's name was Johann Jakob Hochstetler, and they might have been using the English-language equivalent of Johann.)  Sagal does not read the entire deposition on screen; you can read a massaged transcription here.

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Intelligence given by John Hochstetler [a Swiss by] Nation wich was settled in Bergs County [Berner] Town Ship, near Kauffmans Cr was taken by the Enemy Indians the 12th October 1757 and arriving at Shamokin 5th May 1758.

Question:  By What and how many Indians was you taken?

Answer:  By the Delaware and Shawanese, 15 in the whole

Question:  What became of you affter that?

Answer:  [After 3 days travel Est south Est,] I was brought to Buxotons Creek where it emptys in the Ohio [the Allegheny River] and we came to an Indian castle [which lys] upon the corner of it, there I was kept Prisoner all that time.

Question:  How do you escapd from there[, how long and in what maner do you was coming, and where did you arrive?]

Answer:  I got the liberty for hunting, one morning Wery soon I took my Gun finding  Bark Canoe on the River wherein I Crossd it, traveling Est for 6 Days from there I arrivd at the source of the west Branch, there I march for 4 Days further till I was sure of it there I took several blok's tying them together till I got a flott, there I flotted myself Down the River for five Days where I did arrive at Shamokin, living all the time upon Grass, I passd in the Whole for 15 Days.

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So Jacob was abducted October 12, 1757 and arrived at Shamokin, a British fort, on May 5, 1758, a total of seven months.  His deposition was taken by Colonel Henry Bouquet.  Jacob's children are not mentioned at all.

The narrator tells us that more than 1,600 white captives were taken by the Indians during the war.  The French did not require them to be turned over.  Captives were often given to Indian families which had lost family members themselves.  The family had the choice of killing a captive or adopting him.  Young captives were often adopted because they could assimilate more easily to Indian culture.

Jacob's children would have been valuable captives.  Going by the deposition, he probably didn't know whether they were dead or alive.

Sagal says she really wants to find out more about her ancestors.  Shannon says she needs to go to Berks County and talk to people who might have more information from oral tradition (i.e., there are no actual documents).

As she leaves the archives, Sagal is impressed by the amazing story of Amish resilience.

Driving through Reading, Pennsylvania, in Berks County, Sagal says she is going to learn more about the Hochstetlers in the place where they settled.  At the Reading Public Library she meets Dr. Ervin Stutzman, the Executive Director of the Mennonite Church USA.  Sagal remembers the name Stutzman from the family tree she saw and tells him, "I think we're related."  He confirms this and says, "We're seventh cousins."  Sagal is amazed because she doesn't know many relatives and gets a little teary.

Stutzman has some passages marked in a book that he brings out for Sagal to read.  It is Descendants of Jacob Hochstetler by the Rev. Harvey Hostetler, D.D. (originally published in 1912, but apparently it's had some revisions and updates since then).  The passages read come from pages 29, 30, 34, 36, and 37 in the scanned book to which I've linked.  Sagal reads parts here and there.

Sagal starts by reading from "The Massacre" (pages 29–30).

Dr. Stutzman emphasizes how important nonviolence is in the Amish faith.    You can give your life, but it is never permissible to take another's, even to save your own.  He adds that it was unusual for Indians to attack settlers, but this was during the war.

The next paragraph Sagal reads from is "The House Set Afire" and "Murder" (page 30).  She does not read the list of people who were in the house, which includes Barbara Stutzman, who is likely Sagal's 6x-great-grandmother.

Jacob Junior and an unnamed daughter (none of the women seem to be named in this) were killed and scalped.  Jacob Senior's (unnamed) wife was stabbed with a butcher knife and scalped.  Joseph, Christian, and another (unnamed) daughter were thre three children mentioned in the newspaper article who were taken by the Indians.  Joseph was adopted by the Indians (page 34):

Christian wad adopted by an older Indian and treated as a son (page 36):

Stutzman and Sagal don't discuss the fact that the Indian who adopted Christian died soon afterward.  Stutzman does talk about how it was common for many of the captives to develop loving relationships with their captors.

The war ended in February 1763.  The two boys had been with the Indians all that time.  (And along with not remembering names for the daughters, we apparently lost track of the one who was taken captive.  I haven't read through the complete Hochstetler descendants book, so I don't know if she's mentioned in there.)  In the fall of 1764, Colonel Bouquet signed a treaty with the Indians that required the release of all British subjects, about 200 people by that point.  Joseph and Christian were probably in that group.  They had no choice but to return to their prior home.  Sagal reads from the section about Christian's return (page 37).

Christian and many more of the former captives were reluctant to go back.  Some had to be handcuffed and forced to stay with their white families.  Sagal does not read from "His Conversion", but I included it here because it mentions that Christian converted to the Tunker Church.  Tunker is a variation of Dunkard; Christian converted to the German Baptist Brethren.  It's possible other members of the family did also, which might explain why Abraham H. Miller was buried in the Dunkard cemetery.

Stutzman tells Sagal to imagine Jacob's situation — he's a father who had lost his son; the son returns but wants to go back.  What would she way in that situation?  Sagal says that as a mother, you don't have control after a certain point.  She wonders, however, whether Jacob remarried and had more children.  She is happy to hear that he did, as she wanted him to be happy.  In fact, Stutzman says that Jacob has hundreds of thousands of descendants alive today.  Sagal looks overwhelmed to think that she has so many relatives.

Stutzman says that the Amish particularly value stories of people who were nonviolent in difficult situations.  Jacob's old homestead is an important site now.  The original buildings are gone, but a memorial plaque has been placed there.  It isn't far, and Sagal says she would like to go.

The belief in nonviolence is what strikes Sagal the most.  Jacob absolutely would not kill another person.  She can understand his faith, but it's far easier said than done.  She doesn't know if she wouldn't defend her children to the death.

The plaque is on a brick structure.  At first I thought it might have been a chimney that survived from the house, but after reading more of the book than was done in the program, I'm inclined toward the bake oven mentioned in "The Massacre."  The plaque reads, "ERECTED BY THE HOCHSTETLER DESCENDANTS IN MEMORY OF OUR FOREFATHERS WHO PERISHED HERE BY INDIAN MASSACRE SEPT. 19, 1757."

Sagal is very emotional at the end and is obviously holding back tears.  She is glad she comes from a family with strong convictions.  Learning all of this has made her miss her mother, who has been gone a long time.  Being a mother has been her most amazing experience, and she understands her own mother better now.  Her mother grew up quickly but gave her power to stand up for what she wanted.

Sagal ends by saying that she comes from resilient people, from survivors, and from people who stood up for what they believed in.  She feels that describes her also.

Of all things, I had a couple of fashion questions with this episode.  I could not figure out why Sagal was wearing a glove on only her left hand for about the first half of the show.  And I noticed that when she visited Dr. Stutzman she was wearing a plain black dress.  I wonder if that was in deference to his faith.