I had totally intended to write about my Power family this week but it seemed everyone else was and I prefer to do something different. My thoughts went in a few different directions: “power in the blood” (i.e.- the life of one of my several Reverends) or “power in numbers” (i.e.- many offspring), etc. About the middle of the week though, something happened and I wrote about neither. I wrote nothing but emails…but I’m getting ahead of myself. About the middle of the week RootsTech conference started and of course, due to Covid it’s virtual. One of the few things I’ve been grateful that Covid changed…one of the few things Covid changed for the better…is a free and virtual conference! So I got busy with RootsTech and they have this amazing online tool this year where you can see who is at the conference that you’re related to so I started finding all these cousins and messaging them through the FamilySearch system and folks, that’s all the family history writing I’ve done this week! It’s been fun, though! A few have responded back and some I’ve asked to guest write or co-write some blog posts. We’ll see if anyone is willing to do that…fingers crossed, knock on wood, rub the lucky rabbit’s foot, pray-pray-pray!! I love guest writers on the blog and haven’t had one for a long time! Anyway…I decided to combine “power in the blood” and “power in numbers” and revamp them a little so that today I’m not telling the story of an ancestor so much as I’m telling the story of who I’ve been in touch with this week. I hope you’ll stick around and read this one and then come back next week for an ancestor story.

It’s funny how knowing that someone is related to you changes how you feel about them. It changes how much leeway you’ll give them and changes how you interact with them. Even if you don’t think it does…it does. There’s something about a blood connection that changes the way you think about and interact with someone initially. Now…after you get to know them that might change, but initially it seems to make a difference. Not only does it make you more open to introducing yourself to strangers, it’s an eye-opening, visual experience in genetics. It’s been very interesting to see which lines of my families have lots of researchers at the genealogy conference and which have seemingly no one at all. I’m not a statistics person but surely the number of researchers in a specific line makes a difference in which lines of the family get preserved (as far as information, stories, and pictures) and which don’t. I thought it would be interesting to let you see who/which family lines I’ve been in touch with so far.

Power in the Blood AND the Numbers

Dad’s Lines

• Braxton DRAKE/Martha Patsy GREER line: 1 person.
• Mordecai MITCHELL/Lucretia HUTCHISON: 5 people.
• Jesse BAKER/Mary BAIR: 1person.
• John HUBBARD/Nancy CHAMBERS: 1 person.
• Levi HUBBARD/Nancy Indiana WHITE: 21 people!
• John HUBBARD/Nancy WEDDLE: 2 people.
• Josep LARKIN/Mary LANE: 1 person.
• Bartlett UNDERWOOD/Minerva BRINSFIELD/BRINCEFIELD: 1 person.
• James LANE/Nancy CONKWRIGHT/CONKRITE: 1 person.
• John WEDDING/Mary McAfee/McAtee: 1 person.
• John WILLIAMS/Nancy WALLS(?): 1 person.
• John BELL Jr./Sarah HARDIN: 4 people
• Hardy HARDIN/Tabitha ROBERTS: 1 person.

Mom’s Lines

• John BATES/Mary MOBLEY: 1 person.
• Charles G. SEELY/Synthia FOSTER: 3 people.
• George SEELY/Elizabeth SHELLY: 3 people.
• Frederick FOSTER/Mary BURNETT/PICKENS: 5 people.
• John SEELY/Katherine BRINKER: 1 person.
• James GIBSON/Lucinda DOW: 2 people.
• Samuel GIBSON/Lucinda BELL PETTIT: 7 people!
• Henry DOW/Rebecca WHITE: 1 person.
• James GIBSON/Sarah PHILLIPS: 5 people.
• John DOW/Harty ELLIS: 2 people.
• Benjamin WHITE/Mary ELSTON/WALDROP: 6 people!
• James BULLOCK/Cynthia DALE: 4 people.
• James Squire DALE/Elizabeth SMITH: 3 people.
• John LATTY/Martha Frances SCOTT: 4 people.
• Edwin WALLS/Delilah UNKNOWN: 1 person.

Each person I contacted was only counted once. That’s 89 people I’ve connected with so far! Some people are connections for lines I struggle with so that’s very exciting. There are several people I’ve asked to guest write or co-write a blog post about their branch of the family (or about our common ancestor, either way). Some have already given me leads to resources I didn’t know existed for our family! The computer only shows me 300 relatives out of a whopping 45,000+ that are registered for the conference!!! I probably won’t even get through all 300 but I got as far as 5th cousins as of this evening. I’ve also learned how I connect to several professional genealogists I follow. Amy JOHNSON CROW, one of my favorite genealogists, is my 7th cousin through my mom’s FOSTER line. Thomas MacENTEE, another genealogist is my 10th cousin twice removed through my dad’s LARKIN line. Michele Simmons LEWIS, another genealogy friend, is my 11th cousin through my dad’s GREER line. Not all of my favorite genealogists have shown up on RootsTech and some have been no relationship at all. It’s been fun to find out though and I love this online tool.

This is certainly an exciting weekend. It’s been dampened a little by the fact that my computer has decided it no longer wants to live but I’m going tomorrow to get a new one so the adventure can continue! (By the way, I apologize if this post is unreadable or has lots of errors. I was fighting a dying computer that was randomly deleting entire paragraphs and other crazy things.) Over the remainder of the weekend I will likely begin looking up DNA matches to see if I can find any connections there. I hope you have a fun, exciting weekend. Do something for yourself!

Until next weekend,

Lisa @ Days of Our Lives blog