Mappy Monday: Kartenmeister

I recently deciphered the last residence of my second great-grandfather's second wife from her entry on a passenger arrival list as Sielec, Germany. I looked up the Sielec, Germany entry on Kartenmeister.com to determine where it was located and to find out some general information on the city.

Kartenmeister provides the spelling of the name of the city in both Polish and German (in this case, the same), as well as the German and present-day provinces. A link to Google maps shows the location and coordinates. There is also information on parishes in the area and where civil registration was held. I was able to use the parish information to order microfilmed church records. The entry even provides the population (314 people in 1905) and any local landmarks.

Besides the research value, Kartenmeister has the potential to connect you to other researchers. There is a list for each city of surnames and the email addresses of those researching them. You can be added to the list, so that if anyone else is researching the same surname in the same location, you can contact them. The surname list is also searchable for all locations.

Source

“Information on German City of Sielec,” online database, Kartenmeister (Kartenmeister.com : accessed 12 May 2012).

The Genealogy Bug and the Loyalist

I have been crazy about genealogy for quite some time now and my family takes an interest in my findings, but not the research process itself. My mother-in-law recently located her mother's Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) membership number and, lo and behold, now has the genealogy bug. I am very excited to have someone genuinely interested in genealogy research and I love being able to answer the questions she emails to me.

I have read that the father of her Revolutionary War Patriot ancestor's wife was a Loyalist. The idea that our ancestors were disagreeing on politics long before Sunday afternoon debates at my grandparents' kitchen table had never before crossed my mind, but genuinely intrigues me. I registered for a webinar I found on the Geneabloggers website called Fighting for the King! Researching Your American Revolutionary War Loyalist Ancestor, presented by Kathryn Lake Hogan of LOOKING4ANCESTORS. Hopefully I will be able to determine whether what I read is valid or not, and have something interesting to discuss with my mother-in-law.