Profile Accuracy Theme of the Week: Cousin Bait

Question

This week's theme: Cousin Bait.

To participate, simply:

1. Choose a profile that fits this week's theme.
2. Review and improve the accuracy of the profile.
3. Reply with an answer below to let us know which profile you chose.

Also see: Photo Sharing Theme of the Week:Hairstyle

Answer 1

I have an ongoing project in which I'm tracing all the deceased descendants of each of my fourth-great-grandparents, which I'm slowly working on adding here to WikiTree; I hope this might help relatives find us & me on here. I've also been regularly posting updates regarding my work on Facebook, where I am connected with many distant relatives who've been keeping track of my progress (a couple have already joined us here!), as well as on Instagram.

Comments

I like your method Thomas!

Answer 2

At first your Cousin Bait challenge had me stumped. Then I thought since photos attract attention I'd look through my collection of old postcards.  I chose an image of an impressive railway hotel in Glasgow, Scotland.  I researched the history of the hotel and found the extensions shown in my postcard were done by architect James Miller (no relation).  I thought I'd add the image and upgrade someone's profile of James.  But he wasn't in Wikitree.  Digging deeper I found the orphaned profile of his mother Elizabeth Bell http://wikitree.com/wiki/Bell-13827. I adopted her, filled in her sources and added her husband George Miller http://wikitree.com/wiki/Miller-86002. I filled in his sources then added their architect son James Miller http://wikitree.com/wiki/Miller-86003. I will do my best to give a general sketch of his illustrious career and add my postcard view.  Since this is a famous person I hope others will add in the future to the work I've started.

Comments

Thank you for a very interesting answer. You started with a postcard and ended up with an well-researched biography. Now I am inspired to look at the buildings around me.

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Yes, I never thought this one postcard would lead to the man who designed the lavish interiors of the famous ill-fated ship the RMS Lusitania.  I'm trying to put a link on James Miller's profile to WikiTree's free space page on Shipping Disasters (the Lusitania). With the help of Mary Richardson, Project Coordinator I succeeded.  James is now mentioned under the Lusitania and his profile has a link to the Shipping Disasters page.

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James' profile looks good, you have put a lo of work in this week on his and his parents profiles.

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Thank you, Stacie.  This was my first architect profile and first famous person profile.   It was fun. But James has many profiles on the internet.  What I love about WikiTree is we can create biographies for unknown people and tell their stories as if they were famous.

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I love that postcard Pat!  Very impressive just like the profiles you created...outstanding! just like the grand central hotel that just reopened!  My wife and I were going to visit Scotland, since I have a lot of Scottish in me, but I had to have some surgery last year and we cancelled the trip...it is high on our places to visit list once we get back to travelling.

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Thanks, Scott, for your comments.  Yes, check out the hotel when you get to Scotland.  The card I have was written before World War Two and the lady who had stayed at the hotel was fearful it would be destroyed. I have some old postcards from my family but over the years I've purchased a card here and there. I find them fascinating.  Just like the WikiTree weekly challenges...also fascinating.

Answer 3

This Memorial Weekend I plan to drive 165 miles to the western part of Oklahoma. This is where my Long Family cousins live. I will mainly be with my mother's first cousin Anita Long Gee's family. I have not been with these cousins for 27 years, and I will work this week for accuracy on the Gee Family. This is a photo I took of Anita and her two bothers, Jack and Jerry. Anita's husband and Jerry are still living. I plan to spend three days showing them WikiTree.

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Comments

Nice!  Have a great drive and a terrific family reunion!

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Thank you Kathy, this trip was planned last year. I did not go because of the virus, so I am really looking forward to being able to get together with these cousins.

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That sounds like a fun trip!  Enjoy your time with family.

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Don't stop by any cemeteries on the way!  You always have cool things to do Alexis...and, you do them well!

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Scott, I will be going to a part of Oklahoma that has not changed since I was a child. My second cousins will take me to a cemetery that would not be on any GPS, so I will take pictures. I am taking two teenagers with me—I think.

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My paternal grandfather was born in Hartshorne, Indian Ty.  I drove thru there a couple of years ago.  Not much there!

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Scott, my husband was born and raised in McAlester, which is 13 miles from Hartshorne. I live another 60 miles north in Muskogee, which is eastern Oklahoma.

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Alexis i wish you a wonderful trip looking forward to hear about your trip

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Thank you Susan, I am getting excited about the trip.

Answer 4

For this week's challenge I have begun by formatting the profiles of Michele Bait and his wife Lucia Bait formerly Velliscig. More work needed to add more sources and link to the large tree.

Comments

I also worked on these "Baits" and found the marriage source.  Good luck with these!

Answer 5

Cousin Bait, this is a new project I am working on. I have been looking into social media to connect with cousins. I am setting up private Facebook groups for some of my family lines. One of those groups is for my Griffin line. I will be working on Mary Virginia Smith/ Griffin,Smith-133695, born 1872-1957.

Comments

Sounds like a great project Stacie.  I will be interested in the results you get from your Facebook groups.  I just clicked on cousin bait for the first time on a profile and followed the directions for Facebook. (I know that isn't what you are doing with creating family groups, but it will be interesting to see if there is any feedback! 

Answer 6

I have a lot of French Canadian ancestors, but most aren't very interesting: born, married, had children, and died. Most of them had a lot of children, so I probably have a lot of cousins. But I had never bothered to look for them, until :

A few weeks ago, Danielle Laird tossed out some tempting cousin bait : she asked if anyone had any ancestors with interesting dit names (family nicknames). Did I? I looked through my ancestor collection without finding anything to rival Brisetout ("break everything") or Pret a Boire ("ready to drink").

But Aha! here is Louis Guertin dit le Sabotier ("the sabot-maker"), one of the men sent by the king of France to settle the New World. Louis had a useful skill: he could make wooden clogs. I'm intrigued. How can you take a piece of wood and turn it into a shoe? A Google search showed me a video of someone doing just that, much as Louis must have done. A skilled clog-maker might produce three pairs in a day.

Louis' profile is fairly complete and well-sourced, so he is not my accuracy project for this week. But I am still thinking about making shoes. . .

A few blocks from my home, there is a vacant building. This week I discovered that it was once the home of a shoe factory, run by Oliver Robbins and Charles Kellogg. With 450 employees, it produced 1800 pairs of shoes a day.

Having  some colonial ancestors gives me a lot of possible cousins. Following the trail that Danielle Laird began, I have come to my 5th cousin 4 times removed, Oliver Robbins, and his partner, my 7th cousin 3 times removed, Charles Kellogg. As they lived here in Pittsfield, I should be able to find more information about them, so they will be my accuracy project for this week.

Comments

Wonderful ideas. Family nicknames, occupations, a delightful clog-making video, which gave me ideas for future challenges.  Good luck with your research on your distant cousins Oliver Robbins and Charles Kellogg who ran the shoe factory in Pittsfield.  You were related to them but were they related to each other?

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Robbins and Kellogg are not on Wikitree, but they are on Family Search. I just clicked "Relationship to me." If Robbins and Kellogg were distant cousins to each other, they probably did not know it. But I get just as excited about neighbors as I do about 7th cousins. Louis Guertin dit le Sabotier also has a Family Search page with an old engraving of him making shoes. He is using tools much like the ones in the video.

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You are so hilarious! Joyce!  No doubt you have A LOT of cousins!  You ol' cobbler you! You make everything interesting, even those old dead cousins!

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Scott, yourself are one of my relatives--and in several ways, too. Closest is 9th cousin twice removed. Aren't you glad we have ancestors?

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Pat, you and I are 8th cousins once removed. This cousin bait is locating a lot of cousins!

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Not sure about 8th, Joyce, because FamilySearch family trees are at times a bit wobbly, but we have so many connections, we're cousins for sure. What fun to learn this on the Cousin Bait challenge.

Answer 7

I have worked on some unsourced 'Cousins' I found this week, Matthew Cousin and his wife and daughter who were all unsourced now have sources, stickers and categories.

Comments

This is good.  You learned he was a miner.  I wonder what he was mining?

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I was traveling the east coast one time and I passed a small grove of trees and I thought I saw a gravestone.  I parked and got out of my car, walking over into the brush and the trees and there they were, the Cousins family graveyard.  I think it was near Bar Harbor, Me.

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My guess is that he was mining lead. Here's the link.

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Many thanks for that information Joyce, and for the link, I will incorporate them in the bio.

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Gillian, Matthew Cousin's page looks good now.  Lead mining was not my first guess.  Great that Joyce found the info.

Answer 8

The cousin bait in this case was a name and an exhibit in a museum in Abilene Kansas, far from my home in Vermont.  I saw in Abilene the name of A B Seelye, of Illinois and Kansas, and his patent medicines of the late 1800s.  As the family genealogist, I knew about a Seelye family, who came from the same towns in CT that my family did, and then came to (where else) Pownal, Bennington County Vermont, where my mother's family has lived since before the Revolution.  I have Seelye cousins, and thought the spelling of the name was too unique not to be the same one. You can also find it as Cilley. Sealey, etc, but in Pownal it is Seelye.

I didn't have to look far to learn more about Alfred Barnes Seelye, as he is here on wikitree as Seelye-106.  His paternal tree is also visible, taking only one generation to show the connection to Bennington County, Vermont.  I suspect they were really from Pownal, and will try to get some documentation to verify.  SInce they are also in Williamstown MA, which is contiguous to Pownal, it is a good bet.  Cousins from Pownal may move away, and 150 years may go by, but we still find them.

Comments

I enjoyed your story. Discoveries like that make this hobby so much fun.

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Alfred's mother, Ellen Seeley, married James Mason Seelye.  She was born in Wyoming but her roots go back to Goshen, Orange, New York.  FamilySearch has photos of James and Ellen. Learning from Joyce Vander Bogart I clicked on "Relationship to me".  I don't match the Seelye side but Ellen Seeley was my 7th cousin (2x). Great story.

Answer 9

Not much luck with Bait, but I did find Emile Cousin

He came to us through a GEDCOM, and it looks like his family could use some work if you are interested in France, Quebec, and Louisiana.

Comments

Wow!  Nice job on Emile's bio Kay!

Answer 10

I've been working on a project to trace and identify members of my Booth/Kidd families. They originated from County Londonderry in Ireland. A lot of them came over to Massachusetts during the mid to late 1800's.

Comments

You really did a great job setting up your project Chandra!  I love free-space pages!  Good hunting!

Answer 11

A week ago last Sunday, my cousin was visiting.  He is also interested in family history and had brought his mom’s old photo albums and some videos of films taken when we were kids.

Often our families would schedule vacations at the same time.  In about 1960 the four daughters had a total of 10 children.  Year after year, our parents would take photos of us at bed time lined up in age order.  We children had arranged ourselves beside the cousins we played with.

 One of the videos showed us lined up outside in age order, but there were 11 children instead of the 10.  There was an extra girl neither of us could identify.  After watching the whole video, we also saw my grandmother’s brother and his wife, Buddy and Clo, and another unidentified woman were also visiting.  We could not figure out who they were even with my notes on the family.

 After some research, including some hints from my mother, I believe that the girl was Buddy and Clo’s granddaughter with her mother.

 I have not told my cousin yet.  I will improve Buddy’s WikiTree (Roy Earl Cherry, Cherry-2743) profile for this challenge and add, his family, then send my cousin to WikiTree for the answer to the mystery people in the video.

Comments

Great idea Wayne!

Answer 12

I am currently trying to back track Wasyl Rogoza's Rogoza-2 locations.  I have found him in Winnipeg from 1909 to 1912 and then in Stuartburn Municipality, Manitoba from then to about 1921 (Census and homestead records).  I cannot find him in the 1906 or 1911 census and cannot find him in passenger lists.  I'm hoping this updated profile will be good "cousin bait".  I have added his birth record and marriage record which allowed me to add his parents with these sources.

Answer 13

I inadvertently created cousin bait by putting in inaccurate (and sensitive) information on her grandmother's profile (that she left her husband due to his drinking, which was true, but  also that she left her children, which wasn't true). I had this information from another relative's written history of the family, lol.

Comments

I love those relatives that wrote things down!  I recently discovered on of my great grand aunt's notes on the family and it really opened some eyes!

Answer 14

Usually there is no one looking for my close family as there just aren't that many of us, but I was lucky when a second cousin, also on WikiTree, found me.  Now, she didn't know I existed but I did know she and her siblings existed.  Now, I have 3 more pen pals and cousins who have enriched my life.

For this week's challenge, I worked on the Baits that Anne Young is doing more for.  Only finding the one source for their marriage quickly, and realizing it was in Italian, I decided to look for some Cousin profiles.  Well, there are a ton of orphaned Cousin profiles from Louisiana.  I gave Edgar Maxime Cousin and his wife Cecile Cousin sources and biographies.  At first I thought Cecile Cousin probably needed a different last name at birth -- but no, she indeed was named Cousin, as was documented in her marriage registration to Edgar.  I was unable to find her after Edgar died shortly after their marriage, but made research notes, hoping someone who is related to the these Cousins will find them and know more.

Answer 15

Hello,

Have you or a loved one been a victim of cousin bait? If so, please contact the law offices of Nelson, Murdock and Walters. They are awaiting your call. https://allroadhaverhill.blogspot.com/2021/05/52-ancestors-week-20-cousin-bait.html

Check out my Wikitree origin story!

Comments

Great job Chris!  A cousin that I never met told me that I had a whole bunch of cousins living near me.  What should I do?  Run and hide?

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Good blog.  I laughed when you mentioned the person who complained about your profile on WikiTree of THEIR ancestor.  Someone praised a profile I did to the point of insisting she could apply for me for membership in DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution).  I  explained gently that I descended from the daughter of said Patriot who was a Loyalist who fled to Canada.  Gee, she wrote, that might affect your chances.

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@ Scott: Nah. Show no fear. If they knock on the door demanding money, that's when you run and hide. If not, welcome them.

@ Pat: Yeah. That was....weird. It's weirder when you realize he was the brother of my great-aunt's great-aunt and was living with him in Haverhill and was present at my great-grandmother's funeral according to the car list in 1943 AND the 1920 census. People are weird.

Sounds like you had a similar experience with another weird person. Yikes.

But, here's the thing. The further back in time you go, the more people are going to descend from the same ancestors. Learned that here REAL quick thanks to the Quebec lines because once upon a time Quebec was like one street.

Glad you liked the blog!

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Loved the blog, Chris! I literally fell for the trap! You see I had been asking around for 1 or 2 months when my grandmother gave me a document detailing Paulus Maree, his two wives and about 20 children. I searched him up: 

https://www.google.com/search?q=paulus+maree&rlz=1CATTSD_enZA922&oq=paulus+maree&aqs=chrome..69i57j33i160l2.6818j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 

First thing that shows up:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Maree-12 

I waited for 2 months to get on to WikiTree because of age restrictions, finally registered on 20 Dec 2020, fours day after my 13th birthday. Who else at that age does this and makes profiles like this https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Rutherford-4701

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Thanks, Francis! That profile is really good! Keep up the good work!

Answer 16

I have been working on my great-great-grandfather, Sir David Carter Rutherford. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Rutherford-4701 I have to look at his possible sources again. He was a Freemason. I have this problem when there is a chance it might not be them like I find it impossible to confirm a person on a ship list.

Comments

Really nice bio Francis!

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Thanks, Scott,

It was the second profile for my PIP - Profile Improvement Project - Voyage. 

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The PIP Voyage is the best!  I learned a lot!

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You are in the PIP! I loved the voyage, just hated waited to be answered as I would excitedly finish my tasks so quick. My other profile was my third great grandfather, James Charles Norval https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Norval-245 who was my first profile, David was my second. Norval on my mom's side and David on my dad's. What were your profiles?

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I just looked at your profile, some photos are not showing, the following captions:

* My Family Tree.

* Founder of Central Arizona Bikers

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Fixed it!  Thanks Francis!

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Sorry Francis, I didn't read your comment thoroughly.  My two PIP profiles were George Washington Martin and Anne Erwin Hitchcock. Here's my free space page My PIP Voyage.

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I just wanted to ask why George Washington Martin has a Research Notes section and a See Also section at the bottom of the Sources section. Both are empty, should they not be removed.

Anne Erwin  Hitchcock last sentence (Different ages in the same sentence): 

Anne Erwin Hitchcock (age 50) passed away on September 11, 1854, in St. Louis, Missouri, at the age of 51. She is buried at the Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri.

Otherwise, two very nice profiles and I'm happy to see the voyage taught you so much as it did for me. 

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Hey Francis!  Thanks for checking out those profiles!  I have corrected both and appreciate it very much!  Yes, I enjoyed the PIP voyage and learning the correct way to create profiles!  I recently read that WikiTree fails when it comes to proper sourcing.  Kudos to the PIP management team for creating this project!

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Don't worry, Scott,

I love to help! Yes, kudos to Debi Hoag, the co-ordinators and voyage guides!

Answer 17

Cousin Bait?  I have been working on profiles for several years now on WikiTree but I have never clicked on the Cousin Bait drop down menu.  Well, you have forced my hand and I did just that for this challenge.  I, like those who have ancestors that were early Mormons, have a lot of cousins!  I lived in Bountiful, Utah when I was 14 years of age and had a lot of friends, but I never knew that they could have been my cousins until I began researching my genealogy.  My Watchlist guided me to the Snow family profiles and I found a 3rd Cousin, Lorenzo Snow Jr., son of the 5th LDS President, Lorenzo Snow, 2nd Cousin.  Lorenzo Jr and a sister, La Blanche Snow Hunter were orphaned, so I adopted both of them.  My trip through Brigham City produced a lot of photos of graves, including the Snow family members.  They have been uploaded to WikiTree for some time now.  Lorenzo Jr. died in San Francisco, so I will be interested to see why he was in San Francisco.  Lorenzo Jr. is one of 46 children fathered by LDS Prophet Lorenzo Snow.  Yes, I did, for the first time, follow the directions on Cousin Bait and shared Lorenzo Jr.'s tree on Facebook.  It worked like a charm and thanks, Eowyn, for making cousin bait our theme!

Comments

Scott, Lorenzo Snow Jr. is my fifth cousin twice removed. Lorenzo Snow Jr. and Alexis (Lovelace) Nelson are both descendants of Samuel Snow Jr..

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Yoo-Hoo!  Cousins!!!

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I suppose that Lorenzo Jr. Snow was in San Francisco visiting his daughter La Blanche and her family when he died.  I didn't find any other facts of why he was in San Francisco, but that is where one of his daughters lived at the time.  Next project!

Answer 18

I have (distant) cousins named Cousins - so I worked on https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Cousins-1745 and his daughters

Answer 19

I didn't really know what to do this week, but I settled on looking at my great-great grandfather Frank Robert Purse who changed his name to Frank Robert Pearce.

He has an awful lot of descendants and I thought maybe one day, one of them would come across his would WikiTree profile and be baited into giving some information on why he changed his name.

Answer 20

I updated the biographies and sources for:

John Cook: Cook-16530

Arthur Thomas Cook: Cook-16529

Blog post on cousin bait: https://rhymeschemesanddaydreams.wordpress.com/2021/05/23/52ancestors-in-52-weeks-cousin-bait/