One of the things I like about working on Notables is the diversity of it all. So far, his family's all in western Pennsylvania, teenagers working on coal mines and such. When they say he's from labor roots, they're not kidding. An interesting problem is the Anglicization of German names. Looking at the records, it varies a lot as if there wasn't a specific time that it officially changed.. Part of that problem might be that it's mostly Census records I'm looking at, not much else. And the literacy levels of the Census enumerators in the area were not high. Spelling varies. A lot.
This may be related to the class status of the family and how factory life was in the 1800s, but may also have to do with availability of Pennsylvania records. I've always found the state to be a little challenging. It would appear that, for now, looking at people of German extraction, born around the Pittsburg area as early as the 1820s. I'm puzzling about Shanefelter/Schoenfelder transition, too. Getting to learn about a region I don't know a lot about. It's what I like about working on Notables. You never know where it might lead. Very interesting!
No telling how easy it will be to connect to the larger tree. There's getting to be a sizeable fragment now, so have at it. There's room for one and all. I'm not territorial about those profiles.
