Genealogical Gems

Last Sunday I had a great time at the PA Renaissance Faire dancing with the band Tartanic (pictured below for no other reason than the drummers are hot!). After their set, I had a chance to chat with them – one in particular - about tartans. I still had a few questions about them, like which one can I wear if I have several Irish lines.    The Scottish Register of Tartans states a restriction of one of my ancestral tartans is that it may only be worn by those with that surname. Does this mean that since my maiden name is (clearly not Irish) Ruczhak, that I can not wear my ancestral tartans?       My grandfather’s mother was a KILPATRICK, born in Ireland . My grandmother was full Irish. Her grandparents – our immigrants – were WALSH, O’FLAHERTY, KEATING, and DURKIN. My DNA results from Ancestry.com show that I am 35% Eastern Europe, 29% Great Britain and 17% Ireland . I also have 14% Scandinavia, 3% Western Europe , 1% Italy/Greece and a tra...

  Today I actually have a specific goal for Sorting Saturday! On Monday I am meeting up with two cousins on my Walsh/Welsh side. I am so very excited and yet I find myself nervous. So today's goal is to gather up and organize info (and of course print out some things for them, assuming my stupid printer doesn't pull an attitude with me) on our shared lines. Those lines are: Walsh/Welsh O'Flaherty From the Walsh side, there is also Keating. From the O'Flaherty side, there is also Durkin and Murphy (Murphy! Aren't I lucky!). My files above look very organized and for the most part they are ... however I have a wicker basket with surname folders in it. Everything gets thrown in there! If I do not know exactly where a person fits, he or she lands in there. If I simply do not have time to put a document in the appropriate folder, it goes in there. If I come across a tip or a resource, I write a reminder note to myself. Guess where that note lands! Toda...

Pennsylvania State death certificates are available online now through Ancestry.com.  The range available is 1906-1924. I lost half my morning already when I saw these were available! I was surprised how few people I have who passed between these years but I did find some. Some admittedly I already had the hard copies. Some were like ... "wow!" The death cert here at right for example is that of Martha Durkin O'Flaherty - my great-great grandmother. When I first got her certificate (it was one of the first I had actually ordered) I was so excited ... and so in despair! Her mom was a Murphy! A Murphy in Ireland ... that should be easy to find, right? Martha Durkin and Dennis O'Flaherty had eight children. One of whom was Hugh O'Flaherty. Hugh married Katherine Dee and they had six children ... and now - thanks to this database - I have all but one of their names! Five of the six passed between 1906 and 1913, the oldest of whom was 9 years old at the time ...

Today - St. Patrick's Day - seems like the perfect day to post about my immigrants, specifically my Irish immigrants. Michael WALSH believed to be from Dublin. An aunt had told me once that the family were haberdashers there. Once here, they settled in Shenandoah, Schuylkill County working in the coal mines. Anna KEATING Believed to be from County Mayo. She was born in 1855 and came here with her siblings when she was five. Her parents are assumed to have stayed in Ireland. The Keating siblings settled in Ringtown, near Shenandoah. She married Michael Walsh. Michael and Anna had six children. One of whom was Martin Joseph Walsh, my great grandfather. At some point the Walsh family moved to Phoenixville. My grandmother mentioned once it had something to Martin playing baseball. In Phoenixville, which is in Chester County, he married Catharine O'Flaherty. She is the daughter of Dennis and Martha Durkin O'Flaherty. Dennis O'FLAHERTY Dennis was born in 1839. ...

Surname Saturday is a weekly prompt by GeneaBloggers which focuses on a patricualr surname. This week I have chose DURKIN. My great-great grandmother was Martha Durkin, the daughter of Patrick Durkin and Abyan Murphy. Martha is also one of my immigrant ancestors. She was born 1 August 1839 in Ireland. She immigrated and once here settled in the Phoenixville, Chester County, PA area. It was there she married Dennis O'FLAHERTY, also from Ireland. Together they had eight children. The youngest - Catherine - is my great grandmother. Etymology Most sources (that is I have not found any to contradicte) seem to agree that Durkin is from the Gaelic Mac Duarcáin‘son of Duarcán’. Kilmoremoy is a civil parish that is locatedin both County Mayo and County Sligo. My grandmother always said this branch of our family came from Sligo but I have never found any documentation one way or the other ... yet. The crest above is from Irish Abroad . Everything seen in the crest means somethin...

I woke up early this morning and decided to take a look at the old to do list. We all have this sort of list. It's made with god intentions but have you ever noticed as we cross one item off two more items find their way on the list! Anyway, something woke me up at 4 this morning and since I normally wake up at 5 anyway I decided to just stay up. My FarmTown (yeah - I'm addicted!) was not ready so I pulled out the to do list. I think I could probably wake up at 3 for an entire month and still have a nice list! Today - I updated my family file on Ancestry.com finally. It's been a long time coming. If you would like to check it out, it is called Ruczhak Family Tree. It covers: Ruczhak/Hruszczak, Matys, Kurenda, Skrabalek, Still, Walsh/Welsh, O'Flaherty, Durkin, Keating, Murphy, VanHorn, Rice, Bing, Way, Eckman, Deyoe, Schermerhorn, Herr, Miller, Kirchner and more. I used to be able to recall any date and name or place or event ... then I computerized. I love it don...