Loraine Mary Owens 23 Years old - 1936

My paternal grandma, Loraine Mary Owens (born Bricault), b. November 8, 2013.  d. May 27, 2008.  This picture was scanned and given to my dad with the file name 1936.jpg, that would make her 23 years old, one year before she married my grandpa, Thomas Aloysious Owens (b. June 21, 1913, d. April 18, 1992) on September 25, 1937. 



I am not sure what the occasion was for the photo, I would think back then taking a studio photograph would be a special occasion.  Perhaps it was part of engagement photos, I don't know if people did that then, or when they were engaged?  I love the slight peachy color in the cheeks and lips. 

5 Generation Birthplace Chart

I was inspired by a blog I have been reading, Genea-Musings, to create a birthplace chart going back 5 generations. It's a nice reference to show all the states and countries where my family was born.  My mom's side has German roots and my dad's side has Italian, French-Canadian and Irish roots. 

If you would like to do your own - You can download Pat Richley-Erickson's spreadsheet (5 or 6 generations), available at: http://bit.ly/5n6GenBirth.

Seminar at Genealogical Society of Monroe County

My dad and I went to a one day seminar in Monroe, MI yesterday that was put on by the Genealogical Society of Monroe County.  We weren't sure what to expect, but the topics they had listed in the flyer intrigued us to register the $25 each for us and make the drive for the 9am-3:30pm day.  The day didn't disappoint.  The first half of the day was speaker, Kris Rzepczynski, from the Archives of Michigan in Lansing.  We learned so much what we could potentially find at the Archives of Michigan, that we can't wait to make our family research plan and spend a day there! We also learned a lot of what SeekingMichigan.org's website has to offer.  We have used the site before, but we don't realize how lucky we are to have this information free to us in Michigan.  Michigan is a unique state that is really getting on board in indexing and scanning records.  We also learned very soon, all naturalization records will be on the website soon, a huge score, because many times this lists the birthplaces such as cities of countries where our ancestors came from.

Next we had a male speaker named Jan (pronounced Yaan) Steven Zaleski speak about German and Polish research and emigration research tips from the Hamburg port.  We have a plethora of tools to try and trace my German roots (Kolb, Leimann surnames), although it's quite complex and requires a lot of time and digging.  The German information was overwhelming and the day ended perfectly, because I don't think I could have handled another minute of genealogy presentations.  

Why a family history blog?

So, this is my first post on my new blog, These Genes are Mine.  I have decided to start this blog to help aid my research on my family.  I hope it can be a placeholder for timelines, stories and pictures of my my family history.  I got into family research and genealogy over a year ago in January 2015 after reading the book The Orphan Train.  Now, I am not an orphan, nor do I know anyone in my family who was an orphan, but the time setting decorated in the book inspired me to learn more.  Fortunately, we do have quite a bit of family information that my father has kept up with for years and has acquired from second and third cousins.  One of my goals is to make sure the accuracy of my tree is correct by citing sources, sort of a genealogy do-over.  My second goal is to blog about my family and anything to do with my research.  I hope you enjoy reading.