STORIES
The story "Where the Grand Duke was ..." tells how the genealogy bug bit me. But below are some of the side stories about how the project developed and some of the people who helped me. There is almost 3000 pieces of correspondence so I cannot mention everyone here who had an impact on my book - but all the correspondence is indexed in my records and I will not forget. Genealogy Society: One night I was having coffee with a friend and told her about my project. She mentioned that in the last Tisdale paper a lady named Bernice Lawrence had been interviewed regarding the Genealogical Society that she belonged to in Melfort (30 miles away). I phoned her and went to a meeting with her. That night the program was to view the Mormon Church records on family history. The lady at the computer said "Someone give me a name". Another lady said "Thomas Boyce". Thomas Boyce was typed into the computer and up came several people by that name. By process of elimination, using birth date and spouses name (which was known), we found the right Thomas Boyce. Then we could search back to his parents. I was sold. The next meeting I signed up as a member. Bernice lent me some Saskatchewan Genealogical Society Bulletins which I found very interesting. I had a picture that was labeled on the back "Margaret (my great-grandmother) by air ambulance to Saskatoon". There was no year. One of the Bulletins included a history of the Saskatchewan Air Ambulance. It stated that the first air ambulance was the CF-SAH, established in the fall of 1945. By August of 1946, a second aircraft CD-SAM was added. I dug out the picture and examined it with a magnifying lens. Sure enough the letters S A M could be clearly seen on the airplane wings. I now could narrow down the years, because I knew they had moved into Saskatoon in 1953. (In January 2001 I saw the CD-SAM in the Western Development Museum in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.) In another instance, the Bulletin lead me to an article in a National Geographic magazine regarding the Ellis Island Terminal for immigrants in New York. That is where my Great-Grandparents John and Margaret Hirtz, Grandmother Lucy Mitchell and my Grandfather Tom Levorson entered America. There were many helpful articles in those Bulletins. Almost disaster: Once I had scanned and copied all the pictures and news clippings my family had lent me, it was time to return the originals to their rightful owner. Terry and I loaded all the bags and boxes in the trunk of the car in the second week of our 1996 summer holidays. On the way we spent quite a few hours in Saskatoon looking for a new truck. Driving down 8th Street, the front left wheel bearing locked on our car. There was smoke coming from the wheel when my husband noticed it and stopped. I shutter to think if the car had burned with all those one-of-kind photo's in them. However, we followed our car and tow-truck into Auto Clearing (where Terry's brother was in Sales) and said "Let's make a deal!". We were soon on the road again. Ole Bjornson Haukom: When returning the items I had borrowed from Uncle John Levorson, we were ready to leave when John mentioned that he had a box that he had not looked in that contained the papers from his father, Tom Levorson's desk. My eyebrows raised, and he could tell that I wasn't about to leave now. The cardboard box contained so many important papers, Grandpa Levorson's birth certificate, Grandma's Canadian Citizenship papers, Grandpa's report card from 1902 in Norway, news clippings of family in Norway. There was an article about Ole Bjornson Haukom written in Norwegian. There was no Ole Bjornson in my family tree information but I had the article translated to English. No clues came out of the translation so I thought perhaps it was of a neighbor and I filed the translation under Norwegian Farms in my book and thought nothing more about it. It wasn't until much later in my research that I received information from Jon Brauti, the son of Grandma Levorson's brother Gunnar, that Ole Bjornson Haukom was my great great great great grandfather (4x). I moved him from the Farms chapter to the Brauti chapter immediately. In late April 1998 I received an email from Philip Sather at Kyle, Saskatchewan. He had searched on the Internet for the name Haukom and was surprised to see a Saskatchewan email address. We discovered that we are both descendants of Ole Bjornson Haukom from Norway; he from the line of Ole's son Sveinung and I from the line of Ole's son Aslak. It is so bizarre that five generations later, the descendants of Ole are living 30 miles apart in Canada. Philip and his family own the Hilltop Café in Kyle, a spot my parents stopped at frequently and the Sather family know my mom. Philip put me in touch with a descendant of another of Ole's son's; Aslaug. Her name is Carol Hanson Schwinkendorf in Scottsdale, Arizona. She has written a book about the Haukom family which I immediately ordered a copy of. The book is called "Here Come the Norwegians". It is a delightful account of the life in Norway before our ancestors came to North America, their journey over and the struggles of being a pioneer. (In 2001, Carol's daughter, Sandra Christianson emailed me.) Genealogy Library: I visited the Genealogy Library in Regina. They have most of the Community History Books from Saskatchewan and we found many of Terry's extended family in them. I now had names and places to write letters to. They have a Saskatchewan Residence Index started on the computer with over a million names in it. I typed in "Hvidston" to get a list of who they had. Most of the family popped up - we were pretty sure at that time that the only Hvidston's living in Saskatchewan, if not Canada are related. So I was surprised to see a Gerald Hvidston listed because we don't know a Gerald. The computer referred us to a page in a community history book. Upon looking it was in fact my husband Terry that the computer was referring to. There was a typo in the history book. Fjeldskaal: It took awhile for a major break through in Terry's family history. But a phone call came from Mabel Johnson in Regina who is a descendant of Karen Fjeldskaal, Grandma Hvidston's sister. She also is interested in genealogy and has researched the Fjeldskaal family back into the 1700's (at this point I didn't even have names for Grandma Hvidston's parents). She invited me to come and stay at her home and get the information. I made arrangements immediately to do that. I couldn't believe the gold mine of information she had. She copied a family tree down while she was in Norway that traced the Fjeldskaal roots back to the early 1700's. She had a book from Norway that included family information even into the 1500's. She kept photograph albums in a very organized manner, by family unit. She had pictures of all the family's special days - birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and confirmations. She not only knew my husbands great grandparents names, she had pictures of them and information about all their children and their families. She allowed me to bring as many of her albums home as I required. And something else very interesting happened. She shared her diaries with me that she had written during the twenty-two years she had spent as a missionary nurse in Africa. I took the diaries to bed with me. The story that unfolded in those diaries had to be told. In the morning I offered to type her story after she summarized the diaries and to scan and include her pictures. Mabel told me the story about how she found out I was looking for information. When Terry and I spent a day in the genealogy library in Regina, I found a reference to Doris (Schnell) Rast living at Ensign, Alta. I wrote to her there. It was amazing the letter arrived anywhere. The envelope was addressed to Doris Rost instead of Rast - unknown to me, Doris had died the year before - Ensign Post Office no longer existed - but somehow Doris's husband received this letter at Vulcan, Alberta. Thankfully, he took the time to phone Mabel and have his son Timothy deliver the letter to Regina when he was en route to Manitoba. And thankfully, Mabel took the time to call me and have me visit. Even after my visit to Regina, Mabel, her sister Ragna and niece Judy continued to contact other family members and gather more information. In May Mabel Johnson gave me the condensed version of her diaries. I cannot imagine her courage and faith, at the age of 29 in 1947, to have gotten on a boat and crossed the ocean and headed into the jungle to help build and operate a missionary hospital. As I typed her book there were times when I cried and times when I laughed out loud. It is a wonderful story and she did a marvelous job putting it together. My husband and I were delighted when Mabel and Ragna came to visit us in August and pick up the final version of the book she called "Yesterday Remembered". In 2000 Mabel wrote to me that her sister-in-law Peggy Johnson had died. Herman, Mabel's brother, had died the year before. When Peggy and Herman's daughters were going through their parents things, they found two books on genealogy from Norway. They brought the books to Mabel and told her they wanted me to have them. They are one of my most prized books. Mormon Church Family History Library: I visited the Mormon Church in Melfort and did family history research on the International Genealogy Index (IGI). I found my great great grandparents William Mitchell and Martha Borthwick and all their children. My father's middle name is Borthwick, as is his father's and his grandfather's. Lucy Reminisces: Just when I thought I must have tapped all the resources that immediate family had, along came an envelopes in the mail from Aunt Marcy. She sent three scribblers in which my grandmother, Lucy Mitchell, had written down everything she knew about her grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles and continued on with the story of her own life. It is a fabulous story that I included in it's entirety as a separate chapter of the book called "Lucy Reminisces...". 1969 Address Book: I wrote to several of the addresses is my great-grandfather's address book. Grandpa Hirtz had died in 1969 so it was a long shot. Most of the envelopes were returned "address unknown", however one was answered by a Leo Hirtz in Bernard, Iowa. He was a descendant of Peter and Elisabeth Hirtz. Peter and his brother Matt came from Luxembourg to the United States in the 1870's. Leo remembered corresponded with John Hirtz in the 1950's and they were convinced at that time that they were related, however he didn't think that they made the connection between their families. Leo sent me his family history charts. While my family was traced back to the 1500's in the Hirtz line, Leo could only go back to his grandfather. So all I could do was file his information away. In August 1999, I received a letter from a Ruth Ann Hirtz from Illinois who is from the same branch of the tree as Leo. She had received some papers after her aunt died. Among the papers was one of the letters I had mailed out in 1996. Ruth Ann (born the same year as I and also interested in genealogy and computers) wrote that she would like to help me find the missing link between our families. We were sure there must be one as why else would grandpa Hirtz travel to Iowa to see her family. She began going through more papers and found a letter written by my great grandfather to Leo that states that their two grandfathers were brothers. It also states that the brothers, along with one more brother, immigrated to the US in 1870. Now that we have the missing link, Ruth Ann and I have been sharing pictures and other information. A whole new chapter is added to my Hirtz volume. Hirtz - Grandpa John Hirtz was the reason "Keeping Memories Alive" was written. His is a wonderful story of the dreams of riches and adventure that lured the immigrants to North America, the hardships and difficulties they experienced upon arrival. In desperation they abandoned their dream and returned to Luxembourg and Paris for five years, only to yearn to return again. His desperate attempts to find his brother during the Second World War, who was the Chief of Police and obliged by the Prussians to work with them. His many attempts to assist the Luxembourg government during the war and his unending assistance to Luxembourg immigrants to Canada earned him the Grand Ducal award. The Hirtz section has his story. However there were many other members of the Hirtz family that filled in other sections of the family tree. One of the more important contacts I had during this project was Michel Hirtz from Luxembourg. He untiringly answered so many of my questions. Many of Tony Hirtz's children and grandchildren were very helpful. Mady Fauques-Hoffman, Jeannot Hirtz-Schwindt, Lina Hoffman-Hoffman, Helene Lenert-Hoffmann and Josie Rens all deserve mention here as well. In the suitcase from my great grandfather's estate (John Hirtz died in 1969), was an address book. In 1996 I wrote to all the people who were in the book. Most of the envelopes were returned by the post office but one was answered by a Leo Hirtz. He told me that my great grandfather had visited them in Iowa in the mid_1950's. Leo sent me his family history charts. I kept them but I could not connect the two families together. While my family was traced back to the 1500's in the Hirtz line, Leo could only go back to his grandfather. In August 1999, I received a letter from a Ruth Ann Hirtz from Illinois who is from the same branch of the tree as Leo. She had received some papers after her aunt died. Among the papers was one of the letters I had mailed out in 1996. Ruth Ann (born the same year as I and also interested in genealogy and computers) wrote that she would like to help me find the missing link between our families. We were sure there must be one as why else would grandpa Hirtz travel to Iowa to see her family. She began going through more papers and found a letter written by my great grandfather to Leo that states that their two grandfathers were brothers. It also states that the brothers, along with one more brother, immigrated to the US in 1870. Now that we have the missing link, Ruth Ann and I have been sharing pictures and other information. A whole new chapter is added to my Hirtz volume. Embarassing Moments: There were embarrassing moments as well as exciting ones. In one of the Norwegian family lines, I had a form with the family names and their children's names listed underneath. Under one of names was the word "Ingen". I wrote up the story, "... and they have one child named Ingen". I received a letter back from Norway that "Ingen" in Norwegian means "none", this couple had no children. Another Norwegian interpretation error resulted in an unmarried great aunt (a nun) being listed as married to a man named "Sjukesyster" which I now know means a nurse. The Internet: The Internet developed into a valuable research tool. In the telephone directory area, I found I could find not only phone numbers, but addresses for many family members, allowing me to write more letters. I would search across Canada for any names that I knew and would write to them all - on a long shot. I would enclose a family tree chart and hope that if I happened to reach the right one, they would take the time to respond. I also registered the surnames that I was researching at several family history sites. I received many emails from those postings. Hvidston: I searched North America on the Internet for anyone with the last name Hvidston. There were only eight Hvidston's I didn't know that came up, so I wrote to them all - on a long shot. Alden Hvidston's response was of particular interest. He wrote that many Hvidsten's had changed their name to Widsten when they immigrated because that is how the native Americans pronounced it. That gave me a whole new avenue to explore. Off went 18 letters to the Widsten's in North America. Gordon Widsten from Mission B.C. called to tell me he had 41 pages about the Hvidsten's in Norway, including information about the Hvidsten farm. At the same time Hal Widsten e-mailed from Minnesota and mailed me the information his great uncle Carl Hvidsten had researched on their family. I think they came from the same farm in Norway, but are not related. Per Hvidsten replied that he was living on the farm called Hvidsten. He took the time to search a CD-Rom of the Norway telephone directories he had, contact Reidar Hvidsten in Alversund (where Terry's dad came from) and he wrote "I read your E-mail for him and he answered: Everything is correct! I know all the names and the places. Give her my name and address and I'll help her!". So I wrote a letter to Reidar. Per also helped by telling me other spellings of Hvidsten including Hvidsteen, Hvitsten, Hvitstein, Hvitsteen, Withsten and so on. On one of the days that I e-mailed to Per I wrote - "this weekend is -47 Celsius with the wind chill so it is a good day to catch up on my genealogy". He wrote back - "Are you sure it is -47 Celsius?". Oddgeir Hvidsten told me about the place called Kviste that was on the island of Radoy where my husband's family came from in Norway. He said there was three or four unrelated families that took the name Hvidsten from the farm called Hvidsten. His family was not related to us but he and his mother faxed to another Hvidsten they thought was related to us. One Friday night in April 1997 I received in the mail an envelope from Reidar Hvidston. It was a book where the 12 children in my husband's great grandmother's family, and all their descendants to the present day were listed with their genealogical information. Over that weekend I added 1500 new family to my tree! Translation Troubles: I wrote to Michel Hirtz, son of Pierre
Hirtz (who was a brother to my Great Grandfather, John Hirtz). Michel took the time to go
through his papers and find so many news articles and letters. He sent me a three page
article on my Great Great Grandfather, Pierre Henri Hirtz that was written by my Great
Great Grandmother's cousin (H. Trauffler). That article nearly circled the world. Michel
sent it to me from Luxembourg. It was written in German. One of my Board Members offered
to have a friend of his in Germany translate it. His wife faxed it to Germany. The friend
called that it was a different style of German than he could read so he faxed it to his
girlfriend's great aunt in Portugal who had been a German language interpreter. However,
she could not decipher the dialect either. The wife of the Director in my office, took a
copy to a Hutterite Colony near Kindersley, my son took a copy to a fellow who lived in
his building. I ended up writing back to Michel and asking if he could interpret it for
me. Then I sent a copy to Luxembourg to a relative on my great grandmother's side. Mom
found someone in Swift Current who could interpret High German, so I faxed a copy to Swift
Current. Man! I was curious what that article had in it. The elders in the Hutterite
Colony spent several days trying to "crack the code" without success. The
secretary at the school where our director's wife worked had a cousin in Germany whose
husband was a translator of old German dialects. They faxed a copy to Germany. Then Mom
called my office one day. The lady in Swift Current asked Mom what she thought of the
story she translated. Mom said she never received it. The lady swore she had placed the
article in Mom's mailbox. It seemed as though that article was not to be read. I faxed
another copy to Mom. Edna Hirtz called that the copy I had sent her was creating similar
problems for her as she tried to get it interpreted. The editor of the Battleford
newspaper e-mailed it to Luxembourg to try and get it translated. Finally, a
translation arrived. It was well worth the wait. There were many times I wishes there was only one language in the world. I still have a large stack of letters and documents that I would like to get translated. Skarpaas: Torstein Skarpäs from Norway e-mailed back that we had the same great great grandparents. His grandfather Torstein Skarpäs and my grandfather Torstein (Tom) Levorson were cousins. The family in Norway had six years ago had a family reunion and made a family tree that he shared with me by an email transmission. In one weekend, I added 355 people to my family tree. Sigurvin Olafsson from Norway provided so much information about the Skarpäs farm (including pictures) and the genealogy information for more of the Skarpäs family. Knut Skarpaas VIII put me in touch with his father Knut VII and we shared information. Olav Skarpaas helped with other information. In the spring of 2001, my son told me about AIM (AOL Instant Messenger) and I signed on so that we could talk back and forth. One day when I was online, an invitation to chat came from Ron Sieber. He had found my online name (tisdaleval) on the website. He had information on the ancestors of my great grandmother Ingrid Skarpaas right back to my 6x great grandparents Christen Rasmussen (born 1693) and Helge Bjornsdotter Bjorsaate Moeiet (born 1696) and their descendants to the present day. In the coming days Ron shared with me an Outline Descendant tree of 86 pages in length and his family files of 141 pages. I am extremely thankful to Ron for sharing his family history information. Levorson: Lidvard Hytta, who lives on the Hytta farm in Norway where my grandfather Tom Levorson came from, filled in the Norwegian family information on the Hytta-Levorson branches. Through his information I found out a branch of the family had emigrated to Quebec, Canada. I searched the Internet for addresses and sent off letters, but have not found the family. Lidvard sent me a copy of the book he wrote about Leif Levorson called "Bjorn" which was the name Leif used during World War II. Leif was one of the Telemark Heros during World War II. I am very proud to have that book and had it translated to English. The family information of Bergit Levorson Dokken (my grandfather' sister) evaded me for a long time. At Easter time 1997 we were at mom’s and I was looking at the Battrum History Book. At the back of the book was a picture of Sharlene Higginson, the great granddaughter of Bergit. She had done a lot of work towards getting the Battrum History Book ready. She was a Rural Municipal Administrator (RMA), as was my husband. I wrote to her and she phoned me immediately. There was an RMA’s conference coming up in May and we made arrangements to meet for lunch. She agreed to help me by contacting the family and gathering the information for me.Mary Lou Guenther helped me with the Levor Levorson branch and Wilber Smith with the Knut Levorson family. My grandfather Tom (Torstein) Levorson and his brothers Levor and Knut and sister Bergit were the only ones from their family that immigrated to North America. Mom's brother John Levorson and wife Elaine and their children Tammy Wilson and Brad Levorson were also wonderful supporters. Norwegian Name Rules: In Norway, especially in the rural districts, there have long been very strict rules about naming descendants. Some of these rules persist even today. It was customary, for example, for the eldest son to be named after his paternal grandfather and the second son after his maternal grandfather. In a similar fashion the eldest and second daughters were named after the respective grandmothers. After the grandparents' names had been used, the great-grandparents' names were the next to be given, although without strict rules as to the order. Special circumstances might interfere with these rules. For example, the name of a deceased spouse was to be used first; and the name of the father or mother was given if the child was baptized after a parent's death. According to a Norwegian proverb: "The name and the farm must go together." This meant that a child who was intended to be the owner of the farm upon reaching maturity should be given the name of a previous owner, whether a relative or not. The second name was the father's name plus "son" or "sen" if you were a boy or "datter" or "dotter" if you were a girl. Thus if your father's name was "Levor" then your second name would be Levorsen or Levorsdotter. In addition, a third name was often used. This was usually a farm name identifying where the family lived. For example on the farm "Hyttä, those who lived there had the third name "Hyttä. If they moved off of that farm they no longer used that name. The use of a fixed family name was not made compulsory by law until 1925. Smedjebacka: Sometimes researching little mysteries leads to some interesting discoveries. Where was my husband's maternal great grandmother, Breata Johnson born? When did they immigrate to Canada? A family source said she was born the 9 August 1851 in Smedjebacka in Hastbaka, Sweden. The Lake of the Woods cemetery listed her as born in Finland. There is a certificate from the 'Dioecesis Aboensis. Magni Princ Finl.' dated the 1 August 1890 that lists the birth dates of Breata and her first three children. We know that the fourth child, Anna was born in Canada, so we assumed they emigrated in the latter part of 1890 or in 1891. Autumn Knox, a granddaughter to Breata and John, remembers her mother Amanda saying that they lived part time in Sweden and part time in Finland. Also that when Amanda was 13 years old she worked her way across on the boat. That would put the year at 1891 when they immigrated. A fellow in the Genealogical Society put me in touch with the Swenson Swedish Immigration Research Centre in Rock Island, Illinois who had the following to say about an enquiry about the certificate named above: "The only Ontario Church records we have are for one in Thunder Bay. There is a Smedjebacken in Norrbarke parish in Kopparbergs lan (county), but we cannot find a Hastbaka (or similar spelling) anywhere near it, so we don't know where to look. Perhaps our passenger indexes can help narrow something down. We are not familiar with the Latin writing, but think that it must allude to something Finnish". I wrote her back to ask more questions about the seal. She wrote: "I didn't know how to answer your letter, so I put the question to some genealogists on the Swedish genealogy e-mail mailing list I subscribe to." Several replies came. K. G. Olin replied by E-mail that "Terjärv is a place here in Osterbotten, i.e. the west coast of Finland. It is a rural parish east of the town of Kokkola/Karleby. Hastbacka is one of the villages in the parish. This is now part of the Kronoby municipality. This is the Swedish speaking part of Finland. Smedjebacka is a well known name there." Another, "Dioecesis Aboensis. Magni Princ Finl - It is the official seal of the Diocese of Åbo (Turku) in Finland." There was my answer, she came from Finland not Sweden, so that put me on a new research route. Per Hvidston helped fill in more information. He sent maps of the Bergslagen area in Sweden with Smedjebacken and Osterbotten in Finland with Kokkola and Terjärv and Hastbacka. In the period 1150 - 1808 Finland was occupied by Sweden and there were no borders between Hastbacka and Smedjebacken. Finland was governed by fuedal overlords. Abo was the political centre of Finland and capital until 1812. In the E-mail from K. G. Olin, he also stated that he could put me in touch with relatives there if I thought we were related to the Smedjebacka's. He mentioned that a well known genealogist by the name of Helge Smedjebacka had recently died. He gave me the E-mail address for Don Forsman, at the Swedish Finn Historical Society in Seattle who was related to the Smedjebacka family. At this time though, I thought Smedjebacka was the name of a place where family members had been born. In September 1997 I received a letter from the Kyrkoherdeämbetet in Terjärv, Finland stating that John Johnson had been born Johan Johansson Smedjebacka in 1852. I immediately searched back through my records and emailed to both K. G. Olin and Don Forsman. K. G. Olin's mail came back undeliverable. Don Forsman replied: "In checking the family book Släkten Lassas i Terjärv I found family record of Johan Johansson Smedjebacka 16-3-1852 Married to Brita Johanna Hansdr. from Nedervetil. Children: Maria Selina born 8-6-1876, Amanda Johanna 13-4-1878, Emma Emilia 30-3-1881 - family to America 1890. This is listed on Tab. K.704 Släkten Lassas, I could furnish this family line back to the 1500's if you would like let me know. We also have the Nedervetil birth and marriage records. Brita Johanna Hansdr was born to Hans Hansson Murick (Broanda) and Brita Mickelsdr. This family line is on my mothers mothers family line." I contacted him again immediately. It was one of the momentous discoveries in my research. He is the Genealogy Center Director for the Swedish Finn Historical Society in Seattle, Washington so not only had the interest in helping me but many valuable resources and contacts. Don and his wife Syrene supplied me with information on the family going back to the 1500's. Syrene translated a marvelous family story about my husband's great great grandparents that continues to be a myth in the Finland village they lived in. Don told me that Helena Andtbacka was updating the Lassus family book and that I should send our family information to her. Helena and her husband Hasse put me in touch with Carola Smedjebacka who is the daughter of Helge, the well known genealogist in Terjärv. Through Helena and Hasse, I purchased a copy of the 1998 "Släkten Lassas i Terjärv" family book for approximately $120. It is 8 inches wide by 11 inches long by 1 inch thick - 500 pages - of family information. Included in the book is the family information that I submitted on what I knew about the North American families. Maj-Britt Smedjebacka in Finland and I became email pals. We exchanged family information and pictures. McConnell: About New Year's Day 1997 I was browsing around the Internet when I found a "Roots" site where you could register 10 of the family names you were researching and if other's were researching those same names, they could contact you to see if there was a family connection. I received several inquiries after registering but nothing panned out until one day in April. A fellow named Tom McConnell contacted me and through that contact the whole McConnell family opened up for me. Tom was not related to my husband we quickly discovered, however he has made a home page for the McConnell same name families. While looking through the hundreds of McConnell's he had listed, the name "Nish" jumped out of the page at me. My husband's great grandfather was William Nish McConnell. I contacted Don McConnell who had submitted this information to the home page. He emailed back that William was the brother of his great-grandfather Robert McConnell. He has been researching the family for five years and was able to open up another whole generation, not to mention the extended families. Also in June 1997, I received an email from Bob McConnell that he had found a descendant of James McConnell. He gave me the address of Gary Montgomery in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Through Gary I also got the addresses of Mrs. Stan Baker and Mrs. E. Leopold, descendants of the McConnell family. Bob sent me a huge parcel of information and pictures that he had collected and Noreen Reeves had put together. All of sudden the McConnell family opened up for me. In 2001 I received an email from Michael Rennie. He descends from Ellen McConnell, a sister of my husband's great grandfather, William Nish McConnell. He shared with me very detailed records from Ellen's branch of the family. Ingolfsland: The Ingolfsland family also deserve special recognition here. Fred Brauti wrote that Gunhild Brauti married Ole Ingolfsland. They moved to North Dakota and the rest of the family lost touch with them. Through the Internet I wrote to all the Ingolfsland addresses I could find. I received wonderful information from Evelyn Mills, Dennis Ingolfsland, Obert Ingolfsland, Beverly Ellis and Gladys Person to make Gunhild Brauti's branch quite complete. Black sheep: Often people asked me if I had found any black sheep in my family. While there were lots of farmers, teachers and medical professionals; I found no black sheep - until Vidkun Quisling. He would have to be the black sheep of all black sheep. Thankfully he is from an extended family line and had no descendants. Vidkun Quisling, as a member of the Agrarian Party, was appointed Minister of Defense in Norway in 1931. Two years later he resigned to organize his own Fascist party, the National Union, which he modeled after the Nazi Party of Germany. Quisling urged Adolf Hitler to attack Norway and helped sabotage Norwegian resistance to the invasion of April 1940. Quisling's actions at this time were to make his name synonymous with traitor. Vidkun became premier in 1942 but was wholly dependent on German support. After Norway was freed from Nazi occupation in 1945, he was arrested, convicted of high treason and executed (shot). Royalty: Thankfully, to balance this, is also a line to royalty. The present Queen Sonja of Norway has the same ancestors as I on the Brauti line (through Steinar Torson Fjaagesund who died in 1695). Jon Brauti gave me a family line back to the year 872 to a Viking King in Norway named Harald Halfdanson Haarfagre. This spurred me to do some research about the Vikings. The lineage of royalty is kept over the years and so by connecting to the tree of Harald Haarfagre, I was able to get the information back to 65 BC. Detractors: While most of the correspondence that I received from family was very helpful and supportive, there were moments when I almost quit working on the book because of angry letters I received. One of the hazards of writing a family history book, I discovered, is that some family do not want certain parts of the family history recorded. I tried to accommodate anyone who requested information be deleted or changed and I had several requests from marriages that ended in divorce, children born out of wedlock, the manner in which someone died and even the information from an obituary notice I used. The purpose of the book is to "Keep Memories Alive" and bring family together so I accommodated all requests to change information. Brauti: Tor Brauti did a surname search on the Internet and came to my web site. It turned out his great grandfather (Aslak) and mine (Jon) were brothers. He wrote that he had a box full of old family photos and also some old documents from Kviteseid that he was going to mail to me. The parcel that came in the mail was beyond belief. A photo album that belonged to my great grandfather's brother. A song that was written for my great great grandmother's wedding in 1879 and pictures from her album. A cow pox vaccination, many papers from the mid-1800's that were written in Norwegian. Grete Strander sent me an impressive package of information about our ancestors and their descendants on the Brauti and Omtveit families in Norway. Grete deserves a special thank you for all the help she gave me. There are so many in the Brauti family that I would like to thank for their significant impact on my book - Fred Brauti, Svein Ivar Brauti, Hellbjorg Ruud, Gunnar Strander, Jon Martin Brauti, Jon Brauti, Torhild Masterson, Marney Sorgen, Orpha Brauti, Mary Lou Brauti-Minkler - and many others. In 2000 I was contacted by Erling Brauti (son of Olav; grandson of Einar Gunnarson who was the brother of my great grandfather Jon Gunnarson Brauti). He had owned the Brauti farm, part of the Tveit farm and others until January 2000 when his son Olav took over. He knew so much about all the Norwegian farms. He spent hours editing the stories and ensuring the information was complete and accurate. Then he sent me pictures for many of the farms. I am very grateful for his help. He shared with me a wonderful memory of my great grandparents - Jon and Gro. He helped me with his branch of the Brauti family. He had a huge!!! impact on my project. One day I was just browsing on the Internet and found the website of Kjell Eikland. From his GEDCOM file, I was able to add many ancestors and their descendants. Mitchell - There is still much research to do on the Mitchell family. Larry Martin and sisters - Greta Irving and Nicholas Pringle were a great help with the Scotland families. Larry and I share an interest in computers and website design and keep in touch by email. My dad's brother Larry Mitchell and wife Barb and their daughter Laurie Desautels and dad's sister Marcy Collier have all been wonderful supporters of this project - sharing unselfishly of their time, pictures and information. Marcy's son Robert Collier and wife Mary Lou shared the booklet they had made which included the history of our grandparents Bob and Lucy Mitchell. Robert has the Grand Ducal Award that Grandpa Hirtz received from the Luxembourg Government. I wish to give special mention of my brother Murray who has suffered with the effects of multiple sclerosis but he "Makes a difference" in the lives of other disabled people. Goebel - I have only scratched the surface of the Goebel family. Nadine Schreiner and her mom Christiane Bachstein provided a lot information. I had contact with Jacqueline Bisesi, descendant of Gretchen Goebel and Jean Wolter, who was living in Placentia, California, but I have lost contact. Donna and Edward Stockman sent me a package that was absolutely full of pictures and information on the Goebel family, including a book from Luxembourg that included family members back to the 1600's. Schuller - My great-great grandmother was Caroline Schuller born 1860 to Francois and Marie (Thull) Schuller. I have not been very successful in finding out much about Caroline's ancestors or her siblings. Renee Vania gave me a little about Caroline's brother Philippe and two addresses in Illinois for descendants of Philippe. Jim Heckenbach replied to my query and provided more detail and an interesting story involving Philippe Schuller and his second wife Anna Marie Schleich. Borthwick - I am having a difficult time finding much information about the Borthwick family. My father was John Borthwick Mitchell, his father Robert Borthwick Mitchell, his father also Robert Borthwick Michell, his mother was Martha Jane Borthwick (born 1838) to Lawrence Tweedie Borthwick and Joan Thorburn. In 2000 Martha Gordon contacted me. She is a descendant of Margaret Borthwick, the sister of Martha Jane. Margaret has shared with me all her research. The danger of recognizing those who have helped, is that I will have inevitably neglected to include someone. I hope not.
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