My name is Katherine and I am a 36-year-old history buff who lives too far from her family. I am a keeper of pictures and old documents and I feel a responsibility to share. I am new to doing this genaelogy thing on my own. I am, however, lucky enough to have a store of some pretty cool information, although it needs some putting together. I'm going to use this blog to try and do that.
Although Atlantic Roots is primarily about tracing my ancestors in the Maritimes and New England, the fun part is putting them in context and learning about the history they lived through. I believe in transparency of sources, assumptions, and reasoning. And lots of pictures.
This is how I got my start:
My father loved history. Of all sorts, really, but especially when it was connected to our family. He was a Weir and there is much out there that traces our branch of Weir/Wiers back to pre-revolutionary New England. Because of my dad, I spent family vacations looking for old churches and tromping through graveyards. It was great.
My dad, on a visit to the Middle Stewiake Cemetery - 2001
His mother, Alyce Greta (Conroy) Weir, was also fascinated with her family history. Lucky for me, she ended up with a huge number of family letters, pictures, and other documents, which I now have. When I was little, she would take out the box of old photos and tell me about the long-gone people and what she knew of them. Stupidly, no one ever recorded what she knew. I didn't think of it until she was well into Alzheimer's disease and it was too late. So the info will go up here, and I'll see what happens.
My grandfather Clyde Weir holding my father, my gradmother Alyce, my young Aunt Sylvia, Bertha Evelyn (Tupper) Conroy holding a baby cousin - late summer 1946
They are the two that started all this for me. They'd love this.
I'm pretty new at this and do most of my research from this spot on the sofa (and in graveyards). I will try to share my sources as much as possible, as I am trying, slowly but surely, to work back to primary documents. Please let me know if you see a mistake here, or if you find something or know something exciting. I'd love to hear from you.
Email me, Katherine, at katherine at e-maddox dot com (only @ and .com) or please leave a comment.
Three generations: Alexander R. Macdonald, my grandmother (on mom's side) as a girl, and James William Macdonald - ca 1925
