Busy_Bitch5050 t1_iybrqkx wrote on November 30, 2022 at 5:27 AM

Reply to comment by woden_spoon in While replacing a wall in my basement, I found a 100-year-old marriage certificate. by woden_spoon

YES!!! My work here is done 😁

EDIT: In my excitement, I forgot to thank you for confirming, so: thank you!

woden_spoon OP t1_iybs97o wrote on November 30, 2022 at 5:32 AM

Here’s an award—you earned it!

Busy_Bitch5050 t1_iybsewr wrote on November 30, 2022 at 5:34 AM

Thank you very much!

If any of Dorothy's descendants show up with a sledgehammer to retrieve the marriage certificate, I'm denying everything 😂

Gbrusse t1_iybzb5n wrote on November 30, 2022 at 6:53 AM

What sources do you use? I've been very curious about my own family history

Busy_Bitch5050 t1_iyc0y90 wrote on November 30, 2022 at 7:15 AM

For this one, I first went to the site that OP used to verify the marriage certificate. Once I had the date, location, names, and ages, I Googled census records from the 1930s and 1940s by including all the information I had in the search. After that, I figured John E Evans may have served in the war, so I Googled for service records and verified from a few sources, one being ancestry.com (no membership needed this time). Then I searched for his gravesite, but I still needed his age at death. I found several candidates on ancestry, but only one perfectly matched his family's names from the census records.

The trick is to stay completely objective. I don't care what I find when I start because I don't want to influence the outcome. Many people fall into this habit and before you know it, we're all related to some famous king or queen lol. Just follow the evidence and go with whichever path is most likely and rational.