Where were your ancestors when the French general and veteran of the Revolutionary War toured the United States 200 years ago? I'm working on a tool to figure it out. Join me?
https://www.hmdb.org/results.asp?Search=Series&SeriesID=666 This link is to historic markers of his path. Great resource. I'll have to give this some thought. Several of my ancestors were just a few miles from Kaskaskia, Illinois prior to 1817.
Oh, that's MIGHTY nice! I'd pulled up individual of these markers in my list but I'd missed that full list of them.
Now... how to pull the two together. I'll think about how. Certainly their list of markers all include images which will be immediately helpful. Thank you so much.
Would YOU be interested in including YOUR ancestors in the list? As I watch for feedback here I'm thinking the thing to do will be to post a subset of this googlesheet Projectkin can add their ancestors to... I'll then copy/paste to add them to the version linked here. That should do it. 🤔
Wow! This is so intriguing 🤔 What you have done, and continue to do, with this recipe is fascinating. Although I am not sure I have fully got my head around it yet.
It’s actually not hard. I’m settled in fort the long haul here to get spit and polish on this as it’s more than one incredible story in one country. New Zealand history… 🤔💭
I’m now thinking about creating a cohort of Projectkin or Substack friends to share in a group on the timeline. You'll see the row there faintly noted on the left of the timeline "Projectkin Connections"... There are currently just four in that row, all from my own family. The first is my own favorite, Archelaus Allen.
I'd love to include listings for others in this community. ⮕ All I need are name, birth/death dates, state (I'm using, to your suggestion, the state in which they passed) and a little story. Bonus points for links to relevant images, sources and a caption. 🤔 Any ideas? Anyone? DM me, if you'd like.
On September 3, 1824, General Lafayette was welcomed to the Village of Sterling, MA. The September 8, 1824 edition of the Massachusetts Spy detailed his arrival:
At Sterling, Gen. La Fayette was received with every demonstration of joy. His approach to the village was hailed by 13 discharges of Artillery and the ringing of the bell. He was then escorted by two beautiful companions of Light Infantry under the command of Capt. Dana of Sterling, and Capt. Meriam of Princeton. The General was received at the entrance of the village, by the Selectmen of the town under a spacious arch fancifully decorated with evergreens and flowers.
Now to work out who Captain Dana was and how he is related ;)
Don't you just love those newspaper descriptions? I keep losing myself in the text of the speeches he gave or were given in his honor. Such fun.
As a just shared with David Shaw, I'm quite serious in creating a version (or actually just updating this version) to reflect the ancestors of our Projectkin.
I mean, why not? I can make dozens of variations of the timeline. Each one simply runs the Javascript code on a Googlesheet. This particular Google Sheet is linked in this article. My four ancestors are just the starting example. I'll bet we have dozens in here. 😉
I don’t believe I have ancestors who would have followed Lafayette’s tour but I love the potential applications of this. You are ‘playing’ with this idea. Perfect. Can I be an ‘outsider’ with viewing rights?
Absolutely! As I polish this up, the timeline linked ☝️ in the article will just keep updating (notice that it loads each time you tap on it from the article or refresh a link that's already open). I plan to create a proper "Project Recipe" from this example, but what would make that even stronger will be other use cases...
There's a possibility of something from Dean Kirby who happens to have an array of data that relates to the impact of the blitz in Manchester, England. I hope to speak to him over the next few weeks. We'll see where that goes.
If you abstract the idea of a tour of places in the American continent to the location of bombings, you can see how these are variations of the same idea.
Why yes, of course, and it's very cool. I'm in touch with the Friends of Lafayette folks, too. The challenge I was trying to address here was to come up with a way to see where MY ancestors were in a timeline with each of these visits by state.
I could look up one and look at the other but I didn't have a way to put them both on the same timeline or map.
To solve that I created a list of the some 135 stops and plotted that into the timeline. This tool lets me put anyone else on a row below that. I can create as many variations of this as I'd like by making copies to add different lists of people to compare it with. (For now, this list is just pulling from Wikipedia with some effort to add detail, but here's where I'm pulling experts in to help get the facts right. The cool thing is that everyone benefits from the updates with copy/paste magic. )
You seem to have understood why I've been so excited about this idea. I suddenly realized that it would be easy to for you to add your ancestors to the timeline as a “Projectkin” cohort so I added a quick postscript to the post ☝️. See the end of the doc. (Spoiler: Add your details to a shared Google Sheet, I'll copy/paste into the production version after validating.)
I don't have ancestors who met him, that I know of, but some that did live in a place he visited. He stopped in Shawneetown (now Old Shawneetown), Illinois in 1825 and attended a dinner at the Rawlings Hotel. The original is gone, but an 'also old' replacement is still there. I have photos of it from one of our trips. I included mention of this trip in one of my genealogy mysteries because it was such a big deal at the time, as you can imagine.
haha.. I was just dropping you a DM to ask. Shawneetown, that must be what I remembered. I have the stop on my timeline, but no photos. May 7, 1825. I'd love to include one your photos if you'd be up to share one. 😊
Eek! I am SO excited and captivated but this project!! Still on my to-do list to get you names and dates 🤞🏻
https://www.hmdb.org/results.asp?Search=Series&SeriesID=666 This link is to historic markers of his path. Great resource. I'll have to give this some thought. Several of my ancestors were just a few miles from Kaskaskia, Illinois prior to 1817.
Oh, that's MIGHTY nice! I'd pulled up individual of these markers in my list but I'd missed that full list of them.
Now... how to pull the two together. I'll think about how. Certainly their list of markers all include images which will be immediately helpful. Thank you so much.
Would YOU be interested in including YOUR ancestors in the list? As I watch for feedback here I'm thinking the thing to do will be to post a subset of this googlesheet Projectkin can add their ancestors to... I'll then copy/paste to add them to the version linked here. That should do it. 🤔
Wow! This is so intriguing 🤔 What you have done, and continue to do, with this recipe is fascinating. Although I am not sure I have fully got my head around it yet.
It’s actually not hard. I’m settled in fort the long haul here to get spit and polish on this as it’s more than one incredible story in one country. New Zealand history… 🤔💭
This is so exciting! Thank you for all of the work and energy you are putting into this project,
And YOU, my dear, were the fuel. 🥰
I’m now thinking about creating a cohort of Projectkin or Substack friends to share in a group on the timeline. You'll see the row there faintly noted on the left of the timeline "Projectkin Connections"... There are currently just four in that row, all from my own family. The first is my own favorite, Archelaus Allen.
I'd love to include listings for others in this community. ⮕ All I need are name, birth/death dates, state (I'm using, to your suggestion, the state in which they passed) and a little story. Bonus points for links to relevant images, sources and a caption. 🤔 Any ideas? Anyone? DM me, if you'd like.
Fascinating project and enjoying your spreadsheet. I found that on 3 September 1824 he met a likely relative of mine https://www.wgpfoundation.org/historic-markers/lafayettes-tour-52/
On September 3, 1824, General Lafayette was welcomed to the Village of Sterling, MA. The September 8, 1824 edition of the Massachusetts Spy detailed his arrival:
At Sterling, Gen. La Fayette was received with every demonstration of joy. His approach to the village was hailed by 13 discharges of Artillery and the ringing of the bell. He was then escorted by two beautiful companions of Light Infantry under the command of Capt. Dana of Sterling, and Capt. Meriam of Princeton. The General was received at the entrance of the village, by the Selectmen of the town under a spacious arch fancifully decorated with evergreens and flowers.
Now to work out who Captain Dana was and how he is related ;)
Don't you just love those newspaper descriptions? I keep losing myself in the text of the speeches he gave or were given in his honor. Such fun.
As a just shared with David Shaw, I'm quite serious in creating a version (or actually just updating this version) to reflect the ancestors of our Projectkin.
I mean, why not? I can make dozens of variations of the timeline. Each one simply runs the Javascript code on a Googlesheet. This particular Google Sheet is linked in this article. My four ancestors are just the starting example. I'll bet we have dozens in here. 😉
I don’t believe I have ancestors who would have followed Lafayette’s tour but I love the potential applications of this. You are ‘playing’ with this idea. Perfect. Can I be an ‘outsider’ with viewing rights?
Absolutely! As I polish this up, the timeline linked ☝️ in the article will just keep updating (notice that it loads each time you tap on it from the article or refresh a link that's already open). I plan to create a proper "Project Recipe" from this example, but what would make that even stronger will be other use cases...
There's a possibility of something from Dean Kirby who happens to have an array of data that relates to the impact of the blitz in Manchester, England. I hope to speak to him over the next few weeks. We'll see where that goes.
If you abstract the idea of a tour of places in the American continent to the location of bombings, you can see how these are variations of the same idea.
Right?
Have you seen https://www.thelafayettetrail.org/ and https://www.thelafayettetrail.org/map/ ?
Why yes, of course, and it's very cool. I'm in touch with the Friends of Lafayette folks, too. The challenge I was trying to address here was to come up with a way to see where MY ancestors were in a timeline with each of these visits by state.
I could look up one and look at the other but I didn't have a way to put them both on the same timeline or map.
To solve that I created a list of the some 135 stops and plotted that into the timeline. This tool lets me put anyone else on a row below that. I can create as many variations of this as I'd like by making copies to add different lists of people to compare it with. (For now, this list is just pulling from Wikipedia with some effort to add detail, but here's where I'm pulling experts in to help get the facts right. The cool thing is that everyone benefits from the updates with copy/paste magic. )
Well, gosh, I guess y'all get it!
You seem to have understood why I've been so excited about this idea. I suddenly realized that it would be easy to for you to add your ancestors to the timeline as a “Projectkin” cohort so I added a quick postscript to the post ☝️. See the end of the doc. (Spoiler: Add your details to a shared Google Sheet, I'll copy/paste into the production version after validating.)
I love a simple answer. 🤭
Barbara, thanks for your amazing article re Lafayette’s tour.
I know you will find an end to it one way or another. I’m certain there will be Projectkin Americans able to contribute.
I look forward to following along on your journey.
Oh, thank you. I’m certain of that. I look forward to the variations for other stories around the world. I can’t wait.
I don't have ancestors who met him, that I know of, but some that did live in a place he visited. He stopped in Shawneetown (now Old Shawneetown), Illinois in 1825 and attended a dinner at the Rawlings Hotel. The original is gone, but an 'also old' replacement is still there. I have photos of it from one of our trips. I included mention of this trip in one of my genealogy mysteries because it was such a big deal at the time, as you can imagine.
haha.. I was just dropping you a DM to ask. Shawneetown, that must be what I remembered. I have the stop on my timeline, but no photos. May 7, 1825. I'd love to include one your photos if you'd be up to share one. 😊
Give me a few minutes and I'll dig out the photos I took.