Treasure Chest Thursday: Civil War Ancestor: Richard G. Brown

I can hardly contain my excitement!  I just discovered that my great great grandfather, Richard George Brown, fought in the Civil War.  With a popular surname like Brown, how did I determine it was him?

Through his death certificate, I was able to determine that Richard Brown was buried in Cedar Bluff Cemetery in Rockford, Illinois.  I posted his information on Findagrave, and hoped that someone would take a picture of his tombstone for me.  Good luck and bad luck....someone claimed my photo request...but there was no tombstone marker....but.....Richard is listed in the cemetery record book as: Richard G Brown, buried Block 21, Lot 2, Grave 24, buried March 13, 1920, age 72 years old, Notes: G.A.R.

Richard was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R)!  I did some searching on ancestry.com and found his record.

Richard enlisted on February 1, 1864 at the age of 18.  He served for the Union for the state of Illinois.  He enlisted as a Private in Company E, 95th Infantry Regiment, Illinois and was transferred out of Company E on August 17, 1865, and transferred into Company E, 47th Infantry Regiment, Illinois.  He mustered out on January 21, 1866 at Selma, Alabama.

Now, I'm going to do some searching on his two regiments to discover more about his life as a Union Soldier.

Wordless Wednesday: 1947 card game

My grandpa, Nunzio "Nick" Vitraelli" (the one with his shirt on).  Also pictured, Grandpa's friends, John Ranieri and Frank Liparota.

Tombstone Tuesday: Thomas and Martha Tutland

Pictured below is the tombstone of Thomas and Martha Tutland.  While we are not certain if these Tutlands were related to Brenden's ancestors, the Tuntlands, this couple often causes confusion in ancestry records.  Brenden's ancestors, Thomas and Martha Tuntland were born 20 years earlier than this couple and also lived in the same location, Sandwich, Illinois.  We haven't found the tombstone of his Tuntlands.

Inscription:

Tutland
Thomas
1849 - 1932
Wife
Martha
1853-1826

Tombstone located in Oak Ridge Cemetery, Kendall County, Sandwich, Illinois

Picture taken by me, 2010

My Furry Family Friday: Part 1

The title of my blog may make this obvious, but let it be known, I love dogs!

I never grew up with a dog, let alone a pet.  My only "pet" was a goldfish, Hoover, which lasted a couple of months while I was in college.  My mom never had a pet growing up and blocked every attempt of trying to get a dog into our house.  My two sisters and I even wrote and signed a contract saying that we'd take care of the dog.

Mom just wasn't a fan of dogs, their hair, or their drool.  My dad on the other hand, loves dogs.  He grew up with many pets: a cat named Rusty, a turtle, and the infamous poodle named Candy.  While we may have had better luck convincing my mom of getting a dog, if we had wanted a small dog....dad wanted a big, hairy, drooling, Saint Bernard, and my sisters and I wanted a golden retriever who we'd name Cookie.

Each Christmas we'd ask Santa for a dog.  One year Santa brought us a stuffed Old English Sheepdog who we affectionately named Claus or "Claws".  We learned our lesson that Christmas and started putting "dog, real, alive, breathing" on our Christmas lists.

It wasn't until I graduated college and moved into my own apartment that I finally got my dog.

At the time I was completing my Master's degree and working full-time and had just met Brenden.  Never owning a dog before I didn't want a puppy, and volunteering at the dog shelters I knew I wanted a rescue.  I searched pet finder long and hard for a yellow lab or a golden retriever.  Then one day, I saw Millie and read her story......

....to be continued

Touchdown AND Treasure Chest Thursday: An Address Book of Memories

At a recent family party, I discovered a wonderful source of genealogy goodness: my great grandma, Marie Cicero Gardos Malouf, and my grandma, Mildred "Millie" Gardos Malouf Vitraelli's address book.  Two address books!

Although both my great grandma and grandma are deceased, the address book contained wonderful information such as:

1) A birthday card list with their parents, siblings, daughters, sons, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, in-laws, and neighbors birth dates (and death dates)

2) An anniversary list for their parents, siblings, daughters, sons, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, in-laws, and neighbors

3) And of course....Addresses!  Addresses of parents, siblings, daughters, sons, nieces, nephews, cousins, in-laws, and neighbors, and not just the latest addresses, but a history of past addresses (crossed out with one line, and still legible)

I was able to use this information to fill in some missing information in my tree and add people to my tree....I only knew my great grandma had four siblings, when she actually had 11 siblings!!

What a gold mine of information!  An an extra bonus, my great grandmother and grandmother's handwriting

Ancestry.com to Family Tree Maker Import Error: Invalid tag MARR and DIV

I was finally able to import my gedcom from ancestry.com to my 2010 Family Tree Maker software without the software crashing!

But....Upon looking at the Error log, I am finding the following errors:

Line 14615: error 4 : Invalid tag: MARR. Line ignored.
Line 18588: error 4 : Invalid tag: MARR. Line ignored.
Line 33532: error 4 : Invalid tag: MARR. Line ignored.
Line 61331: error 4: Invalid tag: DIV. Line ignored.

There are over 70 instances of the Invalid tag: MARR and 4 instances of the invalid tag: DIV

I opened the gedcom in Excel to see if I could figure out what was happening, here's the info for the following error code:

Line 33532: error 4 : Invalid tag: MARR. Line ignored. (where 1 MARR is Line 33532)

1 MARR
2 DATE 1 Nov 1960
2 PLAC Cook, Illinois, USA
2 SOUR @S1496203298@
3 NOTE
http://trees.ancestry.com/rdf=sse&db=cookcountymarriages&h=6020371&ti=0&indiv=try&gss=pt
3 NOTE
3 DATA
4 TEXT Marriage date: 1 Nov 1960Marriage place: Cook County, IL
3 _APID 1500::6020371


Any idea why I am getting these error codes? Is there a way to fix them all at once, or do I need to fix each record individually? If they need to be fixed, what part needs to be fixed?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Wordless Wednesday: Grandparents Nunzio Vitraelli and Mildred Gardos Malouf Wedding in 1953 in Chicago