To Cherokee or Not To Cherokee, That is the Question.
Well, I've become obsessed (however briefly) with my family history. This ties in, in particular, to my interest in Native Americans -- my Greatgrandma Josie always claimed to be 1/2 Cherokee (I never knew this, actually).
Supposedly she ran away to the Alabama-Coushatta reservation in Oklahoma for a while, probably around 1910 (I thought she was actually Alabama-Coushatta). After that, she ran down to East Texas, probably fleeing her step mother (whom, it seems, she hated passionately).
I've found a lot of stuff using Ancestry.com. BTW, all hail the Census records -- they're the most useful thing in the world. Really, they're almost the only thing I can find. Every once in a while I find a death certificate. Almost no birth records, though, because those used to be kept on a county-by-county basis.
Sadly, I see a long and grueling trip to Wood and Camp counties in my future. At least if I want any answers as to what Josie's mother's name REALLY was. Seems of all the groups researching the family history, none of them know exactly what name she went by.
Oh, and if Eliza A Niell (or what ever her name was?) was born in Oklahoma as is likely, then I'm in for a world of hurt. Oklahoma only became a state in 1907. And before 1890 (well before she was born or even married), it wasn't even an "Organized Territory of the United States". It was just frontier.
So yeah. When you start researching, you get into unrecorded bits of history pretty damned fast.
If anyone knows a lot about this stuff, please help! Really! I beg you!
Supposedly she ran away to the Alabama-Coushatta reservation in Oklahoma for a while, probably around 1910 (I thought she was actually Alabama-Coushatta). After that, she ran down to East Texas, probably fleeing her step mother (whom, it seems, she hated passionately).
I've found a lot of stuff using Ancestry.com. BTW, all hail the Census records -- they're the most useful thing in the world. Really, they're almost the only thing I can find. Every once in a while I find a death certificate. Almost no birth records, though, because those used to be kept on a county-by-county basis.
Sadly, I see a long and grueling trip to Wood and Camp counties in my future. At least if I want any answers as to what Josie's mother's name REALLY was. Seems of all the groups researching the family history, none of them know exactly what name she went by.
Oh, and if Eliza A Niell (or what ever her name was?) was born in Oklahoma as is likely, then I'm in for a world of hurt. Oklahoma only became a state in 1907. And before 1890 (well before she was born or even married), it wasn't even an "Organized Territory of the United States". It was just frontier.
So yeah. When you start researching, you get into unrecorded bits of history pretty damned fast.
If anyone knows a lot about this stuff, please help! Really! I beg you!