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November 13, 2007
Dana Huff
2 Comments

Urban Posters 2

Posted in Uncategorized

It looks like UrbanPosters.com shipped my order today, almost exactly three months after I ordered it.  I still have not received feedback regarding the lateness or the multiple e-mails, or the BBB complaint, and I suppose I don’t expect to now, as they will feel they fulfilled their end of the bargain.  I am not satisfied, however, and will still not order from them again.  Three months for posters they said they had in stock is ridiculous.  Amazon does better with out of print materials than that!

Crossposted at Much Madness is Divinest Sense, the Pensieve, and huffenglish.com.

November 11, 2007
Dana Huff
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UrbanPosters.com

Posted in Uncategorized

Consider this post a public service announcement.

Back in mid-August, I ordered two posters from the website poster outfitter UrbanPosters.com.  September came and went, and they had not arrived.  Furthermore, the company did not respond to numerous e-mails regarding my order.  I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, but the company has yet to respond to that complaint as well.  I’m out about $27, which is not a lot, but much more disturbing to me than the fact that I lost money is the fact that the company ignored repeated requests and a BBB complaint.  I have rarely received such shoddy customer service anywhere. I would urge you strongly not to do business with this company and to spread the word around.

Crossposted at huffenglish.com, Much Madness is Divinest Sense, and the Pensieve.

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August 12, 2007
Dana Huff
One Comment

World War I Veterans Reunite After 50 Years

Posted in Family Biographies/Histories, Genealogy and History, and Photographs

Some time back, I shared with you some photos of my great-grandfather Herman Cunningham and his WWI tentmate John Roy McCravey that my aunt Carolyn had sent me. She told me that she had an article about their reunion, but couldn’t find it at the time. Later, she took the trouble to find the article on microfilm and share it with me. Here it is:

World War I Tentmates Reunited After 50 Years

October 23, 1969, Lockney Beacon

In this age of high speed transportation, our world seems to have shrunk.

For a pair of World War I buddies, the situation was different. Herman Cunningham of Lockney and Roy McCravey of Memphis had no renewed their friendship for half a century until one day this fall.

The local man had inquired for years about his former Army “tentmate” … but to no avail.

This summer he was visiting in a Plainview convalescent home and struck up a conversation with “a fellow who turned out to be from Floydada.” During their chat, Mr. Cunningham asked the Floydada man whether he knew John McCravey.

“No,” was the answer, “but a Roy McCravey used to live there. I think he has a sister still living in Floydada.”

Cunningham’s son-in-law Connie C. Reed, a Floyd County deputy sheriff, knew the woman, who works in a Floydada restaurant. The pair went to see her.

“Do you have a brother named John McCravey?” the Lockney man inquired of the waitress.

“No, but I have a brother, Roy, who now lives in Memphis,” came the reply. Further discussion related that “John” and “Roy” were one and the same individual.

Mr. and Mrs. Cunningham were driven to Memphis for a visit with the former friend several weeks ago by a daughter. McCravey and his wife returned the visit recently.

McCravey had lived in the Plainview and Floydada areas before moving to Memphis.

He and Cunningham became friends in 1918 when they were inducted into the Army and trained together at Camp McArthur, Waco. They shared the same tent.

Later, Cunningham and McCravey shipped out together for France. Shortly after their arrival — “four or five days” — the Lockney man contracted meningitis and was hospitalized in France for treatment.

Before he was “back on his feet,” armistice had been declared.

Back in the states, Herman and Roy got together once for a visit in 1919. That was in the Cunningham home at Whitfield (now Claytonville).

“Then we both moved and we lost connection,” Mr. Cunningham says. He moved to Lockney in 1931.

For the past 50 years the World War I buddies’ trails had not crossed … until a chance conversation put Cunningham on the trail. Maybe it is a small world!

Here is a picture of Roy McCravey (left) and my great-grandfather (right) in 1918:

John Roy McCravey and Herman Cunningham, 1918

And here is a picture of the two at their 1969 reunion:

John Roy McCravey and Herman Cunningham, 1969

It is interesting that I was able to correctly estimate a date for this photo. I guessed it was taken in the late 1960’s or early 1970’s based on similar photos I had seen in my parents’ and grandparents’ photo albums.

July 5, 2007
Dana Huff
One Comment

Genealogy Blogging

Posted in Genealogy 101

More and more people are beginning to use blogs as a medium to deliver their genealogy research, and this is definitely a trend I want to encourage. Many genealogists who create blogs are new to Web 2.0 or Read/Write web technologies. The terms Web 2.0 and Read/Write web refer to tools that allow users to contribute content to the web, including video, photographs, blogs, wikis, and more. Lots of possibilities exist, and I decided that it might be helpful to genealogists to learn more about how Web 2.0 technologies can help them get their family history online. In this post, I will discuss several blogging platforms available to genealogists.

Blogger

Blogger is arguably the most popular content management system, and not just among genealogy bloggers. Registration and blog creation is very easy. You can choose from a variety of attractive templates. Blogger allows users to upload images. Blogger’s images are actually stored in Picasa Web Albums, which have 1024 MB of storage space for images. I would imagine that is standard, but if you use Blogger and have a different amount, let me know. Blogger also offers spell check and auto save features. Auto save will prevent you from completely losing a post if your computer freezes or crashes while you’re writing.

Blogger is perfect for people who want to get started quickly. With Blogger’s new editor, you no longer have to know CSS and HTML in order to alter your template easily. You can select which elements you want to appear on your blog and customize their appearance, and you can change the colors and font on your blog in a snap.

As the largest blogging platform, Blogger is the target of comment spam. Blogger allows users to moderate comments before they post. In order to post comments on most Blogger blogs I’ve seen, commenters must successfully reproduce the characters in a CAPTCHA. I am going to go on record as stating I hate CAPTCHAs. Sometimes it is very difficult to determine what the characters are, and it takes me two or more tries to enter a comment. Even worse, spam comments have become such a problem on Blogger that some Blogger users will only accept comments from people who have registered with Blogger. I will step on my soapbox long enough to say that while I certainly have no problem with comment moderation, I think it is heinous to ask users to register with a service they may not want to use in any fashion just to leave a comment on your blog. Another problem I have with Blogger’s commenting system is that it isn’t customizable to look like your blog’s template. I think Blogger is a fairly good option aside from its commenting system. Many Blogger users actually go with outside commenting services such as HaloScan. Free HaloScan commenting systems allow users to customize the appearance to match their blog, but the service does include ads.

Another feature of Blogger that you might want to be wary of is the navigation bar. This bar allows users to search your blog posts, but it also contains a feature that allows users to surf to the next blog. Just like Forrest Gump’s proverbial box of chocolates, the “Next Blog” feature offers a wide variety of mysterious options. You might click through to an entertaining, enlightening blog you never would have found another way. You might click through to a spam blog or a blog with content you find inappropriate. Will all of your family members understand that this feature is a link to a random blog and not a link you created? You can disable the navigation bar, but doing so will take search capability out of your blog, which is probably something genealogy bloggers in particular want to retain.

WordPress

WordPress, like Blogger, has a quick set-up that will having you blogging in minutes. WordPress has a variety of attractive templates. You can also upload images. WordPress gives users 50 MB of space for file uploads. However, if you want more space you can either purchase it or use an image upload service like Picasa, Photobucket, or Flickr. Like Blogger, WordPress has spell check and auto save features.

One of WordPress’s best features is tagging. Tagging is important for helping others find your blog. It will enable search engines like Google Blog Search and Technorati to categorize your posts and make them easier to find.

By far, WordPress’s best feature is its commenting system. Rather than opening up comments in a new window or popup window, WordPress integrates comments within posts. WordPress users can moderate comments. WordPress users can also take advantage of WordPress’s excellent comment spam killer, Akismet. Akismet works with a variety of platforms, but was developed for WordPress. It does not work with Blogger.

Other Free Players

A wide variety of other options exist for bloggers who want to write about their family history, including LiveJournal, Xanga, and MSN Spaces. If you have a favorite, feel free to write about it in the comments. Also if you have any thoughts to add about the free blog hosts mentioned, feel free to contribute.

In my next post, I will discuss options for genealogists who own their own domains and want to put content management systems on their websites, rather than use hosted blogs.

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June 24, 2007
Dana Huff
2 Comments

Inheriting Given Names

Posted in Family Biographies/Histories, and Genealogy and History

I know some people prefer not to name their children after family members. A solid argument can be made for giving a child a name that is entirely their own, at least within the context of the family. When someone is calling for Dana at family gatherings, I always know they mean me. I believe I’m the only Dana in any branch of my family; I’ve yet to prove otherwise, anyway.

My daughter Maggie has an old-fashioned name. We named her for her grandmother, Margaret, my husband’s mother. Indeed, when parents name their children, it is generally for a close relative rather than a distant ancestor. What I didn’t realize, however, is that the name Margaret stretches quite far back in my husband’s family. My husband’s second cousin Bobbye Phillips connected with me online and shared her Ancestry.com family tree with me.

My mother-in-law’s mother was Margaret Emma Ledbetter (1916-1995), daughter of Clarence Ledbetter (1868-?) and Rosanna Belle Beasley (1881-1946). Rosanna Beasley’s paternal grandmother was Margaretta Etta Pugh Beasley (1827-1898). It’s possible that Margaretta Pugh’s mother, Prudence Jane Nicks Pugh (1794-1887), named her daughter after her own paternal grandmother, Margaret Doaks Nicks (1752-?). Prudence’s paternal grandfather also had a mother named Margaret — Margaret Edwards Nicks (1717-1753).

I find it fairly interesting that the name Margaret has been passed through my husband’s family for nearly 300 years. In some ways, it feels like a connection across the generations. My friend Roger has an interesting essay (which I contributed a small part to) on naming practices around the world: “What’s in a Name?”

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June 6, 2007
Dana Huff
5 Comments

Civil War Records of William Jones Bowling

Posted in Family Biographies/Histories

Much of what I know about my great-great-great-grandfather, William Jones Bowling, is thanks largely to my distant cousin, Joe Bowling, who descends from an uncle of William Jones Bowling’s. Joe sent me a copy of William Jones Bowling’s Civil War records, consisting of his record as a prisoner of war and his application for a pension.

William Jones Bowling was born January 20, 1840 in Haywood County, Tennessee. W.J. Bowling himself gives this information on his pension application. He enlisted in the Confederate States Army in August 1861, according to his pension application. He was captured on March 21, 1864 in Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tennessee (the county bordering his birth county of Haywood to the south). According to his POW records, he “gave himself up.” He appears to have been sent first to Alton Military Prison. He appears on a roll of prisoners of war which indicates he was received at Alton on April 21, 1864. He was transferred to Camp Douglas, Illinois (Chicago) on August 23, 1864 and appears on a roll of prisoners of war received at Camp Douglas on August 24, 1864. Camp Douglas has been considered the Andersonville of the North — described in a History Channel documentary as “80 acres of hell.” The photograph below is dated 1863, so I know that my ggg-grandfather is not one of the many faces in the sea of prisoners, but I find the photograph poignant nonetheless. You can fully explore this photograph, including zooming in to see close detail, at the Encyclopedia of Chicago.

Camp Douglas -- click to see larger version

Bowling later appears on a roll of prisoners of war applying for an oath of allegiance dated September 24, 1864. The remarks on this record state

Claim to have been loyal. Enlisted in the Rebel Army to avoid conscription and desire to take oath of allegiance and become loyal citizen.

He apparently did take this oath of allegiance and was discharged on May 16, 1865. His discharge lists his place of residence as “Hardinmond Co., Tenn.,” which I believe to be a reference to Hardeman County. The 1860 census corroborates this evidence, citing Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tennessee as the residence of W. J. Bowling.

William Jones Bowling’s POW records all list him as a Private in Company H of the 15th Regiment, Tennessee Infantry. Other records, including his pension application, refer to him as a First Sergeant in Company K of the Fourth Confederate Infantry (1st Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi). Which is it? Given the volatility and frequent reorganization during the war, it could be both. I am not as troubled by the inconsistency regarding organization as I am the inconsistency regarding his rank, especially because my cousin Joe is so thorough in his research, and I don’t think he made a mistake.

According to my cousin Joe, William Jones Bowling decided to become a minister while he was imprisoned. It makes sense that a man living in such desperate conditions might turn to the Bible and religion for comfort.

In an upcoming post, I will share William Jones Bowling’s application for a Confederate pension, along with the wealth of information gleaned from it.

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May 28, 2007
Dana Huff
One Comment

Memorial Day

Posted in Genealogy and History

Inspired by Randy’s post about relatives who have served in war time in the armed services, I honor the following ancestors who I know to have served our country during war.

Vietnam

  • Thomas Ray Swier, my father: Air Force

World War II

  • Udell Oliver Cunningham, my grandfather: Navy
  • David Edwin Swier (1921-2001), my grandfather: Army

World War I

  • Herman Cunningham (1895-1980), my great-grandfather: Army

Civil War

  • William Jones Bowling (1840-1916), my great-great-great-grandfather: Army, CSA
  • Shelby McDaniel (1833-1872), my great-great-great-grandfather: Army, CSA
  • John Thomas Stallings (1843-1916), my great-great-great grandfather: Army, CSA

Revolutionary War

  • Joseph Anthony (1713-1785)
  • Joseph Anthony, Jr. (1750-1810)
  • Churchill Blakey (1760-1837)
  • David Kennedy (1768-1837)
  • Alexander Kennedy (ca. 1738-after 1800)
  • James Stallings

Not included on this list are any relatives whose service records I haven’t discovered yet. Following is a list of other relatives who have served in the military:

  • Ryan Anthony Fondulis, my brother-in-law, currently in the Air Force
  • Martin Priester Cunningham, my cousin, currently in the Air Force
  • Teddy Wayne Cunningham, my uncle, retired Air Force
  • Billy Loid Thurman (1936-1991), my great-uncle, Army in Korean War
  • Alvin Herman Cunningham (1921-1962), my great-uncle, Army in World War II

Vintage Memorial Day Postcard

I wish to express my sincere gratitude to all the veterans, family members or not, for their sacrifices.

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May 23, 2007
Dana Huff
2 Comments

What’s a Genealogy Blog Good For?

Posted in Genealogy 101

I haven’t posted in some time, but this time of year is hectic for a teacher, and I have had little time to do any genealogy research. I usually reserve my most intensive research for summers, when I have more time.

However, I did want to mention one the reasons I started this blog was that I hoped distant family members might connect via Google. As wonderful as the genealogy forums are for helping fellow genealogists connect, I think a blog has a wider audience. I have had quite a few family members connect with me through this blog.

If you frequent genealogy forums, but don’t have a blog, consider starting one. Don’t feel compelled to write in each day; I think too many bloggers worry about posting daily too much. A blog might open you up to a wider audience; you never know what you might learn or share!

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April 5, 2007
Dana Huff
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Military Family

Posted in Family Biographies/Histories

I come from a military family. My father served in the Air Force; his father was in the Army in World War II. My maternal grandfather was in the Navy in WWII and later joined the Air Force. His son, my uncle Wayne, retired a few years back after a long career in the Air Force, and my cousin Martin, Wayne’s son, is currently serving in the Air Force. My great-grandfather served in the Army in World War I, and I had several family members on both sides in the Civil War and Revolutionary War.

My family is very proud of its service to our country. My grandmother proudly displays photos of four generations of Cunningham men in their uniforms in her living room. She tells me that people always comment on those pictures. My cousin Martin has recently been sent to Qatar. While I have been assured he isn’t really in harm’s way there, the way this war has gone, you just don’t know; I have already lost a friend, so I worry. This is Martin and his youngest son Nicholas:

Martin and Nicholas

I think Martin is supposed to be gone for about four months. If you have a moment, think about the families left behind while their loved ones are deployed, especially to Iraq and Afghanistan. I don’t agree with this war, but I have the utmost respect for our troops and their families.

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