Genealogy Source Citation Frustration

Yankee Merchants

During my research on John Murdoch, I came across a statement in a book which mentioned that Murdoch had been backed by an East coast firm when he set up his company in St. Louis in 1838. It went on to say that when the East coast firm failed, it took Murdoch's company down with it. The book, Yankee Merchants and the Making of the Urban West, cited Missouri Vol. 37, p. 576 as the source of the information. Digging through all the citations in the back of the book, I determined that it referred to the R.G. Dun & Company Collection. R.G. Dun was the first successful commercial reporting agency in the United States, and it began in St. Louis. The firm later merged with J.M. Bradstreet & Company to become Dun & Bradstreet.

I was cautiously optimistic that I could look at the Dun collection at a local library, since they operated out of St. Louis. Unfortunately, the collection is housed at the Baker Library, Harvard University Graduate School of Business. I checked with the library online, and while the librarians there will look up items in an index, they will not look at the actual collection. This is not helpful, since I already know exactly which volume and page number that I need. I contacted a genealogist in the Boston area that I had previously met at a conference to see if I could hire her to go look at the book for me. She responded that she is located an hour out of Boston, so this would not be feasible for her. Then she gave me two other names to contact. The first had a seven hour minimum for researching (wow!), and the second required a three hour deposit. I contacted them both anyway, on the off chance that they were already heading to Harvard on another project and could tag mine along with it. They both declined my request, but one of them gave me an additional person to contact. This fourth person also stated that he was not interested in the job. Strike four...

It is unfortunate because it made sense to me that Murdoch was backed by someone else. After all, he was only 24 when he arrived in St. Louis. I think it would add to the story to know who that person was, and what became of him and his own business. But there is only so much time (and money) that I am willing to invest in the pursuit of that particular piece of information. The story will have to go on without it.

When is Enough Enough?

Anyone who is writing a family history, memoir or biography has to address the question of when enough is enough. It is so easy to say that you are just going to look at one more source, or research one more thing for your story. At some point you have to draw a line in the imaginary sand and say enough already. It is hard to do though. I will be double checking a source for the story of John Murdoch, and all of a sudden a new article catches my attention. And off I go on another tangent. So I have had to become more disciplined at this stage of the process. I make a list of tasks that I want to complete each day, and I try to stick to the list. If something new crops up while going through my tasks, then I write the idea down on a Possibilities list. Once the first draft of the story is complete, I can decide if I want to come back and add any of the Possibilities items. Otherwise I will be spending all of my time researching and not writing. I have drawn the line in the sand.

Preparing for Continued John Murdock Research

1857 St. Louis map indicates Murdock & Dickson land

Over the past several years I have accumulated many articles about John Murdock. Many of them are hard copies placed in several file folders. But a good number are items that I have found on the Internet, clipped into Word or Photoshop files on my computer. I spent today organizing the files in preparation for a trip to the headquarters of the St. Louis County Library system tomorrow. My goal for tomorrow is to determine what brought John Murdock as a young man of 24 to the city of St. Louis in 1838. What was going on here that enticed him to leave his parents in New Jersey and travel alone to a new city? What was St. Louis like at that time? I also want to know what took place in the 1860s that forced Murdock and his partner Charles Dickson into placing an ad in the April 29, 1869 Missouri Democrat to auction Murdock Farm to pay off debt.

One thing that tends to happen with me when I go to research facilities is that I go off in tangents. For a project this size, I think it will help me to have specific questions that I want answered. That way the librarians can direct me to the best resources as well. We'll see how well I stick to the plan tomorrow!

One Week into the Challenge

We are one week into the Family History Writing Challenge. Except for one day I have managed to meet or exceed my daily writing goal. Like others in the challenge, I am finding it hard not to get distracted by research once I am writing. I have a tendency to think, oh let me check that fact...and before I know it I am looking up something online or in my files. My solution to that is to keep a pad of paper and a pen by my mouse so I can jot down notes to myself. I also make some notes in red within my writing so that I can refer back to those later. The main idea is to not be distracted from the actual writing. Once you stop it is really hard to get back to it.

Through the writing process I can definitely see the holes in my research. I am making a list of questions that I want to discuss with my aunts as well as places and periods of history that I want to research a bit more. At my uncle's funeral I met an older woman in our family who actually lived with my great-grandparents. Oh, how I want to sit down and talk with her! I will be in Cincinnati in May for a conference, so I definitely will make time to go and see her.

I actually think the biggest challenge in writing a family history is to make it interesting. No one wants to just read a bunch of facts and figures. And since none of my ancestors were kind enough to keep diaries, I really don't know what their lives were like. I can see that there will be a lot of historical reading in my future.

Frustrating Times

The week before last I went to the National Archives in Washington, D.C. to do some research. I knew that they have information about the different military units from WWII there, including pictures and videos. Though I had reviewed what was available ahead of time, I was disappointed to learn that the military material is located in another location 45 minutes away. Since I was on a fairly tight schedule I did some other genealogical research instead.

The promised records from the National Personnel Records Center here in St. Louis have yet to arrive. The last correspondence said they would be mailed to me on July 27th. I contacted the office via email again, and now they are telling me that the records will be sent September 20th. I am beginning to think that every time I write them I get pushed back to the bottom of the pile. I believe it is time to find out who is in charge of this office.

Meanwhile I have now missed the opportunity to have my daughter lay out the book for me. She will be heading back to college next weekend. Of course, at the rate the personnel records center is going I may get the records in time for her Christmas break!