I love Google!!

~ Lark Dalin Robart ~ Leave a comment

I got curious this morning about the “Mineral Land Convention” referenced in the newspaper article I wrote about yesterday. So I “googled” the term “mineral land convention”, together with the word “Montana”, and up popped this newspaper article from the Chicago Tribune – dated December 1, 1889. Bam!!

Apparently, the owners of mining locations (my great grandfather being one) were in danger of losing some mining patents to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. A resolution was adopted at the Convention asking the Secretary of the Interior to suspend action on issuing grants to the railroad company pending a formal presentation, by the soon-to-be-formed Mineral Land Association, of its views as to the “best methods by which the true character of such lands may be determined.”

If you’d like to read the article embedded below, click on the 4-window icon in the lower left hand corner, click on page 6, and you’ll find the article Montana Mineral Land Convention near the top of the page in the 2nd column.

So interesting.  This is the kind of information that really puts “meat” on our family stories.

I’ll be doing more research to see what happened with the railroad grants. But in the meantime, let me just say – I love Google!!

a little bit of serendipity

~ Lark Dalin Robart ~ Leave a comment

Last week while going through some old Montana newspapers, I just happened upon this news article that mentions my great grandfather David Lyman Blacker. I’ve searched his name on many occasions – but this is an article I’ve never come across. So it was a great find!

Mineral Land Convention

Also listed in the article are John Keating, my great grandfather’s business partner, and Moses Morris, a close friend who was at my great grandfather’s bedside when he died years later in 1911.

The source for this newspaper article is:
“Mineral Land Convention,” The Helena independent. (Helena, Mont.), 28 Nov. 1889, p. 1, col. 3; image copy, Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress (www.chroniclingamerica.loc.gov : accessed 28 November 2016), Digitized Newspapers.

A transcription of the article follows here:

MINERAL LAND CONVENTION.

Delegates Who Will Represent This
County at Encore Hall Tuesday.
      —————o————–
The delegates from this county to the last
meeting of the Mineral Land convention
met last evening and added several gentle-
men to their number. The convention
meets on Tuesday at Encore Hall, at 2 p.
m. The following is a full list of the Lewis
and Clarke Delegation:

J. S. Harrris, Thomas Cruse,
H. M. Parchen, Moses Emanuel,
Moses Morris, C. B. Vaughn,
E. R. Tandy, Geo. B. Foote,
J. B. Wilson, John Keating,
James W. Carpenter,  R. C. Wallace,
Chas. Runley, Henry Klein,
E. D. Weed, Chas. Rinda,
James Gourley, Wm. Hickey,
John Shober, C. K. Wells,
Wm. Coyne, Clarence Kinna,
Ed Zimmerman, P. H. Constans,
Henry Jurgens, Niel Vawter,
John Steinmetz, Joseph Davis,
A. M. Thornburgh, Samuel Word,
John T. Murphy, J. B. Sanford,
John Steinbrenner, Albert Kleinschmidt,
Jacob Sweitzer, James Sullivan,
L. H. Hershfield, Mike Burns,
R. P. Barden, A. K. Prescott,
Ben Price, M. M. Holter,
David Blacker,  W. E. Cox,
B. P. Carpenter, Thomas G. Merrill
And all the members of the house and
state senate from Lewis and Clarke county.
—————o————–

We’re Related | part 3

~ Lark Dalin Robart ~ Leave a comment

Note: This series on Ancestry’s “We’re Related” app begins here.

Five new “cousins” since my last post.

By category, they are:

ACTORS (1)
Cecil B. DeMille1

AUTHORS & WRITERS (2)
Dr. Seuss
Emily Post

POLITICIANS (2)
John McCain
Samuel Adams

Only one of these – Dr. Seuss – is on my Dad’s side. So that makes a total of two matches thus far on his side – Steve Jobs and Dr. Seuss. The remaining 32 out of 34 matches are on my Mom’s side.

The most promising in this new group appears to be John McCain, although additional research is required to confirm this match.

This series continued here.

NOTES
  1. Although Ancestry put him in the Actors category, he was primarily an American filmmaker, acknowledged as the founding father of the Hollywood film industry. ↩

We’re Related | part 2

~ Lark Dalin Robart ~ Leave a comment

Note: This series on Ancestry’s “We’re Related” app begins here.

Since I first wrote about my matches on Ancestry’s new app (click here), I’ve had a two more pop up, both in the Actors category:

Lucille Ball
John Wayne

The John Wayne match made me laugh because when I was a little girl, I always thought my dad was just like John Wayne – only better, of course. But this match is on my mom’s side, not my dad’s. In fact, both are on my mom’s side.

But I digress.

Of these two, the Lucille Ball connection looks like it might be legitimate. I’ll know more after further research.

I also started a WE’RE RELATED tree in Ancestry and have added these four matches (from the “part 1” list) so that I can study them more carefully:

Billy the Kid
Warren Buffett
Abraham Lincoln
Elizabeth Montgomery

Out of these four, the match that looks the most promising at this point is Abraham Lincoln – although I still have more research to do before calling this one a “good” match.

The matches for Elizabeth Montgomery and Warren Buffett will require quite a bit more research – so it’s too soon to tell whether either one is legitimate.

The “Billy the Kid” match is the most problematic, as it’s based entirely on the assumption that he was the son of William Harrison Bonney – which, as far as I can tell, has never been proven.

This series continued here.