Dykeman - Ellis Marriage

95 years ago today, my Great Grandparents, Velma Ellis and Henry Dykeman got married in Catskill, Greene County, NY.

For descendants:

2 Children

6 Grandchildren

12 Great Grand-Children

21 Great-Great Grand-Children.

Dykeman - Beattys Marriage

A note or two of interest in the Brewster Standard, July 6 1877:

142 years ago, this was the wedding notice for 

Junia Dykeman 1856-1934 and Helen "Nellie" Beattys  1861-1920. 

And then on Monday a gathering was held:

Newspapers

It used to be if you wanted to know something, go read the newspaper.  

Today we go online and google what we're looking for - and sure enough we'll find the information - and a whole lot of it may be questionable. Years ago, most newspapers had the information about what is going on in town. Sure some of it might not have the facts correct, or be an ad disguised as news - but oh the things there are to learn about the family in the newspaper.

Try  looking for those missing facts in the paper of the day.  Most my family tree comes from New York. NY is a state where getting information is difficult at best.  I find much of my information in the local news columns of the past. Most often i use the search for "Firstname Lastname" with the quote marks included.

Free resources online - 

Try http://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html which  covers all of NY - an a little of other places. Read the FAQs section which is the link down at the bottom in the scrolling messages, it will assist you in the searching.

Or for those of us in the Hudson Valley, there is https://news.hrvh.org/  which is a smaller resource but seems to have different papers.  Putnam County Courier used to be on its own website, but it has been added here and is much more searchable this way.

Any county in New York, can be searched at the  NY Historic Newspapers website,  and you can search one or multiple counties at the same time if you choose.  Open each search result in a new tab here, which makes it easier to go back to your original search.

For a wider network, there is the Chronicling America website Which runs 1789 to 1963 all over the United States in various papers. The advanced search options here will give you better searches.

For other newspaper resources look at Cyndi'sList to see if  there are better newspapers for your area of interest that are free.  Ifyou're ready to pay for your searches, there are many susbscription services as well, like Newspapers.com. 

Santa Clara Tree

The first year Henry and Velma were married, they took a honeymoon trip to California.  After they were gone we found Velma's diary of the trip.  Much later we found pictures. 

On May 29 1925, (94 years ago) they were in the California State Redwood Park near Boulder Creek, CA. Velma writes "we walked down to the Santa Clara Tree which we were told was the only perfect tree in the park, the center not having been burnt.  It was certainly a very perfect redwood tree." 

I don't know what she had for a camera, but  she took a picture that day of her new husband, Henry Dykeman in front of that perfect redwood tree.

Someday I hope to stand at the foot of this very same tree.