February 25th Genealogy Showcase

Hey everyone, I know it's been several months since my last post.

I'm still not totally back to the genealogy but I am trying to at least stay active these days. On February 4th, I attended the the Spring Genealogy Conference, African American Genealogy: Overcoming Roadblocks, at St. Augustine University in Raleigh.

Later in the month, February 25th, the African-American Heritage Ministry at Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, put on a Genealogy Showcase. I'm a member of both the church and the ministry. The ministry tries to plan activities throughout the year in order to try to educate the members of our church, especially our youth, about our history and heritage. However, most of our activities are centered around the month of February.

Several of these activities center around genealogy / family history. Last year, one of the other members of the ministry and I conducted a 1 1/2 hour presentation on getting started in genealogy.

This years event was the Genealogy Showcase. We invited the members of the church to participate and share part of their family's history. In addition we invited several of the local genealogy organizations, including AAHGS - AAGIG, Comprehensive Genealogical Services, and the Mecklenburg County Library. Guest speaker, via Skype, was Dr. Gina Paige of African Ancestry DNA.

Due to several events, such as the CIAA tournament, occurring that same weekend, attendance and participation was not what we had hoped for but it was still a nice event.

Here are some of the visual displays.

This first one is from my friend, Beatrice Cox. Mrs. Cox and I are the main two researchers in the ministry. She's the one I did last year's presentation with.

This next display is from our chair person, Cynthia Dumizo. Cynthia, as well as Mrs. Cox, are very active in a local group, Comprehensive Genealogical Services, which is active in finding local abandoned slave cemeteries.

This was the beginning of the display by another of our ministry members, Rosalyn Johnson. Originally, this was all that Rosalyn had planned to bring. She was planning to use a corner of my table but I ended up using my entire table, so Rosalyn ran back home and brought in some other materials. Since I was also doing a lot of running around (even going back home myself), I did not get a picture of Rosalyn's completed table.

The following tables were done by other members of the church and unfortunately, I didn't get their names.

And last but not least, here are the pictures of my table. If I had known we could use more than one table, I would have definitely brought more materials but for this being the first time of doing a visual display, I think it turned out okay. I got several tips from the Conference / Workshop earlier in the month that I employed in creating my displays.

Family History Month 2010- Challenge #2

In honor of Family History month, Afrigeneas is conducting a series of Family History Challenges. My entry for Challenge #1 is posted on Conversations With my Ancestors as well as at Afrigeneas.


The instructions for Challenge #2 were as follows:
Since we're getting ready to enter a long holiday season, it seems a good time to remember holidays past.


How did your family celebrate special occasions and holidays? What are your favorite memories?

Interpret the theme any way you like. Write as long or short as you like. We encourage you to post photos to illustrate the story. Be creative!

Just a couple of rules:

1. Make our lives easier, please! Post your story as a response to this thread so we can keep track of the stories in each challenge.
2. Challenge #2 begins today, Oct 7th and ends at 11:59 pm on Oct 11th.

My entry was a few hours late. I had it written but fell asleep before getting it posted. What can I say? I was exhausted.

One of my fondest memories during my childhood days was the sort of mini reunion that my maternal granddad’s branch of the Hosch family held at Christmas each year. We typically gathered at one of the relative’s house, which most years seemed to be Aunt Lucille’s house.

Even though I saw some of my cousins on a daily basis (the bulk of my first cousins lived in my hometown), there was still something special about the descendants of my grandparents getting together at Christmas. After everyone arrived, the occasion always began with us singing Christmas Carols. Aunt Lucille, through the years, had acquired a large stash of FREE Christmas Carol songbooks from one of the local banks. So, my dad, the true musician in the group and who had married into this monstorous Hosch clan, would provide the instrumental accompaniment to our singing. On occasion, after I got older, the instrumental duties fell on my shoulders.

The above pictures, which are part of my mother’s personal collection, show dad at the piano, granddaddy and his children, grands, and great grands all gathered around, singing carols. (Granddaddy is sitting on the sofa next to the lamp.) If you look carefully, you can tell how thrilled all the kids were with the hymn and carol singing. :)

After the completion of the carol singing, we usually ate. Dinner was usually potluck, similar to the annual Hosch family reunion that was held back in those days but on a somewhat smaller scale. But before we ate, there was grace. Uncle Ed, Aunt Lucille’s husband who was also a minister, usually said grace. On the way to the Holiday Feast, Aunt Lucille would have us all speaking into her trusty microphone / cassette tape recorder. I remember we had to say our name, tell our place in the family, and then say something about the holidays or what ever else was on our minds. Just goes to show that daddy’s side of the family wasn’t the only side of my family that relied on tape recordings to communicate / document family events. (Reminds me, I will see auntie some time this week and should ask her if any of those old recordings are still in existence. By chance, maybe they haven’t met the same fate as other family recordings that are now special to me but no longer around.)

After we were through stuffing our faces, we gathered around the Christmas tree doing our usual family socializing until the gifts were handed out. After all the gifts were handed out, we lingered and socialized some more before we slowly started filing out to return to our individual homes. Looking back, it almost feels like that each one of us in our on way tried to make that day last as long as possible. It’s almost like we knew those times wouldn’t last forever and we were trying to make those gatherings last as long as we could.

The Introduction to Ms. Fannie (Part 1)

The bulk of the stories handed down on my maternal grandmother's side of the family always seem to center around my great-grandmother Fannie.

First, there is her possible lineage that I mentioned in my last post.

But my favorite story that has been handed down is that after my great-grandfather died, great-grandmom said she wasn't going to remarry because of how great-granddad had treated her. Well, next thing you know some man comes along and great-grandmom tried to get all her daughters out of the way by marrying them off. Based on the 1910 census, my granddad lived two houses away and I've always imagined my great-grandmother saying to my grandmother "Mary, there's that nice Hosch boy over there that's about your age."

I don't know if there is any truth to the story but I can say that great-granddad died on 14 May 1910 and my grandparents were married on 9 Oct 1910.

Great-grandmom is also my most mysterious ancestor. The more info I find out about her, the more questions that are raised, which is why I've decided to introduce her somewhat slowly.