THE REASON FOR THIS SITE

Genealogy for me started with discussions with a colleague at work. During one of his trips to the National Archives, Harold Lefevre did a look-up to give me an example of information that was available; he gave me his transcription of the census records that showed both my dad and mother as children. At that time all I knew was what my parents had already told me. Dad had a couple of books on the "Underwoods of America" which showed his mother, Vanata Maccara Underwood. He also had a piece of paper with birth and death dates associated with a number of people whose relationship was then unknown. My Mom knew her grandparents were Emma Bowen and John Maxwell, and Enos Stanley and Harriett Hays.

Since then, I have discovered additional ancestors, learned about some, and had the excitement of successes and surprise of learning that postulated relationships were not correct. I have broadened the scope of my searching to include my wife's families. My general desire is to identify a particular voyage (boat and date) that each ancestor family used to come to this country and the names and location where one or more generations of ancestor families lived in the "old country."

Over time I have exchanged information with a number of people who had a similar interest, and have had extensive communications with and have “met” a number of "cuzs" who some day I would like to meet personally. It is my desire to share the results of this searching that led to this web site.

CONTENT OF THE SITE

The content is shown on the left and currently should be considered as three sections.

-The First consists of pedigree charts: one starting with Carter, my father, and another with Stanley, my mother. Each of these charts shows up to 5 generations. When additional generations are known for a family, an additional pedigree chart is shown under the initial chart; it starts with the 5th generation and could show up to 4 additional generations (for a total of 9 generations). I then did the same thing for my wife’s Porter and Runser families. I may have information beyond 9 generations for some families and it is interesting, but that is beyond my stated purposes.

-The Second consists of narrative about what I did, why I thought I should do it, and some of the resulting experiences. Additional people may be identified, but the primary purpose is to describe what I did and learned, and not who was found. These narratives are grouped to include my families and my wife’s families. At the end of this discussion I present a listing of Patriots who have been identified as being an ancestor of me or my wife. This is followed by discussions of the pedigree charts of the first section, and how I kept my data and pictures.

-The Third consists of some extensive documentation of the Runser family. A cousin of my wife had gathered information on some Runsers that I found most interesting and wanted to pass on others. It includes a lengthy autobiography written in the late 1800s. Because of the great start and limited numbers of involved family members, I was able to trace most Runser families who lived in America up to about 1900. Unfortunately, the research did not identify how this Runser line was related to my wife’s Runser family, but I know they most be related.