Wildcards work!!! Two mysteries solved.

[speleobat2]

Thank you DavidW for your article under Statuatory Records on wildcards! After reading it, I decided to give it a try and search one more time for my great great grandmother Jessie Milne Longmuir. I entered Longm***Milne for a marriage search and got a hit for James Longmuir/Janet Milne. When I pulled up the OPR on SP, wonder of wonders, it actually contained some information. Janet's father was William Milne Seaman Peterhead and one of the witnesses was John Longmuir, Blacksmith, Aberdeen. I already had census records for the two brothers in Aberdeen and Jessie is sometimes a nickname for Janet. Using the wildcard again, I searched for a death record and found one. Janet Longmuir died in Oct. of 1855 of typhus fever. The record listed all of the children she had which were a match for my records and gave her mother's name as Mary Gordon, Peterhead.

The second mystery was her final child Alexander who was 9 months old when she died. He was sent to his Uncle William and Aunt Janet's in Rathven to be raised by them. This is our unidentified "uncle Alexander" from Providence Rhode Island. He is listed as a nephew in the census records, but I could never and still can't find a birth record for him. Uncle Alexander provided rooms for rent to my grandfather, his brother and several friends when they immigrated to the US in the early 1900's.

I had tried using wildcards before, but didn't really understand how they worked. After reading the article, I had some very good success with them!

Carol

[*Wendy*]

Aww what a fantastic story Carol .. i'm so pleased for you!
I got all excited after Annette found marriage details for me the other day .. it's a great feeling when you can finally solve a puzzle

[mallog]

It's amazing how a simple thing like that can lead to so much fitting into place. Thanks for posting.

[Russell]

Hi Carol

Now all you have to do is think completely 'out of the box' before you start your next search.
List every possible variant on the name you can think of (including fore names). Get friends and family to come up with ridiculous possibilities and improbables - and add all of them to your list.
Now concentrate on how they might abbreviate the forename and start a second list.
Now plan how you can use wildcards effectively to take in as many of your list as possible. If they don't, or allow room for another unrelated name to creep in- then search for them separately.

Its a bit like Seduko but with letters instead of numbers.

Last hint - Don't try it if you are tired. You tend to miss the obvious.

Russell

[speleobat2]

You mean something like *****h*****!

Hmmm. Wonder which relatives I'd get with that one?

Seriously, I also used the wildcards with the Passenger ship records and discovered that my great aunt Jessie had made 5 trips over here between 1903 and 1916 under 5 different variations of the name Clerihew. I wonder if she even knew who she was by the time she settled down?!

Carol

[Russell]

Hi Carol

One thing about *****h***** you would get lots of hits

What's the betting great aunt Jessie never ever saw one of the passenger lists so she didn't know she (or rather the purser) was causing her descendants grief in later years.

My good friends on TS discovered that my great aunt Marion travelled out to the States first time more or less steerage. Later, when she was well established as a governess, she travelled on the Queen Mary no less
I couldn't find her at all but the keen eyes and brains on TS sussed her out in half an hour.

you could simplify your wildcard search down to *h* and get the same number of hits. Watch out for David though. When he uses *** it generally means he would like to spit, stamp and swear all at the same time.

Russell

[speleobat2]

Good morning Russell,

Actually, most of my variations seem to be transcription errors. When I pull up the original, I can read usually read it!

I really shouldn't complain about any of this because my mother was Finnish. Talk about a language barrier! It's pretty amazing what was done to some of the names on her side of the family by the census takers etc. Fortunately, we had more family sources on her side to talk to.

Carol

[DavidWW]

Good morning Russell,

Actually, most of my variations seem to be transcription errors. When I pull up the original, I can read usually read it!

I really shouldn't complain about any of this because my mother was Finnish. Talk about a language barrier! It's pretty amazing what was done to some of the names on her side of the family by the census takers etc. Fortunately, we had more family sources on her side to talk to.

Carol

Ach, Finnish is easy, just understand that there's no connection with any other European language except a very distant, - 2,000 years ago, - common Finno-Ugric derivation with Hungarian.

And if you think that Latin was a problems with all those declensions and conjugations, multiply x3 for Finnish

The pronunciation of Finnish is quite fascinating, as every single letter is pronounced, - you should hear how they say Schweppes , - not least because "every letter" includes double letters, - a double consonant I mastered, but not the combination of a double consonant followed or preceeded by a double vowel ............

One day I turned up at the HQ of a major Finnish company, with an appointment, and asked to see Mr Koponen, - he duly turned up at reception, quite puzzled as he wasn't expecting a visitor....... after a few minutes, it was established that my appointment was with Mr Kopponen ........

David

[speleobat2]

Congratulations on learning any Finnish. My mother was bilingual for many years, then since she had moved out of the Finnish community, she lost most of her Finn. She kept enough to talk to her sisters on the phone however, and drive the three of us kids nuts at Christmas by reverting to Finn when they were discussing our Christmas presents!

My mother and her sisters were named Helmi, Hilda, Hilia, and Hilma (Mom). The 1930 census had them as Helaine, Hilda, Helia, and Helmar. Took me a few minutes to figure out that one. I thought we had another whole family of Kuosas in the US.

Yesterday, I came up with a Cleriken and a family of Clivehens who just happened to have a Clerihew listed with them!

Carol

[Russell]

Hi Carol

I admire your determination in the face of considerable adversity (namely spelling an unusual name) to keep going.

Your last finds have got me wondering whether some of the names I have turned up and said "Nah!, That can't be them.........." need to be dug up out of the 'unlikely' folder and looked at again.

Keep going girl. You'll soon have cornered the world market in Clerihew and variants

=D> =D> =D>

Russell