Ole Peterson and the Peterson Family - 1

Part One - Before there was Peterson, there was Moe

The Peterson family, their descendants and allied families have lived in the Town of Blue Mounds, the Village of Mount Horeb and other surrounding communities for about six generations. Ole Peterson, who arrived in 1862 would have a large family and thus the Peterson name would be fairly prominent in the area during the later half of the 19th Century and for much of the 20th Century. In the telling of family history, Ole is often sited as the starting point . . . the immigrant who came to America and started a family in this new place.

Ole may be the beginning of the 'Peterson' story but the family does not start with him. It might be better to start the story with his father, Peter Olsen Moe who also came to America about the same time. The reason Ole and Peter had different last names was a result of the way Norwegians named themselves and the changes in that naming process as they became American. The Norwegian tradition of naming children after fathers and often adding a place of residence to the end of a name meant that virtually every generation had a different name. For a more detailed discussion on the naming system in Norway, read the post titled, Peterson - Moe, What's in a Name?

Sogn Fjord and Hafslo are located in west-central Norway. This
is the ancestral home of Peter Olsen Moe and Ole Peterson

History Page Added - More Stuff

I've been thinking about ways to add more information to this website; specifically, more photos and some of the many documents that reside in my archive. The goal was to add a page (or pages) to display these images. I also wanted to do it in a way that was not too difficult and would not require too much serious HTML work. Blogger can be a powerful tool but when it comes to plugins and widgets, it is not as well developed as Word Press or some other platforms (not that I am complaining). I like things "out of the box" and am not really interested in changing the template; so I needed to look around for some help. Specifically, I was interested in creating a "thumbnail page" that would show many images at a glance. This would contrast with the slideshows that reside at the bottom of the page. After looking around a bit, and reading a lot of "how to" topics, I finally found a way to add a table - of sorts - in a new page. The method looked like something I could handle and the page appearance was "good enough" at least for now.

Francis O'Neil, Short Biography

One of a series of short biographies of individual ancestors. These are undertaken, from time-to-time, when enough information becomes available about an individual.

Francis O'Neil, Ireland, Scotland, Wisconsin, Iowa

Francis was born in 1812 in Armagh County in northern Ireland. He is reported to be the son of James O'Neil (b.1785, d.1817) and Nancy (?). Not much is known about his parents but when Francis was about five years old, his father died, and he and his mother moved to Scotland. As a young man, he worked as a potter while living in Scotland. At some point, he may have gone back to Ireland. In 1834 he married Rosa Hoy (b.1812, d.1854). Once again, records are unclear but he seems to have married her in Ireland and census records indicate that she was from Ireland. After their marriage, they may have lived in both England and Scotland in the 1840's (some of their children were born in Scotland).

1940 Census - Once in a Lifetime

Something is about to take place that only happens once and takes 72 years, truly a "once in a lifetime event." In just a few days, on April 2nd of 2012, the individual family records of the 1940 census will be unveiled and made available to the public. It will also be the first census to go almost immediately into digital format.

Genealogists spend a lot of time gathering vital records about our ancestors. This includes census data which often forms a foundation of knowledge about our family history. In some cases, the only records we have are from the census. Census data, though not actually a vital record, offers a great deal of insite into an individual's situation. In addition to the usual information, such as where they lived and the names and ages of those that made up that household, census records can also tell us about immigration dates, military service, occupation and land ownership. The census record also has its limitations. It is a snapshot and is only taken once every 10 years. Since a lot can happen in 10 years, its value must be put in that context.

Reuben Holcomb I - Short Biography

One of a series of short biographies of individual ancestors. These are undertaken, from time-to-time, when enough information becomes available about an individual.

Reuben T. Holcomb - Wisconsin Pioneer

I find Reuben Holcomb to be one of the more interesting of my ancestors. This might be in part because there is some good information available about him but I think it is also because of the times he lived in and the pioneering path he chose. Reuben was born May 16, 1816 on the western frontier in Monroe County, New York. He was the third born of five known children of Apollas Holcombe (b.1791, d.1823) and Mehitable Bunnell (b.1793, d.1853). Apollas was born in Granby, Connecticut and had come west to Bloomfield, New York with his parents after the American Revolution. Apollas was a veteran of the War of 1812, where he was wounded at the burning of Buffalo in 1814. He would die in 1823 at the age of 32 and leave Mehitable to raise their five young children. Mehitable was the daughter of Jonathan Bunnell (b.1741) and Mehitable Morse (b.1743). The Bunnell family came west from Blandford, Massachusetts and settled near the Holcombe family in Bloomfield.

David Hermann - Arrived 1862 (2)

Part 2 - A Life in Wisconsin
If you missed part one of the story, go here . . .

Note, this post has been revised. The original David Hermann article has been updated and more information has been added. Because of its length, it has also been split into two parts with most of the new information in this part.

David Hermann was born in 1838 near the Baltic Sea in the Principality of Mecklenburg. His family and ancestors were of the peasant class and of very modest means. Life was probably very hard for them and advancement in that society was unlikely. In 1860, he married Anna Rohde and two years later, the two of them, along with their first born child, boarded a ship and sailed for America. They would travel from New York to Wisconsin and settle in the south-central part of the state.



Farm buildings from the Hermann farm in the Town of Verona, Wisconsin;
they are no longer in use but still standing in this 2011 photo.

The Flow of Information

A little over a year ago, in a post titled New Discoveries are Delightful, I wrote the following: "my genealogy research is pretty casual these days." I went on to say how I was running out of information and was content to sit back and take it slow. I also acknowledged that "new stuff shows-up." Those thoughts were all pretty genuine but what I did not realize was that just around the corner, a massive amount of family history was waiting for me. First, some background information,

Green County Historical Society

When I wrote that post, in January of 2011, this blog was only about three months old and I had yet to write any posts on individual family members. It would not be until February of 2011 that I would write my first post on one of those family members - the Goldner Family.  That was followed a couple of months later with a post on the Peterson / Moe Family. Both of those two talked as much about the process as the families themselves.