Catching Up...

Hello from Pennsylvania -

Been off my keyboard for almost a week so I thought I would take a few minutes & catch everyone up on the progress of my research for the past week!

Our stop in Medina County, Ohio at the library netted us abt 157 obits, some marriage write ups, a wedding photo and more. I don't have the exact numbers with me, I'm not at the hotel right now. But it was a very good day!

We left the library and went in search of some headstone photo's, we found a few that we had been searching for so it wasn't a total wash. I think the highlight of the Medina stop was the full birth, death information on Mark's ancestor Heinrich Augustus Reusch, whose name is on a headstone but no legible dates. Did I mention that this church record also included the name of the village where he was born?

From there we headed over to Centre County, Pennsylvania to research Henry Gates, the founder of Gatesburg, Pennsylvania. I was looking for links between Henry & my George Gates who was born in Pennsylvania in January 1810. Lots of bad info out there, as nothing is panning out YET.

Finally we moved into the area I was most looking forward to - Lancaster County! Paid a visit to the Lancaster County Historical Society - although we found lots of great info we really didn't knock down any walls or make any extreme discoveries. BUT I'll take the tidbits and consider myself blessed that I was able to travel to Lancaster & get the tidbits!

Did find an awesome little English tea room - I'll blog more about that in a later post.

Today (Wednesday) we opted to head over to the Berks County Historical Society . An excellant place to research, and a staff always ready to help! The church records we found there provided so much information I must admit we were sorely tempted to make another trip tomorrow. We've decided not to return tomorrow, but we've barely scratched the surface of this awesome facilty!

The first church records were for The Evangelical Lutheran Congregation of Rhersburg, Berks County - the traverse into these church records was quickly rewarded with the baptismal record of my fifth great grandfather, Thomas Kreitzer! The record gives his name, birth date, baptism date, and the names of the sponsors! A photo copy was made and will be scanned very soon after we arrive back at home! There were other Kreitzer records found but none that really compare to this one!

The second set of church records we wandered into were from Christ Church in Stouchsburg, Marion Township, Berks County. We were rewarded with entry after entry on the Gebhart family, and more records on the Kreitzer family as well. Nothing as earth shattering (you did feel it didn't you?) as the baptismal record, but still, quite a few maiden names and many dates that were previously missing from my data base!

Its been quite a week here. Now that the rain has stopped we are hoping tomorrow to do some more headstone photography - somehow I enjoy it more when its not pouring rain! I do believe I've talked Mark into a return trip to the tea shop. The scones are just out of this world!

I'll blog more on the tea room & some other goodies when I return home!

Happy Researching!

Karen