cindyabs

yes, and I would have thought that that would have been her favorite. I have always loved her too. She is a hoot, but down to earth as well.

Englishtart

I saw an interview with her on the beaches movie once, she did enjoy making it, but I think she got fed up of allways being asked to sing 'wind beneath my wings' IIRC.

love the braziere skit in that movie...over the shoulder boulder holder...

cindyabs

ain't it the truth.............sigh..

I had a tape of one of her routines appearing somewhere, don't know where. I loved the Sophie Tucker ones,

Englishmum

In our area (New York metro) when I was watching "Who Do You Think You Are?" was being broadcast, every time there was a break for adverts they kept showing ads for ancestry.com.....I assume this advert was on throughout the US.

It turns out that ancestry.com is operated by the Mormons (as are many other genealogical sites). They are the biggest compilers of people's family trees/ancestors in the world.

Apparently Mormons believe that they can convert dead relatives (going back many generations) to become Mormons...!)

How weird....how can you give 'permission' to convert to Mormonism when you're dead?

"The Link Between Mormons and Genealogy"

http://ask.metafilter.com/61472/The-...-and-genealogy (you need to scroll down past the google ads to read why the Mormons do this)

It seems that they will trace your ancestors for you for free....but I guess they'll try to convert you to their faith lol!

cindyabs

so far nobody's come knocking on the door since I joined Ancestry.com,

the site has been a big help to me personally in my research.

robin1234

True, the LDS do have weird beliefs about retrospectively saving the souls of long-dead people etc. They are rather an odd organization, but, I'm quite tolerant of them in general, part of life's rich tapestry etc. I do not think they are positively evil like (for instance) Scientology.

As for their genealogical work, I think they have done wonders over many decades, preserving and presenting to a wider public (often free of charge) all kinds of family history records, some of which might have been permanently lost if the LDS hadn't preserved them.

As for ancestry.com (and its associated sites such as ancestry.co.uk) I'm not particularly keen on the interface, the ease of searchability, and other design & usability issues. However, it does contain many datasets that are not available elsewhere. Also, it has a great "community" or "web 2.0" component, in the form of active message boards and other mechanisms for sharing information. For instance, when I was starting out, I had some questions about various family members who had died at sea, several of them in the British Merchant Marine in both WWI and WWII. So I asked questions on the relevant Ancestry merchant marine message boards, and was helped by people who really knew the specialist records inside out, including someone who was able to give me a translated transcript of the U-Boat War Diary of the U-Boat that sunk one great-uncles ship in November 1940.

In general, I think the findmypast service is better for British records than ancestry. It has the 1911 census, too. What I think is cynical is where two services (e.g. ancestry and findmypast) clearly collude in sharing out records so people are forced to subscribe to both..

cindyabs

The message boards have been a godsend to me-one tipped me off to the previously unknown background of one gr grandmother and the whole New Amsterdam/northern NY, Native American and Loyalist () background for her.

cindyabs

Emmitt Smith is on tomorrow night's program.

Kaffy Mintcake

I have a cousin in the music industry who knows her. She's supposed to be a really great person. I do know that she didn't let her kids watch TV. (I use past tense because I heard this years ago and am guessing that they're much older now.)

Kaffy Mintcake

That's correct. If anyone in your family was ever Mormon they have incredible records. My mother was born in Salt Lake City. My father has been able to trace part of our family back to the 1400s.

My understanding is that the dead, of course, do not agree to conversion but if your family agrees ... that's all they think is needed. Very, very weird.

snowbunny

What's wrong with Loyalist?

I have two families in that boat, but more than that who fought the redcoats. Anyway, nothing trumps being related from axe murderers and a teenaged slag:

http://www.ancestrymagazine.com/2000...those-tuttles/

Of twelve children, I descend from Simon the barrel maker. His brother, Benjamin, killed their sister Sarah in front of a houseful of family members with an axe; then sister Mercy killed her 17-year-old son with... an axe!

Elizabeth started her village bike career early, kissing a Dutch sailor before his return to Holland when she was a teenager, then marrying one man while up the duff by another, then carrying on affairs while married until her husband, who'd gotten another woman in the "family way", was finally granted a divorce after years of Elizabeth threatening to slit his throat in his sleep.

Who says family history is boring? Those celebs have got nothing on me!

snowbunny

The Mormons have been like the monks were in the Dark Ages. They have travelled the world gathering records, transcribing same, and filming others. However delusional their beliefs, like the fact that the man of the house was the route to heaven and that his wife and children were "bound" or "sealed" to him.... and that they perform proxy baptisms on people like Elvis Presley with a stand-in for Elvis (no costume necessary) cos he's not around to protest.... still has contributed much to genealogy and to history in general. Some English rectors refused to let the Mormons photograph their parish records, and nearly all of the Catholic priests were prevented from doing so.

I have a couple of distant cousins who are LDS and while I don't mind sharing family history with them, I have told them that if they proxy baptise me I will damn them to hell and rise from the grave to haunt them!

robin1234

What kind of records has your father or others found for the earlier period? In your example, from the fifteenth century up till the late eighteenth century, for instance? I assume some are parish records, but what else? I ask because my only experience is relatively recent research (late nineteenth century up to the mid twentieth century.) I hope to get into some of those earlier researches eventually.

My experience (speaking as someone who has only become interested in family history in recent years) is that however much you find, you will never run out of things to look into; even if relatively recent. This is why I am still happilly searching 20th century records for various great-uncles etc.

cindyabs

Ain't it the truth about never running out of stuff to look into. I have found errors and ommissions on some of my trees which people will in turn replicate without verifying.

Kaffy Mintcake

I asked my Dad your question a few minutes ago. He said that Ancestry.com is an excellent source. Aside from that, he's obtained records from other family members, etc. He's actually traced us back to the 1200s in one case. That's only because we are very distantly related to the Rockefellers who commissioned a geneology study that went back that far. (Tracing our family to fleeing France for the UK after the Edict de Nantes.) He's been able to trace some other lines back to the 1600s, though his father's side of the family is Swedish, which makes things very tricky as last names changed every generation.

He didn't mention parish records specifically, but rather a little bit of everything, coupled with books or research published by distant relations and Ancestry.com.

I may look into this for my husband's family. We just inherited the trunk that they brought to America when they came from England in 1848. The family story is that there was some sort of lawsuit in England and that in those days if you lost the lawsuit you lost everything. Things weren't looking good and they fled to America, only to find out in later years that they had actually won the lawsuit. Who knows how true that is, but it's interesting.