Fearless Females - Favorite Female Ancestor

Lisa Alzo of The Accidental Genealogist blog is running her Fearless Females: 31 Blogging Prompts to Celebrate Women’s History Month series again. This was one of the first set of prompts that I did on my blog in 2011 and I thought it would be interesting to go back through them and see how much I've learned. For some of the prompts, I will post updated information and for others, I will post something new.

March 1 — Do you have a favorite female ancestor? One you are drawn to or want to learn more about? Write down some key facts you have already learned or what you would like to learn and outline your goals and potential sources you plan to check.

In 2011, I posted about my two grandmothers, Anna Lee Pulskamp Creeden and Edna Willis Councill. This year, I'm choosing an ancestor that I didn't even know about in 2011.

I can't really choose a favorite, but one ancestor that I want to learn more about is Julia Creedan. Julia took the name Sister Mary Felix when she took her vows with the Sisters of Charity in 1872. That information helped me find her death certificate which gave both of her parents' names and a date of birth. With the parents' names and date of birth, I was able to find a transcription of her baptismal certificate. She was baptized as a Roman Catholic on July 3, 1842 in Carricapooka in the parish of Clondrohid, Ireland. Her parents were Patrick Creedan and Mary Coakley.

I believe that Julia is the brother of my 2x great-grandfather Timothy Creeden, so it was exciting to not only find a sibling for my Irish ancestor, but parents' names and a location!

One thing I've discovered about my female ancestors is that many of them worked outside of the home. Julia is a good example of this since she worked for many years as a nun, nurse, and teacher.

To Do:

• Document the information that I already have for Julia
• Research her career as a nun, nurse and teacher
• Find out more about her parents and Clondrohid
• Order publications about the history of the Sisters of Charity

Follow Friday - Favorite Finds

Here are a few of my favorite finds for the past few weeks:

• Heather Kuhn Roelker posted some great tips for using Excel to create ancestor graphics and timelines on her Leaves for Trees blog.
• Fred Siler has a large collection of resources for Queen Anne's County, Maryland on his website. He has resources for many other locations too.
• The timeanddate.com site has interesting date, time, and weather information, including a nice calculator to add or subtract from a date. The calculator is very useful if you have an age in years, months, days from a gravestone and want to calculate a date of birth.
• Jennifer's 'On  a flesh and bone foundation'" An Irish History blog has a thought provoking post called Stepping into the Looking Glass: Reflections of ourselves in our family trees.
• From the geograph site, "The Geograph^® Britain and Ireland project aims to collect geographically representative photographs and information for every square kilometre of Great Britain and Ireland, and you can be part of it.". A search for my Creeden family's homeland in Clondrohid turned up a nice photo of Carrigaphooca Castle in County Cork.

Carrigaphooca Castle, County Cork, Ireland

 Photo © Copyright Mike Searle and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Follow Friday is an ongoing series at GeneaBloggers and was suggested by Earline Bradt of Ancestral Notes.

Talented Tuesday - Celina Band

This photo appeared on an old post card from Celina, Ohio. The Celina Band posed in what is now Mercelina Park. They look so serious in the photo! If anyone has any ideas on their identities or the date, let me know. The seller of the post card thought it was the 1890s.

Sunday's Obituary - James E. Creeden

This is from an obit card at the Mercer County Library in Ohio. Thanks again to Marj for sending them to me!

CREEDEN, JAS. E.
   b. Clinton Co., OH.  age, 17 yrs., 11 mo., 2 d.
   d. 13-October-1889  Hopewell Twp.
   status - single
   cause of death - typhoid

James was the son of Timothy Creeden and Mary Ann Matson. He is buried in the Old Buck Cemetery in Mercer County, OH next to Mary's brother John Matson.

Picture courtesy of Cousin Becky on FindAGrave

His gravestone says that he died on October 3, 1889 and was 17 yrs., 11 mo., and 3 days old. If that is accurate, James was born around November 11, 1871.

The only census record that James appears in is the 1880 census. He was 8 years old when the census was taken in June 1880 and was living with his family in Clinton County, Ohio.

Sibling Saturday - Pulskamp Twins

These pictures are of my grandmother Anna Lee Pulskamp and her twin sister, Emma Lee. They were born on June 11, 1910. I love their outfits with the little boots!

Sibling Saturday is a daily blogging prompt suggested by Susan Mosey of Ancestry Binders.