A fascinating piece of local history (03/28/07)

Genealogy is one rabbit hole I've successfully managed not to fall down.

There's a marginal interest, of course. But I'm content to let a cousin in New Jersey reconstruct how the Ronalds came from Scotland, farmed in Ontario, then drifted south into the United States.

He's doing a tremendous job, and his updates via the Internet are always interesting.

Still, I found a book that crossed my desk the other day remarkably intriguing.

It's called "Family Maps of Jay County, Indiana," and it was written by an attorney in Oklahoma by the name of Greg Boyd.

In some ways, it's as much a toolkit as it is a book. And it's assembled to help folks who think their family's roots might lie in Jay County get a handle on things.

Boyd's a genealogist, obviously, but he must also be something of a techie, and he's incredibly well-organized. He has used the web site of the General Land Office of the Bureau of Land Management to put together maps showing all the original owners of parcels of ground in Jay County during the county's earliest years as a unit of government. Then he has developed a series of indexes that allow a reader to track down specific details.

Here's how it works.

Say you're curious if your ancestors were original patent holders of land in Jay County. Those are folks whose deeds were the first recorded as having owned the land.

First you turn to the index of "Surnames in Jay County, Indiana Patents." Some of the names are familiar even today.

A quick look yields the following, for instance: Ashcraft, Banta, Bray, Brubaker, Buckmaster, Cochran, Current, Frazee, Gaunt, Isenhart, Jetter, Lare, Manor, Paxson, Priest, Ritchey, Shannon, Sibery, Starbuck, Thornburg, Tullis, Vore, Wehrly, and Zimmerman.

And that's just a small sampling of the familiar names found on a quick browse through.

Say you find your family name. The index tells you how many parcels of land were recorded for that last name in original patents.

Then you turn to the "Surname/Township Index." Here's where it gets more specific.

Let's say your ancestors were named Bigalow. The index tells you there are two parcels recorded under that name. It also gives you the meridian, township, and range information. On top of that, Boyd simplifies things by giving you a "map group" reference.

In the case of Bigalow, for instance, the index refers you to "map group" 10. Turn to that group of maps and you find yet another index. This one lists the individuals named in the patent deed, the section, the part of the section, and the date the patent was issued.

In the case of Bigalow, it turns out that William Bigalow had two parcels of land in section 24, dating from Aug. 20, 1838.

The first map in the group looks like a plat map from about 1838-1840, and you can quickly spot the two parcels of Bigalow land.

They abutted properties owned by people named Finch, Lare, Taylor, and Heckman.

The next map shows the same sections but instead of the individual properties, it shows towns, highways, county roads, and cemeteries.

So, if you were looking up your Bigalow relatives, you could quickly learn that their land was southeast of New Mount Pleasant.

The two closest cemeteries - where you could go looking for Bigalow gravestones - are the Bost Cemetery and the Wentz Cemetery, both of which are marked clearly on the map.

A third map drops out the roads and highways but adds creeks streams, and railroad.

William Bigalow, it seems, was farming not far from Bost Run, which feeds into Brooks Creek.

That may not mean much to those of us whose roots don't go so far back into Jay County history, but for someone on a genealogical treasure hunt it could prove to be invaluable.

Just for the record, the book is published by Arphax Publishing Company in Norman, Okla.

As for the free copy they sent me, I think I'll take it down the street and donate it to the Jay County Genealogical Society.

Sounds like a good addition to their library.[[In-content Ad]]