The Golden Nugget (Revised)

In family research, while we dredge through archives, untangle archaic script in old documents, and build our family trees, there is one elusive document we hope someday to find. These are not the documents of public record, nor does it exist on the internet until found and published there. These are the documents in an old trunk, in a dusty attic box, or buried somewhere in the artifacts of our past. It is the Golden Nugget of family research: The diary, the journal, or the memoir.

These handwritten notes of a moment in time are the single most important records about a family. They tell of family’s experiences, their hopes and fears, their politics, religion, and dreams. It takes a family tree and makes it burst forth with life. You may have been lucky and found a few memoirs written by your ancestors, and I am sure the vibrancy of those times and their experiences gave immeasurable richness and texture to your family’s story. And so, it is not surprising that the reading of other people’s journals,
especially those that write of the same time and place, can give us an idea of our own family’s life.

An example is the 1852 diary of John Francis Freeman, who traveled on a wagon train that left Illinois in April 1852, while my Fisk family departed Illinois a few weeks later in May 1852. While John Freeman was recording his own journey across the Oregon Trail, my family was but a month behind him, having many of the same experiences of that journey. Perhaps they even noticed the fresh, unmarked graves.

Here is another example that is no less amazing. I was asked to help find information about a man who lived in Baker City, Baker County, Oregon, in the 1860s. I found a record of a memoir written by Allin W. Woods that included an index of surnames mentioned within that memoir, and one of the names listed was the family name I was researching. I am happy to share that memoir with you in the link below.

The memoir is a rare departure from the conventional diaries of those times. The author was less than ten years old when he journeyed with his family across the Oregon Trail to Montana, but he wrote the story nearly 40 years later. Despite the passage of time, his memory of that journey was rich in detail, while simultaneously conveying a view of that journey through the eyes of a child, with all of his mischievousness, humor, and innocence of a child.

After writing his memoirs, Mr. Woods went back and annotated it, adding greater detail to some of the events. In one of those annotations, he listed the names of the children who went to school with him in Montana. On the list were three children whose father was the brother of the Baker City man I was researching. Clues within the memoirs about those children and their father helped me build a timeline for the family. Events, dates, old photographs, and stories helped me describe the life and family of the Baker City man.

One story that surfaced, concerned the son of the Baker City man, who was also the grandfather of the man who asked me to research for him. The family did not know the story of the grandfather’s death. Stories had the grandfather dying between 1911 and 1935, buried in different states, or being in an asylum. Finally, in one document, I saw the letters “E.O.S.H.” after his name, and I knew where to
look. A records request from the Oregon State Archives for Eastern Oregon State Hospital revealed his death certificate, with his date of death (18 November 1913), the cause (alcoholism), and the place of burial. It did not feel like the hundreds of other records like this I’ve seen. Instead, this one felt so real, and it was time to tell what I’d found to the 80-year-old grandson of the man who was put in an unmarked grave.

He wrote me a letter and told me the news had brought tears to his eyes, and then he thanked me. I was left with the bittersweet feeling that I had given him the worst and the best family history. For him, he had the end to a story he had always wondered about. For me, I was left with some happiness for giving him a sad but important gift. I also got a little vindication for what I’ve long said—family research is not about building the most extensive tree, but rather, in trying to understand our ancestor’s lives and
how, like the pebble in a pond, the ripples of their life move forward in time and shape who we are today.

Remember, the whole story of that family evolved from a journal written by someone not in his family. These diaries, journals, memoirs are important. Find them and share them. Let them live. For they are the deep and important part of our history, impacting us and as I learned, impacting others. When you research your family, research the periphery: the siblings, the aunts and uncles, the people that they were associated with in business, town events and adventures. For often, just as in the writings of people I have found who had nothing to do with the surname being researched, you will find references and
clues to the person you seek.

Freeman, John Francis. Diary, 1852. Transcribed by Richard L. Rieck, Western Illinois University. Oregon Trail Genealogy (https://oregontrailgenealogy.com/john-francis-freeman-diary-1852/ : accessed 27 October 2023). Used to reveal the Merritt family history.

Woods, Allin W. Journal, 1880s, “Reminiscence of a Pioneer Life: Some Time in the 1880s. Oregon Trail Genealogy (https://oregontrailgenealogy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Allin-W-Woods-Reminiscence-of-a-Pioneer-Life.pdf: accessed 27 October 2023). Used to reveal the Maxfield family history.

With thanks to the Oregon State Archives, the Oregon California Trails Association, University of California ArchiveGrid, Oregon State Hospital Archives and other researchers with shared interests.

This article slated to be published in the March 2024 Journal of the Genealogical Forum of Oregon