Sunday, February 17, 2008

I found Bert Church!

Awhile back I wrote about finding the Steele family plot at the cemetery, but not knowing much about Bert and Mary (Steele) Church. Ancestry.com recently posted California voter registrations from 1900-1968 for various cities and counties. I was able to find registrations for Bert and Mary for several years between 1930 and 1944. The records list their addresses (they moved a lot!), and occupations, and were very helpful because they gave me the correct spelling of Bert's name, which led me to finding his death record and census records showing his family, plus a WWI draft registration record. Bert died 29 Oct 1971, 3 days before I was born. I must be missing some key piece of information about Mary, because I can't locate her death record.

Also in the voter registrations I found a record for Yonovera "Mame" Towey in San Francisco in 1935.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Another Arrival

I recently found the immigration record of my great-grandmother Mary Badigian Basmajian. She arrived at age 22 with her 52-year-old mother, Markarid (which means pearl) and her brother Vartan, who was 12, aboard the SS Laurent. They sailed from Le Havre, France on December 15, 1906 and arrived in New York on December 28. Also sailing with them was Markarid's nephew, Hovsep Karabian and his wife, sister and 3 small children. The whole group had their passage paid by Markarid's brother, Krikor Karabian, who was living in Fresno.
So, now I have found arrival records for all 4 of my father's grandparents, who each arrived separately with their families!