Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Ancestral Name Roulette

It's that time again! Here are the rules via Randy Seaver's blog:

1)  What year was your paternal grandfather born?  Divide this number by 100 and round the number off to a whole number. This is your "roulette number."


2)  Use your pedigree charts or your family tree genealogy software program to find the person with that number in your ancestral name list (some people call it an "ahnentafel"). Who is that person?


3)  Tell us three facts about that person in your ancestral name list with the "roulette number."


4)  Write about it in a blog post on your own blog, in a Facebook status or a Google Stream post, or as a comment on this blog post.


5)  If you do not have a person's name for your "roulette number" then spin the wheel again - pick a grandmother, or yourself, a parent, a favorite aunt or cousin, or even your children!



1)  My paternal grandfather, John E. Gombash, Sr.,  was born in 1935.  Divided by 100, that makes 19.35, rounded to 19.

2)  Number 19 on my ancestral name list is Amelia Stec (1887-1968), daughter of Jan Stec and Sophie Swiczek, who married Franciszek Grządziel in 1904.

3)  Three facts about Amelia Stec:

*  She was born in Barycz, Brzozów, Lwów, Poland and had four siblings: Katarzyna (married Franciszek Wojewoda), Mary (married George Karnas), Tekla "Tillie" (married a man surnamed Domaradzki) and Jan.

*  She immigrated on 27 Nov 1908 through Ellis Island, with her daughter Katarzyna (Catherine) Grządziel. They were going to Franciszek Grządziel in Joliet, Illinois. One of my grandfather's brother told me that Franciszek actually didn't know of their oncoming arrival, and Amelia received a horrible beating for it. What a horrible man.

*  Amelia left her husband Franciszek Grządziel sometime after 1919 and was married to a man named Franciszek Bogusz, in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1922. Amelia never divorced her first husband, Frank Grządziel. Frank what I've been told of this man, I don't blame her for getting away.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Two Degrees of Separation

I know this is two days late, but I couldn't resist this one up! It sounded so fun!! Here were the rules:


1)  Using your ancestral lines, how far back in time can you go with two degrees of separation?  That means "you knew an ancestor, who knew another ancestor."  When was that second ancestor born?


2)  Tell us in a blog post of your own, in a comment to this blog post, in a status line on Facebook or a stream post on Google Plus.

And here are several of mine!

1)  My Gombash-Adas-Domagalski Line (1886): Me (born 1986) - I met my grandfather, John Gombash Sr., a small handful of times until his death in 2005. My grandfather (1935-2005) was the son of Alex Gombash and Catherine Grządziel). Since his wife/my grandmother, Mary Louise Adas, passed before I was born.. he would have known her paternal grandmother, Josephine Domagalski (1886-1958). She died one year after my grandparents were married.

2)  My Stuempges-Weishaupt Line (1868): Me (born 1986) - I met my maternal grandmother, Elaine Stuempges Rodgers (1926-1987), as a baby. She was the daughter of Walter John Stuempges and Sylvia Martin. My grandmother knew her paternal grandmother, Anna Weishaupt. She was a native of Graber, Leitmeritz, Boehmia and was born in 1868 to Joseph Weishaupt and Maria Anna Kasper.

3)  My Martin-Märten Line (1846): Me (born 1986) - I was fortunate enough to have met my direct maternal line great-granmother sevearl times. She was Sylvia Martin Flemming (1909-2008) and the daughter of Herman Wilhelm Gustav "Gust" Martin and Maria Summ. She knew her paternal grandfather, Carl Gustav Märten, who was born 1846 in Töpperkuthen, a community belonging to Berneuchen in Kreis Landsberg, Brandenburg, Germany. He died in Polar, Wisconsin in 1934.

Genealogy Find Of The Day: Baptism of My Great-Grand-Uncle, Albert Dudash

For a while now, I've been doing the blogging theme of "FamilySearch Find Of The Day", highlighting new finds I stumble upon and discover for my family tree. I came across a great find today on Ancestry.com and I came to the conclusion I could change the title of my theme: Genealogy Find Of The Day.

Today's "Genealogy Find Of The Day" highlights the baptism record of my great-grand-uncle, Albert Dudash. He was married to my great-grandfather's sister, Elizabeth "Betty Gombash". Below is an extract and image of the record:

First Hungarian Reformed Church, Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania

Entry Number: 96

Date of Birth: 01 November 1908

Date of Baptism: 07 November 1908

Name of Child: Albert

Gender: Male

Legitimacy: Legitimate

Father: Dudás György, csömöri szül. (born in Csömör), ref. (Reformed), bányász (miner)

Mother: Diószeghy Juliánna

Residence: Whitsett, Pa

Sponsor: Fazekas István

Sponsor: Bóczán Jánosné (Mrs. János) szül. (born) Gyüre Erzsébet

Priest: Kalassay Sándor

FamilySearch Find Of The Day: Zsa Zsa Gabor's Maternal Aunt

Today while browsing through the Budapest marriage records in district VIII, I stumbled upon the marriage record for one of Zsa Zsa Gabor's maternal aunts: Rozália Tillemann.

Zsa Zsa Gabor was the daughter of Vilmos Gábor and Jancsi Tillemann, a family of Jewish origin who are from Budapest, Hungary. Below you'll find the document and extract of Jancsi Tillemann's sister's marriage in 1923. You'll notice that Zsa Zsa's father was actually a witness to the marriage!



Entry: 1334
Place of Marriage: Budapest, District VIII
Date of Marriage: 07 October 1923

Groom: Rein Manó
Occupation: nagykereskedő (wholesaler)
Religion: Izr. (Izraelita; Jewish)
Place of Birth: Budapest
Date of Birth: 26 October 1895
Residence: Budapest District VIII, Ér street 2
Father: Rein Schnierl
Mother: Marcusson Breine

Bride: Tillemann Rozália, elvált (divorced)
Religion: Izr. (Izraelita; Jewish)
Place of Birth: Budapest
Date of Birth: 05 October 1898
Father: deceased Tillemann Jóna (Jósza) Hersch
Mother: Reinharcz Chave Feige

Witness: Heltai Simon, Budapest District VI, Rózsa street 71
Witness: Gábor Vilmos, Budapest District IV, Muzeum boulevard 31

FamilySearch Find Of The Day: Anna Weishaupt's Baptism in 1868

With the recent update to the FamilySearch database "Czech Republic, Church Books, 1552-1935", I was able to obtain a copy of my 2nd-great-grandmother's baptism record. The following are an image and extract of that record:

Date of Birth: 06 May 1868, 9a.m.

Date of Baptism: 07 May 1868

Place and House Number: Graber, Number 64

Name of Child: Anna

Religion: Catholic

Gender: Female

Legitimacy: Legitimate

Father: Weishaupt Josef, häusler in Graber N. 64; son of the deceased Franz Weishaupt, häusler in Graber N. 64 and the deceased Anna Maria, daughter of the deceased Josef Müller, häusler in Johnsdorf N. 28.

Mother: Maria Anna, daughter of the deceased Franz Kasper, feldgärtner in Graber N. 90 and Maria Anna, tocther of the deceased Josef Reichenbach, gärtner in Graber N. 4.

Sponsor: Anna Hesse, daughter of Anton Hesse, (occuptation unknown) in Graber N. 6.

Sponsor: Anna Weishaupt, daughter of the deceased Franz Weishaupt, häusler in Graber N. 64.

Sponsor: JOhanna Hackel, daughter of Josef Hackel, (occupation unknown) in Hermsdorf N. 33.

Sponsor: Josef Führich, son of Franz Anton Führich, (occupation unknown) in Graber N. 22.

Sponsor: Josef Petters, son of Ignaz Petters, feldgärtner in Johnsdorf N. 22.

The Family Tree of Tim Tebow, Quarterback of the Denver Broncos

If you know me well, you know I have a hobby of picking up and researching random celebrities' family trees. I've previously researched and posted about Aaron Rodgers, quarterback of the Green Bay Packer and also Lady Gaga.. far many more not publicly posted about. So when I began researching into Tim's family, I was pleasantly surprised at the wealth of information I was able to find.

 I began with some public data: his name, date or birth and the names of his parents. I was able to easily find the marriage record for his parents (12 Jun 1971 in Alachua County, Florida) and then found the birthdays for both of his parents from the Public Records databases on Ancestry.com. Knowing that Tim's father was a Junior/II, I figured finding Tim's grandfather under the same name would be easy enough.. and boy was I right! What I found when I entered their full name (Robert Ramsey Tebow) was Tim's grandfather's application into the SAR.. the Sons of the American Revolution! You can find the images to the left (part 1) and below (part 2). These two documents hold a wealth of information that Tim's grandfather knew and had researched, obviously with the help of the publication "The Hayes Family, Origin, History and Genealogy", by Royal s. Hayes. Tim's grandfather had researched his roots back to the Revolutionary veteran, Captain Joseph Hayes.

Have you researched into Tim Tebow's ancestry?

What interesting things did you find? :)

My Christmas Genealogy Wish-List

Dear Santa & his Elves at FamilySearch,

I've been a good boy this year, giving aid to researchers left-and-right; from strangers to fellow geneabloggers. I know this to only be a wish-list, but please consider my list and hopefully some will come true and appear on your website, in the year-to-come! For each request, I will describe one good genealogy deed I have done in the past year. I will only request three specific things... because i'm not greedy, of course! :-p

1. Hungarian Church Records
I have helped countless fellow Hungarians who contacted me by email, find out more about their Hungarian heritage. I helped them to determine where in Hungary their family was from and the next proper steps to successful research.

2. German Church Records
I had stumbled upon a blog post by fellow geneablogger, Randy Seaver, and was able to quickly find out information to aid him in his search. He even made a post about it here, and a subsequent post here.


3. Polish Church Records for Barycz and Osobnica; even on microfilm!
I helped a member of the Society of Genealogists (SOG) based in the UK, to create a course on Eastern European research. The course will begin in January.