Heather Wilkinson Rojo's Blog (118)

James Wilson was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire on March 15, 1765. His father was a farmer, and James was an apprentice to a blacksmith. He had little formal education. In 1796 he…

An early Halloween Story.....

In the spring of 1819 the residents of Ipswich’s Chebacco Parish (now the town of Essex) saw lantern light in the graveyard at night. Soon they discovered that the graves had been disturbed, and several families discovered that their relative’s graves were empty. Eight graves, going back to…

News Clipping from the Salem Evening News, June 3, 1938 (a Massachusetts Newspaper).

Old houses in Essex Of…

The John Harvard statue located in Harvard Yard

A few years ago Philadelphia began a campaign to stop tour guides from telling myths and to start studying history…

The independent film "Princess Ka'iulani" I reviewed last May on this blog post ( http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/05/princess-kaiulani-in-cambridge-again.html ) is finally being released on DVD today, September 14th, 2010, in stores and online. You can read about it more at this link at Amazon…

James Wilson was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire on March 15, 1765. His father was a farmer, and James was an apprentice to a blacksmith. He had little formal education. In 1796 he removed to Bradford, Vermont and taught…

Last November I wrote a post at Nutfield Genealogy www.nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com about a quilt made by a member of my family tree. I didn’t know about this quilt, nor about this branch…

If your ancestors lived in Colonial New England, or if you suspect that your ancestors lived in New England any time up until 1800, then you must have used the New Hampshire State Papers for your genealogical research. I first came across this wonderful resource years ago (before the internet) at the Portsmouth Atheneum library. Now, when I run across a new name in the family tree, I can go to the NH…

We were recently sitting around the Easter dinner table discussing tuition, college and relishing the fact that we will no longer be paying tuition, since our daughter graduates with her Master’s Degree a few weeks from now.

My mom stated that she paid $110.00 for all…

Books I read ahead or bought along the way:

The Betrayal of Liliuokalani, Last Queen of Hawaii, by Helena G. Allen,…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history related trip to Hawaii. On our last full day in Hawaii we met with my Honolulu cousin and privately visited the gravesites of the Dominis family at the Oahu cemetery. We also were able to see the Royal Mausoleum, located nearby, where the royal family, including Governor Dominis, is buried. The Mausoleum, Mauna ‘Ala, is on sovereign…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history research trip to Hawaii. It was our second to last day in Honolulu, and we had a second appointment with the curator at Washington Place. This was the home built by Captain John Dominis for his wife, Mary Lambert Jones, sister to my 4x great grandmother, Catherine Plummer Jones. The Jones family was from Boston, and so he built her a grand, New…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history related trip to Hawaii. We hadn’t done much research on the past two days, so this day was back to work day! We had another 10 AM appointment for a guided tour at Iolani Palace. It is necessary to make reservations for guided tours ahead of time, but my cousin and her nine year old grandson were able to secure tickets to join us.…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history related trip to Hawaii. On this day, Hubby woke up extra early to swim at Waikiki Beach whilst I slept late. I missed another opportunity to swim in the Pacific Ocean. Then we drove east past Diamond Head, the Halona Blow Hole, the Makapu’u Lighthouse and Hanamuma Bay. This side of the island was dry and rocky, and the mountains look decidedly…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history related trip to Hawaii. Since we had been so busy doing my genealogy research, it was time for my hubby to choose the day’s activities. He decided to go to Pearl Harbor, since it was Sunday, and most museums and archives would be closed. Several taxi drivers and hotel staff had told us to arrive extra early in the morning, since…

This is a continuation of the story of my family history related trip to Hawaii for the past two weeks. I’m skipping over the cruise we took for seven days (you can read a short version in yesterday’s post) and recounting our days on the island of Oahu. We checked into another hotel on Waikiki beach, and then immediately rented a car to get to the Bishop…

This is a continuation of story of my family history related trip to Hawaii for the past two weeks. Our first day was full of meeting “new” cousins and seeing historic sites related to the Dominis family and Queen Lili’uokalani. This next day we checked out of our hotel on Waikiki Beach, Oahu to board a cruise ship to see the islands of Maui, Hawaii and Kauai. This was the vacation part of the trip,…