Who hasn’t taken Tums for the tummy?  On our bus ride from the boat to the Gateway Arch in downtown St. Louis, and not in the best-looking part of town, we passed a 5-story red brick factory building……. the home to Tums for nearly 100 years.  Everything comes from somewhere and Tums come from St. Louis, Missouri. Here’s a bit from their website:

Insomniac snacks, car crashes, tax audits, pink slips… Imagine all the gushes of gastric acid those Tums have neutralized. The brand leads the industry, selling more than 60 million bottles or rolls a year—almost double the total of its second-place rival, Rolaids. And 99.9 percent of those Tums, more than 6 billion tablets, are made right here. (The .1 percent? Wrafton Laboratories in England.)

Now you’re ready to be a Jeopardy champion!

Here’s another bit of trivia for you: 

When did hurricanes start getting named?  It was back in 1950 when the U.S. Weather Bureau began using the phonetic alphabet (Able-Baker-Charlie). In 1953, women’s names were substituted and in 1979 the World Meteorological Organization switched to a list that included men’s names. Now you know.

Minding the many, many vessels going up and down the Mississippi River is a huge challenge. There would be total chaos were it not for rules. I learned about two interesting websites to learn more about these rules and thought you might want to check them out too. First was www.MarineVesselTraffic.com. From an opening menu, you do a search for a specific ship (where it is), sea ports, military ships and planes tracking, container ports, cruise ships and more. Quite interesting if that’s your thing.

I also learned that while the U.S. Corps of Engineers is charged with keeping the river open and safe for traffic, the U.S. Coast Guard has charge of the ships. The National Vessel Movement Center is a fairly new organization, functioning since 2001. At this website, you can learn the rules and regulations concerning the ships using the Mississippi River (and they fill volumes). 

Please read clear to the end for my Big Announcement!

I knew that my maternal grandmother, Clara Ann Joseph, was born on 14 Nov 1894 in the Mississippi River town of Ivy Landing, Illinois. By 1900, the Joseph family was living several miles inland which gives a big clue as to way I could never find Ivy Landing on any map. It must have surely washed away! In those early days, men’s attempts to control the Mighty Mississippi were puny at best. It was well into the 1890s that the Corps of Engineers began building dams to (hopefully) better control the river.

In late October 2022 I tool a cruise down the entire length of the Mississippi River. I was very surprised to see miles and miles and miles of river bank looking much like the picture above. Was this where Ivy Landing was? I’ll never know for sure but I’ll bet it was a tiny town back in the trees along a stretch of river bank just like this.

Now for my big announcement:  On this recent cruise, I kept my eyes and ears open to learn everything I could about the Mississippi River and the history of states along the river, the Heartland of America. Polling several genealogy friends, and getting their thumbs up, for the foreseeable future I will be sharing much of what I learned about America’s history. One highlight was that I got to visit Graceland and see Elvis!! Stay tuned………………. Come learn some U.S. history with me!

It is now officially 2023 and why not treat yourself to a new book for the New Year???

One might guess that with eighteen books to his credit that Nathan Dylan Goodwin was running out of ideas. But nope. Book number nineteen, The Sawtooth Slayer, adds another star on his story flag.

The Sawtooth Slayer is set in April 2020 in Twin Falls, Idaho, where a serial killer is on the loose. A nameless man is kidnapping young women from their own homes, taking them out of the city to kill them before returning their bodies to random locations around the city. The local officers in charge in frustration turn to Venator—an investigative genetic genealogical company—in hopes that they can identify the killer from his left-behind DNA before he kills another young woman.

This book is definitely not another typical murder mystery. The Sawtooth Slayer is different in that DNA is featured prominently in the solving of the murders.

Will the Venator team solve this string of gruesome murders? You betchya….with the help from DNA.

The old phrase comes to mind: “Try it, you’ll like it.”  And I believe you will. You can order it from Amazon in Kindle format, hardcover and paperback ($13.99).

You could have your very own sewing machine for only $22.50! Note that it was a foot-powered model but it did come with a 10-year guarantee!

Only $39.90 for a Michigan A Grade Family Wagon…. “we must sell 1000 of these vehicles before the close of the season.” And a 3% discount was offered if you pay in full with your order. Horses not included. 

How many of us remember drooling over the pages of the Sears catalog Christmas Wish book? I do!

The first Sears Christmas Book debuted in 1933 and came in the mail for 60 years, until 1993 (when Sears went totally out of the catalog business). 

Through the decades, the items offered varied. In 1937, tractor sets and Shirley Temple dolls were offered. By 1949, Western TV shows and movies exploded and the book offered a wide variety of Roy Rogers inspired gifts and even school supplies. As America entered the space race in 1968, children everywhere dreamed of becoming an astronaut. Marking America’s Bicentennial in 1975, nostalgic theme toys appeared: fife and drum sets, Colonial dolls and models of the USS Constitution.  Transformers exploded on the scene in 1984. 

What likely did your grandparents or parents or YOU order from the Sears Christmas Wish Book???

Then www.shipindex.org is the website for you to find that image!!  I know the copied image above is fuzzy but the first paragraph says it all:

“ShipIndex.org simplifies vessel research. Whether you’re a genealogist, a maritime historian, a researcher, or just curious, we can help you learn more about the ships that interest you. We tell you which maritime resources, such as books, journals, magazines, newspapers, CD-ROMS, websites and online databases mention the ships that interest you. We enhance these references by noting which ones include illustrations or crew and passenger lists and where you can find or purchase the resource.”

You can barely see that “our full database had 3,151,517 citations to ships in 1004 resources.”

You can do a quick first index search for free but you’ll need to subscribe to view the citation…………. a whopping $6.00 for two full weeks. 

From the Mayflower to the Titanic to the Queen Mary this website will delight you and enhance your family history stories, I guarantee.

“The hens only lay egg-nog at Christmas-tidek but egg-nog will lay a man any time he tackles it,” reported the Idaho Avalanche on January 3, 1880. In 1881, The Herald, in Omaha, Nebraska, also found eggnog a subject for humor:  “Hens favor sobriety. They generally quit laying when the egg-nog season approaches.”

Big thanks to a decades-old issue of True West magazine for this December-timely article, penned by Sherry Monahan.

 Out on the frontier, eggnog was not just a holiday beverage, but also a saloon drink year-round. In 1881, eggnog was ranked as the eighth most popular saloon beverage and it was served hot or cold. Here is the recipe for Victorian eggnog, adapted from the Idaho Daily Statesman, 12 Dec 1892:  

                 3 eggs, separated
                    1 cup powdered sugar                    1 1/2 cups cream
                    1/4 tsp nutmeg
                    1 TB powdered sugar for egg whites                    1/4 cup brandy and rum
                    1 cinnamon stick for grating
                    Beat the egg yolks and sugar; set aside. Beat egg whites with 1 TB sugar until stiff and refrigerate. Heat cream and nutmeg to just a boil, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and gradually add hot cream mixture into the egg and sugar mixture. Return everything to the pan and cook until the mixture reaches 160oF. Remove from heat, place in bowl, set in ‘fridge to chill. Fold the egg whites into the mixture when serving and served with grated cinnamon and nutmeg.  Serves 2

Too much work for me! I’ll just go to Safeway or Rosauer’s thank you very much. Bet you will too. 

Bet you’ve never heard of the World War I Veteran’s Compensation Fund for Washington state veterans of the “war to end all wars.”

These are now to be accessed in FamilySearch.org and are a Department of Veterans Affairs bonus record set. World War I veterans could apply for compensation from the state of Washington between 1921-1925. 

The World War Adjusted Compensation Act, or Bonus Act, was a U.S. federal law passed on 19 May 1924, that granted a benefit to veterans of American military service in World War I.  The value of each veteran’s “credit” was based on each recipient’s service between 5 Apr 1917 and 1 Jul 1919, with $1.00 awarded for each day served in the U.S. and $1.25 for each day served abroad. The maximum payment was set at $500.00. 

To search this collection (on FamilySearch), it is helpful to know the name of the soldier and the state where he enlisted.

I, too, have questions. Was this a U.S.-wide program? Which paid, the federal government or the state government? Apparently, Washington state did.

If you wish to know more, click to the FamilySearch WIKI and then Washington (state).  Also click to Wikipedia for the World War Adjusted Compensation Act. 

Jarred by an old newspaper article, I had to dig into the sad story of Herbert Franklin Niccolls, Jr. Most of this information comes from Find-A-Grave. 

Born in 1919 in Boise, Idaho, to Bert and Hazel Niccolls, he was one of the younger children. The family lived in extreme poverty. When Herbert was 9, his father was declared insane and committed to an asylum. Hazel, with no other recourse, gave away her sons. 

Herbert was incorrigibly delinquent. The loving foster parents who took him in had to send him away after he repeatedly lied and stole from them. Herbert finally was released into the care of his paternal grandmother “a religious zealot who was determined to starve and beat the sin out of him.”

On the night of 5 Aug 1931, 12-year-old Herbert broke into a store for candy and tobacco. The break-in was discovered and 73-year-old Sheriff John L. Wormell entered the store to investigate. Herbert, crouched behind a vinegar barrel with a stolen gun, fired one shot, hitting the sheriff in the head and killing him instantly. 

The arrest of the 12 year old killer, barefoot and dressed in ragged overalls, made headlines across the country. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. Herbert, 80 pounds, 4 foot 8 inches, with delicate features, curly brown hair, bright and polite, became a poster child for reform of the incarceration of juveniles. 

Herbert fared fairly well in prison. He was kept under close supervision of the wardens, kept away from the general population and assigned tutors and mentors, and achieved a good education behind bars. He remarked to his brother many years later that prison saved his life.

Herbert was released from prison at the age of 21. After a brief, unsuccessful start at a bakery job just after his release from prison, Niccolls worked in the accounting department of a Tacoma shipyard and there he excelled. He subsequently moved to California and joined the accounting department at MGM and later worked for 20th Century Fox in Hollywood. He married and had a son, John.  

Herbert died of a heart attack in 1983, having lived a crime-free life since his parole 42 years earlier.