Tag: florida

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Portraits of African American Midwives in Florida ~ 1930s and 1940s

The Florida Board of Health initiated a midwife licensing program in 1931 to reduce infant mortality and to promote maternal and child health [1].

The Board of Health's first formal training institute was the West Florida Midwives Institute, held at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, Florida. The week-long institute brought together midwives from surrounding regions to learn safe and aseptic delivery practices [2].

Pictured in this photo gallery, among images of unidentified Florida midwives are:

Georgianna Pride, Miccosukee, FL

Rosanna Ruso

Nurse McGreen

Uncle Ab

Certified Nurse Midwife E.J. Kirkland

Janie Stokes (from Suwannee County)

Georgianna Alexander Greenville (from Jefferson County)

Rachel Washington

You may order prints from the Florida Memory Collection if you find an ancestor here!

Further Reading

You can read more about Florida midwives in the book In the Way of Our Grandmothers: A Cultural View of Twentieth-Century Midwifery in Florida by Debra Anne Susie.

References Cited

[1] Florida State Archives, Florida Memory Collection, http://www.floridamemory.com, accessed 23 Mar 2013.

[2] Susie, Debra Anne 2009 In the Way of Our Grandmothers: A Cultural View of Twentieth-Century Midwifery in Florida University of Georgia Press, p. 42.

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African American Employees of the American Sumatra Tobacco Company, Quincy, FL, ca. 1910

This picture, taken some time after 1910, depicts African American employees of the American Sumatra Tobacco Company in Quincy, Gadsden County, Florida [1].

Formed by a merger of twelve growers in 1910, the American Sumatra Tobacco Company owned 34,000 acres of land in Georgia and Florida. Their 41 shade tobacco farms produced one-half of all tobacco in the region in the early 1900s [2].

References Cited

[1] "Employees of the American Sumatra Tobacco Company,"State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, http://floridamemory.com/items/show/3353, accessed 23 Mar 2013.

[2] Pando, Robert T. 2003 Shrouded in Cheesecloth: the Demise of Shade Tobacco in Florida and Georgia. Master's Thesis, Florida State University, Electronic Theses and Dissertations, http://etd.lib.fsu.edu/theses/available/etd-11142003-204324/, accessed 23 Mar 2013.

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Searching Online Records for Florida? Don’t Forget These Valuable Resources!

FamilySearch Florida Collections (current to Feb 2013)

Title	Records	Last Updated
Florida, Births and Christenings, 1880-1935	20,227	10 Mar 2012
Florida, Civil War Service Records of Confederate Soldiers, 1861-1865	285,975	21 Apr 2012
Florida, Civil War Service Records of Union Soldiers, 1861-1865	25,416	21 Apr 2012
Florida, Confederate Veterans and Widows Pension Applications, 1885-1955	Browse Images	26 Sep 2011
Florida, Death Index, 1877-1998	5,187,074	10 Feb 2012
Florida, Deaths and Burials, 1900-1921	24,800	27 Apr 2010
Florida, Deaths, 1877-1939	471,800	29 Mar 2010
Florida, Divorce Index, 1927-2001	3,012,178	29 Feb 2012
Florida, Key West Passenger Lists, 1898-1920	Browse Images	*16 Jan 2013
Florida, Marriage Index, 1822-1875 and 1927-2001	11,718,373	14 Jan 2012
Florida, Marriages, 1830-1993	571,766	9 May 2012
Florida, Marriages, 1837-1974	859,969	26 Mar 2012
Florida, Probate Records, 1784-1990	Browse Images	27 Sep 2012
Florida, State Census, 1885	110,864	27 Mar 2010
Florida, State Census, 1935	1,599,085	27 Mar 2010
Florida, State Census, 1945	2,249,138	27 Mar 2010
Florida, Tampa, Passenger Lists, 1898-1945	50,103	21 Dec 2012

Florida Message Boards ~ Ancestry.com

Message boards or forums are a great place to engage with others researching in our area of interest.

AfriGeneas States Research Forum

You can post your FL-specific queries here!

AfriGeneas Slave Research Forum

This board is reserved for discussion of the Enslavement Period, slave genealogy, documents pertaining to slavery, and techniques for finding the last slaveowner and the first slave ancestor.

Free Persons of Color (FPOC) Forum

This is the hosted message board of the Free African Americans of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware website. This is the place to discuss issues pertaining to ancestors who were either born free or emancipated prior to the Civil War.

Florida GenWeb

The purpose of FLGenWeb is to preserve and educate the public about Florida's rich heritage and to help families discover their ancestors.

Florida Digital Newspaper Library

The Florida Digital Newspaper Library exists to provide access to the news and history of Florida. All of the over 1,376,000 pages of historic through current Florida newspapers in the Florida Digital Newspaper Library are openly and freely available with zoomable page images and full text.

Florida History Online

From  Daniel L. Schafer, Professor Emeritus of History, University of North Florida, Florida History Online is an educational website intended as a resource for teachers and scholars, students at all grade levels, and the general public. It offers free online access to transcribed Florida history documents.

Floridiana on the Web ~ USF Libraries Digital Collections

An astoundingly rich collection of digitized manuscripts, oral histories, historical photographs and full text articles on Florida history. All back editions of the journal Florida Historical Quarterly are available as searchable full text.

State Archives of Florida ~ Florida Memory Project

The Florida Memory Project website presents a selection of digitized historical records that illustrate significant moments in Florida history, education resources for students of all ages and archival collections for historical research. Notable online collections:

• Call and Brevard Family Papers
• Florida Confederate Pension Application Files
• Florida's Early Constitutions
• Florida Folklife Collection
• Florida Photographic Collection
• Spanish Land Grants
• World War I Service Cards

Resource Guide ~ P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History

Excellent guide to online resources for Florida history and genealogy

Florida Cemetery Index

There were 12,071 names from 83 cemeteries in the database as of 1 August 2000.

City of Tallahassee ~ City-Owned Cemeteries Burial Records

Looking for someone who you think might be buried in a City of Tallahassee-owned cemetery? Here's where to start. Also included is a wonderful comprehensive guide to researching ancestors buried in private cemeteries, not in the five owned cemeteries and operated by the City government. Here you will find links to the largest funeral homes in Tallahassee, area churches, and other helpful resources for researching ancestors buried in Tallahassee. See also their page of links to information about cemeteries in general.

The Obituary Daily Times

The Obituary Daily Times is a daily index of published obituaries. It is distributed Freely, often twice a day by email, and usually has over 2500 entries a day. You can search the database anytime with their online search engine.

WPA Life Histories from Florida

First-person accounts of life in Florida collected during the Great Depression.

Alachua County Ancient Records

493,813 Page Images of early Florida records. 14,890 Pages have been transcribed. As Alachua County was an early seat of government in Florida, this collection has records from across Florida, not just Alachua County. You can volunteer to index records, too!

Elmer’s Genealogy Corner

Madison County, FL marriage, divorce, cemetery, voter and obituary records

What Are Your Favorite Florida Resources?

Which FL resources do YOU recommend? Please add a comment with your favorites!

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County Spotlight: Duval

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Searching for Land Records in Florida: Federal Land Grants

In my last post on the Florida State Census, I talked about finding your ancestors between censuses. Another way to keep up with your ancestors between censuses is to follow them through their land records.

Our ancestors bought, sold and leased land to family members and other members of the community. Through land records, you can discover who your ancestor had relationships with and start to see what role he or she played in the community. There are many types of land records, including mortgage deeds, records of sale, and liens. For part one of this discussion, well talk about finding Federal Land Grant records on a free website, the Bureau of Land Management.

Bureau of Land Management

Head to the BLM General Land Office Records site to search land patents for a patent record belonging to your ancestor. Land patents document the transfer of land ownership from the federal government to individuals. For our purposes, we will focus on land patents filed just after the Civil War. Lets use my fourth great-grandfather, Major Reddick, as an example of how to use the BLM site. Use the screen demonstration or the instructions below to find your ancestors land patent.
 

1. Go to the General Land Office Records site at http://www.glorecords.blm.gov.
2. Click "Search Land Patents".
3. Type in your zip code and click continue.
4. Select the state to search. For Major Reddick, select Florida.
5. Type in a last name, like Reddick. Remember to try different variations of the last name.
6. To narrow your search, type in a first name, like Major.
7. Click "Search".
8. The results show the state, county, issue date, land office and the identifying numbers for the parcel of land.
9. Click the patentee name to view more information about the patent. You'll need this information if you want to request original documents (the patent application) from the National Archives.
10. Click the Legal Land Description tab. Note the Aliquot Parts, Sec./Block, Township, Range, Meridian, State and County. In the next post, we'll show you how to interpret this description and map it using Google Maps.
11. Click the "Document Image" tab to view the scanned image of the land patent. You can save this image to your computer (right-click and select "Save image as...") or print it. You can also order a certified copy of the document.

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State Census Records Fill the Gaps

Although genealogy experts recommend that we start our research with records at home, those of us doing research away from our ancestral home often start with the internet. And, of course, that usually leads us to census records.

The United States Census Bureau has conducted a census, or a count of the population, since the late 1800's. The census is conducted every 10 years, providing not only a count, but demographic information on every citizen in the country. The most recent US Census available to the public is the 1930 census (1940 will be available in 2012). You can access the census records on many sites, both for free and for a fee. In another post, we'll discuss the differences between the free and paid websites and why you might want to pay for information.

You'll find rich information on your ancestors in the Census records, but what if you want to know what happened in the 10-year gap? What if the US Census records you need were among those lost to fire? What if you can't find someone that you are absolutely sure lived within the 10-year gap? Try the State Census records.

Florida is one of several states who conducted a State Census every 10 years, between the years of the US Census. Not all counties are included, but it's worth taking a look at the 1885, 1935 and 1945 State Census records for Florida. Take a look at the sites below to access them:

Ancestry.com	Free index with registration, fee for images
FamilySearch (pilot)	Free (1885 not indexed, images only)