New Books on My Shelf: February/March 2025, Part 2

 

About two months ago, I stumbled upon a podcast called The People’s Recorder, hosted by public historian, actor, and nephew of Alex Haley, Chris Haley. Through contemporary conversations and original audio from the thousands of interviews conducted by the Federal Writers Project during the Great Depression, the podcast takes deep dives into fascinating stories from regions and communities across the U.S. at a pivotal moment in the nation’s history. The first few episodes lit a spark in me – or perhaps re-lit, as I’ve definitely been fascinated by this era and its sources before, have even found a related interview of one of my family members! - and I headed (back) into the rabbit hole. And, of course, the deeper I went, the more money left my pockets, because, of course, I bought some books! Here’s what I got:

New Books on My Shelf: February/March 2025, Part 1

 

Sometimes I just can’t help buying books! But you’ve heard me say it before: it’s not really a bad habit if it’s informing my research and helping to improve my skills, right? It doesn’t matter if I haven’t read everything in the last batch yet (lol), it’s more about having the right books for the right time, and that right time might be today, tomorrow, or sometime in the future. 

DNA Seals the Deal? An Evans Family Connection

Have you taken a DNA test? If so, you’ve probably sorted your matches into people you know, people you don’t know but you do know how you’re related to them, and people for whom you strike out on both counts – you don’t know ‘em and you don’t know how you’re related to ‘em. The more distantly related you are – 3^rd and 4^th cousins and such – the harder it might be to know where and specifically through whom you connect, especially if you have enslaved ancestors. I’ve got more than a few DNA matches in this latter category. 

But I just moved one match out of this category, and, in doing so, I think I’ve made a DNA connection to Daniel Evans and Jennette (aka Anna Jane) Welch, the subjects of most of my recent posts.

The Many Names of Laura Ann Scruggs

In genealogical research, some names are more difficult to track than others. Unique names, ones with a variety of consonants, ones where spelling and pronunciation don’t necessarily seem to match. These all make sense – you’re probably going to have to be creative in your research techniques to find the person or people that you’re looking for. (See my maternal great-great-grandmother Scoatney (Scott) Cooper and her sister Masonia (Scott) Worthen for two examples.)

But I didn’t think “Scruggs” would be one of those names. Sure, maybe the “c” becomes a “k,” maybe there’s one “g” instead of two, maybe the “s” even becomes a “z,” or the “gg” becomes a “ck,” but none of those should make the name particularly difficult to research; how many different ways could people really hear or write the name? 

Finding the Parents of Laura Ann Scruggs: Part 1

In my last Mystery Monday post, I introduced the question of who the parents of one set of my paternal 2x great-grandparents were. The question was asked of me by one of my 3^rd cousins in Alabama – we share (James) Steven Evans and Laura Ann Scruggs as our great-great-grandparents, but neither of us had yet researched beyond that generation. So, the hunt was on.

I spent the next 3 blog posts (1, 2, 3) detailing the results of that hunt, focusing on (James) Steven Evans’ parents, who I now believe to be Daniel Evans and Jennette (aka Anna Jane) Welch. And I threw in a bonus post with some lingering questions about (James) Steven Evans’ siblings. But of course, that was all focused on only one side of the couple my cousin and I wanted to know more about.

Who were the parents of Laura Ann Scruggs?

A Note on (James) Steven Evans’ Siblings

If you were an eagle-eyed reader of my last post, on how researching the potential siblings of my 2x great-grandfather (James) Steven Evans helped me to make stronger connections between him and the people I believe to be his parents, Daniel Evans and Jennette (aka Anna Jane) Welch, you may have noticed two things.

• First, in the snippet of the 1900 Census I shared, showing the household of Daniel and Jennette, there are two numbers on the far right of the image: 3 and 3. Though it’s not visible in the snippet, these numbers are written into the columns headed “Mother of how many children” and “Number of those children living.”
  

• Second, in the snippet of the 1910 Census I shared, illustrating Jennette (as Annah Evans) living with her daughter Sarah and son Nelson, there are again two numbers in the far right columns: 14 and 5. As before, these numbers represent the number of children she has given birth to and the number who are currently living.

Finding the Parents of (James) Steven Evans: Part 3

One of the exciting things about trying to take your tree up another generation is that in addition to extending your tree backwards, you also have the opportunity to expand your tree outwards. That is to say, when you’re looking for parents, you’ll likely also find siblings. And that was absolutely the case in my search for the parents of my paternal 2x-great-grandfather (James) Steven Evans.

(Are you all caught up on this series? If not, start here and then work your way forward. Ready? Let’s go!)