The year was 1964 and after seventy-five days of filibustering by Southern Democrats, the required two-thirds vote was secured in the U.S. Senate that shut down the debate of the Civil Rights Act. Every senator, including Senator Clair Engle (D-CA) who had suffered a stroke, was present to cast his or her vote. Senator Engle could not speak, but instead pointed to his eye to signal his “Aye” vote.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on 2 July 1964. It bans discrimination on the basis of a person’s color, race, national origin, religion, or gender in regard to issues of public accommodation (e.g., buses, restaurants, theaters, etc.), schooling, employment, voting, and government programs. 

More history was made in the Civil Rights movement as Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., becomes the youngest man to receive the Nobel Peace Prize at age thirty-five in 1964.

Although the first U.S. regular combat troops would not arrive in Vietnam until March of 1965, by the end of 1964 there were more than 23,000 military advisors in place, and the CIA was running covert operations supported by U.S. Naval forces.

The public got a wake-up call in January of 1964 when the U.S. Surgeon General released a report stating that cigarette smoking gave smokers a 70 percent higher mortality rate than non-smokers and that smokers were at a much higher risk of developing lung cancer than non-smokers. At that time 44 percent of Americans were smokers. 

Disaster struck on 27 March 1964 when a 9.2 magnitude earthquake struck South Central Alaska causing catastrophic damage in Anchorage. The energy released from the quake was 10 million times that of the atomic bomb at Hiroshima and eighty times that of the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. It also set off a tsunami that was responsible for 122 of the 131 casualties attributed to the quake. 

Beatlemania was spreading around the world as the first Beatles album was released and sped to the top of the charts. On 6 April Beatles songs grabbed the top five spots on Billboard’s Hot 100 singles chart.

The “British Invasion” continued when the Rolling Stones appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show in October of 1964. It was their first American appearance.

And this last one is for my husband who sighs wistfully every time he sees a Ford Mustang.  The famous “muscle car” was introduced in 1964 at the New York World’s Fair.

Were you around in 1964? Share your memories and family stories in the comments section below.

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Contributed by Maggie Baker
This is a photograph of Ella Ann (Houston) Kraher, b. 1870. She was the great-granddaughter of Robert Armstrong Houston, the first Sheriff of Knox County, Tennessee. The photo was taken by her husband, Philip Kraher, in his Studio on in St.James, Missouri, around 1905.

Click on an image to enlarge it.

Contributed by Sharon Mullane
This is my grandmother, , dressed as a gypsy, ca. 1920 in Newark, New Jersey. She was born to German immigrant parents in Westchester, New York, in 1899.

Many of you are probably familiar with Sherry Irvine’s work through her columns here and in many other publications. Now she’s preparing to help students on a more personal level in tackling their brick wall problems. Here’s the press release from Pharos Tutors.

Pharos announces the launch of one to one online tutorials with expert genealogist Sherry Irvine

Pharos Teaching & Tutoring was the first British company to provide online tutor assisted classes aimed specifically at helping researchers with British ancestry. Now, Pharos is launching a new one to one tutorial service to help genealogists tackle those nasty research problems generally known as “brick walls.” The service provides a practical option when it is difficult to find a course that fits the problem or when expert analysis is needed. Continue reading →

Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Ancestry has added 20 million images to its Historical Newspaper Collection—doubling the collection in size! And to celebrate, they’re offering free access to the entire collection through 19 June 2008. Click here to start searching now.

More information on this huge launch is also available on the Ancestry blog.

 

To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle; every cubic inch of space is a miracle.
~ Walt Whitman

Posted This Week

• New South Wales, Australia, Assisted Immigrant Passenger Lists, 1828-1896 
• New South Wales, Australia, Unassisted Immigrant Passenger Lists, 1826-1922 
• California Passenger and Crew Lists, 1893-1957 (Updated) 
• View a list of all new and updated databases 
• Learn more about what’s new at Ancestry.com 
• Search the Ancestry.com Card Catalog

Is there a particular record that you have avoided working with because you don’t have experience with it? Land records? Tax lists? Coroners’ records? Court records? Take the bull by the horns this week and research that record type and its availability in the areas in which you are researching. Start with a reference book or look for an article on the subject in the Ancestry Library. Follow up with research on the websites of repositories that may hold these records and determine what records are available and how they can be accessed (e.g., snail mail requests, online and e-mail requests, interlibrary loan, etc.). Then make it happen. You’ll wonder why you ever put it off!

What do James Dean, Daniel Boone, Richard Nixon, Dave Matthews, Betsy Ross, Joan Baez, and James Michener have in common? They either had family members who were Quakers, were raised in a Quaker home, or counted themselves among the Quaker faithful.

Having Quakers in your family tree, even if they weren’t famous, can be like a genealogical parting of the Red Sea opening up a promised land flowing with ancestors.

The Society of Friends, commonly known as Quakers, traces its origins to George Fox. In mid-seventeenth century England, Fox was disillusioned with the current religious practices and sought a more enlightened form of worship. When he was nineteen, Fox believed he received a revelation from God. This revelation, based on the concept of “Inner Light,” fueled a movement that snowballed into a full-blown religion across England.

Eventually, Quakers made their way across the Atlantic, but the welcome mat wasn’t always out. Two Quaker women, suspected of being witches, were promptly deported from Boston in 1656. Undeterred, more and more Quakers immigrated to North America and before long the religion had a strong presence in the Colonies.

Family history researchers relish having Quaker roots because the Quakers were diligent note-takers. These notes, or minutes, recorded at their monthly meeting for business, hold bundles of clues about our Quaker ancestors. For example, the minutes noted marriages. The industrious clerk recorded the marriage vows that my ancestor Manoah Chiles repeated when he married his second wife in the Virginia Cedar Creek Monthly Meeting in 1742. He also threw in some valuable genealogical scoops: “Manoah Chiles, son of Henry, deceased of the county of Hanover, and Anne Cheadle, daughter of John Cheadle of the county of Caroline.” The minutes often recorded births and deaths of members, as well.

Additionally, Quaker minutes frequently noted the comings and goings of its members. You might find a record stating that a member transferred to a different meeting. You will also learn about members who were disowned. Many were dismissed from the group for engaging in military service. My ancestor, Peter Hubbard, involved in a contentious land dispute with his brother, was disowned “whilst he remains in that un-Christian spirit.” Continue reading →