- Go to our first known ancestor with our birth surname and calculate our Henry Number from that person. Show each generation of your line of ancestors with your birth surname with their Henry numbers.
- How did you calculate the Henry numbers? What do these numbers tell you?
- Tell what you did in your own blog post.....
1. My first known ancestor with my birth surname is Peter SCHARFENSTEIN (1655-1713). Here is my descent from him:
1 Peter Scharfenstein (1655-1713)
11 Matthias Scharfenstein (1678-1756; immigrant ancestor)
111 Johann Moritz Scharfenstein [aka Morris Sharp] (1714-1781)
1118 Morris Sharp/Scharfenstein (1750-1823)
11186 Morris Sharp (1796- ? )
111868 Morris T Sharp (1834-1917)
1118681 Alvah Clyde Sharp (1871-1923) *
11186811 Harold Herbert Sharp (1893-1934) *
111868112 Alva Curtis Sharp (1917-1978)
1118681123 Virginia Leah Sharp (1948-Living)
* Denotes a son who was the eldest son with living children.
2. I generated an Outline Descendant Report in Family Tree Maker 2009 and manually added the Henry numbers, as I couldn't see a way to get FTM to do it. I'm not sure I have all the children for the first three generations of this list. I haven't focused much on this line for quite some time....like 25 years (?)
I was somewhat surprised to notice in doing this that I am doubly descended from Peter Scharfenstein. The Outline Descendant Report is 28 pages long. Through my direct male Sharp line I show up on page 22. But I also appear on page 6! As it turns out, Morris Sharp (11186) married Anna Mary Thomas (111312), a granddaughter of Anna Sharp [Scharfenstein] (1113). Notice that we have mis-matched generations here, which is not surprising given the birth positions, which are obvious in this numbering system.
Interesting system, but since I'm not sure I have all the children in all of the generations, it's probably not terribly accurate. And, of course, if you go another generation back, you have to start all over again!
