Keystone Radio School in WWII

My mother was a WAC. According to her “Report of Separation,” she enlisted on February 3, 1943 in Los Angeles, California. She had been a comptometer operator in civilian life, working for the Soil Conservation Service in Columbia, Missouri.[1] The Army trained her as a “radio operator” at the Keystone Radio School in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania.

After my mother died, I found a photo album she had created of her time in Hollidaysburg. There is curiously little written about this place. In several years of searching, I have found only one newspaper mention of this school:













[2]

Mom’s album says she arrived in Hollidaysburg on April 7, 1943 for Class 1-W. The first photo in the album is labeled “Highland Hall, Ye Olde School.”

She labeled a photo of Duncan House as “Barracks-Keystone Style.”

 
From the photos in the album, it’s clear that this radio school wasn’t exactly all work and no play. There are lots of candid photos of her classmates, both at the school and visiting the town, a carnival, and on various outings. This photo is labeled “WAACs resting in front of Highland Hall.”

 

There’s also a whole series of photos of the women marching.....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But most of the photos in her album are of the women she trained with. In one photo, she identifies the women in her unit. I have tried to track down these women, with very little luck. I thought I had found down one of them who appeared to still be alive in northern California, but I got no response to the letter and photos I sent her. 

Caption: Room 1 – Early June ‘43

Marion Sterne                   Nancy Swicegood

Coral Howard                    Genevieve Long

Olive Wicker                      Viola Noirot

Dorothy Smith                   Mary Sparks

Sue Wills                             Mary Strome

 

Both Fold3 and MyHeritage have recently added the U. S. World War II Army Enlistments database to their search results. I found my mother listed in these records as “Nancy S. Sharp”, born 1917 in Missouri, residence = Los Angeles, CA, enlistment = Aug 6, 1943 at Hollidaysburg, PA, Technician 5^th grade in Women’s Army Corps.

There are several odd things about this enlistment record. First, it suggests that she didn’t enlist until after she had already graduated from radio school. Second, she’s listed by her married name, which she didn’t obtain until June 1944. And in the above record, it said she was divorced, not married. Weird.

Searching this database for other people who supposedly enlisted at Hollidaysburg on Aug 6, 1943 generated 23 additional women’s names, 21 of them were listed as “married”, one was single and one divorced. I could not match any of the names to the women identified in my mother’s photo album. I doubt that any of them were married when they enlisted in the Army and attended the Keystone Radio School.

There were clearly more women in this group than show up in the enlistment records. I believe that this photo is of the women at graduation:

There appear to be about 50 women in this photo. My mother is in the first row, 4^th from the left.

 

I would love to know more about this school and where the women went from here. The US Army Heritage and Education Center at Carlisle, PA, claims no knowledge of the Keystone Radio School. It also isn’t identified in any of the Signal Corps records that NARA has put online. Highland Hall is now a National Historic Site and is currently used for Blair County offices. I don’t know what became of Duncan House. If anyone who reads this knows more about Keystone Radio School or any of the WAACs who trained there, please contact me through the “Comments” button below.

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[1] 1940 US Census, Columbia, Boone County, Missouri; Roll T627_2086; ED 10-16A, page 9B.

[2] The Daily News, Huntingdon, Pa., Monday, April 5, 1943, pg. 6,

 

SNGF: Researching on FamilySearch.org

This week’s Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings is:
1) You're going on a scavenger hunt - for records of one of your relatives.  You can pick a relative who lived in the 1800 to 2000 time period.  A brother of one of your ancestors might be best (since males don't change their surname).  Or the husband of a sister of your ancestor.  Tell us the name of your chosen relative. 

2)   Go to FamilySearch and search for records for that relative.  Start on the Search page - https://www.familysearch.org/search.  Search any way you want.   

3)  Tell us what you found in the FamilySearch record collections.  Did you find something new about that relative?   

4)  Write your own blog post, comment on this post, or write something on Facebook or Google+.

 I’ve been scanning photos from an old album of my mother’s and ran across this photo of her grandmother, Martha Elizabeth “Mattie” Coffey Swicegood, and Mattie’s sister, Aunt Belle. Belle’s full name was Melinda Isabell Coffey. She was born on 27 Oct 1869 in Maries County, Missouri; married John T. Fields 23 Aug 1888 in St. Clair County, Missouri; and died 24 May 1965 in California. I’ve never really researched this line, so now’s as good a time as any!

A search for “Melinda Isabell Coffey” born 1868-1870 in Missouri, father’s name Squire Coffey, turned up only one appropriate record on FamilySearch.org:

·        1870 Census [https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/M46G-LPL]: Melinda, age 0, is listed with her parents, Squire (43) and Drusilla (36) COFFEE and 5 siblings ranging in age from 16 to 3 and living in Jackson township, Maries County, Missouri.

A search for “Belle Coffey” born 1868-1870 in Missouri, father’s name Squire Coffey, did not turn up any additional records.

So, I switched to searching for Belle’s husband, John T. Fields, born 1862, died 1928 and found:

·        1880 Census [https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/M6FZ-PWS]: John T., age 17, is living in Jackson township, St. Clair County, Missouri with his parents, C. R. (Caleb R), age 71) and Elizabeth (age 41) Fields, and 4 siblings—Mary E. (15), James R. (13), Lonora A. (11), and Emma (5).

·        after scrolling through 10+ pages of results—mostly Civil War records, even though I set birth year as 1860-1865—I got fed up and quit looking for any more relevant records.

·        I attempted to look in the FamilySearch Family Tree, but was thwarted when I tried to sign in. Even after changing my password, I couldn’t get in and there is apparently no online account support. Very frustrating.

In short, I found very little for either Belle Coffey or her husband, John T. Fields, at FamilySearch. This may have been the most frustrating search I’ve ever done on FamilySearch. Even when I clicked “exact search” I got huge numbers of totally spurious “matches” and nothing very useful.

SNGF: Counting Cousins

This week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (SNGF) challenge from Randy Seaver of the Genea-musings blog is to count your first cousins. Specifically:

1)  Take both sets of your grandparents and figure out how many first cousins you have, and how many first cousins removed (a child or grandchild of a first cousin) you have.
2)  Extra Credit:  Take all four sets of your great-grandparents and figure out how many second cousins you have, and how many second cousins removed you have.
HINT:  Make a Descendants Chart with your genealogy software program!
3)  Tell us the grandparents and great-grandparents names, but don't give the name of living cousins unless you want to.  
4)  Are there any of those lines that you don't know all of the cousins names?  Do you care?  
5)  Tell us about them in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Facebook or Google+ post of your own.  Be sure to drop a comment to this post to link to your work. 

1a. My maternal grandparents were William Earl SWICEGOOD and Molly Fay BROOKSHIRE. They had 6 children. The photo at right was taken in 1984, I think, at a family reunion. From left to right: Dee, Bob, Leah (my Mom), Nina, Bill, Patty. Only Uncle Bill is still alive.
   As for cousins, Aunt Dee had two daughters. One has 3 children, who I don't know, and the other has 2 children, who I keep in touch with regularly. So...2 first cousins, 5 first cousins once removed.
   Aunt Nina had two daughters. One has 1 son; the other (now deceased) has a son and a daughter. So...2 first cousins, 3 first cousins once removed.
   Uncle Bill married, but had no children.
   Aunt Patty had three children. Her oldest daughter has one natural daughter and 3 step-daughters. Between them they now have 15 children. The next daughter had one son, who has 2 sons. Her son has one natural daughter and I'm a bit fuzzy on his step-kids; there are either one or two step-daughters. So...3 first cousins, 3 first cousins once removed, 4 or 5 first step-cousins (?) once removed.
   Uncle Bob had two kids, a daughter and son. The daughter has not married; son has one daughter. Tally...2 first cousins, one first cousin once removed.
Total for Mom's side: 9 first cousins, 12 first cousins once removed.

1b. My paternal grandparents were Harold Herbert SHARP and Virginia Corine MELDRUM. They, too, had 6 children. Unfortunately, my Dad had no contact with his family from age 17 on and was unwilling to answer any questions about his family. He even claimed I was named after the state we were living in when I was born (Virginia) rather than admitting that I was named after his mother and/or sister.
   Anyway, based on census and vital records, I believe my Dad's family consisted of the following:
   Older brother Harold, who I believe married but had no children.
   Younger brother Dawes, who has been married at least 4 times and has fathered at least three children, a daughter and two sons. One son has at least one child; I don't know anything about the other two.
   Sister Virginia who I believe was married three times and had one child each by her first two husbands. Each of her kids have been married at least 3 times, according to Texas marriage records online. I have no idea how many kids they've had.
   Younger brother Jack married and had at least one daughter.
   Youngest brother James married and I think had 5 children, 3 of whom had at least one child each.
Total for Dad's side based on limited information: 11 first cousins and no telling how many first cousins once removed.

skipping to #4: I am pretty close with several of my cousins on my mother's side and with my one surviving uncle, even though we live half a continent apart. I try to get back to my mother's home town in the Ozarks every year, primarily to visit cousins, but also to do research. None of the family actually lives there any more, but the extended family still has a couple of houses in the town. I think of Weaubleau as more "home" than anyplace my family actually lived.
   I've never met anyone on my father's side of the family. My Dad died at age 60 and his mother survived him. When she died without a will, his family tracked my mother down through the V.A. and one brother, Dawes (who I think is still alive) came and visited her. However, she didn't mention this to me and I didn't discover the sheet of "family notes" Dawes had given her until after Mom died in 1996. I was able to track my aunt Virginia down--who assured me I was named after her, not their mother--but would not share any family information with me. I found an address for Dawes and sent him 2 packages of family history information and a couple of short notes, but never got a response. I guess I should try to track down some of my Sharp first cousins, but Texas is a long way from Seattle and I'm really not sure what I have in common with any of them. Someone posted a Sharp family tree on Ancestry a couple of years ago that includes this line, but is has since been taken down. I tried 3 times to contact the "owner" of this tree, but never got a response.

Funny I hadn't noticed until writing this blog post that both of my parents were the second children of six. Mom's siblings were more spread out than Dad's, from 1915 to 1932 versus 1916 to 1926. But from all I can tell, my Mother's family was much closer knit, though further spread out geographically, than Dad's. All of his siblings stayed in south Texas; none of Mom's family stayed very close to home.

SNGF: My "Real Life" outside genealogy

Tonight's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge posted by Randy Seaver is to write a blog post about our "real life" hobbies and interests outside of genealogy and family history activities.

I'm not sure I'm up to this challenge, but will try.

1. My husband and I like to travel. He prefers cruise ships and driving trips; I'm generally up for going just about anywhere just about any time. If we're driving, I can usually squeeze in some genealogy research or at least snap some courthouse pictures. I have a "thing" for old courthouses. ;-> Many of our driving trips end up being to the Minneapolis area, where our daughter lives. And every year we drive to/from Arizona where we "snowbird" to avoid the cold and wet of Seattle's winters.

2. I love sports. Since I'm too decrepit to play them any more, I watch on TV or in person. I'm an avid volleyball fan and have had season's tickets to the University of Washington volleyball program since they started selling them. We used to be part of a season ticket cartel to Seattle Mariners baseball, but that group fell apart a couple of years ago and now I'm lucky to get to one or two games a year, but did finally make it to a spring training game this winter. And, of course, after almost 40 years in Seattle, I'm a Seahawks fan. Everybody in Seattle is, at least this year!

3. Since retiring in 2006 I've taken up quilting and absolutely love the feeling of creating new pieces. I haven't yet managed to combine quilting and genealogy, but that's coming.

4. I like to garden and have our yard looking nice. I've gotten into saving seeds from year to year and starting all our tomatoes and some flowers from seed. As I get older, I have trouble with the acidity of most tomatoes, so this has become a necessity. Unfortunately, we're often traveling in the fall when our tomatoes finally get ripe, so we miss the fruits of my labors.

5. I read lots of mysteries. I have a fairly long list of authors that I check for new offerings from every 3-4 weeks through our local public library. Many years ago, I made a conscious effort to diversify my mystery reading geographically and love reading mysteries set in locales I've visited. Examples: Mary Daheim (Seattle area), Joan Hess (Ozarks), Jess Lourey & Monica Ferris (Minnesota), Susan Wittig Albert (Texas & Mississippi), Earlene Fowler (Calif. coast), J A Jance (Seattle & Arizona). In the last few years, I've sought out mysteries related to quilting and sewing. It's amazing how many fun stories there are out there!

6. And, of course, I love spending time with friends and relatives. We're still waiting for grandkids, but do have two wonderful kids and a host of friends, most living close by. My "neighborhood" bridge group of 25+ years has diversified in the past few years, but over half of our members still live within 10 blocks of us.

Probably not a very exciting life by most standards, but it works for me!

Easter Memories

I'm a day late writing this because I couldn't decide whether to post about Easter or not.
I remember family Easter egg hunts in our house--the eggs hidden in the "holes" in our bamboo furniture we brought from Japan.
When we still lived at Vint Hill Farms, Virginia, I have a vague recollection (perhaps from a photo?) of getting all dressed up on Easter Sunday, my sister and I usually dressed in matching outfits, and going off to church on the Army base where we lived. I'm sure there must have been a big post-wide egg hunt, but I don't remember them.
As our children were growing up, we did the egg dying and hiding of both "real" egg and plastic eggs stuffed with candy and coins. Those hunts were almost always inside, thanks to the early spring weather in Seattle. But the kids loved them.

But my fondest Easter memories were when I was growing up in State College, PA. I don't remember exactly when I joined St. Paul's United Methodist Church and the church choir, but I looked forward much of the year to the annual Easter sunrise service on the steps of Old Main.  Old Main is the original administration building for Penn State University and is basically across the street from our church, which was on College Avenue, the street that separated "town and gown" in State College.
For Easter, there was always a brass band at the top of the stairs, between the columns and in front of the building's doors. Our youth choir was usually right in front of them, or to the sides. I so loved hearing the clear brass tones ring out, echoing under the overhang, and watching the sun come up. Luckily I've forgotten the Easters when the weather was cold and snowy or rainy.
After the sunrise service, we would all go over to the church for breakfast, then sing for one or two more services. Most of my best friends were in the choir with me, so we always had a good time.
I've never found a similar service here in Seattle. A couple of years ago a cousin and I attended Easter sunrise service in Weaubleau, Missouri, but it was held inside the church. How useless is that? You couldn't see the sun come up!

SNGF: Random Research

This week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge from Randy Seaver at the Geneamusings blog asks us to:
1. Go to the Random Name Generator website and generate a name (first and last);
2. Enter that name in the SEARCH box at Ancestry.com;
3. Research the person by that name who appears in the first census result listed;
4. Learn whatever you can about that "random" person;
5. Share your findings.

Since it's a rainy, crappy day in Seattle and I'm climbing the walls from being laid up for over a week, I'll try this one.

1. The first name generated for me, Allyson Bentley, had NO census results at Ancestry.com using the "exact match" requirement on the name. The second name, Charles Shelton, had 4087.

2. The first Charles Shelton who shows up in the Ancestry.com census results is for the 1940 US Census:

1940 United States Federal Census
about Charles Murphy 

Name: Charles Murphy [Charles Shelton]  Age: 22 Estimated birth year: abt 1918 Gender: Female Race: White Birthplace: Minnesota Marital Status: Single Relation to Head of House: Daughter Home in 1940: Washington, Marshall, Iowa Map of Home in 1940: View Map Inferred Residence in 1935: Rural, Marshall, Iowa Residence in 1935: Rural, Marshall, Iowa Resident on farm in 1935: Yes Sheet Number: 5A Occupation: Hired Man Attended School or College: No Highest Grade Completed: Elementary school, 8th grade Hours Worked Week Prior to Census: 80 Class of Worker: Wage or salary worker in private work Weeks Worked in 1939: 52 Income: 325 Income Other Sources: No Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age Paul E Shelton 47 Ira Shelton 40 Kerrok Shelton 8 Clarke Shelton 4 Mildred Shelton 2 Charles Murphy 22

Note that the census listing is actually for a Charles Murphy, NOT Charles Shelton. It's not clear why Ancestry gave the alternative name. I'm a bit suspicious that this is an error, given that they didn't record the guy's gender and relationship correctly (clearly an "M" and "hired hand" on the census page).

3. I attempted to find more records for this "Charles Shelton", born about 1918 (+/- 1 year), born in Minnesota and came up with zero results at Ancestry.com. I think this person is Charles W. Murphy, for whom I found an "Iowa World War II Bonus Case Files" record indicating that he was born in Spring Valley, Minnesota, on 25 Feb 1919. In May of 1949, when this application was processed, he was living at 116 No 11th Ave., Marshalltown, Marshall Co., Iowa. Mr. Murphy served from 16 June 1943 until 2 Sep 1944 and was credited with three months of foreign service, from 14 Dec 1943 until 24 Mar 1944. He served in the 762nd Tank Battalion, 6th Army.

4. Curiously, I couldn't find any other records for this Charles W. Murphy born Feb 1919 in Fillmore Co., Minnesota on Ancestry.com. I've done some Minnesota research in the past, so know that birth certificates from 1900 to 1934 are indexed on the Minnesota Historical Society website. There I found that Charles Wilson Murphy was born on 25 Feb 1919 in Fillmore County; mother's maiden name was Lindamond. I returned to Ancestry.com and entered "Charles Wilson Murphy" as the name, relaxing the "exact match" a bit, and his mother's maiden name and found him in a submitted tree titled "Elliott Family History." It lists his parents as Harry Guy Murphy and Ruby Ila Lindamond and says he died in Jan 1976 in Phoenix, Arizona. No records or sources are attached; 5 sons are shown as living. I found an apparently matching record on FindAGrave (name, birth year, death year) showing that he was buried in Riverside Cemetery, Marshalltown, Marshall Co., Iowa, along with his wife, Doris V. Murphy, who died in 1999.

5. See above. An interesting exercise, but a bit frustrating that it's based on an erroneous census listing on Ancestry.com. As a side note, I was hoping that Charles Ira Shelton, a first cousin of my mother's, would show up as the first census record.  ;->

SNGF: Source/Citation Stats

This week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge posted by Randy Seaver on his Geneamusings blog is as follows:

1)  Have you done a good job of citing your sources in your genealogy management program or online family tree?  How are you doing?  How many source citations do you have, and how many people are in your tree?  What is the sources to persons ratio?

2)  Which master source (e.g., 1900 U.S. census, Find A Grave, specific book, etc.) do you have the most citations for?  How many?  How did you figure this out?

3)  Tell us in your own blog post, in comments to this post, or on Facebook or Google+ in a post.  Be sure to leave a comment with a link to your post on this blog post.

When I read this challenge yesterday, I drew a blank. I could not figure out how to obtain the requested information from my FTM2014 databases. Russ Worthington kindly provided some insight into where some of this information is contained in Family TreeMaker.

So....using my SWICEGOOD FTM2014 file, which contains primarily just my maternal line, in the "Plan" area I see the following statistics:
     Number of People: 14,968
     Number of Marriages: 4,962
     File size: 29,344 KB
     Generations: 13
     Surnames: 2536
 
     Facts: 50,227
     Places: 4,779
     Sources: 580     Templates used: 0
     Citations: 4,368
     Media: 29

The 580 Sources are actually "master sources"; there are multiple unique source references within each of these source groups. I see that I have a LOT of work to do to clean these up. I've been using genealogy software since the 1980s and just keep transferring my old files to newer software over the years, keeping all of my old sources and citations. Much of my real source information is in the "Notes" sections of each person's entry, not in the "Facts" entries.

As an example of how totally un-standardized my sources are, these are the "Sources" for the 1880 US Census:
     1880 Census > includes 16 different "citations" that link to 41 different "facts"
     1880 Census listing > includes 6 different "citations" that link to 29 different "facts"
     1880 Soundex > includes 2 different "citations" linked to 6 different "facts"
     1880 United State Federal Census > includes 1 "citation" linked to 10 "facts"

For the master source "findagrave.com", I apparently have 50 different citations! They appear to be linked to 196 different facts. I'm guessing this is the source with the most citations, but I would have to work through each source to figure that out.

Needless to say, the sources and citations in my FTM2014 Swicegood file need a lot of work. In my own defense, there were no templates or suggested formats when I started creating my sources, so I just created my own with as much information as I had at hand. It's obviously time to either (a) work through all of these sources and citations and standardize them, or (b) start over with a new FTM file and carefully source/cite EVERY fact in a standardized fashion.