Another thought.
The house genealogy is a good point. Take the house builder's family and
research it back to their beginnings in this country and IF possible to
their homeland. IF possible.
If you or your students don't want to do that, take a person of your
interests. Washington's family history or Joe Schmidt from down the street.
Audie Murphy or Medal of Honor winners.
Horse racers or bootleggers. I have found finding the 'outlaw' in the family
that your mom and aunts don't talk about is very interesting.
Genealogy for the unknown person can be fun as well.
JPA
Texas
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mel
Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2015 10:15 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: VA-HIST Digest - 26 Jun 2015 to 29 Jun 2015 (#2015-78)
House histories are really interesting. We have one for our house, built in
1869, and you learn a lot from delving.
~Nurture your empathy~
> On Jun 30, 2015, at 11:43 AM, Leland Ness <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> That is an excellent point.
>
> Genealogy will not always work for US history courses. Some students will
be recent immigrants, while others may have environments at home that will
cause them to resist family research. For such students "micro-history" may
well be a suitable substitute. Research your house, if it is an old one. If
not, find another house that looks old and cool that you pass by, or perhaps
even a commercial building, and research that. They can find the names of
owners and root around in the census records and online newspaper archives
and try to piece together their stories.
>
> Of course, that is easier as the dates of course coverage get more recent.
Finding houses from 1900 or 1920 is not that hard. But if you need to find
one from the 18th century, then the pickings get pretty slim in many areas.
Perhaps the history of a road or street?
>
> Anyway, I am a big believer in that sort of "micro-history".
>
> Lee Ness
> Town of Potomac (VA) Historical Assn.
>
> -----Original Message----- From: Liana Arias
> Sent: Tuesday, June 30, 2015 8:44 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] VA-HIST Digest - 26 Jun 2015 to 29 Jun 2015
> (#2015-78)
>
> As a foreigner who bought a very old house in Roanoke Virginia and
> decided to follow the link of the families in my house back in time
> (to the 1740's!) I can assure you that it was surprisingly rewarding
> and it helped me learn so much about the local history and customs as
> well as the history of those countries my homeowners left and their
> movements in the US following regional happenings. History, as it was
> mentioned below, stopped being a series of dates and names and became
> something more interesting even that tv sagas sometimes are because it
> was real, pertinent and interesting. It allowed me to have a logical,
> linear understanding of history over time that many, many years of
studying history in Spanish schools could not
> accomplish. As you can see, it does not have to even be personal
genealogy
> either.If you can develop a link your students can understand between
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