I have no idea who Duncan I, King of Scotland, was.
Apparently he was born in 1001 and lived for 39 years.
Duncan I was part of several pieces of a puzzle given to me by Brent and Donna Haroldsen.
The puzzle is essentially a mosaic of ancestors that — once assembled — creates a map that allows you to partake in the ultimate scavenger hunt that allows you to piece together glimpses into the lives those that make up your family tree.
The Manteca couple are genealogy enthusiasts both by faith and by passion. They also happen to be history buffs which dovetails well into their interest in genealogy.
Volunteers with LDS
Family History Center
The Haroldsens are part of the volunteers than help oversee The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Manteca Family History Center located at the Stake Center at 6060 Northland Road.
Prior to a month ago, I had little working knowledge of anyone on my father’s side save for his mother and his maternal grandmother. That wasn’t the case for my mom’s side of the family that I knew lived in California predating statehood.
It helped that my Grandmother Edna Towle shared family stories with me and the fact that many of my maternal relatives were woven in tightly with early Placer County history from owning the lumber company that supplied the lumber for the original snow sheds for the Central Pacific Railroad over Donner Summit to owning the ranch where the deposits of high quality kaolin clay were discovered while the county was cutting a road north of Lincoln. The discovery ultimately lured a pair of enterprising men — Charles Gladding and Peter McBean — to start a lay products plant in 1875 that is still in business today.
The LDS church uses genealogy to unite families. Their doctrine teaches marriage and family can continue beyond this life. While non-Mormons may not share the same exact beliefs but it is clear genealogy unites families in that it can — if you dig deep enough — give you a peek into the lives of those that preceded you.
FamilySource is
extensive genealogical
treasure trove
The Manteca Family History Center is one of more than 5,100 worldwide under the umbrella of FamilySearch that offers assistance. It is a non-profit operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints offering genealogical records, education, resources, and services.
The FamilyService website is free to anyone although it requires registration.
The church since the late 19th century has traveled the world copying any official records they were allowed to — birth, death, marriage, census, and more. As a result FamilySearch is arguably the world’s foremost single source of genealogy information complete with digitalized books, digitalized newspapers, digitalized records and more to account for more than 2 billion digital records.
The website’s Family Tree features more than a billion individuals. It allowed user generated content to be added to the tree.
Which brings us back to Duncan I.
Brent Haroldsen noted searches become more difficult going back beyond the mid-19th century and are almost impossible once census records start drying up around the 1500s. Before that it takes something such as royalty in your family tree to glean much information.
The question is how accurate the user generated content you come across can be. Haroldsen noted sometimes people will embellish what they post. Apparently those more into trying to one up others than painting a clear picture of their family tree. It is why he advises using the information as a starting point to retrace your family history.
Sometimes the information may be correct to a degree. One obituary from the 1920s of a Wyatt mentioned he worked for PG&E for 40 plus years starting in the late 19th century. PG&E wasn’t founded until 1905 although some of the power/water firms they acquired did go back into the previous century.
In doing verification searches through emails and such you are likely to communicate with relatives you never knew you had.
In the case of Donna Haroldsen who was adopted, it allowed her to find family members she had no idea existed.
You can even find out
in the 1920 census if
an ancestor owned a radio
Haroldsen pointed out searching through records is part of the fun of piecing your family puzzle together. Census records, depending upon the decade, will give you information about ancestors such as their occupation, where they immigrated from, whether they owned a radio, if they rented or owned their home and if they did own how much they paid for it, and who their parents were.
Some voter rolls back in the 19th century included helpful information verifying voters with a scar on their left hand, those that walked with a limp, and other identifying marks that would help prove who they said they were.
Duncan I — if correct — goes back 28 generations on my father’s side.
The wealth of information that allows you to fill in many blanks can be found in more recent times.
The Haroldsens created a “fan” of information already on the Family Search data base Family Tree regarding both my father’s and mother’s side. It lists names along with birth and death dates with color coding to represent their birth country.
The fan so far shows what is available for what others have researched that by father’s side of my family tree is 51 percent German. No surprise there given my father’s name was Frederick Beerman Wyatt. From there the rest of the family tree going back nine generations is 15 percent England, 13 percent United Kingdom, 10 percent United States 10 percent, and unknown 11 percent.
It surprised me that 42 percent of my mother’s side going back nine generations were tied to British Colonial America based on research others had done that can be found on the FamilySource Family Tree.
My surprise is probably because between the ages of 6 and 9 every time my grandmother babysat me while my mom was working I got verbal family history lessons concentrated exclusively going back five generations as a Californian along with advice coupled with stories as to why one shouldn’t walk around with chips on one’s shoulder. That talk was sandwiched in between games of Chinese Checkers and solitaire.
I also read most of the 19th century volume of the History of Placer and Nevada Counties that tied various maternal ancestors to New England states but no farther back.
As for my father’s side, my cousin Larry used to joke that funerals were Wyatt family reunions. He wasn’t far off the mark. Couple that with the fact no one was exactly talkative about family and the farthest I could go back on my paternal side before meeting the Haroldsens was my great grandmother Mary Beerman. She was an educator who had Lincoln’s first substantial elementary school named after her. I went to school there. The campus was knocked down in 1969 — the same year Manteca High’s beloved tower met its fate. The Mary Beerman School — just like the old Manteca High — was expected to come down in two days as it was no longer considered safe in an earthquake. And just like Manteca High the first attempts to knock it down failed requiring even heavier demolition equipment to be brought in.
What is known via the Family Tree of the maternal side shows 44 percent going back nine generations were born in the United States. The rest is split between England, Scotland, Germany and the big surprise — a slice of Switzerland.
Items they also pulled off as example from the treasure trove of FamilySource documents available to anyone that registers on the site included a wealth of information on both sides of my family printed in the weekly Lincoln News Messenger when I worked there, long before I did, and stories on pioneer families written after I left.
If you are interested in tracing your family history and would like some assistance getting started, you can contact the Manteca Family History Center at (209) 239-5516 during hours of operation. Those hours when the pandemic guidelines are not in place are Mondays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. as well as Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Sundays from 6 to 9 p.m.
As for my family tree, I guess I’ll have to find out if I really do have some royalty back before the Domesday Book — a great land and property survey was commissioned in 1088 by William the Conqueror to assess his new possessions — or if I’m just a royal pain.
To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com
