Gathering our family history is like gathering our family around us. The process expands our universe and our hearts and creates a sense of something divine and spiritual. The gathering process lasts a lifetime, but the foundation can be laid now to make the lifetime process easier and habit-forming. Our family members will continue to be born, marry and die and their daily lives will be filled with hopes, dreams and disappointments. If we do not record the lives of those we love, their stories will be lost with our memories of them.
As time passes, and as we keep looking, more information will become available which will give our ancestors life and we will grow to love them, even though we might not have ever met them in life. We will begin to understand that we are fulfilling a sacred obligation to find them and that they are waiting for us. Our posterity will know where we placed value by our efforts and examples and they will be inspired to continue the process.
Always begin at the beginning. This means that YOU are number one. That means that you if you are single or you and your spouse if you are married are the beginning point for the process of gathering and compiling a family history. Everything flows backwards, forward and sideways from you. The reasons why will become apparent as you proceed.
A common mistake people make is to find interest in a particular ancestor who is known, whose descendants through your direct line are NOT known. That is why it is important to start in the present and work backwards, not the other way around. Starting in the past is backwards.
A LOUD word of caution as you begin the gathering process: People love their stories, even if the stories are not true or correct. There is usually a grain of truth in most family stories, but often they are embellished or altered to fit the picture of life an individual wants to paint. This is particularly true if there are some perceived negative events in a person’s life.
Truth and accuracy are essential when gathering information for and compiling a family history. However, some secrets are secret for a reason and should be kept or at least tempered with the feelings of others in mind.
Start With Your Immediate Family
Gather the following for your immediate family group. This means you, your spouse and your children.
{This list is oriented towards members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints but includes most things in common with all denominations}
- Birth Certificates
- Certificates of Blessing or Christening
- Certificates of Baptism
- Certificates of Priesthood Organization
- Priesthood Lines of Authority
- Certificates of Advancement in Church Organizations
- Patriarchal Blessings
- Marriage Certificates
- Death Certificates
- Family Photographs
- Individual Photographs
{ If you are a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, your ward clerk can give you your Family Membership Record which contains all of the ordinance dates for you and your family }
Gather the following for your parents.
- Birth Certificates
- Marriage Certificates
- Death Certificates
- Photographs
- Personal History, Oral or Written, Biographical or Autobiographical
Gather the following for your siblings.
- A Family Group Sheet for each family complete with all birth, death and marriage dates and places for each member of the family
- A family photograph and individual photographs of each family member
Gather the following for your parents’ siblings. {your uncles and aunts on both sides of your family}
- A Family Group Sheet for each family complete with all birth death and marriage dates and places for each member of the family. That means that if your uncle has five children, you will ask for a family group sheet for your uncle and his spouse and EACH of his five children.
- Family group and individual photographs
When you gather information for your own family, the families of your siblings, your parents, your aunts, uncles and cousins and grandparents . . . it is easy to see the importance of starting here. Your living family becomes quite large in many cases.
BE PATIENT. While this information is important to you, it may not be to others. In fact, most people don’t have the information you are asking for. They haven’t cemented their families in time and so they must begin in the same place . . . with themselves.
This keepsake photograph was taken in about 1946. It shows two of the three sons of Everest Elliott Watrous and his deceased wife Mary Maria Jenkins. Wayne is on the left, Ray is in the middle and Everest Elliott Watrous in on the right. Ray is holding his youngest child Thomas. On the left in front is Wayne’s son Gary and on the right is Mervin’s son Michael. We assume that Mervin is the photographer. This keepsake photograph was taken in Salt Lake City, Utah.
This keepsake photograph shows Everest Elliott Watrous 1883-1958 with his son Everest Raymond Watrous, 1909-1989. They are our direct ancestors. This photograph was taken in the mountains of Utah, their home. It is thought that it was taken in about 1925 when Ray was about sixteen. Don’t you love Everest’s lace-up boots and their wonderful walking sticks?
These snowshoes were made in the 1950s by Everest Raymond Watrous for his family. Two pair are in our home and others are in the homes various family members. He loved to work with leather and knew just what to do. He often said that he learned how from his father. There was very little he couldn’t do. Each winter, someone takes them down from the shelf and goes for a snowshoe hike. Our modern snowshoes are shorter and wider. They are much easier to walk with. But, no one seems to care about that. There is something magical about going for a hike in the snowshoes Grandpa made, especially in the beautiful Utah mountains we call home.
Elsewhere on this site are photographs of the Little Mountain Ski Hill. This was a resort in Emigration Canyon created through the partnership of direct ancestor Everest Raymond Watrous and his friend Mel Henshaw. It was just a few minutes from downtown Salt Lake City. This venture offered night skiing under lights, complete with polka music over a loud speaker. A rope tow pulled skiers from the bottom of the hill to the top. Comparing the 1940s to today, it is easy to see that even large families could afford to spend a little money for an evening of skiing. It is hard to understand how the proprietors could make anything for their troubles. Their experiment lasted for about three seasons before their lease from the Forest Service was up and they discontinued the operation. Today, Little Mountain is a popular place for sledding at no cost.
Direct ancestor Everest Raymond Watrous began his career working for the Safeway Stores. He began as a produce manager and worked his way through the store. This experience helped him to prepare for his dream career which was owning and operating his own stores. He built The Home and Garden Variety Store at 1700 South and 1700 East in Salt Lake City, Utah which was extremely successful. He also owned and operated The Brighton Village Store in Big Cottonwood Canyon outside of Salt Lake City, Utah. Both stores have since been razed. On the site of the variety store is a gas station and on the site of the canyon store is an overflow lot for skiers.
This wonderful keepsake portrait was taken about 1912. It is Everest Raymond Watrous, direct ancestor and youngest son of Everest Elliott Watrous and Mary Maria Jenkins. It is in the possession of his daughter Carolyn in Salt Lake City, Utah.
This is the funeral program for Clara Lzina Barker Pugmire who died of cancer in 1969. She left behind thirty-two grandchildren, eighteen great grandchildren and seven children. All seven of her children attended her funeral. She had been a widow for 20 years. Funeral programs are wonderful sources of family history information. They are also wonderful sources for noting changes in culture. For example, it used to be the case that each funeral in Salt Lake City received an escort from local police from the church to the cemetery. It also used to be the case that all mourners followed the hearse in their cars with their lights on. People usually stopped and let the entire cortege pass. As the city became larger and larger, both practices ceased. The program is also interesting because it was made by typewriter rather than the computer style we are used to today.
Lois Margaret Schillinger was born in Moline, Illinois in 1901 to Albert Jerome Schillinger and Margaret Conley. She was the second child and only daughter of four children born to her parents. At a young age, Lois became involved with a young man named Luke P. Young who played in a band. They married before 1920 when a son was born to them. We assume that his name was Jerome Young. However, as the story of Lois will tell, we aren’t sure. Through her relationship with her husband Luke, Lois contracted syphilis. Syphilis was not yet understood as it is today and thus it progressed until Lois was institutionalized at the State Hospital in Moline, Illinois. She was twenty-five years of age. Prior to her commitment, she was living in the home of her aunt Rebecca Schillinger Clark and Rebecca’s husband Albert. Lois’ son is also found in the residence. After Lois was admitted to the State Hospital, her aunt Rebecca and Uncle Albert Clark adopted and raised her son. She was unable to care for him as her mental illness intensified. In fact, Lois spent eleven years, seven months and 13 days in the Hospital where she died.
Subsequent censuses list Lois’ son as Jerome Clark. While he was listed as a survivor in his adopted father’s obituary in 1949, we do not know what happened to him. Family members closer to this family do not know anything else about him.
The day before Lois died, her aunt Josephine Schillinger Porter paid for her funeral. Josephine and Rebecca Clark were sisters. While the obituary that was provided by Lois’ family states that she died at home, she actually died in the State Hospital in Moline. A small family service was held prior to her burial at the young age of thirty five.
Our ancestor Jerome Timothy Watrous had a daughter named Caroline Malone Watrous who married Martin Schillinger. Among their children were Albert Jerome, who was Lois’ father, Rebecca, who was Lois’ aunt and the adopted mother of Lois’ son Jerome, and Josephine who paid for Lois’ funeral. Jerome Watrous had been married to Olivia Burke Muse who was Caroline Watrous Schillinger’s mother. When Jerome Watrous married for a second time, after Olivia’s death, his wife Mary June Reynolds became our direct ancestor through their son Henry Reynolds Watrous. Thus, direct ancestor Jerome Timothy Watrous was the grandfather of Lois Margaret Schillinger Young as well as the grandfather of direct ancestor Everest Elliott Watrous. Everest and Lois were first cousins.
This is a sad story. Family members do not have a photograph of Lois or any additional information about her.
Direct ancestor Clara Lzina Barker attended the St. Charles Ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints in the small, farming community of St. Charles, Bear Lake County, Idaho. This photograph was taken about 1900.