
“Everything is relative except relatives,
and they are absolute.”
-Alfred Steiglitz
Family history is a way to bring our ancestors to life.
This blog details my journey as a genealogist and is a means to record my notes, recent discoveries, and the stories of my ancestors. The goal of Relatively is to inspire other family historians to preserve and share their own family stories.
RECENT POSTS
Great-Grandpa’s Big Invention
My great-grandfather, Clarkson Valentine Hendrickson Jr. (1890–1964) was a mechanical engineer or draftsman as I remember my father describing his occupation. But I never had…
Harold Ewart’s Passport to Nowhere
Growing up I remember my mom carrying around her father’s seaman passport photo. It was one of only a few she had of him. He…
An Unexpected Connection at Green-Wood Cemetery
Have you experienced any strange coincidences in your family tree? By definition, a coincidence is a remarkable concurrence of events or circumstances without apparent causal…
Citizen Alfred Knowles
It’s unclear when most of my ancestors became American citizens. Some immigrated to the U.S. before the American Revolution, while others arrived as late as…
Unsolved Mystery: The Woman in the Window
Old family photos are some of the most treasured records in a family history, capturing fleeting moments in an ancestor’s life. I’m fortunate to have…
Clarkson V. Hendrickson vs. the United States
My great-great-grandfather Clarkson V. Hendrickson, Sr., and Jasper Chisholm, a coworker, filed a claim against the United States in 1912 for payment of overtime work…
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