Dalarna research

There hasn't been much going on this past week. Except work, and that was also rather uneventful. It was my turn to drive to the remote storages and it was not pleasant. My back is not really in favor of that kind of heavy lifting. I have made an appointment with my chiropractor on Tuesday.

Saturday I once again went to the flea market, but didn't find much. I got a brand new handbag for 20 SEK, that was all. I then took the bus out to the archive, which is situated in an industrial area east of the town center. This is also where we have one of the remote storages. This time I actually did some research for myself. My paternal grandmother had assembled some family information about 25 years ago, and there were considerable gaps on one side. There wasn't much about my grandfather's father's side. This part of the family lived in Dalarna province (towns Hedemora and Garpenberg), and that's not an area I'm used to searching in. I have to say that it was easier than expected. First of all, most of the household records had indices, both village- and name-indices. Wonderful aids for a researcher. Then these people didn't move around much, they tended to stay where they were born. Also something you prefer in cases like this. It took about four hours to get three more generations on my grandfather's father's side. Most of them were farmers or worked at the ironworks. When I came home I searched the internet for those names and found that someone else has done even more. For part of the ancestor chart there were names back to about 1650. I will make an ancestor chart for my grandfather and give it to him on his birthday in about two weeks. It will be his 95th birthday and he plans on celebrating with a lunch at a restaurant. We are all amazed at his good health.

Today I have cleaned the stove and vacuumed. Not much else, apart from the vain attempts at keeping the genealogy and other documents off the floor. I counted the number of folders I have associated with genealogy - 75! And then there are heaps of papers everywhere which are not yet filed.