Recently I discovered there was a published book called Descendants of John Cox of Abington, Indiana and Joseph Cox of Hampton, Illinois by Ruth Anna Hicks and William Jerome Utermohlen. It was published in 2007. I went to the website, found the email address and sent an email to Mr. Utermohlen to make sure they still had copies of this book.
They did. Not only that, the price was reduced significantly. A bargain. Who doesn't love a bargain. Between the time I ordered it until it arrived, I'd found a few comments about the book. I was pretty excited. My expectations were very high.
That's usually a pretty fatal combination. A bargain and high expectations.
This time, it was a winning combo. My expectations fell way short of the quality of this book. I've seen several family books. My mother even published one on the Braden side of our family. This is by far the most professional family book I have ever seen.
It's loaded with facts, supporting documents, pictures and stories about my ancestors on that line of the family. I knew there would be a picture of Rachel Cox Knight, my great, great, great grandmother in the book.
The picture of Samuel was that nugget of gold. I don't believe my mother ever saw a picture of Samuel Knight. I know she did of Rachel, since she had one of Rachel in the stash I have custody of now.
This book contained information about Samuel's life. Another nugget. Samuel's grandson was my great grandfather. He didn't know much about his father or grandfather. Samuel's son, my great grandfather's father, died when my great grandfather was four years old. I never expected to learn much about Samuel. I didn't even dream that one day I'd see a picture of him.
It's not a great picture. I did email Mr. Utermohlen so see if he could email me a scanned copy of the picture they used in the book. He did so. I took that scanned copy and cropped it to where we have a picture of Samuel Knight. Bill Utermohlen said the original was a tin type picture and his partner in the publication of their book was sent a photocopy of the picture. He wasn't sure exactly who sent Ruth Anna the copy, but possibly either Eleanor Antes or Jerry Cox.
Is that information important? Of course it is. As far as I know this is the only picture of Samuel Knight. The trail of where the copy came from is important to keep it attributed to my great, great, great grandfather who was named Samuel Knight, born 1799, Pennsylvania, died, 1867, Iowa.
There are a lot of Samuel Knight's in this world. Today and from all our yesterdays. All of us love pictures of our family, even those who were gone long before we were born. The chances are very high for someone who has an ancestor named Samuel Knight, born 1810, New York, died 1894, Iowa to claim this picture as his ancestor. Because I asked about the history of this photograph, it's easier to stake my claim to this being my ancestor and not belonging to the other Samuel Knights.
Each time we get a nugget of gold, it's our job, the genealogist -- the chosen -- the story tellers -- to not only preserve the information, including pictures and documents, but the history of how each piece was obtained. It helps to prove this belongs to our ancestor when someone later comes along and attributes it to their ancestor, who obviously isn't our ancestor.
Protect your ancestors with the same vigor you use to protect your descendants.
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