Thinking about John M. Smith’s date of birth

If I’m believing the information given in the Oscar Smith biography, John M. Smith was an early pioneer of Danville, Kentucky.  The wording in the biography – “the pioneer of the family in Kentucky” – made me think of researching the first settlers in Kentucky in nearby Fort Harrod, but maybe that’s not quite right. [...]

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1st Land Grants of (Current) Mercer County, Kentucky

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~kymercer/grants.html – Also has a nice history of County Formations for the area. Smith Zachariah 400 Harrods Run 02-07-1780 1-9 1000 Harrods Run 05-29-1780 1-56 Zachariah had a brother named John…

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Naming Patterns – Thinking Out Loud

I’m still obsessed with John M. Smith (1760-ish – 1835) and trying to make a connection between him and a Smith family from the first permanent settlement in Kentucky – Fort Harrod.  John has been a brick wall for a long time, and some of the information I’ve discovered in the last year has given [...]

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Harrodsburg Original Land Grants Map

This is on my computer desktop. I have no idea where I found this, although it HAD to be through a Google Books search because of the highlighted words.  I tried to find it again, but no luck…  Wish I could get rid of the highlights.

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THE hint

This is the hint that started my Danville quest.  From “The History of Kentucky” (written in 1922) page 437-438 found in Google Books. (My own additions in parentheses.) Oscar M. Smith has been a member of the Russellville bar for fourteen years, and during a large part of that time has occupied his present position [...]

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Early Kentucky History Research

Thinking about RootsTech has got me in a genealogy mood, so I’m trying to think of “quick” things I can research and accumulate that might be helpful to me when I have a full day to research.  I’ve decided to concentrate on my Smith line.  (Doesn’t everyone have a Smith line?) I have a brick [...]

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A New Puzzle

This week, my library received the FHL films that I ordered for Kentucky Land Grants.  I had 4 specific grants to look at.  I thought they would be certificates of some kind and I probably wouldn’t get much information from them, but instead, they look like deeds with land descriptions and such.  Neat!  But they [...]

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A Wonderful Find – Now What?

I’m so excited about some discoveries I’ve made doing research with Google since Saturday! I had read a story that one of my ancestors, along with his brothers, had a trading post in the Danville, Kentucky area around the time of Kentucky statehood and I wanted to try to confirm that.  The last ancestor that [...]

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Smith Feast or Smith Famine!

I’m continuing on my search for information on John M. Smith (17?? – 1835). Here’s what I know: Russell County Kentucky was formed in Dec/Jan of 1825/26. John Smith “of Russell County” bought 100 acres in April 1827 and appears in the Russell County tax list for the first time. On Dec 31, 1827, John [...]

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John M. Smith (AKA The Brick Wall)

I’ve been researching John M. Smith for years. YEARS! He definitely falls into my “Madness Monday” category! Here’s what I know about John M. Smith I know that John was listed in the Russell County tax records from 1827 – 1835. I know that John was listed in the 1830 Russell County Census. In the [...]

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