Irish Surname Variation
Here are a few helpful links I’ve found on Irish surname variation.
Author: JackI retired in 2008 and so I have more time now to devote to several of my interests The blog here is mainly for my interests in some current events but may have the occasional rant on other subjects. I have also decided to keep my genealogy posts and book reviews here instead of 2 additional blogs (and so simplify my life a little).
Matthew Greer, son of John
This is about Matthew Greer. But there are 3 people in my family tree named Matthew Greer and so I specified above that he was the son of John Greer.
This Matthew Greer lived at home, first with his parent and then his widowed mother. In the last record I found on him, he was living with his mother in the 1925 New York census. Then the trail went cold. I could not find him in subsequent census records or in any type of record. Continue reading “Matthew Greer, son of John”
Help with Irish research
These tips will point you in the direction of some good resources. In your case, some may be helpful and some not so helpful.
1. Maybe someone has already done a good bit of work on your family but you don’t know it. Perhaps a third or fourth cousin you don’t know. Or there might be some people searching the same surname who are not closely related but may have some advice. One way to check that out is my surname page (not ready yet) . Another option is to use Google or some other search engine to find the names that interest you. Be creative in your search terms!
2. There are also mailing lists where you get emails on a topic which could be a surname or an interest such as Irish genealogy or even as local as Co Limerick genealogy. Maillists work by sending a copy of each message to posted to all subscribers. Some lists are very small and some are large. Continue reading “Help with Irish research”
The Forgotten Room
The Forgotten Room: A Novel by Lincoln Child was an enjoyable book.
The opening chapter got my attention. Then I thought the next part was just interesting enough to keep me turn pages. Since I read this on my Kindle Fire, I kept touching the screen to advance to the next page. This would be about 20% of the book or about 60 pages since the hardback is a bit over 300 pages. Continue reading “The Forgotten Room”
War on Science
There seems to be a war on science. I am a scientist so my bias is to believe something is probable when most reputable scientists in the relevant field say it is true.
Sure, science gets is wrong once every now and then but not very often. Science is a self-correcting process and mistakes are normally discovered pretty quickly. I suppose a betting man would lose a lot of money by betting against something that most scientists agree with. Continue reading “War on Science”
My Irish genealogy website
I am continuing the update of my Irish genealogy website.
The site serves as the County Limerick pages for IrelandGenWeb. In addition, I have a good place to read or post genealogical queries on the name Reidy and its variants. Also some good information of the REIDY, RIEDY, REEDY, READY, etc name.
The site has lots of links and resources for those of us with family from County Limerick.
I had a good bit of information on Irish Genealogy and I expect it will all be there shortly. Right now I have almost everything on the Reidy name moved, a most of what I have on County Limerick, and some general Irish genealogy information.
And it is all free to use.
The Conservatarian Manifesto reviewed
I’ve spent a good amount of time the past few weeks reading this book, thinking, re-reading, and re-thinking my ideas about politics. Although far from being a believer in the right-wing of American politics, I thought this was a very good book.
The Conservatarian Manifesto: Libertarians, Conservatives, and the Fight for the Right’s Future by Charles C.W. Cooke presents his beliefs that neither conservatives nor libertarians have a coherent solution to good governing. Continue reading “The Conservatarian Manifesto reviewed”
Major update of my website
I’m pretty busy these days updating my website.
The site is a work in progress as I’ve recent changed from HTML to WordPress. In the long-term I think this will be an improvement. I will be able to do more things and hope to improve the site as I learn. But right now my major task is trying to move all the content from my old site.
It is taking longer than expected. And it is also more work than I expected. But I guess that is the price of progress. A good bit of what I had has been moved over but much is still left to be done.
I had a good bit of information on Irish Genealogy and I expect it will all be there shortly. Right now I have almost everything on the Reidy name moved, a good bit on County Limerick, and relatively little on general Irish information and Irish surnames.
When should I take Social Security?
I’ve been doing this blog called the RetiredGuy and I picked that name because I am a retired guy, I like being retired and I wanted to express my opinions on a variety of issues. But despite calling the blog the RetiredGuy, I usually don’t address retirement issues issues in a big way.
But what started me thinking about was an email discussion of when to start taking Social Security among my high school classmates. Most of us are still working but a few (like me) decided to retire early.
So I looked into Social Security because a big question is Continue reading “When should I take Social Security?”
Politics of potholes
Having just written about potholes, I was wondering why politicians seem to ignore them.
Fixing potholes would seem to be an issue with considerable popular support. I live in Pennsylvania and potholes are a big problem. They make driving dangerous. You could easy lose control of your car while swerving to avoid a pothole or lose control after hitting a big one. Or someone else could and you could end up in the accident.
Nobody likes a pothole. Continue reading “Politics of potholes”
Prevent Potholes
According to AAA (quoted in a report by WUSA ) damage to cars will cost motorists 6.4 billion dollars this year.
Road departments will be busy filling in potholes now that the winter weather is behind us. But would it not be better if we could prevent potholes from forming on our roads.
Can the roads be made to prevent potholes from forming or at least make it less likely? I suspect the answer is YES.
Continue reading “Prevent Potholes”
Walker v. Sons of Confederate Veterans and offensive license plates
A case before the Supreme Court (Walker v. Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, Inc.) contests whether the state of Texas can decide not to issue specialty license plates bearing a Confederate battle flag.
At one time license plates (called tags in some locales) just served to identify the car for law enforcement purposes. But states realized they could make money by allowing those with registered vehicles to pay a bit extra to have specialty license plates with a logo or message on them.
Texas law gives the state the right to reject specialty license plates that are offensive. But some things are offensive to a few, and others offensive to many. Is this standard vague? Continue reading “Walker v. Sons of Confederate Veterans and offensive license plates”
Social Security Budget
One of the many things that impressed me when reading Social Security – Get What’s Yours was that the budget for administering Social Security is clearly inadequate.
Budget cuts have caused the Social Security Administration to cut services in a time of growing demand. The baby boomers are getting to retirement age and we can only expect demands on the Social Security Budget to increase. We should expect better from our government.
Secret Science
Let me start by saying that as a scientist I am against the idea of secret science. Science should be an open process and certainly not secret.
But sometimes, it isn’t. And there is nothing sinister about that. And certainly no need to be reformed. However, that is not what this bill is about. If science needed to be reformed and it doesn’t, Congress is the last place I would think of. Continue reading “Secret Science”
Newspapers for genealogy
I’ve been doing genealogy and finding things on family members for years. Over a year ago, I decided to try newspapers for genealogy.
Not exactly a new approach. I had used the occasional search of free resources. I did some research on the Library of Congress site. And the New York Times site. The Times does limit you if you don’t subscribe but we do so there was no problem.
I had found a few things Continue reading “Newspapers for genealogy”