2014: The Year of Pilgrimage

This calendar year promises to be one of greatness on a myriad of levels, and the research of the family is certainly one of those levels. I anticipate this being a year in which many family history questions will be answered (and many posed, as I have learned that every answer brings with it at least three questions, particularly as it relates to the quest of learning history of from whence we come).

According to a word study as it relates to the word ‘journey’, found in the second edition of the Oxford Pocket Dictionary and Thesaurus, a journey suggests that a considerable amount of time and distance will be covered while a pilgrimage is applicable to a journey that is undertaken for a specific purpose. Ah, that is exactly what this endeavor is, a pilgrimage. I am on a journey, one on which I hope you will join me, to learn as much as I can, and share that knowledge with you, about those who came before, those who paved the way for us. I am on a mission to give voice to the Ancestors, to tell as much of their story as I possibly can, to connect past and present.

This year, I hope to learn more about, introduce you to, or reconnect you with Henry TRIBBLE, Benjamin SULLIVAN, Melinda KIMBROUGH, George GULLICK, Nannie SEAMAN/NAPIER, Alfred SAMUELS (and his brothers) and SO many more. I hope to share with you research challenges and receive insight from you. I hope, that in the process of giving voice to the Ancestors, we connect and build stronger bonds as a family—that we are able to get to know each other, that we can begin and continue to create beautiful legacies for our children, grandchildren, nieces, and nephews.

I do not research in hopes of ‘gathering dirt’ or locating proverbial ‘skeletons in closets’. I research to learn, to grow, to connect. There are certainly wonderful and joyous finds, just as there are some heartbreaking finds—but they are all part of our legacy, and it is my mission to share it all, in grace, in love, with respect for both those gone before and those still with us in this realm. I hope you will join me as I make this pilgrimage—undertake this journey, if even just for the ride.