Cathy Pouls can trace her family's presence in Rochester back to
1830, just 13 years after the town's founding. Of Scots-Irish and
English descent, she's working on going back further - much further.
"My goal has been to get as many lines as I can back to the
boat," she said. When she hits a roadblock in one branch of the
family, she starts on another, "because you have that craving."
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Genealogy is something of an
addiction for Pouls, who lives in Rochester Hills. So much so that
it doesn't even have to be her own family she's researching. A
member of several heritage groups, Pouls has been working to secure
the community's historical records for future generations.
She has digitized the records of veterans buried at Mt. Avon
Cemetery.
Last year she began methodically reading, retyping and digitizing
records of births, marriages and deaths in Rochester, starting with
copies of the Rochester Era newspaper going back to 1883. Her work
is being added to the Web site of the Rochester-Avon Historical
Society as it becomes available.
"It's going to be a slow process," Pouls said, adding that she
hopes to complete the records to 1914. She enjoys reading the
flowery language of the time and has come to the conclusion that the
more lavish the language, the more well-liked was the dearly
departed.
"I really love reading these obituaries; they're a delight," she
said. "And when you transcribe them, you transcribe them as written.
So it looks like you're making a lot of grammatical errors, but
you're not."
FILLING IN GAPS
Pouls' home is filled with photos and mementoes of her family and
boxes containing research projects in process. She started getting
interested in genealogy at age 16 and says her grandfather left
complete records, though they were a bit hard to decipher.
"I kept hearing these names as a child, but didn't know who they
were," she said. Several other family members contributed notes and
old newspapers.
"That's what really got me started thinking, 'I've got to do
something about this,'" she said. "I was able to fill in a lot of
gaps, learn a lot of new things. If my father was alive he would
say, 'I don't believe this.'"
Today she spends time at the library, viewing microfilm, printing
out announcements, then taking them home to type. She also helps
others research their own family histories.
Over the years she's learned a lot about good and bad sources for
doing genealogical research. She said knowing the difference is
crucial.
"Do not take everything you see on the Web as gospel, especially
if it's not sourced. Some of it is fiction," she said. "
You can't document your genealogy with sources that are not
acceptable."
For anyone just starting the process, she suggests starting with
census information: "Start with yourself ... and work your way
back."
After a decade of doing this kind of research, Pouls said every
new find of good, verifiable information is a joy.
"It's kind of fun," she said. "I love it."
akingsbury@hometownlife.com
(248) 651-7575, ext. 17
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