I have been musing on how hard it will be for future generations to research me for primary documents in genealogy. Of course, I have no children so no future generations of my progeny will be researching me. But maybe a descendant of my six nieces and nephews might be interested in filling out the family tree and start a project on me. After all I wrote 40 articles on genealogy and they may wish to know how I fit in.
Off the bat, you won't be able to find my birth certificate. My parents lived in Jersey City, NJ but my mother had gone to school in New York City and her doctor contacts were there. So my birth certificate is in Manhattan although I was there for only a week. I suppose you will be able to find my parents in the Jersey City directory for that time period.
After that I appear in the 1970 and 1980 censuses in Pompton Plains, New Jersey with my family. I went to college several states over so how you find that out is a question. By 1990 I'm in Somerville, Massachusetts with Michael. Will they look at domestic partnership records in Cambridge, Massachusetts? By 2000, I'm in Belmont, California. Again will they check domestic partnership records in California State or San Francisco County? In 2004 I got married in San Francisco, but that marriage was annulled by the California Supreme Court. Is there any record of that?
In 2005 I got married again in Boston, Massachusetts. In 2010 I'll be in the census in Boston. In 2020 I'll be in the census in Norwood, Massachusetts. But there are only land records to prove my residency in Florida from 2020 to 2024. And now I'm in Delaware where I intend to stay and could be the place where my death certificate and will will be and possibly my grave.
Land records are county by county so you'd have to search a wide swath to find the counties in which I owned property. And some of the properties were investments and I never lived there. I have owned property in North Carolina but never lived there. Otherwise you miss San Francisco and Wilton Manors.
I've left a slew of records but I think my peripatetic nature will make them hard to find.
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