Moon & Yew Genealogy

07/27/2025

Today is National New Jersey Day—a time to celebrate our state's rich history, vibrant culture, and lasting contributions to the American story!

For centuries, New Jersey has been home to the Lenape tribe, whose descendants remain an essential part of our state. While the Lenapes' broader range was called Lenapehoking, several sources refer to the New Jersey region specifically as Scheyichbi. Later, Swedish and Dutch settlers established the first European communities here.

New Jersey became a British colony on 24 June 1664, after England seized land previously held by the Dutch. Half the territory was granted to Sir George Carteret for his loyalty and defense of the Isle of Jersey during the English Civil War. Thus, "New Jersey" was born.

For over a century, New Jersey was divided into East and West sections, with frequent disputes over land, leadership, and borders. By 1776, those tensions fed into the push for independence. New Jersey declared statehood six months before the Declaration of Independence and adopted one of the earliest state constitutions. It played a vital role in the Revolutionary War, hosting over 100 engagements—earning it the nickname "Crossroads of the American Revolution." On 18 December 1787, New Jersey ratified the US Constitution, becoming the third state to join the Union. On 20 November 1789, it was the first to ratify the Bill of Rights.

During the Civil War, New Jersey remained loyal to the Union, sending troops, leaders, and essential resources to defeat the Confederacy. In the postwar era, the state welcomed waves of immigrants who helped fuel the Industrial Revolution and cemented New Jersey’s reputation for innovation and commerce. Despite its cities and industry, the state boasts abundant forests and rich farmland, which secured its title as The Garden State. Today, New Jersey remains one of the top five producers of eggplant, tomatoes, cranberries, spinach, and other produce grown in the United States.

So raise a glass to New Jersey—the only state where it's still illegal to pump your own gas! 🍅🥂💚

07/01/2025

I'm deeply honored to be quoted in the Association of Professional Genealogists' July eNews feature on continuing education. Thanks to Jenifer Kahn Bakkala for including me!

It's true, though! I have benefited enormously from mentoring other genealogists. Teaching turns you from a passive receiver of information into an active user of knowledge. It compels you to organize and relay your thoughts in a clear, logical manner, address gaps in your education, and distill core principles, enhancing your grasp of what's most essential and yielding a more durable understanding of the complex concepts and codes that guide us as genealogists.

06/02/2025

I don't often see genealogy depicted in scripted television shows, let alone animated shows, so it was fun to catch this rerun of Bob's Burgers last night, wherein my kindred spirit Linda Belcher traces her family's lost Bolognese sauce recipe back to her great-grandmother, Maria Volpintesta.

According to family lore, Linda's great-uncle Tony Volpintesta worked day and night on the docks to save up for his dream home, but his brother, Joey, married into a rich family and bought Tony's dream house right out from under him. At a housewarming dinner at Joey's new home, Tony reached with his fork for more spaghetti while Joey was angling for more parmesan, causing Tony to fork Joey in the hand. While Tony maintained it was an accident, Joey insisted the forking was retribution for his taking the house. The scandalous silverware stabbing would split the family in twain (note the aggressive scratch-outs in the family tree). According to Tony's side of the family, after Maria died, Joey and his wife crept into the house under cover of darkness and stole the only written copy of Maria's recipe, and they've been hogging that perfect Bolognese to themselves ever since.

Of course, family lore is commonly colorful but not always accurate, and the actual fate of the Volpintesta Bolognese recipe proves more mundane (and less dastardly) than Linda and her estranged cousins were led to believe. This is where genealogists like me can be instrumental in differentiating history from myth!

05/31/2025

Amazing news from the fearless, hardworking folks at Reclaim the Records! After a four-year legal battle with the New York State Department of Health, the state's highest court has ruled that the agency must turn over its death index for all years spanning from the start of state-mandated records collection in 1880 through the end of the year 2017. This will be the very first time this list has ever been published. Whether you're a genealogist like me or you're just a big fan of government transparency and public access to historical records, this is cause for celebration. :)

Indexed data from more than ten million records from the state of New York for the years 1880-2017 have now been ordered released by the New York Court of Appeals, the highest court in New York. The court has also remanded the parties back to a lower court so that a judge may conduct an “in-camera...

05/30/2025

History is almost never as ancient as we imagine it to be. The last living grandson of John Tyler, who served as the 10th president of the United States from 1841-1845, only just passed away. To put that in perspective, John Tyler was born in 1790, and his presidency predates the Civil War by a solid twenty years.

Harrison Ruffin Tyler was just three generations from the White House, since his father and grandfather both fathered children in their 70s. The chemical engineer helped preserve his family's legacy.

05/22/2025

I love seeing this representation from the Plainfield Public Library! Like every other field, genealogy often interprets its subjects through lenses of heterosexism and cisgenderism. While early documents rarely identify them as such, LGBT+ people have, of course, existed throughout history. Though their identities have been overlooked and too many of their stories have been erased, q***r folks are undoubtedly among the relatives in your own family trees. I'm so excited that programs like this are helping to reclaim LGBT+ people's place in the historical and genealogical record. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

05/18/2025

Hats off to all the program graduates, but particularly to my amazing Group 93, who came to each session prepared and engaged, offering keen insights, meaningful questions, unique perspectives, and generous support to one another as they wrestled with challenging concepts of genealogical proof. I'm so grateful for their participation, their trust, and their investment in the course and in each other. ❤️🔮

03/17/2025

I'm so pleased to be returning as a mentor genealogist for the Spring session of GenProof Study Groups. Over the next eight weeks, I'll be guiding a group of talented family historians toward mastering genealogical proof, as they collaborate to build new skills, solve complex problems, and discuss the joys and challenges of our chosen passion. It's an extraordinary privilege to serve this amazing learning community! 🔮

03/15/2025

This is a beautiful story about how genealogy links us to the ancestors who came before us—family who passed away before we ever got the chance to meet them—and the indelible connection that binds us forever:

"My dive into the world of amateur genealogy has not brought my grandfather back, nor has it fully eased the pervasive sadness I feel that our paths never crossed. But it has given me the gift of knowledge and the ability to connect with my grandfather as every version of himself—from the little boy writing letters to Santa Claus to the young military man to the driver and dad with a larger-than-life personality.

There's peace in knowing that the seemingly mundane things we leave behind might matter to those who come after us. The documents we sign, the photos we pose for, the quick quotes we share with local reporters, the yearbooks, and the letters. These small slices of personal history create a portal between us and our family members."

My paternal grandfather died before I was born and everyone loved him. Through genealogy I learned so much about him and I feel connected now.

03/06/2025

On 23 January 1815, Elizabeth Witter single-handedly invented the clapback, after her husband, Ezra, tried to call her out in the local paper a couple weeks earlier.

While newspapers have always been a source of information about world events and community happenings, long before the invention of social media they served as a neighborhood bulletin board, where citizens might announce a party they held, describe a vacation they took, or, on some occasions, air their grievances.

—located in The Geneva (New York) Gazette, 11 January and 1 February 1815 editions, respectively.

02/21/2025

Yesterday I completed a mammoth 213-page client report that was a real labor of love! This project took me from the narrow stone streets of Neapolitan suburbs all the way to the rural charm of Port Morris, New Jersey, and the vibrant, bustling Italian enclaves of Newark.

One of the best parts of my job is getting to see the excitement and astonishment on my clients' faces as I fill in some of the lost chapters of their family story. Like when I told my client that her great-grandmother, a life-long New Jerseyan, actually spent four years of her childhood in her parents' native village in Italy. Or the discovery of relatives who lent their entrepreneurial spirit to confectioneries and ice cream shops ("That explains my sweet tooth!" my client laughed).

Just as great are the endless opportunities for me to learn. Every time I research someone's ancestry, I carry so much forward with me, from the small, random details (like the role of a locomotive engine wiper or the history of the Morris Canal) to the major discoveries that enrich my understanding of our collective human story. What a gift.

02/13/2025

When I'm not rummaging through drawers of microfilm in an archive, I can often be found in a movie theater. I've loved cinema all my life, and for several years I've had the pleasure of heading a film club that regularly meets for movie screenings, pizza slices, and wonderfully robust discussion.

This week I'm especially proud to show them LOSING GROUND by the late, great Kathleen Collins. Perhaps I have special fondness for Collins because she was a teacher (something I also do outside of genealogy office hours) and, best of all, a New Jerseyan. Having grown up in Jersey City, Collins was a well-respected professor of screenwriting at the City College of New York and also active in the Civil Rights Movement. As part of the SNCC, Collins advocated for desegregation and canvassed in Georgia for Black residents to register to vote. She was arrested twice in the process.

As they have in too many other spheres of life, Black women have faced many daunting barriers in film—studios unwilling to finance their visions, distributors uninterested in screening their work, preservationists overlooking their historic contributions. Kathleen Collins certainly faced these barriers but forged ahead anyway: in 1982, she was among the first Black American women to write, direct, and edit a feature-length film. Despite earning the top prize at an international film festival, however, LOSING GROUND did not secure distribution. After a battle with breast cancer took Collins at just 46, her work languished in relative obscurity.

In 2015, LOSING GROUND, lovingly restored by Collins's daughter Nina Lorez Collins, saw a proper release and received the acclaim it long deserved. With programs acknowledging Black History increasingly under attack, it's even more important to honor Black filmmakers like Kathleen Collins and ensure their work is counted within the rich tapestry of American cinematic history.

1: Portrait of Collins
2: Collins (née Conwell) in 1950 census
3: The Jersey Journal 6/23/65
4: Losing Ground poster