Dear James, Here we are 13 months later and I wanted to update you on my own Mayflower adventure. Thus far, I have verified three passengers on my mother's side, William and Mary Brewster and Issac Allerton, and have received certificates from the Mayflower Society. I also just received the certificate for Stephen Hopkins on my dad's side and am submitting another supplemental application for his daughter Constance. I never dreamed of having Mayflower ancestors and it is all due to the information you had on Ancestry that caught my attention. I wanted to thank you for that, and I am wishing you a belated Happy New Year. Kind regards, Pat
I have had nothing but wonderful experiences since joining SMDNJ in 2014; and then SMDDE and SMDPA in 2019. I have made lasting friendships in all three Member Societies, working with great people. I have attended countless events in good company with prominent speakers at interesting locations. (Along the way, I may have gained a few pounds from the many three-course lunches!) I have enjoyed genealogical travels to place my feet in the footsteps of my “Mayflower” ancestors, which always feels profound. And I have sparked a new love of colonial history, with shelves of engaging nonfiction books that I am slowly working my way through.
Given such richness, I always thought, “Why not share these experiences with others?” My first targets have been direct family: parents, siblings and their children, and first cousins and their children. Yet through Ancestry.com I have also sought out distant cousins I never knew, to spread the good news.
Searching on most any ancestor Profile in Ancestry.com and viewing the results of family trees will yield pages of possible cousins. For example, there are a remarkable 3,031 family trees that contain my maternal fourth great-grandmother on my “Mayflower” line, an ancestor normally I would have considered obscure.
To help attract and educate these possible cousins, I began laying down electronic “breadcrumbs” by setting up the ancestor Profiles on my “Mayflower” line. First, I uploaded to my ancestor’s Gallery an image of an SMD medal, titling it, “Society of Mayflower Descendants” (Upload media). I also captioned this image with the name of my “Mayflower” ancestor and details of my SMD membership. Next, I uploaded this medal as my ancestor’s Profile Image (Choose profile image). Thus, any search result that yields this “Mayflower” ancestor of mine, including pictures, family trees, and DNA matches, will prominently display this SMD medal.
Optionally, I took things a bit further. Adding to the Galleries of my deceased “Mayflower” ancestors, I uploaded MS Word files of the relevant references that SMD applicants may need for their submissions. So whenever possible cousins message me directly through Ancestry.com, I can simply direct them to these Galleries and invite them to download whatever they may need.
Of course, this evangelization method is largely passive, relying on the search results of others to prompt inquiries. For a more active method, you could click on the individual family trees appearing in your search results to view how far back their lines extended – perhaps all the way to your “Mayflower” ancestor in-common. Then you could use Ancestry.com’s messaging function to alert them to this potential “Mayflower” connection that could qualify them for SMD membership. But I caution that there are dos and don’ts to this active approach, which I will detail in a later Governor’s Message.
In the 10 years I have been leaving SMD-oriented hints on Ancestry.com, I have heard back from quite a few distant cousins who successfully applied for SMD membership, including “Pat” above. These acceptances have been very rewarding for me, and in several cases, created new friendships. I am pleased to have made this meaningful difference in people’s lives, and I invite you to consider doing similar promotion on Ancestry.com and elsewhere online.
Best Regards,
James (Jim) Campbell SMDPA Governor [email protected]
