Mightier Acorns

Journeys through Genealogy and Family History

A parody of a family coat of arms designed with acorns as elements, with the motto "ex gladnis potentioribus" Latin for "from Mighty Acorns"
From Mighty Acorns

Category: Westmoreland County, PA

Families that lived in the county and research done there.

  • The Last of the Milton Township Diaspora

    One last family in the Milton Township Diaspora series: The Fergusons. We know they were the last to leave by about ten years.

  • Lives and Fortunes: Three Revolutionary War Americans

    This story is part of the celebration of America’s 250th birthday at Projectkin – Stories250. Look for more at https://projectkin.substack.com/p/stories250-now-in-timeline-and-map

  • A Surfeit of Berlins

    An update on where we are with the Berlin family – tidying my ancestors and leaving clues for one or two other families.

  • The Absence of Evidence

    The infamous “Brick Wall” is not the end of the story, but sometimes it can take years for the clue you need to find its way to you.

  • How our origin story shapes our future A couple of weeks ago, David Shaw of Serengenity made a salient comment (emphasis added) on my post about great-great uncle George’s 1911 Callin Family History: In that time period Genealogy was quite a fad, consequently many are badly written and poorly sourced. Their resources at the time…

  • Teasing meaning from the absence of evidence (part 3) Previously, in Still Finding James Callin, we looked at the Revolutionary War muster rolls, examining whatever they could tell us about him, and we talked about how they loosely support the statements made in George W. Callin’s 1911 Callin Family History. James, last noted in the…

  • Teasing meaning from the absence of evidence (part 1) I owe a ton of thanks to two cousins for their part in getting my Callin Family History published: and John K. Callin. Joan is my 3rd cousin, 1x removed; John is my 2nd cousin, 1x removed. Our nearest common ancestors are William Callin and Elizabeth…

  • A valentine for my surname A couple of weeks ago, I had some unexpected time off (thanks, persistent pandemic!) and since my brain was still functional, I decided to use that time to launch a One-Name Study for my surname on WikiTree. (This post is short because I want you to follow that link.) I…

  • A Quick Overview of my work under this surname The revised Callin Family History is where I focused most of my efforts from 2015 to 2022. I started with James Callin, my 5x-great grandfather, and traced as many of his descendants as I could using Ancestry’s World Deluxe membership (which includes partial access to Newspapers.com…