This Ship Manifest Clue Saves You Time and Effort

Has this ever happened to you? You're searching for a person's immigration record to learn more details about them. But the only search result for your person is a page with a heading like "Record of Aliens Held for Special Inquiry".

Pages with this type of heading don't give you all the details you want. You need to see their original listing that can tell you:

• their age
• who they traveled with
• their hometown
• the relative they left behind
• their final destination
• who they're coming to join and where
• their height and the color of their eyes and hair
• if this is their first time in the country
• and more.

Whenever this happened to me, I had to search each page of the ship manifest for my person's name. Sometimes that's an awful lot of pages. But earlier this year a RootsTech webinar showed me the clue I'd been overlooking.

The detention page shows the page and line number for each person's original listing! Once you know what to look for, it's obvious. I'm embarrassed that I needed a webinar to point this out to me. Let's look at two types of headings you need to find.

Sometimes your search for an immigrant ancestor delivers their detention page. You need their original listing. Here's how to get from one to the other easily.

1. The Manifest Heading

In 1913, Luigi Bruno arrived at Ellis Island in New York. The authorities detained him as an LPC—Likely Public Charge. I needed to find his original listing, so I went searching for his name on every page. But the answer to this search is on the detention page. Under the heading Manifest (which should have been the tip-off) it says Group 131, No. 8.

This means I need to look for the page with a large 131 written or stamped at the top, and then look at line 8 to find Luigi Bruno. And there he is! The detention page shows that he ate 4 breakfasts, 4 lunches, and 4 dinners, so they held him for 4 days. His original listing has a rubber stamp that says ADMITTED. It tells me:

• he's 17 years old
• his father is Marino Bruno
• he's heading to Clearfield, Pennsylvania, to join his cousin
• he comes from Sant'Angelo in Italy, and
• it's his first time in the United States.

This level of detail proves he is the same Luigi Bruno born in my great grandparents' hometown in 1896. I found his Italian birth record on the Antenati website.

And speaking of ship manifests:

• Finding the Chain of Immigrants that Led to You
• Find Out What You're Missing on Those Immigration Records
• 6 Key Genealogy Facts on a Ship Manifest
• Why Your Immigrant Ancestors Came Here 'Legally'
• Why Did Your Ancestor Leave Home?

2. The Ticket No. Heading

This example is specific to Japanese immigrants detained at Angel Island, San Francisco.

In 1929, Tatsu Kadoguchi arrived at the port of San Francisco. Authorities detained and released her on the same date. The reason is not given, but it may be that she's a woman waiting for her husband to claim her. Her detention sheet has a heading of Ticket No. with the entry "11 - 9". Each person on this detention page has a similar ticket number: 7 - 17, 7 - 18, 10 - 2, etc.

This number tells you which list and line number to look for. Tatsu's original manifest entry is on List 11, Line 9. Once again, you can look for the manifest page with a stamped or written number 11 at the top. Then look at line 9 to find the person.

Every immigrant in my family tree arrived at either New York or San Francisco. I took a fresh look through my collection of downloaded ship manifests. Every detention sheet has either the Manifest heading or the Ticket No. heading. How I didn't realize this on my own is a mystery.

I wanted to find more detention examples and different headings to share with you. So I asked Microsoft Copilot this U.S.-specific question:

I know that some passengers arriving at Ellis Island were detained for reasons including health problems and being a likely public charge. Passengers were also detained at the port of San Francisco. Which other ports were know to detain passengers in the early 1900s?

Copilot culled its answer from FamilySearch, GeneSearch, and the U.S. National Archives. It says New York and San Francisco were the main east and west coast detention centers. But other ports known to detain passengers were:

• Boston
• Baltimore
• Charleston
• Galveston
• Mobile
• New Orleans
• Philadelphia
• Seattle
• various Alaska and Mexican/Canadian border ports.

When it comes to Ellis Island ship manifests, the lists of detainees are always at the end of the collection. I spent time searching through manifests at many of the ports listed above as well as some non-U.S. ports. But I can't find any detention records.

If you've found detention records from other ports, please share an example with us. These special headings are an enormous time-saver when you're researching a detained immigrant.

Do You Need AI Guidance for Your Family Tree?

An article in "Who Do You Think You Are" magazine looks at the research guidance feature in Legacy 10 software. (This software is 100% free at legacyfamilytree.com.) This feature is like having a professional genealogist sitting beside you saying, "Have you looked here yet?"

From what I can see, this feature is like the benevolent AI of the 1980s. People are wary of AI now because it's eliminating jobs for humans and creating false imagery. But Artificial Intelligence has been around for a long time.

Your self-built genealogy intelligence can rival any artificial intelligence for working on your family tree.

In 1986 I was a copywriter for a computer software company. I wrote a brochure and article about their new AI software called MINDOVER. It used AI to track mainframe computer systems and predict problems before they happened. I was so intrigued that I tried to write an AI program about a favorite subject of mine: architecture. The first step was to build its knowledge base. I entered the names of architectural styles and the features each one included. The software then asked a question like, "Does the building have this feature?" Based on your answer, it narrowed down the style asked the next logical question.

You're already using your own intelligence to build your family tree. That intelligence comes from your experience. And it grows in value each time you work on your tree. That intelligence might look something like this. Let's say a family member tells you they think your relative married in New York City in about 1920. What can you do to prove this? You might:

• Search for the couple in the U.S. Federal Census in 1920, 1930, 1940, and 1950 to narrow down the year they married.
• Search for the couple in the New York State Census of 1925 for any more clues.
• Search the "New York, New York, U.S., Marriage License Indexes, 1907-2018" database for the date of their marriage license.
• Search the New York City Municipal Archives for the marriage certificate. (See Day 5 in "7 Days to a Better Family Tree".)
• Search their local newspapers for a marriage or engagement announcement.

If this process makes perfect sense to you, then your own genealogy intelligence is doing a fine job. But if this whole concept is brand new to you, the AI research guidance feature may be the kick-start you need.

If you don't want to switch to Legacy 10 software, you have 3 options:

1. Install Legacy 10 and import your GEDCOM file. Follow its research suggestions, but record the data in your family tree software. Or,
2. Use Family Tree Analyzer to show you which types of documents you're missing. Or,
3. Learn which resources are available and search every one that applies. For example:
   • Which censuses are available for the country where a particular relative lived?
   • Which vital records (birth, marriage, death) are available for their location?
   • If the person emigrated, can you access their ship manifest to learn more?
   • Can you find their naturalization records?
   • Which military records are available even if the person never served in the armed forces?
   • Are there city directories for the place where they lived?
   • Is their school yearbook online?
   • Was this person ever mentioned in their local newspaper? You may find a birth or marriage announcement, an obituary, or a human interest story.
   • If they traveled, can you find their passport application?

Once you've run through every possible type of record, you have built your internal knowledge base. You can refresh your memory on the types of documents available by doing what I did to write the list above. Consult your file folders.

The FamilyTree folder on my computer has sub-folders for different types of documents. These include:

• applications
• census
• certificates (that's vital records)
• city directories
• draft cards
• immigration
• military records
• naturalization
• newspapers
• passports
• yearbooks
• and a few others.

If you're new to this hobby, go to your favorite genealogy website and search for a person. Take note of the results page and the types of documents it offers to you. Ancestry has a feature on their search results page called "Browse by collection". This makes it easy to see the types of documents in the results.

I did a search for my great grandfather who came to America several times but always went home to Italy. The collections in his results included:

• Census & Voter Lists
• Birth, Marriage & Death
• Military
• Immigration & Emigration
• Directories & Member Lists
• Court, Land, Wills & Financial
• Family Trees

These results were not all for my great grandfather—some were for men with roughly the same name. But this is a good way to get familiar with the main types of records available. Then it's a matter of looking at what you have for a person, and using logic to decide what else you may find.

I've written several times about my Document Tracker spreadsheet. The overwhelming size of my family tree made me abandon this tool. But if you're new to family tree building, this spreadsheet is a great substitute for AI. It's pre-built intelligence that will help you gain the experience you need.

Are you using the research guidance feature in Legacy 10? If so, please share your experience in the comments of this article.

Using Names to Fortify Your Family Tree

I can't be the only genealogist who treasures names. I had no particular love of names before I got into genealogy. But once I started viewing vital records from my Grandpa Leone's hometown, it opened up a world of wonder.

What's in a name? When it comes to genealogy research, absolutely everything. Find out how to honor the names in your family tree.

This was somewhere around 2008, and I remember being smitten with certain names. Last names like Lapastoressa and Pisciotti were fun to say. First names like Serafina and Elisabetta sounded musical.

After years of researching a handful of Italian towns, I know which last names came from which town. Even my husband recognizes some names from having seen them in the towns' cemeteries. This name recognition comes in handy when you're looking at your DNA matches. Even those with the slimmest of family trees. It can help you find your connection.

Today, let's look at the power of names in genealogy research.

When Too Many People Have the Same Name

It's funny when someone writes to ask me about a particular person in my family tree. I have to ask, "Which one? I have at least 6 people with that name." Different cultures have specific baby-naming conventions. And that can lead to a lot of relatives with the same name.

Don't worry. There are techniques you can use to make sure you're putting the right person in the right nuclear family. Here's a case study in "Same Name; Which Ancestor is Which?"

When One Person Used a Few Names

Because I fell in love with the Italian names in my family tree, I have a few rules about recording those names. Spellings can change over the years, and someone with two or more names may not go by their first name. A man named Giovanni Antonio Bianco may use the name Antonio Bianco. My great grandmother was born Marianna, but she often used the name Mariangela. She had an older sister Mariangela who died very young.

I choose to respect the original name. In my family tree, I list everyone's name as it appears on their birth record. I'll use the birth fact's description field in Family Tree Maker to note name variations. I admit, I did not record the mistaken name given to my mother at birth. Grandma was out cold, and Grandpa told the midwife the wrong name. This still causes Mom trouble when it comes to getting official government documents. And guess what? That wrong name connects back to Grandpa's mother, born Marianna but called Mariangela.

See which name rules you'd like to adopt in "4 Rules for the Names in Your Family Tree".

Find the Maiden Name to Expand the Family

I'm thankful that women in Italy kept their maiden name for life. If I'd known that before my marriage, I'd have gone back to my maiden name, as impossible as it is for people to handle. It was only when these women came to America that they adopted their husband's last name. They adapted to the local cultural norms.

For a long time, my great grandmother Maria Rosa's line was a dead end. As I began building my family tree, my aunt told me that Maria Rosa's last name was Caruso. That helped me find her many brothers who came to New York State before her. But I couldn't find anything to tell me her mother's name.

A few clues pointed to her first name being Louise (Luisa in Italian), but I didn't know her maiden name. It was a glorious victory when I merged different resources to come up with her most likely last name. Then I proved it, and at last I built her full family tree.

To find out what those clues were and where you can find them, see "These Tips Find Missing Maiden Names".

---

The names of your ancestors infuse cultural heritage into your family tree. Honor them by recording them the right way and sharing them with your relatives.