David Lambert The Online Genealogist

Each day (M-F), the NEHGS Online Genealogist, will post an interesting "Question of the Day" to share with you. We hope these questions are valuable and beneficial in your research. Check back daily for new questions and answers or read through our archives. SUBMITTING A QUESTION: You can email the Online Genealogist at onlinegenealogist@nehgs.org. Please try to formulate the question(s) within one or two paragraphs. It is helpful to mention sources that you have already used to try and answer your questions if applicable. If you require someone to perform research at NEHGS for you please contact our NEHGS Research Services department at research@nehgs.org or by phone at 1-617-226-1233.

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January 14, 2009

Question:
I have had mixed success looking for my great-great grandmother in the US censuses indexed on Heritage Quest. She is not with her parents in 1870, when she would have been 17. There is a girl who might be the right one listed as an inmate of the State Industrial School for Girls in Lancaster, Mass. I gather this was a reform school of some sort. Do you know if there are there records available from that time period?

Answer:
The State Industrial School for Girls in Lancaster, Mass. case records are located at the Massachusetts State Archives. Unfortunately these records are closed to the public, even though they are over one hundred years old. If you would like to inquire about the possibility of a case being opened for you please call the Department of Youth Services in Boston, Mass. at (617) 727-7575. The Massachusetts State Archives can be reached at (617) 727-2816, or online at: http://www.sec.state.ma.us/arc/arcidx.htm

Archives:

• 1-14-2010
  I have had mixed success looking for my great-great grandmother in the US censuses indexed on Heritage Quest. She is not with her parents in 1870, when she would have been 17. There is a girl who might be the right one listed as an inmate of the State Industrial School for Girls in Lancaster, Mass. I gather this was a reform school of some sort. Do you know if there are there records available from that time period?
• 1-13-2010
  My Revolutionary War ancestor was born supposibly in Gorham, Maine in the 1750’s. An extensive search of pre-1892 records in print and microfilm has not turned anything up. Would the state have a record, or would the church?
• 1-12-2010
  I recently consulted the Ogden Codman 1918 compilation of Granary Burying Ground internments. Included are records taken from the Boston City death records of tomb burials. I had always thought that tombs were limited to relatives, but it appears that unrelated people were buried in tombs, perhaps after the original families had died out....
• 1-11-2010
  Is there a list that you know of for those who perished in the 1860 Pemberton Mill fire?
• 1-8-2010
  My great-great grandparents are buried in Mount Wollaston cemetery in Quincy, MA. I would like to find out where in the cemetery they are buried, or at least where I could go to find that information, before I make a trip to Quincy to search for the grave. Do you know if there are burial records for the cemetery, and if so, who I could contact about searching them?
• 1-7-2010
  While researching original marriage vital records for Dartmouth Massachusetts I have found some records stating, "they were married Coram". Please explain what this means....
• 1-6-2010
  Can you identify what cemetery was considered the "Town Cemetery" in Chicopee, Hampden, Massachusetts in 1874. My great grand-aunt died on 11 Dec 1874 in Chicopee....
• 1-5-2010
  Is there any difference in the information contained in Mass Vital Records and the Catholic Diocese of Boston? If so, what is the difference in birth/baptism, marriage, and death records?
• 1-4-2010
  I am looking for an ancestor’s parents. I believe she lived in Clarksburg, Berkshire, Massachusetts in the early 1800’s. I heard from a genealogical friend of mine that the Clarksburg town hall burned down, and some of the records survived. I am specifically looking for a person born there in 1793, married there in 1814 am I out of luck?
• 1-3-2010
  I have tried to find Thomas White in the Great Migration series unsuccessfully. According to the “History of Weymouth” volume 2, pp. 615-616 (a sketch about his great-grandson Nathaniel White), Thomas White was “admitted a freeman in Massachusetts Colony March 3, 1635/6”.
• 1-2-2010
  I am looking for my ancestor Laura Morton who was born in the state of Maine in 1852. According to my grandmother her father was “a doctor, and quite a prominent one…..”