In the summer of 2020 we had a big family history trip planned. Of course it was canceled because of COVID and most genealogy places were closed. One of the main purposes of the trip was to get to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania where all four of my mothers paternal great grandparents lived at one point. They also all happen to be the four surnames causing the biggest headaches. The one causing the biggest is Bebbus (wife’s obit), Bibbus (fathers obit, headstone, and Illinois land records), Bibus (census), Bibboose (census) or Bippus (passenger list).
Sound things out, try spelling phonetically
So, what can you do to try and figure out alternative spellings or variations? Here are a few tips. Have you sounded out the name phonetically? Have you had other people do it too to get their opinions? There is also a Phonetic Substitutes Table at FamilySearch you can use. Now don’t forget there may be silent letters, such as H, E, Y. An example would be Mark - Marke. Maybe the surname starts with a vowel. If so, try a different vowel with a similar pronunciation like Ingalls- Engels. Finally, remember to try adding or taking away the S at the end of a name to see if you get different results.
Try various letter sequences
While adding and taking away letters are some steps you may also check a few other issues such as were letters transposed. This can happen a lot if the record has been transcribed such as Crips - Crisp. There may have also been a typing error such as names with double letters. Was a letter added by accident or left out? Maybe replace a letter with one by it on the keyboard. An example would be Lapp - Kapp. You may also try to add or remove prefixes, or suffixes. If you are on a site that you can do a wildcard search you may add the root name and then a letter to see what other names come up you can search for. Such as put in Gold with an s at the end and see what other names like Goldsmith and others come up.
Try using wildcards in your search
Finally, we know handwriting had more flourish long ago, more so than today's writing. So make sure the letter you think it may be is the actual one. FamilySearch also has a Commonly Misread Letters Table. This can help you make sure that G is not really a C like Garter - Carter. You can also check the names of your ancestors if you think a name was anglicized, see if you can figure out the surname in the native language.
Finding ancestors can be a roller coaster! Sometimes you find someone without hardly trying and other times you may spend years looking! Having tools ready that you can use to help in your searches is a must. Have a notebook handy with ways you have used before or things you learn from other people so when you hit those hard areas or brick walls you can tackle whatever comes your way.
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If you need any help finding your ancestors, just let us know.
