COSMIC RESEARCH ASSISTANCE by Mel Green, [email protected]

After experiencing one of the most extraordinary episodes that I have encountered during my genealogical studies, I've come to the conclusion that I must be getting some kind of cosmic research assistance.

A few months ago, I looked up the obituary of my grandmother, Annie Nelson HARTLAND, from a 1947 issue of the YOUNGSTOWN VINDICATOR and discovered that she had a sister of whom I'd had no knowledge. Her name was Christiana and apparently she had married someone named COWHER, since that was shown as her married name. Other than the fact that she lived in Pennsylvania and was born in England, I had no other information about her. I searched the 1920 Pennsylvania Soundex for every COWHER whose wife was listed as Christiana, who had been born in England. It was a little tiring, but I did find her, and learned that she had married Sylvester COWHER and had 15 children.

Two months later, I was in the Lock Haven, Pennsylvania library researching an entirely different subject when I happened to stumble across this family on the microfilm viewer. I said to my wife, "Look, there is Christiana COWHER, she was my great- aunt." A woman sitting behind us turned around and said, "Pardon me, but how were you related to the COWHERs?" I explained to her that Christiana Nelson COWHER was the sister of my grandmother, Annie Nelson HARTLAND. Then she said, "Christiana Cowher was my grandmother." We were second cousins!

We exchanged information. She had completed extensive research into the NELSONs and I had completed considerable research into the HARTLANDs, so we saved each other about a year's worth of research. Even better, she had a photograph of my grandfather, Samuel James HARTLAND, who had died in 1916 when my mother was only 9 years old. I had not known what he looked like and had been frustrated because no photograph of him seemed to have survived.