Family Records

John McCune's Wives

Sometimes determining where a particular person falls in a family tree is a matter of putting together a lot of little pieces of information and hoping that they all show a part of the picture as a whole. Such is the case for John McCune of Newton township who died in 1793.

Too Many Samuel McCunes

Due to the fact that many early families named their children over direct ancestors, there are often names that reappear over and over again in the families. This can create some real challenges when drawing up the family lines correctly and mistakes become all too common. Unfortunately, many of these errors have been published and accepted as true, leaving pitfalls for the unwary genealogist. A case in point is the lineage of Samuel McCune who married Eleanor Sharp, daughter of Alexander and Margaret.

Unexpected Discoveries

One of the reasons that I photograph a lot of gravestones during the course of my research is to help verify data that I have gathered over the years and sometimes some unexpected information comes to light as a result. While in Shippensburg this past Sunday, I found that one of my great-great-aunts had apparently remarried after the death of my great-great-uncle, but I had never seen any information about her second marriage. Aunt Lily as she was always known to the family, was married to Thomas Jefferson McClelland sometime between 1900 and 1910 and they lived in Chester County. Uncle Jeff passed away in  1941 and is buried at Spring Hill in Shippensburg in the McCune plot. Lily’s grave is right beside his, but shows her name as Elizabeth McCune McClelland Spader, so apparently she remarried in later life. Since she was still signing as Elizabeth McClelland when my parents were married in 1955, Mr. Spader became her husband sometime between 1955 and 1962 when she died. Hmmm…who was this guy and where did he come from?