People, Places & Events

Rootseekers elect new officers, discuss calendars
Special to The Monitor
MABANK–Newly elected officers of Rootseekers were sworn in by parliamentarian Jim Robertson.
The new officers are also members of the Sarah Maples DAR Chapter or Colonial Dames and other organizations in the community. They are Ruth Shelton, Nina Hendricks, Betty Foster, Margaret Ann Trail, Geneice Morris, Grace Donovan and Carolyn Bostain.
Trail did a book review of a new book “A Field Guide for Genealogists.” This book is a little different than the reference books that we have relied on such as the Redbook, The Source and The Handybook for Genealogists available in the library.
The Field Guide is a veritable encyclopedia of solutions for situations than can arise in research.
There are sections on dating photographs, identifying historical eras from hairstyles or clothing, antiquated names of diseases, units of measurement used in bygone days, nicknames and on and on.
Most of Trail’s talk revolved around calendars.
There are two basic types of calendars, lunar and solar.
The lunar is based on phases of the moon, with months going from new moon to new moon, making each month approximately 28 days long.
These calendars are used by religious and ethnic groups, such as Islamic, Judaic and oriental groups.
The solar type of calendar is based on the sun’s relationship to the earth solstices and equinoxes, and divides a year into 12 equal months.
Since the Roman era, most westerners have used solar based calendars.
The Julian calendar was devised for Rome in 45 BC by Sosigenes, a Greek mathematician and astronomer which is the basis for our present calendar.
It was named after Julius Caesar.
The Julian calendar attempted to correct earlier errors by assigning one additional (leap) day to every fourth year.
The Gregorian calendar was created by studying the equinoxes. It became evident that, in reality, the error discovered prior to the Julian calendar, actually required an additional seven days every 900 years rather than 25 days every 100 years.
The Gregorian calendar omitted 10 days beginning Oct. 3, 1582 – Oct. 5, 1582, became Oct. 15. It was released during Pope Gregory XIII’s reign.
It was based on the sixth century work of Bede, an Anglo Saxon monk.
There are many other calendars too numerous to mention, even the Quakers had their own calendar.
It gets very confusing, but in researching your ancestors you have to know where they lived and what calendar they used to be able to determine how old they were and what year they were born.
 

SAR receives Wal-Mart grant
Special to The Monitor
ATHENS–The Sons of the American Revolution Athens Chapter received a grant from Athens Wal-Mart in order to fund some of their student and teacher projects.
Among the contests and essays considered will be 5th grade American History posters, high school oration, Eagle Scouts, JROTC and American History teacher and high school essays.
Chapter members recently met with Wal-Mart management, during which Chapter President Charles Luna presented Store Manager Jeanene Villagran with a Certificate of Appreciation.
 

On the way to Branson
Monitor Photo/Pearl Cantrell

Members of the 50-voice Mabank Middle School Treble Choir, under the direction of Christian Reed (left), hosted a pancake breakfast in Brawner Hall in Gun Barrel City recently to help raise $30,000 to send the choir to Branson, Mo., in May. The choir was invited to participate in the Banson Festival after judges viewed their audition tape. The choir will hold a fund-raising concert at the Middle School at 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 11. Tickets are $5 and a cake auction is also planned for this event.