Female connection method: using a social network approach to genealogical research in the search for the mother of Margaret Champion

Abstract

The search for Margaret Champion's mother is accomplished using two approaches. The first employs the FAN (friends, associates, neighbors) method and direct evidence. Associates in eighteenth-century America (and elsewhere and in other eras) were predominantly male because it was overwhelmingly males who participated in transactions and organizations that indicated association. A brief consideration of some of the philosophical and sociological theories of feminism, however, shows the critical role of women in connecting families together over time and binding family units united in marriage. Often male FAN associations were dependent on female connections. Thus, the second approach combines the female connection method and direct evidence. In some cases, this method not only leads to solutions to practical genealogical problems but also explains the reasons families were networked. This case study illustrates both approaches. Its research subject is Margaret Champion who lived in Pennsylvania and Ohio in the United States, and who died in Ohio in 1843. She was chosen for this case study because she served a pivotal role in her extended family. The genealogical research goal is to learn who her mother was. The article opens with establishing who her father was. Beginning the search in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania, it first uses a combination of clues gathered from direct evidence and the FAN method. After achieving the end goal of identifying her mother, the article next illustrates how the problem is also solved using the female connection method without the FAN method. Of course, these two methods may be used together to bolster the proof argument. Margaret Champion When Christian Zimmerman * wrote his undated will in Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania, he named Margaret Champion as one of his children. 2 It was written between 1803 (it mentions daughter Sarah who was born in about 1803) 3 and 7 November 1805 (when the will was proved). 4 The will did not specify who Margaret's husband was, but referred to Zimmerman's plantation "where John Champion now lives," strongly suggesting

Using Welsh manorial estate records to prove identity and origination: Robert Davis/Davies

“…He lived in the same township at the same time as Evan Watkin (married to Elizabeth Davies), progenitor of the Radnor, Ohio Watkins, and it is possible that his relation to the Watkins was through Margaret (Davies) Watkin or Elizabeth (Davies) Watkin. Consistent with the frequent role played by women in binding families together in a social network, 104 it is possible that the close association is explained by Robert's wife, Jane, if she was a Watkin (but that is speculation).…”