Harold Henderson

Expert Author

Harold Henderson, CG, of La Porte County, Indiana, has been a professional writer since 1979, a genealogist since 1999, a professional genealogist since 2009, and a Board-certified genealogist since June 2012.

He has published articles in the National Genealogical Society Magazine, the Association of Professional Genealogists Quarterly, and in quarterlies in Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Ohio, western Pennsylvania, and Utah. His web site is midwestroots.net and he blogs at midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com (named one of Family Tree Magazine's 40 Best Genealogy Blogs). He moderates the on-line Transitional Genealogists Forum. He has studied at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy; at the Institute for Genealogical and Historical Research at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama; and in the on-line ProGen Study Group. He serves on the boards of the La Porte County (Indiana) Genealogical Society and the Association of Professional Genealogists, and serves as La Porte County Genealogist for the Indiana Genealogical Society. But at any given time he'd probably rather be reading a grantor index.

What are your specific genealogical interests?

Researching and writing up families in the Midwest and its feeder states; improving standards and methods. My tightest focus is on my home county and the 50 or so counties in three states within reasonable driving distance: west to Rockford IL, south to Lafayette IN, east to Fort Wayne, north to Muskegon.

What got you into genealogy?

My daughter discovered that she could gather family information and tie our ancestors into published genealogies. While we've improved our methodology since then, the thrill of visiting an ancestral county never gets old.

Most surprising genealogical find:

My great-great-great grandfather's will, recorded ten years after his death in a Licking County, Ohio, deed book.

If you could find the family history of any historical great, who would it be and why?

I'd trade all the "historical greats" put together for five minutes with 17th-century immigrant ancestors William Thrall and Thomas Gunn—and their wives, whose names we don't even know.
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