Sharing My Story

Genealogy Interest Part 2

Over several years I became more interested in the
actual lives of the people I was researching. I selected
one of my great-great uncles who I later found out
died in 1918. This was Dr. Silas Benjamin Ensign who
was an older brother of my great grand father, George
Washington Ensign. Much of my research about his
life was gleaned from the local newspapers that were
published in the small towns were he lived. The state
historical societies have microfilmed many of the
surviving copies of these old newspapers and I was
able to get them on inter library loan.

I spend many evenings and Saturdays hunched in
front of a microfilm viewer at the South Pasadena
Library going through hundreds of pages of these
19th and early 20th century newspaper reproductions
looking for any scrap of information about the elusive
Dr. Silas Ensign and his relatives that lived in Iowa
and South Dakota. I learned that certain sections of
these newspapers contained useful nuggets of
information about my genealogical quarry. These
were included at a marketing ploy by the editors
to encourage the readers to keep subscribing to
the newspaper. People like seeing their names in
print. This includes the comings and goings, personal
and business trip information, illness and heath
reports, some birth, marriage and death data were
all carried in these columns. Also individual
obituaries and other local news articles appeared
in the papers. After becoming experienced a
researcher can go right to the sections that are
most helpful as most of these local newspapers
were filled with advertisements and filler material.

Often the front pages were filled with world, national
and regional news that were provided by what were
would today called news syndicates. This allows the
newspapers to cover the world but their real news beat
was the local scene. I soon found that I needed to be
aware of other people (usually relatives) who lived
locally because they were more than likely a part of
my subjects life. I discovered that old Silas lived a
significant, interesting and long life. I also made a trip
in 1995 to Iowa and South Dakota in a effort to see if
I could uncover more information about Dr. Ensign.
I did end up finding his grave in the Lake Preston,
South Dakota cemetery. While there I also found some
descendants of his friends who gave me some of his
old photos and showed me his house. He had various
professions included farming, being a minister,
a homeopathic doctor and real estate developer.
He was involved in local and state politics and was
prominently involved in the social life of his communities.

He was also listed as one of the founders of New Hartford,
Iowa and Lake Preston, South Dakota. Perhaps most
important was his friendship with the CP Ingalls family
of DeSmet, South Dakota. Laura Ingalls Wilder, daughter
of CP Ingalls was the author of the beloved Little House
on the Prairie books.

It was a fascinating exercise to reconstruct this man's life
from the available records and I wrote and published a
short book detailing his life called Silas B. Ensign, Frontier Doctor.
After leaving the Narramore Christian Foundation I spent
time completing the book This book was published in 2000
and culminated a good ten years of research. I was able to
make it available to a family reunion that summer where it
was well received. There were still always questions about
this man's life that my never be answered. Even so it was a
very gratifying experience in biographical reconstruction.