Another Local Knowledge Success

We spent the past few days in St. Ignace, MI near Mackinac Island where Dick's Ojibwa line originated. We visited the Museum of Ojibwa Culture and the Fort de Buade Museum. As we were ready to leave the museum's gift shop, I mentioned in passing to the woman who was volunteering at the cash register that Dick had traced one ancestral line to that area. She immediately asked about a surname--then told us to wait while she went next door to the Historical Society. She came back with a printout of a descendant chart of the Bourassa family to show where she and Dick both had connections. We were able to return the next day to pick up a copy for a small donation.

We also spent the next morning at the local library in its genealogy department: many local history books and a card file of "area genealogies." It was interesting to learn that Dick's Grignon family traveled from Green Bay (where there was no church at the time) across Lake Michigan to Mackinac Island for baptisms. Four children were baptized at the same time several years after their births.