Without Mr. Capes research, I don't know where we would be with the McLaughlin genealogy research. When I say "we", I mean everyone connected to the line who is interested in knowing about their family history. I have also made an exception here to call out the name of researcher who pieced together the 34 page document about the descendants of Thomas McLaughlin. Without it, we would be lost. It is a masterpiece.
In his research, he sought to find the McLaughlin's who went west. He is, in fact, a descendant of James McLaughlin who's wife was Julia Mahoney. I am, in fact, a descendant of Thomas Michael McLaughlin who married Ellen Maxwell and moved onto Napa, CA. I believe that Thomas led the way to Austin, Nevada and three of his brothers followed him including James. Also, Frank and Hugh followed their brothers to Nevada. Mr. Capes essentially found the long lost family that went West. I have a letter that he wrote to my grandfather, Richard J. Flanagan of Napa, CA, about twenty years ago asking for information about his mother, Mary McLaughlin, and his grandparents, Thomas Michael and Ellen Maxwell McLaughlin.
Whatever compels people to research their family tree definitely lives inside of me. I "get it" and want to know more about my family origins. I do self-identify very well and find that the name of the NBC TV show "Who do you think you are?" should instead be called "Where do you think you come from?" or "Who do you think you come from?"
The McLaughlin Family Tree that I have on Ancestry.com may not be fully updated to include every detail that I have in the 34 page document for the Descendants of Thomas McLaughlin but it is pretty close. I placed the information on Ancestry.com back in May-July of this year. It took some time for sure. I can't say that all of the sourcing was transferred over to Ancestry.com. I need to carve out some time to review the McLaughlin/Maxwell Tree in full. The Maxwell portion is pretty well updated at this point.
Using my blog/diary as a repository for family tree information has proven itself quite useful. It is challenging to place the family tree itself online within a blog post. I do think that the time that I invest now will pay off in the future for networking and offering this online library of sorts to those connected to my family tree.
I certainly hope that there is more to find about my McLaughlin's.
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