Mari and Ole Sr Finnestad funeral documentation

The first document above contains the log entry from the Unger Horner funeral home in Rochelle, Illinois, listing my great great great grandfather, Ole Finnestad Sr. Ole is listed by counting to the 17th position.

The second document contains the log entry from the Unger Horner funeral home which helped me to track down the gravesite for Mari Finnestad. Mari is listed by counting to the 11th position. Spelling errors didn't help my search.

Without Unger Horner's records, and their willingness to put up with my incessant calls over a 9 month period attempting to track down Ole Sr, I would never have been able to locate Mari and Ole Sr Finnestad.

I guess having been an investigator for over 20 years was a big help in tracking down this information. Plus a keen interest in history and genealogy.

Update: 9/26/2009

The "ordered by" indicates a "Mrs. Vallem". It wasn't until several months later I discovered that "Mrs. Vallem" was Ole and Mari's daughter, Rachel.

The "Vallem" name, shows up on a grave site next to Ole and Mari and also on the 1900 plat map for the Alta township. Who knew?

The interesting thing with tracing one's genealogy, is that things do not happen sequentially. Names that appear next to your ancestors on plat maps, census records, and cemetery plots/records are often somehow related.

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Finnestad Farm - Stavanger, Norway

It was customary in Norway to take the farm name as the family name. Prior to arriving in America, Ole Finnestad was known as Ole Olson. According to the Regional State Archives of Stavanger, in 1862, Ole Olsen bought a farm from Bjørn Larsen. The following link provides some farm information along with the family members in 1865: http://digitalarkivet.uib.no/cgi-win/webcens.exe?slag=visbase&sidenr=59&filnamn=f61126&gardpostnr=582&sokefelt=vis “Merknad 387b” now means property nr. 16 of the farm Finnestad. (Please keep in mind that accuracy of records is less than perfect - so ages and other information are not always correct) For more information on Stavanger and a map of the area, please go to the following wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stavanger

Rasmus Finnestad - death certificate

I had previously written two posts regarding the death of Rasmus Finnestad. Those can be found here and here . Here is his Washington state death certificate: The death certificate incorrectly lists his father as "Oluf". His father was Ole (Olson) Finnestad. His mother was Mari Skaar, misspelled as "Skaare" on the death certificate.

Mary Olsdatter (Finnestad) Bell: Witness for the Prosecution

Mary Olsdatter Skåreflådå (Finnestad) Bell appeared as a witness in a murder trial that took place in Dixon, Lee county, Illinois from April 26, 1898 through May 5, 1898. The December 27, 1898 issue of the Dixon Evening Telegraph reported the initial details of the December 24th murder of Fred Tolsted on their front page. From page 2 of the Wood County Reporter (Grand Rapids, Wisconsin) in their December 30, 1897 issue, the 'suspect' alleged the victim connected him 'unpleasantly' with the housekeeper (Mary Finnestad Bell). The local newspaper in the adjoining county, published a brief article on the murder on January 12, 1898 on the front page of The True Republican in Sycamore, DeKalb county, Illinois. The Sterling Standard published the names of the law firm, prosecuting attorney and judge in the upcoming murder trial on page 12 of their January 13, 1898 issue. The trial began on April 26, 1898 as reported in the April 27, 1898 issue of the Dixon ...

Finnestad Ancestry

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