Website Post from June 1, 2008 - Book is Done!

June 1, 2008:


THE BOOK IS DONE!

Announcing the publication of

The Combined Casto Collection of David Leroy Casto & James H. Casto

Vol. 1—The Descendents of David Casto & Phoebe Gandy

550 pages v 2720 names in the index v 19 page, 2 column appendix v available in book or cd (pdf) version

GREAT NEWS, FRIENDS!

As many of you will recall, last summer we pulled together and had the research of David Leroy Casto and James Harold Casto shipped to my home in Ohio so that the research could be shared and made use of.  There was over 500 pounds of research and it has taken a while to pull it together and try and make sense of what all we’ve got.  I have turned my formal dining room into a research library and have been very diligent in keeping that Casto material separate from my own research.  I am now ready to publish the first of several volumes of research that was done by Dave and Jim.

I am very excited about this for several reasons.  It is the first book on the Casto family to be published in many years and was created by two of the most thorough Casto researchers to have ever lived.  This book will be a huge benefit to anyone researching descendents of David Casto and Phoebe Gandy which accounts for all Castos in West Virginia and their descendents.  I frequently hear from people begging for copies of out-of-publication books on the Castos and am very pleased to be able to now offer them something this substantial to assist in their research.  Also, this is just the first of several volumes I am planning on publishing from the research of these two men.  Additional volumes will include research relating to the earliest Castos in America, wills, maps, and census records of Castos, correspondence done over the years, many items that I’ve yet to even sort out.  The best part is that this is in addition to my own research and publications relating to later Casto researchers and the information I’ve gathered on their lines.  This is just the start!

PUBLICATION DATE:  June 1, 2008

TITLE:  The Combined Casto Collection of David Leroy Casto and James H. Casto
            Vol. 1 – Descendents of David Casto & Phoebe Gandy
            Danita Smith, editor

PAGES:  513 pages of genealogical material plus a 2720 name index

SYNOPSIS:  This material was almost publication ready when found in one of the shipped boxes.  It appeared to be either a computer printout of a database or more likely, a printed word document that had been typed and pulled together over time.  There was no title page, foreword, table of contents, or index so I have gone through every page and created that information.  The time span covered ranges from the 1720’s to the 1990’s.

A typical page:

BONUS FEATURE:  An electronic pdf copy of the entire book (additional cost).  [Big thanks to Dodi Wozniak for scanning this for us]


SIZE & BINDING:  8 ½”  x 11” pages, comb-binding, cardstock covers

PRICE:          $40.00 each for the books (price changed in 2010)
                   $5.00 each for the pdf version on CDs
(can be added to the price of the book or sold separately)

TO ORDER:  Send checks to:
Danita Smith
4943 Kenwood Drive
Mason, OH 45040

For more information, please contact danita@castoconnections.com

Website Post from September 1, 2008 - Database is Messed Up!

September 1, 2008:

Hello to all my old friends and my new ones, too!

It has been an exciting few months with the release of the new Casto book but now it’s time to get back to the work of our genealogy research. I am currently corresponding with new researchers in England, North Carolina, Washington (state), New Jersey, Oregon, and, of course, West Virginia. A typical evening will include coming home from work, having dinner, doing two hours of correspondence, and then another hour or two of working on my database.

Friends, I hate to admit but I really messed up my database. Not to the point of not being fixable but I was trying so hard to combine all my data into one place and I thought the new software could handle the duplications—it could not! I will either get it fixed or go back to the original data but I’ll have a working version soon to upload. There’s a lesson here—even very experienced researchers can make mistakes! My main reason for the combination of the databases was to add more info to the website with some of the other major families I work on—YOUNG, STECH, BAILEY, SMITH (that line still makes me shudder!). I help a lot of people with lines other than Casto so don’t even hesitate to drop me a line if you hit a brick wall on any of your lines—always glad to help.

On the home front, the kids are getting ready to go back to school—when I started Casto Connections, Bonnie was in kindergarten and Alex had just turned 4. This year, Bonnie is a high school senior and Alex is a freshman! They have grown up with Casto and genealogy and are quite the little (ok, not so little) researchers themselves. Alex decided he would solve where the Castos came from and surprise, surprise, found a website that would sell him a coat of arms saying we were from Spain! The poor kid wants an ancestry a lot more exciting than my mostly British roots and he’s stuck with the exciting last name of SMITH to boot! I warned him away from websites that will SELL you your family tree based on a surname—if it was that easy, we’d have nothing left to research!

I’m going to tinker around with the website now and look for the areas which need the most improvements. I just noticed a lot of my info is missing from my Castos Across America—starting with that today (Mason Co. WV records)

Until next time,

Danita

Website Post from October 12, 2008 - Mark Casto Postcard

October 12, 2008:


Welcome to Casto Connections!

I cannot believe how time just flies by! One minute it was spring and now it’s fall and where did the summer go??? After many years of being a stay-at-home Mom and housewife, I got back into the workforce and for the past year, I’ve been working a regular job for 45+ hours a week. I feel like I get so much less accomplished now! My husband says it’s because I’m spending so much less time doing the things I love (like genealogy and photography) and I guess he’s right. This poor website has certainly suffered from the lack of attention but I still try!


Latest News: an update to the DNA project has been submitted by Walter Casto. You can see that here.

Also, I recently purchased this original 1906 postcard on Ebay:

In looking through my website, I couldn’t find where I had ever written about Capt. Mark Casto and the brave crew of the Schooner “Alberta”. I had done a lot of research on him but I recently found a 2008 article in an newsletter of the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission. You can now find that story here.


In other items of note: Debi Sanders, who has worked on Casto genealogy for many years and has been a great collaborator and contributor on some of my own research on the Castos, recently wrote me to say that AOL was closing down their Hometown web service where she has hosted her website and that she would not be moving it to another site. However, she did give me permission to download whatever I wished and incorporate it on this site. I was able to capture her entire site (!) and will be working it in to this site over time (with proper credit given, of course!). Debi’s hard work and research was too wonderful to be lost so I’ll be sure to get it uploaded again as soon as possible.


Last but not least: I have sold out of the new Casto book (The Combined Casto Collection of David Leroy Casto & James H. Casto) but will order more in time for Christmas if I receive enough advance orders. Let me know soon—Christmas is less than 2 months away!


Until next time,


Danita

Website Post from December 14, 2008 - Casto DNA Project Info

December 14, 2008:

Merry Christmas from Casto Connections!

Recent Items of Note:

• 
  
  An update to the DNA project has been submitted by Walter Casto. You can see that here.

• 
  
  No sooner did I post the update than something cross my desk that was extremely relevant! In very simple terms, DNA research works on the direct PATERNAL line—father to son. When Walter and David did their research, it was apparent that they were working with two separate lines, even though both men were Castos. There were problems with David’s line tying in properly with the rest of the Castos. Remember, we’re being very simple here! Well, continuous research on David’s part has provided the answers he needs. David’s ancestor, John George Casto, was really the son of William Goucher and Sarah Casto, daughter of David Casto, Jr. & Margaret Provence. John George Goucher changed his name to John George Castoe after deserting the Army in Dec., 1834. Check out the DNA page for more detailed info and sources. But we now have John George Casto(e) tied into the correct Casto line—a major discovery! Thank you, David, for not only continuing your own family research but sharing it with others who will also benefit!

• 
  
  Capt. Mark Casto & the Schooner “Alberta”. You can now find that story here.

• 
  
  I have sold out of the new Casto book (The Combined Casto Collection of David Leroy Casto & James H. Casto) but will order more when I receive enough advance orders. It will be too late for Christmas unfortunately but after the first of the year I will be contacting some libraries and genealogical groups to see if they would like some. CD VERSIONS WITH PDF FILES ARE STILL AVAILABLE FOR $5.
• Now something that is very important to me: Tomorrow is the 67th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Two Casto brothers were killed that day, along with 427 others while serving on the USS Oklahoma. I have a page dedicated to these brave men and those who served with them. My research into these brothers led me to survivors from that ship who have provided me with pictures and information to share with you. Major Van Harl (USAF Ret.) wrote a poem entitled, “The USS Oklahoma Veteran” which I think everyone should read and think about. Today, we here in the United States enjoy more freedoms and liberties than any other country on the planet and it is because of men like Charles & Richard Casto, Paul Goodyear, Albert Stone, Roscoe Smith, and Van Harl who were willing to risk everything to protect their country and their families. God Bless them All and God Bless the United States of America!
  
  
  
  
  

  
  
  

Website Post from October 3, 2009 - Dark Times

Dear Friends,

I like to help people. I have been helping people find their ancestors for many, many years now and it has always been a source of great pride for me that I have been able to do that. With the support of my husband and my children, I had the luxury of using my mind, my time, and my resources to research, explore, and add to the great body of knowledge now known as Casto Connections. But life has taken me to a very dark and unfriendly place this year and every day is a struggle to just keep my head above water, let alone help others with their hobby. If that seems a little melodramatic, believe me, it is not. I am in the process of losing everything and rebuilding my life from scratch, literally wiping out the last 25 years. But I have many more responsibilities than I did when I was 23 – my daughter in college, my son in high school, professional pressures that weigh upon me daily, and people wanting my help on a daily basis that I struggle to find the energy to even answer their emails. And yet, I have knowledge and abilities I did not have when I was young and am fighting to find the passion for life that has driven me for so long. I have been hurt to my very core by the actions of another person and am paying dearly for being the victim. But I am too strong and too much of a fighter to be a victim for long and the lion inside of me is roaring to take action. If genealogy and the Casto research in particular were just my hobby, it would stay dormant for a while longer. But my obligations and responsibilities as an expert on the family and keeper of so much knowledge and information requires me to focus some of my attention on this continuing endeavor and not let the information become lost or unavailable to others. Plus, by focusing my energy on something that meant so much to me, it may help me find balance in my life again, even if I am forcing myself in the beginning.

So, please be patient and understanding and don’t hesitate to ask questions, just don’t be surprised if the answer takes a while to come back to you. The second and final release of the Casto book will be out shortly and I am still working on the new book for release in December. Is that pushing myself too hard? Probably but having something to work towards is a good thing.

Until Later,

Danita

Postscript 6-19-2010:  Things have gotten better, and while still not great, I am managing better and my genealogy is going better than it has in years.  I appreciate all the good wishes I have received.  The new book has still not materialized but is still in the works!

Website Post from January 1, 2010 - Helpful Ideas for the Coming Year

JANUARY 1, 2010

As I sit here and watch the snow fall out the window and celebrate the arrival of a new year, I am thinking about what I want to accomplish in the months ahead. I have a lot of catching up to do from 2009 and it is time to move on. Here are some of my thoughts:

Simplify—Life can be very complicated and messy and some times you need to step back and look at how to may it more manageable. That can be applied to this website and my genealogy, too. What are the primary goals we want to achieve and how to we get there?

Focus—Focus on what is important and what is best for you and your family and everything else will follow.

Just say “no” - It is too easy to say “yes” when someone asks but I have a tendancy to say “yes” even when my plate is already full. I need to learn to say “no” in order to accomplish what I want and what is important to me—this website and my research being one of the important things I want to focus on.

Never give up—Sometimes it’s a struggle to keep up with all the demands placed on us by our family, friends, job, and everything and everyone else that wants a piece of us. Sometimes the best you can do is just maintain the status quo and not move forward like you would want. But don’t throw in the towel and give up on your dreams of moving forward. Be patient, do what you have to for now, and when the time is right, then move forward again. I could have—and did at one point last year—box up all my research because I could not focus on it. Then, in baby steps, I pulled it back out and started moving forward again.

Help Others—Casto Connections is the culmination of decades of research by a lot of people all interested in learning about their roots and sharing that knowledge with other people. I chose to create this space where it can be seen and be available to others and even when I literally stepped out of my “cyber world” for a year, the research and knowledge and years of work were enough to sustain the site and still help people while I focused on my family. Each time you, the person who is reading this, sends new information or shares your family with another researcher, you are helping others.

Get Back to Basics—When I started out working on my genealogy, the internet was new, there were no websites, and most of my correspondence was done by good old U.S. mail. The tools we use in our research may be different but our goal is the same—learn about our family’s past. Other, more experienced researchers helped me and now I help others. The internet and this website have made things easier in terms of accessing information quicker and more difficult in that instead of one or two people corresponding, I get dozens of requests for information. And it is not the amount of requests that is the problem as much as it is the TIME to answer them. So, this year, I will be focusing on time management and scheduling time that will just be for genealogy. To the rest of the world, I will be unavailable and it will just be me and my Casto researcher friends working together in the Casto universe!

Happy New Year, My Friends!

Danita

Website Post from May 22, 2010 - Newsletters Starting Again, Okey Casto

May 22, 2010


How embarrassing! I updated the website but forgot to upload it! Duh!

The most important thing I want to share with my friends is that I have started writing articles for the CASTO CONNECTIONS NEWSLETTERS again and the latest issue (#26) will be release shortly—electronic version only! I don’t have time to maintain a subscriber mailing list and track who has paid and who has not so I’ll just write and upload them here! I will follow a very similar format as what I used before—a couple of articles on Casto related research, reader responses and queries, etc. So please help me out by sending me article requests—what would be useful to you—brick walls, and most importantly, feedback and input so we can get interaction going between researchers across the country. One of the greatest achievements, at least in my humble opinion, of the whole Casto Connections endeavor has been the ability to connect researchers with other people working on the same line. In this electronic age with communication much easier than it was 13 years ago, we will be utilizing all avenues—website, Facebook, and even a chatroom to get people really excited and motivated about their Casto research.


The upcoming issue will feature two articles about recent cases I have worked on mixed in with tips on how to use the same techniques to work on your own genealogy—Castos and all those other lines.


In other Casto news, I was saddened to hear of the death of Okey L. Casto of Scott Depot, West Virginia. His great-nephew, Chris Casto, past the obituary along for our obituary section but I thought I would post it here first along with our condolences to all of Okey’s family:


Okey L. Casto, 84, of Scott Depot passed away Friday, May 7, 2010, at CAMC Memorial Hospital, Charleston.



Born March 12, 1926, in Staats Mill, Jackson County, he was a son of the late Ola and Cora Rhodes Casto.


He retired from Columbia Gas Company with 37 years of service. He was a Christian and a member of Judson Baptist Church, Bill's Creek, Winfield, where he was a past deacon, trustee, and a member of the cemetery committee. He was a U.S. Army veteran of World War II, earning two bronze stars, combat infantry badge and several other commendations. He served in France, Germany, and participated in the crossing of the Rhine River at Remagen. He was also a member of the Washington Masonic Lodge No. 58 A.F. & A.M, St. Albans, Scottish Rite and Beni Kedem Shrine, both of Charleston. He was a past patron of the Order of the Eastern Star, No. 153, Nitro, and the White Shrine of Parkersburg, a member of VFW, St. Albans, and a member of the NRA.


Okey is survived by his loving wife of 51 years, Garnett L. Booth Casto; son and daughter-in-law, Allan and Lois Casto of Scott Depot; sister, Lorena Penland of Laurel, Md.; brothers, Glenver Casto and Russell Casto, both of Ripley. Also surviving are two loving grandsons, Zach and Micah Casto.


Funeral service will be held at 2 p.m. Tuesday, May 11, 2010, at Bartlett-Chapman Funeral Home, St. Albans, with the Rev. H. B. White Jr. and the Rev. Fred McCallister officiating. Burial will be in Cunningham Memorial Park, St. Albans, with military honors and Masonic rites.


Visitation will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. Monday at the funeral home, where an Order of the Eastern Star service will be held at 7:30 p.m.


Online condolences may be made at www.bartlettchapmanfuneralhome.com.


Bartlett-Chapman Funeral Home, 409 Sixth Avenue, St. Albans, is in charge of arrangements.


Well, I’m going to get busy writing—stay tuned for updates!

Until Next Time,

Danita

Website Post from March 27, 2010 - Otis Casto, Book Price

March 27, 2010


Every day is a new beginning and a new opportunity to be seized. I have been putting a lot of effort into helping others, expanding my possibilities, working on my goals, and thinking of ways to make this website better. I am basically using the same format I was 13 years ago when I started the site and the site really needs a facelift! Of course, given my time commitments and limited budget, this is going to take some time but I am hoping to implement changes at least to this homepage area within the next 3 months.

As for what is happening specifically in Casto Connections, I have had the last batch of the Casto books printed. The price is now going to be $40 instead of $25 because of how much it cost to have this batch done. The price for the CDs will remain $5 and I am going to burn a new stack of those so if anyone would like one, please let me know.

The book I had hoped to have finished last year is taking much longer than I thought to create. It is becoming an Encyclopedia of Castos and I am still working on determining if there is a faster way to produce it than how I am doing it. It will indeed be a beautiful thing when done but because of the printing costs, it will most likely be produced in an electronic format—maybe a pdf as well as an interactive database. I will keep you posted!

As I have been exploring the genealogy universe and working on coming into the modern age, I have joined Facebook, created a Casto Connections page there, and am learning about its possibilities by seeing how others have done their pages. The page for Ancestorville Genealogy is an example I would like to emulate. The owner, Debra Clifford, has gotten over 6,100 fans in the past month and has a very active community. Her chat rooms are very popular and I was able to do a presentation this week called “Genealogy on a Dime” that went over well. I will be presenting again in the near future on the topic “Organizing Your Research for Beginners and Experienced Genealogists”.

I have also created a general genealogy blog called Family Tree Hunters that is going to be a tool to help people with general genealogy tips and advice. I am going to create a new one just for these Casto Connections blogs that have totally outgrown this site and will be loading my old blogs into it. I can’t image what I wrote 13 years ago but I’m going to try and go back that far—if the content seems relevant!

I am also exploring the idea of a “Premium Members” area of the website and loading new newsletters, chapters from the book as they are created, research services, etc. I’d like feedback on that idea.

And lastly, I would like to thank to our friend Dodi Wozniak for sending me these pictures:

And to another dear friend, Betty Briggs, for taking the time to identify this Casto.


Otis Allen Casto was the son of Orville Otis Casto and Myrtle Knopp. His wife was Frances “Em” Jones Casto, daughter of Jahugh and Nellie (Withrow) Jones. These pictures came from Pataskala Cemetery in Licking Co., OH.

Orville Otis (9/30/1903—Sep. 1974) and Myrtle Casto (4/30/1900—May, 1983) were married in Kanawha Co., WV on Dec. 18, 1921.

Orville Otis Casto was the son of John Marvin Casto (1880-1960) and Myrtle Bailey (1885-1920).

John M. Casto was the son of Thomas Franklin Casto (1859-1944) and Mary Jemima Kessel (1862-bet. 1888-1891).

Thomas Franklin Casto was the son of John Riley Casto (1834-1907) and Ruth Bowles (1834-1912).

John Riley Casto was the son of James Casto (1789-1868) and Sydney Kessel (1798-1883)

James Casto was the son of William Casto Sr. (1760-1836) and Margaret Patsy Parsons (1772-1838)

William Casto Sr. was the son of David Casto Sr. (founder of WV Casto line)

Please send me your comments, suggestions, and requests and I will most certainly try to help you with your Casto research!

Until Next Time!

Danita