I would like to encourage all readers who like
research to be prepared to go wherever the moment takes them. A book like Separate Identity requires
discipline and that is fine. But if you just have a keen interest in all things
historical, then you can go off on all sorts of tangents. That I freely confess
is what I do. Many are dead ends, but occasionally some yield gold.
Two recent examples from my own research for a
couple of blogs illustrate this.
I had the announcement of Charles Ball’s 1889 funeral
from a newspaper. It was a filler, no more than that. But then I decided to
follow it up. I found his gravestone, which led to other questions and
ultimately led to finding out exactly when he joined the Russell household.
That then led to establishing when his younger sister, Rose, joined the
household. This has been a debated question over the years, but was now
resolved. It shot down a theory I had been peddling for decades, but hey – that’s
OK, if we are wrong we are wrong, and truth should out.
The other journey started with the funeral of Andrew
Pierson, former vice president of the Society. I had a newspaper cutting, again just a
filler. The usual sources neglected to state who took his funeral. That led to
finding that George Fisher had done this. That led to the disagreements that
Fisher, one of the Brooklyn 8, had with J F Rutherford in the mid-1920s. That
led to letters JFR wrote about the problem that were published in Golden Age.
They were written from an address in Monrovia, California. That led to
examining where Mary Rutherford lived at the time. That led to a far better
understanding of the Rutherfords’ domestic arrangements in the 1920, and partly
dispelled a lot of inaccurate speculation made over the years. One thing led to
another, which led to another.
So, if time allows, dig away. Go where it takes you.
And if you find out something positive worth sharing, then share away.
4 comments:
Not everyone will have the same perspective on the history but sometimes a question or two or a simple finding will connect the dots for what someone else found and this is how stories come together.
Just curious, when you mention "partly dispelled a lot of inaccurate speculation made over the years," are you referring to speculation that the Rutherfords were not on good terms, thus separated and not living together?
Well, you will know the sort of things some have said using ad hominem reasoning. This research found concrete information about personal family matters, which for anyone else would have been kept personal and private. Mary supported her husband in the same faith all her life and her son Malcom supported her; those are the main points I would make.
Very true. As you mentioned, research and digging reveal a lot of facts previously uncovered.
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