Help with my family history, UK and NYC

[Trickeration]

Hi,
My husband and I have gotten pretty into our family history over the last couple of years. His uncle has done a lot of the footwork for his family, going all the way back to the Mayflower. My family are more recent Americans, so to speak. My grandmother came here in 1908 from England. I'm still digging into my grandfather's side.

I don't want to inconvenience anyone, but I'd like to ask that if any of you are in, or happen to travel to the following places, that you might take a picture for me. Here are what I'm looking for...

The first item is in the Ellis Island Museum. There's a rather large (a couple of feet in size) print of a photo of my grandmother and her family just after they arrived. The captioned has their name, Sympson. Unless it's been moved, it's on the second floor of the museum in room W206, and is listed as panel 431. I'd just like a picture of the print, I already have a copy of the ships manifest.

The second item is in the UK. Listed on the manifest is the last known address before my grandmother and her family sailed. I'd love to have a picture of the building, if it's still there, or even a picture of what's there now/the street. The address is 5 Willowfield Road, Eastbourne, Sussex. I'm also looking for whatever I would need to complete the mailing address, such as a postal code, so I could try writing to the current resident.

As I said, I don't want anyone going out of their way. It's just if you happen to be there already and think of it. Thanks so much for your time and help.

Trix

 

[Ken]

All I could find out was the postcode for Willowfield Road, and no guarantee it is the same for all the house numbers - according to electoral roll, this applies between houses 55 and 67, which seem to mostly be businesses.

BN22 8AP

Ken

 

[BellyTank]

...and there was me thinking BN22 was Hampden Park, East Sussex...
I thought Eastbourne should be BN21.

Trickeration,
Eastbourne is in East Sussex and the 'BN' is for Brighton, which is in the same region.

 

[Ken]

I just went by what I could find in the electoral roll results at 192.com

Ken

 

[Trickeration]

Thanks guys! I'll try sending letters to both the BN22 and BN21 and see what happens, but what about the 8AP that Ken mentions? Do I need that set of numbers/letters as well? Or do you think the postmaster would still send it on?

Trix

 

[BellyTank]

If you write to the street address and East Sussex and add the BN21 and United Kingdom it'll get there.

B
T

 

[Vanessa]

Trix - that's neat that you're looking into your "tree." Did you begin the research or did you pick it up from a family member? My mom & I were researching back when I was in high school & we traced back to the American Revolution, but then hit a wall. We got rather discouraged and haven't really worked on it since.

 

[Lauren]

Have you tried this link? http://www.familysearch.org/

It's by the LDS, and I'm not a member of that religion, but it's the best free geneology site I've found. I've gotten mine back quite a ways with their help. And my great great great or whatever grandpa came over on the mormon trail so he did quite a bit on our family too. It's fun stuff, family history is

 

[Trickeration]

Thanks, everyone, for your help.

Vanessa-
We got started with family history through my husband's uncle. He'd already done a lot of research into Rob's family, tracing them all the way back to the Mayflower. Rob is related to John Alden and Priscilla Mullens, and to 2 other families from the Mayflower whose descendants married then later also married into the Alden line. His family is all over New England and we've found lots of cool stuff including a lake named for the family there, and even streets named after them!

They were also pretty involved in the Revolutionary war, too. We learned that the wife of a Wyman hid John Hancock and Samuel Adams from the British in her home in Massachusetts. The funny thing about that story is that not long after we learned that, my son was watching a show called Liberty's Kids (educational cartoon on PBS I think) and they showed that same story. Only they didn't say who the woman was. It's still cool, though. I'm going to order a copy of the show.

Anyway, Rob's uncle got lots of the info from the LDS site that Lauren mentioned, and more by emailing the towns where family was said to live. We went Boston for a wedding last year and drove to Maine to sightsee, but also because we heard that some of his family went that way just prior to the Revolution. My son saw an old fort he wanted to visit, so while he was getting a tour I thumbed through the old sales books for the supply house that was there. In the books I found names of more of Rob's relatives who had come down river for supplies. It was cool to see the actual lists of what they bought. The museum is sending us copies of the pages in exchange for a small donation.

Lauren-
Like I told Vanessa, Rob's uncle has used the LDS site. I hadn't yet since I didn't know where exactly it was. So thanks for the that. I'll go on later today and see what I can find. My grandfather on my mom's side wasn't exactly an upstanding citizen so I'm not sure where I may find records! But even that makes it an interesting challenge. There is one census that he may be listed in. I'm hoping that will give me some more clues. I'm just getting started, so I have little to go but stories from my mom (my dad passed away in 2002) and that ship's manifest from the Ellis Island website. My dad's family will be hardest. I never knew any of them. He broke from the family shortly after marring my mom, so all I have is the names of some of his siblings.