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| Our 2008 national reunion at the Heinz History Center helped the City of Pittsburgh celebrate its 250th birthday. Seen here, Pittsburgh 250's Bill Flanagan gives remarks to more than 115 cousins and friends. The 2009 reunion will be held on Sat.-Sun., July 11-12 -- click for details. |
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Congrats Pittsburgh Penguins! |
This award-winning site -- founded in May 2000
and named one of Family Tree Magazine's
"Top 10 Family Websites"
in the nation -- captures the sweep of Americana through the eyes of one family,
with thousands of stories.
It's is a forum for sharing knowledge and promoting the national reunion of our large pioneer clan, the Minerd- Minard- Miner- Minor family, with origins in the Pittsburgh region of Pennsylvania. The site may change the way you think, learn about and understand families. While our clan is no bigger, better or more interesting than anyone else's, it is symbolic of many early families who put down roots and let time work its magic.
Instead of
just tracing backward, we're also exploring forward in
time to tell the saga of one Pennsylvania-German family over a span of 275
years. It starts with German-Americans Friedrich and
Eva Maria (Weber) Meinert Sr., and their son, Revolutionary War veteran Jacob Minerd Sr. and his wife Maria Nein,
pioneers of Fayette/ Somerset Counties, PA, and thence to thousands of their
descendants, down to the present day, with long-term, collective impact on our nation. We're
very interested in making contact with all descendants, everywhere.
Today, cousins primarily spell the name Minerd, Minard, Miner and Minor. On average, though, fewer than 1% of us carry the name, with the remaining 99% having some other name. As a result, most cousins don't even know they belong. When we stopped counting in 2000, we had identified about 15,000 cousins and spouses, but the actual number has grown dramatically since the launch of this site and may be substantially higher, perhaps 40,000 to 50,000 all told among the diaspora. A staggering 625-plus cousins have passed away since we began counting in July 2000. Helping cousins and communities connect with their roots, honoring past lives with more than 1,175 biographies and more than 5,000 images, and exploring the clan's connectedness with American society and culture, are at the center of our interest. Be sure to take a peek at our 2008 Annual Review.
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Next Reunion: July 11 - An "Old-Fashioned Gathering of the Clan" |
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The Center is just a few miles' drive from the Donegal Exit of the Pennsylvania Turnpike (Exit 91), and a two-hour drive from the Pittsburgh International Airport. It's also just a few miles from the farm where our pioneer- Revolutionary War ancestors Jacob and Maria (Nein) Minerd Sr. settled in 1791. Click for details. |
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Website and Reunion Featured on Genealogy Insider Blog |
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| A March 24, 2009 post by Diane Haddad on her Genealogy Insider blog of Family Tree Magazine, "Tips from a Reunion Whiz," highlights our "Pittsburgh 250" family reunion with ideas for organizing reunions. Full text link. |
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Prayer for Our Military Cousins in Harm's Way |
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| Scores of our cousins are serving in the United States Armed Forces in the war on terror in Iraq, Afghanistan and other military hot spots around the world. Please say a prayer for their safety -- click to see the names of each known one. |
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"Pittsburgh
250" -- 2008 National Family Reunion Draws |
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You
and your family are cordially invited to this year’s national reunion
– an old-fashioned “Gathering of the Clan." The Saturday picnic
will be held at the Indian Creek Valley Community Center near Indian Head,
PA. Reunion president and Minerd.com
founder Mark Miner will give a presentation about the family website and
his vision for the future of the reunion and website. 
More
than 115 Minerd- Minard- Miner- Minor cousins and guests celebrated Pittsburgh's
250th birthday
at the clan’s three-day | In the Great Hall of the Heinz History Center, reunion president Mark Miner (left) greets reunion speaker and History Center CEO Andy Masich |
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Internet Genealogy Magazine Profiles Minerd.com |
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 The
December 2008/January 2009 issue of Internet
Genealogy magazine features a full page profile Minerd.com and its
founder, headlined "Bringing Family Together - Donna Murray Finds Out
What Makes Minerd.com a Top Family Website." The specialty magazine
has a national circulation and is available on newsstands coast to coast.
Donna writes that our "highly regarded" site is a "way to
share material and pull distant cousins out of the woodwork... It's easy
to navigate, well-organized and it's free. The biographies form the core
of the site and the rest of the data flows from this central
concept." Click for more detail.
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Minerd.com Featured in Pittsburgh Quarterly Magazine |
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In its special commemorative
"Pittsburgh 250" edition, |
Illinois State Genealogical Society Quarterly Reprints Minerd.com's Biography of Sarah (Miner) Boyd |
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| The Minerd.com biography of Sarah (Miner) Boyd, wife of Civil War veteran William Boyd of Fulton County, IL, has been republished in full in the Fall 2008 edition of the Illinois State Genealogical Society Bulletin (Volume 40: Number 3). |
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Own Your Own Reprint of the Rare Younkin Family News |
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In Memory - Capt. Erick Foster - The Ultimate Sacrifice in Iraq |
 Cousin Erick M. Foster, a captain and paratrooper with the 82nd
Airborne Division, died Aug. 28, 2007 of combat injuries sustained during an
enemy attack using small arms fire in Muqdadiyah, Iraq. The great-grandson of Oakey
and Gertrude (Shroyer) Harbaugh, he was the troop commander of A Troop,
First Squad, 73rd Cavalry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team.
Tragically, Erick is now one of 27
known cousins in our family to make the ultimate sacrifice during wartime.
Kellner's Fireworks held a huge fireworks exhibition on Aug. 22, 2008 in
Oil City, PA in memory of Erick and as a fundraiser for the Wounded
Warrior Project.
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This
11” x 17” book is a complete set of all 44 pages from the eight issues
of the rare family newspaper from the 1930s and early ‘40s. Each page has been
scanned professionally from all eight originals, with an attractive cover and high quality paper and binding. Only 100 copies
have been printed. 
We Want to Hear from You!
Our website and archives are continual works in progress. We regularly update the site with new findings, and add to the archives with news of you and your family, past and present. (We even welcome ultrasound photos from the womb, such as the image here of Jacob Benjamin Miner, a 1999 addition to the family!)
If you have questions or information, spot any errors, or wish to contribute your own writings or archival materials, please contact us.
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Acknowledgements
- Click for our updated Who's Who
2008
booklet Total visits:
from May 7, 2000
launch to May 31, 2009: 1,357,065 |
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Copyright
© 2000-2009 Mark A. Miner. |