John Grow of Ipswich Massachusetts and Some of His Descendants

<blockquote><strong>Recipient: National Genealogical Society Award for Excellence: Genealogy and Family History Book Category (Honorable Mention 2021)</strong></blockquote><p><br></p><p>This engaging and highly readable family history follows ten generations of a mainstream middle-class family through three and a half centuries of American social and economic history from the Puritans to the internet age. In doing so it serves as a model and a research guide for genealogists interested in writing family histories that put their ancestors' lives in historical context.</p><p><br></p><p>The author a retired history professor begins with an overview of the research resources that a professional academic historian would regard as essential for writing a contextually accurate family history including a general introductory reading list and a suggested research methodology. The chapters that follow then trace the lives of ten generations of a white Anglo-Protestant middle-class family over a 350-year period with a sustained chapter-by-chapter focus on key topics in American family history - marriage and fertility patterns birth-control and child-birth practices the economic functions of families men's and women's roles social status religious beliefs old age and burial practices (including gravestone iconography) - as they evolved over time. The resulting book is a significant addition to the family-history literature and one that will be of value to genealogists of all levels.</p>