Days of the Week

Photo by Estée Janssens on Unsplash

​Life is full of serendipitous moments.  And often in genealogy those “gifts” of unexpected information and odd coincidences happen at the most interesting times. This past week I have been reviewing medical records for a relative and trying to determine a date of an event.  We had the day of the week and the date but not the year.  In today’s mail and the February/March 2020 issue of Internet Genealogy, there is an entire article dedicated to finding and using days of the week in your family story. 

When I was trying to find what years that February 11th fell on a Monday, I turned to the internet with mixed results.  Most sites wanted to tell me about what future years would have February 11th on a Monday.  Hmmm.  Not quite what I wanted.  So I was quite pleased to see several sites recommended for finding what day of the week a date fell on in a particular year. 
The article ‘The Days of Their Lives’ by Robbie Gorr provides several ideas on how you can make use of the day of the week in your family story.  If you get a chance take some time to read his article. You might want to see which day of the week an ancestor in the 1800s married versus an ancestor in the 1940s versus today.  We are used to weddings on Saturdays, but most weddings were held during the weekdays in the past.  Interesting isn’t it?
I have a slightly different twist in my search for an event.  I know that it happened within a ten-year period so by looking for February 11th on Mondays across these years, I’ll be able to pinpoint the year.  (I a finding a couple of candidates so I will be looking for additional information to confirm the year.)
Here are some of the links that were shared to help you find the days of the week for a key event in your ancestor’s life.
Perpetual Calendars
Time and Date
Ancestor Search Perpetual Calendar Calculator
There are other calculators such as Find Day of the Week Calculator for Past or Future Date that will help you find those days.
After exploring these sites, I decided to look at the tragic deaths of four small children from one family in 1886—they had all died within a four-week timeframe due to diphtheria.

• Nicholas on Tuesday July 13, 1886, age 3.
• Clara on Sunday July 18, 1886, age 6.
• Pauline on Thursday July 22, 1886, age 9.
• Mathilda on Monday August 2, 1886, age 5.

I’ve always realized these dates were close but looking at the days of the week, I realized that they lost three of these children within 9 days…in a little over a week!  From Tuesday to the next Thursday. And with little Mathilda—dying ten days later—did the family think they seen the worst of this disease only to deal with death yet again? Imagine having to bury four of your children in in less than a month.  It was a very tragic for this family. See if you have an event in your ancestors’ lives that might benefit from a different viewpoint by adding the day of the week.
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May you find something interesting in your research by applying the day of the week. I hope your day is a good one—whatever day of the week you are reading this.
 
“Someday is not a day of the week.”
--Janet Dailey