David Thackery
1953-06-15 1998-07-17
NEWBERRY OFFICIAL DAVID THACKERY
Meg McSherry Breslin, Tribune Staff Writer
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
David T. Thackery took his passion for history seriously. While doing research for a book on men from his small Ohio hometown who served in the Civil War, he spent hours in tiny rural libraries and at cemeteries, searching for any details he could find on the 66th Infantry Division.
"We'd literally be crawling around the headstones until he found the 66th Division" on a tombstone,, said his mother, Enid Thackery.
Such fascination with family and community history developed at an early age, and it carried Mr. Thackery from his rural Ohio town to the University of Chicago and later to the Newberry Library in Chicago, where he established a national reputation for his work in family and community research.
Mr. Thackery, curator of local and family history at the Newberry, died July 17 after suffering a heart attack while jogging in Chicago. A resident of Hyde Park, he was 45.
As head of Newberry's genealogy department for 15 years, Mr. Thackery dramatically expanded the library's services and collections in that area. In 1988 and 1989, he used a $62,000 grant from the Lloyd A. Fry Foundation in Chicago to buy microfilm from the National Archives with histories of former slaves.
He also hired people to go out to Chicago schools and community agencies in the African-American community to explain how residents could use the new materials to research their family ancestry. As a result, the library saw a dramatic jump in patrons, and it watched some exciting tales unfold as patrons uncovered secrets from their past.
At one point, two people working independently at the library, one white and one African-American, discovered their ancestors worked at the same plantation by using Mr. Thackery's National Archives research. Those kind of moments made the staff realize how important Mr. Thackery's work was, said Charles T. Cullen, Newberry's president.
"They met each other and they realized they could be related, and that in any case their lives were intertwined way back. It's that kind of thing that people are doing here now that's really quite exciting," Cullen said.
Cullen said no one was more thrilled to see the new interest from patrons than Mr. Thackery.
"David did his own research, and he knew how exciting it was to get the information. When he helped somebody else make those discoveries, it made his day," Cullen said.
Ruth Hooper, a former registrar for the Daughters of the American Revolution in Chicago, got to know Mr. Thackery while researching family histories at the library.
"He was just very helpful in trying to impart his enthusiasm for genealogy to anybody who would listen," she said.
Mr. Thackery also helped Newberry work out an agreement with the Mormon Church in Salt Lake City, which houses the most complete genealogical data in the world. The church has agreed to open its storehouse to anyone who cannot find what they need at Newberry, giving patrons quick and easy access to important information.
A native of Urbana, Ohio, Mr. Thackery received his bachelor's degree from Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, and later received two master's degrees from the University of Chicago, in library science and in divinity.
After arriving at the Newberry, he wrote dozens of articles and submitted regular columns for Ancestry Magazine. He was a regular speaker for genealogical societies throughout the Midwest. His history of the 66th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, a Civil War regiment mostly from his native Champaign County, Ohio, will be published by Kent State University Press in 1999.
The book details the history and lives of the men who served in that infantry, and it consumed much of Mr. Thackery's interest for the last several years.
"The important thing is that he has left his work," his mother said. "That was his expression of life."
Mr. Thackery has no other immediate survivors. The Newberry Library will hold a memorial service later this summer at a date to be determined.
Meg McSherry Breslin, Tribune Staff Writer
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
David T. Thackery took his passion for history seriously. While doing research for a book on men from his small Ohio hometown who served in the Civil War, he spent hours in tiny rural libraries and at cemeteries, searching for any details he could find on the 66th Infantry Division.
"We'd literally be crawling around the headstones until he found the 66th Division" on a tombstone,, said his mother, Enid Thackery.
Such fascination with family and community history developed at an early age, and it carried Mr. Thackery from his rural Ohio town to the University of Chicago and later to the Newberry Library in Chicago, where he established a national reputation for his work in family and community research.
Mr. Thackery, curator of local and family history at the Newberry, died July 17 after suffering a heart attack while jogging in Chicago. A resident of Hyde Park, he was 45.
As head of Newberry's genealogy department for 15 years, Mr. Thackery dramatically expanded the library's services and collections in that area. In 1988 and 1989, he used a $62,000 grant from the Lloyd A. Fry Foundation in Chicago to buy microfilm from the National Archives with histories of former slaves.
He also hired people to go out to Chicago schools and community agencies in the African-American community to explain how residents could use the new materials to research their family ancestry. As a result, the library saw a dramatic jump in patrons, and it watched some exciting tales unfold as patrons uncovered secrets from their past.
At one point, two people working independently at the library, one white and one African-American, discovered their ancestors worked at the same plantation by using Mr. Thackery's National Archives research. Those kind of moments made the staff realize how important Mr. Thackery's work was, said Charles T. Cullen, Newberry's president.
"They met each other and they realized they could be related, and that in any case their lives were intertwined way back. It's that kind of thing that people are doing here now that's really quite exciting," Cullen said.
Cullen said no one was more thrilled to see the new interest from patrons than Mr. Thackery.
"David did his own research, and he knew how exciting it was to get the information. When he helped somebody else make those discoveries, it made his day," Cullen said.
Ruth Hooper, a former registrar for the Daughters of the American Revolution in Chicago, got to know Mr. Thackery while researching family histories at the library.
"He was just very helpful in trying to impart his enthusiasm for genealogy to anybody who would listen," she said.
Mr. Thackery also helped Newberry work out an agreement with the Mormon Church in Salt Lake City, which houses the most complete genealogical data in the world. The church has agreed to open its storehouse to anyone who cannot find what they need at Newberry, giving patrons quick and easy access to important information.
A native of Urbana, Ohio, Mr. Thackery received his bachelor's degree from Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, and later received two master's degrees from the University of Chicago, in library science and in divinity.
After arriving at the Newberry, he wrote dozens of articles and submitted regular columns for Ancestry Magazine. He was a regular speaker for genealogical societies throughout the Midwest. His history of the 66th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, a Civil War regiment mostly from his native Champaign County, Ohio, will be published by Kent State University Press in 1999.
The book details the history and lives of the men who served in that infantry, and it consumed much of Mr. Thackery's interest for the last several years.
"The important thing is that he has left his work," his mother said. "That was his expression of life."
Mr. Thackery has no other immediate survivors. The Newberry Library will hold a memorial service later this summer at a date to be determined.
I just completed David's book "A Light and Uncertain Hold". I highly recommend it especially if you have ancestors from the Champaign County area.
tribute by Phil Hill