A while ago I was listening to a lecture on Google Books and Google Scholar given by Ben Bunnell from Google. I highly recommend the lecture if you want a good introduction to Google Scholar and Google Book Search. As I was listening I decided I would try a search for “vandrimmelen” and see what came up. I knew that some of my ancestors were educators, but they died years before I was born, or I was too young to remember them to know what they really did.

I started out with Google Books and was delighted to find a couple of interesting things that my Dad and Mom probably know a little bit more about than me:

Addresses and Proceedings - National Education Association of the United States

This book has several references to Thomas VanDrimmelen Jr (from Utah). If you scroll down on the page you see the beginning of a dialog that he is having. It looks interesting. I think that Thomas was a brother of my Grandfather.

Nursing in Hospice and Terminal Care: Research and Practice

Reference to an article that my Grandma Van co-wrote: “Evaluation of a commonly used oral hygiene agent” (Published in Nursing Research, 1969). I knew she was a nurse and taught nursing classes at BYU.

Prediction of successful nursing performance v. 1

This one doesn’t have visuals of the book itself, but I imagine if I were to find this book (which is very easy with Google Books just enter search by zip code) I would find something about or by my Grandma in there.

I then went to Google Scholar and found a reference to my Grandpa Van:

Evaluation of Health Standards used in Determining Qualifications of Prospective Teachers.

Co-authored by my Grandpa Van in 1964. He died when my Dad was still a little kid, so it was almost surreal as I read something that my Grandfather, the man I had heard about my whole life, wrote.

What have your experiences been? Do you have any long lost relatives that you found through Google Scholar/Book Search? Try a search (Books, Scholar) and see what you find.