About the Glarus family tree project (the methodology of the research work)

 

For many years, I have been researching the families of Glarus as a hobby. About five years ago, I started an ambitious project to trace the family connections between the 200 or so original families from Glarus. The starting point for my family research is always the outstanding genealogical work of Johann Jakob Kubly-Müller. In more than 30 years of work (1893-1923), Kubly-Müller created this unique reference work. It comprises a total of 36 large and small volumes as well as the index for the older Glarus genealogy and an alphabetical index. Kubly Müller's monumental work, which is based on the entire inventory of parish registers in the canton of Glarus and supplemented by historical indexes, documents and materials from public and private archives, lists all Glarus families from the 16th century to the present in their sequence and links them in a neat and legible script.

 

After the death of Johann Jakob Kubly-Müller and the sale of the work to the canton, the respective state archivists or biblothecaries or their employees appear to have updated the births, deaths and marriages on the basis of official notifications. My research has shown that at least the deaths were updated until 2010. The various manuscripts can also be used to identify the people who made the additions, at least on the basis of this feature:

 

1893 – 1923    Johann Jakob Kubly-Müller

1923 – 1932    Hans Schiesser (State Archivist, State Librarian and Interrogating Judge)

1932 – 1965    Dr. phil. Jakob Winteler (State Archivist)

1965 – 2005    Josef Müller (Secretary of the State Library, State Librarian)

1987 – 2017    Erika Kamm-Weber (genealogy, only partial updating and maintenance of an external database)

2017 -              Lara Caetano (genealogy, no more updating in the genealogy work)

 

Whenever possible, I have included the Kubly-Müller reference in the Glarus family tree. In addition, I also use information I find on relevant websites (e.g. Ancestry.com, Find A Grave etc.). Since such information must be taken with a grain of salt, I try to verify the information gathered from the Internet whenever possible.

 

In Switzerland, I mainly use the work of Kubly-Müller and the corresponding church register records for my research tasks. In order to keep the Glarus Family Tree up to date, I have started to evaluate the current obituaries on www.todesanzeigenportal.ch as well as the obituaries published in the official gazette of the Canton of Glarus up to 2017. The research work is ongoing and the aim is to close the gap in Kubly-Müller's work that arose due to the discontinuation of official tracking work around 2010. At present, the current period back to 2010 is covered by my own research work. 

 

I publish my results on various websites, one is my own website on Geneanet, another on Geneal-Tree, a German website and the third is the paid website of Ancestry (see links below). These websites give me access to interested genealogists with whom I am constantly exchanging further available information and in return receive additional information that supports my project. Family history is not just about collecting birth, marriage and death data. Family history is interesting and only accessible through individual stories and photos. Therefore, whenever possible, I have included photos and historical facts in the family trees. I receive most of these documents from the ever-growing circle of interested amateur genealogists. Therefore, additional information about missing family members is always very welcome.

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The Glarus family tree with more than 360,000 individuals can be found on:

 

• Geneanet (Free of charge / German and English / Living persons are hidden and can only be viewed with an access code) - Updated with every 5,000 new persons

• Ancestry (subject to charge / German and English / living persons are hidden and can only be viewed with specially granted access) / updated after every 5,000 new persons

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Every user can contribute to the financing of the Glarus family tree project with a voluntary donation. These donations are used to cover the costs of web space, web hosting and domain. The webmaster of this website thanks you for your donation.

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Please use the following link to make a donation

 

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Family research in Switzerland

 

Civil status: Civil status documents (birth, marriage, divorce, death) have only been recorded by the Swiss authorities since 1876. Before that, civil status was recorded by the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches. The first step is to find out which religion an emigrant in Switzerland belonged to.  The records were kept in a Catholic or Protestant church before 1876. It is rare for people to change religion when emigrating, so in case of doubt you can assume that the religion practiced abroad is the same as in Switzerland. 

 

Home town: Where is the home town? This refers to a city, small town or municipality where civil documents are kept. The place of origin is also known as the "place of citizenship". This place of origin is passed down from father to child and to wife upon marriage. Until recently, a woman had acquired the place of origin from her husband on marriage and lost her own. However, this was changed in the last revision of the law.  

 

Documents relating to changes in marital status are recorded in the place of origin, regardless of where the event actually took place. This has been the case since 1876, in some cases even since the end of the 17th century.  

 

However, there is one important exception: the home towns only register the documents that are sent to them. In past centuries, when a person emigrated, it was very rare for changes in marital status to be reported to Switzerland and so the family registers could not be kept up to date.

 

Switzerland's data protection regulations have made it difficult to search for living relatives. The Civil Status Ordinance requires a cantonal research permit, which is subject to a fee set by the canton. The Swiss Data Protection Act can be viewed here: Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP)

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Family research in Glarus

 

Data on persons born before 1918 or who have died since 1988 can be viewed without authorization. Authorization from the cantonal registry office is required to access data on persons who are less than 100 years old or have been dead for less than 30 years. An application to this effect must be sent in advance to marianna.weber@gl.ch, stating the reasons for such an examination. Permission is usually granted without any problems if you want to research your own family. If you need assistance, click here.

 

The Kubly-Müller volumes with all the family information are archived in the National Archives in Glarus.

 

Landesarchiv des Kantons Glarus

Gerichtshausstrasse 25

8750 Glarus

 

Before you go there, you must ask permission or reserve a desk:

 

Lara Caetano

Wappen und Genealogie

Phone: +41-55 646 63 11

lara.caetano@gl.ch  or  landesarchiv@gl.ch

 

Opening hours:

Wednesday to Friday from 8 am to 12 noon and 1.30 pm to 5 pm, on Thursday until 5.30 pm

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Allow enough time for your research. It can take 5 minutes or several hours. I have prepared a user guide for your visit to the National Archives: User Guide On How To Read The Kubly-Müller Records.

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Here you can see the official flyer of the Landesarchiv in English): 

User Guide prepared by the Landesarchiv in Glarus

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The church records of Glarus

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The introduction of church registers in Glarus came relatively late, almost 100 years after the publication of the oldest church registers in Switzerland (in Pruntrut in 1481). Although the Council of Trent had passed resolutions on the introduction of church registers in 1563, in the very distinct Catholic parishes such as Näfels they did not begin until 1655, while the Protestant parish of Mollis, for example, was the first to introduce these registers in the canton from 1570. The use of the parish registers must be clear, based on which parishes existed at which time and where their inhabitants previously went to church. The parish of Bilten belonged to Niederurnen until 1607, Netstal to Glarus until 1699 (Protestant) and 1708 (Catholic), and Mitlödi before 1725, while Luchsingen belonged partly to Betschwanden and partly to Schwanden until 1753. Mühlehorn belonged to Obstalden until 1760 and Ennenda to Glarus before 1774. Oberurnen, which was the last church to be elevated to its own parish before the introduction of civil registers in 1868, belonged to the parish of Näfels until then.

 

The church registers before 1876 leave much to be desired, as the control of the church committee and the synod had little effect. The covers and bindings of some of the church registers are loose and torn, and in many cases pages are missing at the back and front and have been lost through carelessness and indifference. Remarkably, the books of the Sernf valley are almost the best kept. In these, for example, all those who died of the plague in 1611, 1625 and 1626 are included, while in all the other church records of the canton there is virtually no record of the plague deaths; only in the marriage registers can a corresponding entry be found from time to time. To the credit of the parish priests, however, it must be mentioned that he must have been very strict at the time during the plague. In addition, most clergymen had the inglorious custom of not entering children who died under the age of 16, i.e. before confirmation, in the registers of the dead. Some registrars only mentioned at the end of the year that so and so many people had died, including so and so many children, but the names of the children were missing. Incidentally, the infant mortality rate was alarmingly high despite the usually plentiful supply of children, with infantile diarrhea (variolis) and dissenteria (dysentery) having a major impact. The highest infant mortality rate was recorded in 1801, a truly terrible year for the youth of the canton of Glarus, in which more than 2000 children died of smallpox alone.

 

The parish priests of earlier times did not always deserve honorable testimony for the register keeping entrusted to them and, above all, the mutual exchange and reporting of civil status incidents to the home parishes was very poor. The clergy of both denominations were not subject to any control and would not have tolerated any superintendence. In this respect, they had an unconditional blind trust, which was not always appropriate. However, the Civil Status and Marriage Act of 1876 brought about a fundamental change in these abuses. 

 

One notable exception from the 17th century was the pastor Johannes Marti von Glarusl, pastor in Betschwanden from 1692-1702, who, when he took office in 1692, voluntarily recorded a register of the population of the entire parish of Betschwanden and entered each family with all its members' names and dates of birth in a booklet with a beautiful leather cover. His successor, Pastor Johann Heinrich Zwicki from Mollis and Glarus, was the exact opposite, leaving behind a dreadful mess in Betschwanden and later also in Netstal, not to mention Pastor Leonhardi from Filisur, who made no entries at all in the parish register during his entire term of office from 1809 to 1829. And like him, Pastor Levin Feldmann in Schwanden also failed to make any entries from 1729-1735.

 

It is also very regrettable that the books of the Kerenzerberg, which according to credible reports were kept very carefully and in which a pastor is said to have entered himself as a plague victim, were destroyed by the fire in the rectory in Obstalden on March 4, 1834. The parish priest at the time, Jakob Menzi, was startled by the fire in the house and first took his chickens to safety and once this was done, it was no longer possible to save the parish registers. An irreplaceable loss that is very much to be regretted. Although the parish of Kerenzen later had a register of citizens compiled for a shorter period of time, it was no longer possible to go back to the earlier periods. Unfortunately, these ecclesiastical records have been destroyed for all time. Niederurnen also lost its parish registers in the 17th century due to a fire, which is why the records from that time are also incomplete, although attempts were also made there to at least collect the names of the male deceased, which were partially successful. Fortunately, the Protestant books from Glarus were preserved in the Glarus fire. Pastor Johann Jakob Streiff had the presence of mind during the fire to first throw the books from the already burning rectory down into the garden, where they were found and recovered the following morning, protected by a corner of the wall, completely intact. Unfortunately, most of the Catholic parish registers were burned and the entries only go back to 1722, while nothing is known about the fate of the earlier books of the Catholics of Glarus, Netstal, Ennenda and Mitlödi. In addition, the oldest parish register of the parish of Elm was burned in 1861. 

 

Another important source for the genealogy of the canton of Glarus is the Zürcher Glückshafenrodel. In 1504, a large international shooting competition was held in the city of Zurich. This shooting competition was also associated with a so-called "Glückshafen", a kind of lottery in which considerable lucky tickets could be won for a small deposit. A precise register was kept of these deposits, in which between 500 and 600 Glarus names appear. This register is all the more valuable as the church records in the canton of Glarus do not go back to this time. For a list of the names appearing in it, see Johann Jakob Kubly-Müller, Die Glarner am grossen internationalen Freischiessen im Jahre 1504 zu Zürich und ihre Beteiligung am sogenannten Glückshafen, in: Jahrbuch des Historischen Vereins des Kantons Glarus, Vol. 36 (1910), 64ff.

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First church registers of the parishes

B: Birth and baptism registers

M: Marriage registers

D: Death register

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Betschwanden: B: 1598-1875 / M: 1606-1875 / D: 1771-1875

Bilten: previously belonged to Niederurnen/ B: 1607-1875 / M: 1607-1875 / D: 1607-1875

Braunwald: previously belonged to Betschwanden and Linthal

Diesbach: belongs to Betschwanden

Elm: B: 1595-1875 / M: 1595-1875 / D: 1595-1875

Engi: previously belonged to Matt/ B: 1801-1875 / M: 1801-1875 / D: 1801-1875

Ennenda: previously belonged to Glarus / B: 1775-1875 / M: 1775-1875 / D: 1775-1875

Filzbach: belongs to Kerenzen (Obstalden)

Glarus Protestant B: 1598-1875 / M: 1598-1875 / D: 1620-1875

Glarus Catholic: B: 1800-1875 / M: 1800-1875 / D: 1800-1875

Hätzingen: belongs to Betschwanden

Haslen: belongs to Schwanden / B: 1801-1875 

Kerenzen (Obstalden): B: 1834-1875 / M: 1834-1875 / D: 1834-1875 (Reconstruction of earlier years on the basis of old church records)

Leuggelbach: belongs to Schwanden

Linthal Protestant: B: 1601-1875 / M: 1601-1875 / D: 1640-1875

Linthal Catholic: B: 1654-1875 / M: 1654-1875 / D: 1654-1875

Luchsingen: previously belonged partly to Betschwanden and partly to Schwanden / B: 1752-1875 / M: 1752-1875 / D: 1752-1875

Matt: B: 1595-1875 / E: 1595-1875 / D: 1595-1875

Mitlödi: previously belonged to Glarus/ B: 1725-1875 / M: 1725-1875 / D: 1725-1875

Mollis: B: 1571-1875 / M: 1627-1875 / D: 1617-1875

Mühlehorn: previously belonged to Kerenzen (Obstalden) / B: 1761-1875 / M: 1761-1875 / D: 1761-1875

Näfels: B: 1655-1875 / M: 1655-1875 / D: 1655-1875

Netstal Protestant: previously belonged to Glarus / B: 1698-1875 / M: 1698-1875 / D: 1698-1875

Netstal Catholic previously belonged to Glarus / B: 1861-1875 / D: 1861-1875 

Nidfurn: belongs to Schwanden

Niederurnen: B: 1680-1875 / M: 1680-1875 / D: 1680-1875

Oberurnen: previously belonged to Näfels / B: 1868-1875 / M: 1868-1875 / D: 1868-1875

Riedern: belongs to Glarus

Rüti: previously belonged to Betschwanden / B: 1809-1875 

Schwändi: previously belonged to Schwanden / B: 1801-1875

Schwanden: B: 1611-1875 / M: 1611-1875 / D: 1662-1875

Sool: previously belonged to Schwanden / B: 1750-1875 / M: 1750-1875 / D: 1750-1875

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Information on Swiss cemeteries

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In North America, cemeteries can be an important source for gathering genealogical information. Headstone inscriptions and plot placements can lead to new information about your ancestors. Find a Grave is a website that helps you find gravestones around the world.

 

You will not find this resource in Switzerland.  Very few graves are older than 25 years. Switzerland is a very small country with limited land use.  Therefore, it is important to know that burial plots can usually only be rented for 25 years. 

 

Families can buy plots or rent them on a very long-term basis. You may also find a headstone of an important citizen that could date back more than 40 years. But in most cases, once the grave is dug, the headstone is returned to the family or recycled.

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What happens when the term of the graves expires?

 

In addition to the official notification and notices at the cemetery, the municipalities also notify the relatives of the upcoming grave clearance a few months in advance. It is not possible to extend the period of rest for a row grave, but it is possible for family or other rental graves. However, in these cases the grave space is also subject to a charge. 

 

The grave is always cleared in blocks. It is therefore possible that some graves exist for exactly as long as the legal term stipulates, others for slightly longer - depending on the difference in the burial date between the first and last grave in the field.

 

When the grave is cleared, it is only removed from the surface. All this clearing work goes only 15 to 20 centimeters deep, i.e. well above the urns and coffins buried. It is then filled with fresh humus at the same level and sown. The human remains or the urn containing the ashes of the deceased remain in the ground. Depending on the amount of space required, 60 to 80 years will pass before the next burial and another coffin will be buried in the same place. During this time, there is nothing left of what was previously buried because today's cemeteries are constructed in such a way that there is no water accumulation. Good ventilation of the earth is also ensured. The decomposition of urns is also accelerated because they have to be made of lightly baked material.

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Publication of civil status notifications

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The publication of civil status cases (births, marriages or burials) only began with the introduction of the cantonal civil status system on 1.1.1870. From this time onwards, the civil registrars had to publish all entries in the civil status registers in abbreviated form in the cantonal official gazettes. 

 

From 1978, the publication of a civil status case could be omitted at the request of the person concerned to the civil status office. In the canton of Glarus, births and deaths were published in the official gazette at the request of relatives. 

 

Until June 30, 1998, the registration of a marriage was known in Switzerland as an "order of marriage" and was posted publicly or published in the official gazette for 14 days. Since July 1, 1998, the publication of marriage ceremonies has been dispensed with for data protection reasons.

 

On 1 July 2017, Article 57 of the Federal Civil Status Ordinance was repealed for data protection reasons, meaning that the cantons may no longer authorize the civil status offices to publish civil status cases. In the canton of Glarus, marriages, births and deaths are no longer automatically reported to the official gazette since the change in federal law, and civil status notifications have no longer been published in the official gazette since 1 July 2019. However, relatives are allowed to report events to the public themselves by means of a private announcement.

 

The website Todesanzeigenportal.ch publishes all obituaries published in magazines or online in Switzerland.

 

In the municipalities, it is important for residents to be informed about life in the village or municipality. It is not for nothing that birth, marriage and death announcements are among the most widely read sections of newspapers and newsletters. Civil status announcements published online are among the top news items and are read the most. The argument that publication does not correspond to an overriding interest must therefore be contradicted. For this reason, National Councillor David Zuberbühler proposed to the Council in a motion in the 2019 autumn session that the ban on the publication of civil status notifications be lifted again.

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Count your ancestors

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Many of us are interested in where our families come from and who our ancestors were. Where are our "roots"? Some of you may have even researched your genealogy or family history. But have you ever seriously thought about how many direct ancestors you really have? Obviously it's a lot, but how many? You may have even heard statements that all Europeans are descendants of Charlemagne, or that all people of English descent are 86% descended from people who lived in England at the time of William the Conqueror almost a thousand years ago. If you live in North America and have English or European ancestry, the same questions apply. In fact, wherever you live and whatever your ethnic ancestry, the issues of ancestry and descent are the same. A short article published on The Wild Peas Blog in 2012 attempts to answer, or at least explain, some of these questions in a non-mathematical way.

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Here is the link to the English-language article

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How many people have ever lived on earth? / Wie viele Menschen haben jemals auf der Erde gelebt? Here is the link to the English-language article

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Table with the theoretical number of ancestors, age and year of birth of all your direct ancestors

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