Noentje Lena Grass had been one of those immigrant ancestors I could never find on a manifest. Virtually all of my Ostfriesen ancestors have been found--and I have over twenty who immigrated between 1850 and 1883.
I think I've located the Backemoor, Ostfriesland, native in the New York Passenger lists.
Years ago when I searched, I focused too much on her first name and the variants such as Nontje, Nantje, etc. The recent discovery of letters she wrote in 1887 indicated she might have gone by Lena as well.
Searching the passenger lists for Lena/Lina Gross/Grass brought no results.
I finally gave up on the first name when searching. I went back and revisited her 1900 census entry (it is the last one for her as she died in 1902). On that census (which easily could be wrong) she indicated she came to the US in 1873. I performed the search as shown in the image with this post.
This entry struck my interest. And when seeing the actual image, it is easy to see how the entry could have been interpreted as Luie. However, it really does appear to be to be Lina.
Next on my list is to look at the other names on the manifest and see if any of them "ring a bell" in my head.
And I will pay close attention particularly to any last or first names that sound Ostfriesen.
We've looked for great-great-grandma for years on passenger lists and I'm just excited to find her (I think).
And it is always important to track your searches as you do them, so you do not repeat searches already done and so that all reasonable searches are conducted.
