The Schitt Family Bible — Surviving Register Pages
Family Register, c. 1783–1938
Among the surviving materials of the Schitt family are several pages from the family Bible, maintained across successive generations as births, marriages, and deaths were recorded.
Unlike the Official Register, which was assembled from numerous archival and public sources, these pages represent the family recording itself.
The handwriting changes.
The ink changes.
The people holding the pen changed.
The family did not.
Museum Note
The surviving pages were not completed at one time. Entries appear to have accumulated over generations, with later family members continuing the record begun by those before them.
Differences in handwriting, ink, spacing, and notation have therefore been preserved rather than standardized.
Dates and relationships appearing on these pages should be read as entries in the family record and may be compared with the Official Register of the Schitt Family and other materials held by the Archives.
Family Register — Earlier Entries
Recorded families and related lines, late eighteenth through nineteenth centuries.
Archivist’s Note
The earlier register contains some of the oldest connected family entries preserved in the Bible.
The Schitt name appears alongside Talon, Bird, Ironton, Chitty, Malarkey and others—not as separate histories, but as families gradually joined by marriage, circumstance, and the occasional decision nobody thought necessary to explain.
Several of these names appear elsewhere throughout the Archives.
That is not an accident.
Family Register — Later Entries
Continuation of the family record into the twentieth century.
Museum Note
By the later pages, names familiar elsewhere in the Archives begin appearing together in the same family record.
Among them are Bewilder Overawe and Honour May Schitt, followed in succeeding years by members of the family whose records extend into the modern Schitt generations.
No interpretive family tree has been added to these pages.
Visitors wishing to determine precisely how everyone is related are encouraged to consult the Official Register.
Or stare at the Bible long enough. Both methods have been attempted.
A Note About the Record
Family Bibles occupy an unusual place in genealogy.
They are personal records rather than government documents, often maintained by people recording events they witnessed, remembered, or were told about by other family members. Consequently, an entry may preserve information unavailable elsewhere while occasionally disagreeing with another surviving source.
The Crock O. Schitt Historical Archives preserves these pages as family records, including their inconsistencies, omissions, later additions, and changes in handwriting.
Where the Bible and another archival source disagree, the Archives records the discrepancy rather than quietly choosing whichever version causes the least trouble.
That policy has caused considerably more trouble.
Crock’s Comment
“Folks keep askin’ how all these people are connected. That’s why somebody wrote the damn names down.”
— Crock O. Schitt
Archival Identification
Collection: Schitt Family Bible
Record Type: Family Register
Period Represented: 1783–1938
Contents: Births, marriages, deaths, and associated family entries
Physical Record: Surviving family Bible register pages
Archival Status: Preserved / Cross-referenced
Related Holdings: Official Register of the Schitt Family; Back History; Schitt Family History
Final Museum Comment
These pages are presented without a reconstructed family tree intentionally.
The Schitt family did not develop as a tidy diagram. Families married into families, branches separated, names changed, people moved, records disappeared, and later generations attempted to make sense of what remained.
The Bible is one of the places where those branches can still be seen crossing.
Sometimes the easiest way to understand all this Schitt is simply to follow the handwriting.