On the record: Bill Eddleman receives Award of Merit from Missouri State Genealogical Society

Dr. Bill Eddleman has followed his passion for genealogy and history for more than 25 years.

He says he began working on genealogical records after his uncle wrote a book that contained a number of historical inaccuracies. The uncle sent Eddleman his files for inspection in 1989, and he has been hooked ever since.

"I like to get beyond just the born, died, married (details). ... I like to try and figure out what their lives were like," he says.

Eddleman was one of three individuals to win a 2015 Award of Merit from the Missouri State Genealogical Society in August, but he had been unaware of his nomination.

"I didn't know I was nominated until I got notified that I was getting the award. ... It's a nice endorsement that I am doing decent work," he says.

Bill Eddleman poses for a photo at the Cape Girardeau Public Library. (Laura Simon)

He says the award is typically given to someone who "has contributed substantially to genealogy on the local level."

Eddleman became a member of the Cape Girardeau County Genealogical Society in 1991, and when he moved back to Cape Girardeau several years later, he started going to meetings. He has lived and worked here for the past 21 years and has held positions as the recording secretary and president of the society for seven two-year terms. He is currently the vice president.

Meanwhile, Eddleman worked at Southeast Missouri State University as a professor of biology, chair of the Department of Biology and eventually he became the provost of the university in 2014. He plans to retire from the university on Jan. 1.

Along with his work at Southeast and within the genealogical society, he has been editor for the society's quarterly magazine, "The Collage of Cape County," for 18 years, a position that often requires researching and writing of most of the magazine's content.

A large portion of Eddleman's research is conducted at the Cape Girardeau County Archive Center in Jackson. He says he is thankful for the accessibility and proximity of so many of the county's important records.

Bill Eddleman poses for a photo at the Cape Girardeau Public Library. (Laura Simon)

"We're very lucky here," he says. "I have ready access to the archives center; I can go out there and photograph documents and transcribe them for articles. Cape County has a wonderful preservation of its records."

Eddleman tries to encourage young people to be interested in history and genealogy by combining the two subjects.

"I think a lot of people when they do view genealogy, it's just like, 'Oh yeah, it's a bunch of old dead people.' And it's kind of the same way they view history, but if you marry the two ... I think it makes history come alive a lot more, and it also makes the genealogy a lot more meaningful as well."

Eddleman says his main focus lately has been on land records in Cape Girardeau County, especially deed abstract ledgers, which detail all the previous owners of a piece of land, house or property, including the current owner. He says this focus may have been the drive behind his nomination.

"I'm pretty sure Judge [Stephen] Limbaugh is the one that actually was behind getting me nominated," Eddleman says. "The historical society nominated me, but he used a number of my deed abstracts books. I have every deed from Cape County abstracted and indexed through 1850."

Eddleman says he wasn't expecting to win an award like this, but was slightly tipped off when Limbaugh told him at one of the society's meetings that someone should give him some type of award for all of his hard work.

"It was not 100 percent a surprise, but it was mostly a surprise," he says.

Ultimately, Eddleman was proud to receive the award, but he remains humble in its acceptance.

"It's an honor to get it. I know there are not that many that are given out every year," he says. "Somebody like me would have never gotten that award if it wasn't for a lot of people that did a lot of good work in Cape County with the society for many, many years before that."

Eddleman says he wishes to continue his work with genealogical records after he retires from the university.

"I'd specialize, since I know Southeast Missouri and a little bit about southernmost Illinois, and also people oftentimes specialize in certain types of records, and so land records is one of my areas, and then military records also," he says.

Eddleman also will be focusing more on his hobby of birding and on spending time with his grandson, who was born in April.