Welcome!

This web site updates and extends the work of two researchers into the Board families of Bedford County, Virginia and their descendants. Those researchers, Margaret Isabelle Board Oberst and Leah McCarty, published manuscripts in the late 1990s detailing their findings. I corresponded with Isabelle Oberst in the early 2000s and she shared with me her web site which expanded the genealogy in her printed volume. Unfortunately, after her death in 2018, the web site was lost. I was able to preserve a certain amount of that site's new information and have included it here. The one shortcoming of the Oberst and McCarty manuscripts is a lack of source citations for the many facts, dates, and relationships described. Given the extensive detail present in these works, it is likely that both authors had access to private family documents not known to others; however, corroboration from other sources is desirable regardless. The works also show that many hours were spent researching government and other records.

My purpose in updating the work of Oberst and McCarty has been to (a) make this information more available and relevant to researchers, (b) include reliable sources for as many facts as possible, and (c) to find other Board descendants for collaboration in DNA testing. Descendants of John Board, Sr. of Bedford County, Virginia, who wish to work in DNA-based genealogy are urged to contact me via email. I am especially interested in male-line descendants who are willing to pursue Y-chromosome research.

Like the Oberst manuscript, this web site begins with Francis Board and his wife Anne Mead in Baltimore, Maryland, circa 1700. I have tracked all known Board surname lines to the near present, but I have not pursued other surname lines as far. I have shielded the privacy of those persons who are likely to be alive today.

Questions or corrections (with sources, please) should be sent to me by email. Best of luck in your genealogical quest!

Tom Board
January 2023

The original works cited above:

• [Margaret] Isabelle Board Oberst, The Board Family Chronicle; From Maryland to Bedford County, Virginia (N.p.: Self-published, 1997)
• Leah McCarty, The Board's From Bedford County, Virginia to Breckinridge and Meade Counties of Kentucky (Evansville, Indiana: self-published, revised third edition 1997)

  Descendants of Francis Board
  Surname List
  Index of Names
  Sources (Bibliography)

Send E-mail to wildcattommygenealogy@gmail.com