Do you have a long-term genealogy goal? Is it tracing your pedigree as completely as possible? Is it preserving and identifying as many pictures as you can? Is it sharing stories for future generations? Is it tracing the descendants of one or more sets of ancestors as completely as possible? Is it proving a parentage or connection that no one has been able to prove? Is it simply researching for the fun of it and leaving a pile for your family to clean up when you are gone? There’s no wrong answers…just your answer. The real question is: what are you doing to meet your genealogy goal?
Make certain you’ve located your relative in every extant census record for censuses taken during their life time. This may seem like basic advice, but it can be easy to overlook a census year. For those enumerations where you cannot find the ancestor, indicate where and how you have looked. People do get overlooked in the census, but your notes should always include a comment indicating that you did try and find the person. We’ve added “during their lifetime” to this tip because I have had people try and locate someone in a census only to discover that the person died several years before that census was taken. Being dead makes it difficult to be enumerated in a census–except for mortality census schedules.
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Working a record for as many clues as possible should be high on the list of activities for any genealogist. One question to ask is “who does this record suggest is alive?” That can help you with a “died after date” for that person. In some situations just knowing that can be crucial. It all depends on the family and what you do and do not know. An additional question is “who does this record suggest or state is dead?” Sometimes a “died before date” can be helpful in differentiating between two individuals of the same name.
A good reminder from a while back… Some researchers will “believe” something when they have three sources that provide the same piece of information. One has to be careful using this approach. Sources may all contain information from the same person or “original source,” which does not really mean that three “sources” agree. It could only mean that the same person gave the information three times. And there is always the chance that the second two “sources” got their information from the first. Think about who provided the information, why it is in the record, and how reasonably the informant would have known the information. That’s a good way to get started with information analysis.
Check out the return of Casefile Clues (genealogy how-tos) on our website. Casefile Clues is more in-depth and detailed than Genealogy Tip of the Day.
This is your periodic genealogy reminder: do not assume. Unfounded assumptions are one of the largest contributors to “brick walls.” Whenever you think you know something, ask yourself “how do I know this?” “Because it has to be true” is usually not an adequate reason. Do some research.
There are several things a genealogist can do to create their own stumbling blocks. One of those things is to assume that every family is the same and that the dynamics in your family are how every family functions. In my family every one knew everyone else’s age. No one’s age was a secret and shading years off your age was futile because someone would call you out on it. It had nothing to do with genealogy at all. I later learned that not all families are like that. It also took me a while to understand the dynamics of larger families (I have one sibling. My father had one sibling and my mother had no siblings who lived beyond infancy). They can be significantly different that smaller […]
If you are fortunate enough to find a case file of papers for a court or probate case, put them in chronological order before reading and analyzing them. Legal documents are confusing enough. Reading them out of order makes it even worse. The same goes for papers from a pension or other government benefit application. More Genealogy Tip of the Day–the book! Casefile Clues–my how-to newsletter.
Photos do not always stay attached to cardboard. Writing on the back of a cardboard mount for a photograph is no guarantee that the writing (and the cardboard) will stay attached to the picture. That’s what happened to the photo in the illustration. After 100 years, the glue failed to hold. Do you have pictures that could lose their identification?
Really getting into these things takes some time, but here are some general things to remember when you are “stuck:” We’ve posted an update about the return of Casefile Clues on our website.
Just a thought… Don’t assume those websites that say they will host your images/data “forever” will be around forever. The digital world is littered with websites and companies that no longer exist. FamilySearch is probably into preserving things for the long haul. Using online sites and preservation services is not bad, but just keep in mind that they may not preserve things as long as you think they will. Companies go out of business on a regular basis.
A good reminder… Never be so stuck on an initial conclusion that you avoid other reasonable scenarios or avoid looking for records because the person you need to find “simply cannot be in that location.” A relative concluded a family member returned to Germany for a visit and returned to the United States simply because the ancestor could not be located in the 1870 census. The story of the trip was repeated enough that it became an accepted fact. It’s easy to jump to conclusions when we are first starting out. We can sometimes “break brick walls” by going back and reviewing those initial conclusions.
We’ve posted an update about the return of Casefile Clues on our website.
Documenting your research is also about including in your notes why a record caused you to reach the conclusion that you did. Some records state things pretty clearly and explicitly–we say those are “direct” statements. Other times the researcher needs to take statements from several documents, combine them with other known facts to reach a conclusion not specifically stated in any one document. We say those statements are “indirect.” That reasoning needs to be included in your notes. Just in case anyone else wonders how you got a “piece of information” that’s not explicitly stated in any one record. Or in case you forget. But that would never happen, right? A reminder: For several years, quite a few years ago, I wrote a how-to newsletter, Casefile Clues. It contained […]
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