To learn more about your ancestor’s employer as given in a city directory, search the rest of the city directory for information on that employer as it may include advertisements or list the employer in a list of area businesses. Consider performing a Google search for the name of the business and search local and regional histories as well, many of which have been digitized at Google Books (http://books.google.com) or Archive.org (http://www.archive.org).
Initial letters or prefixes of names can be intentionally or inadvertently omitted, with: Knight becoming Night Hoffman becoming Aufmann O’Neill becoming Neill MacArthur becoming Arthur Van De Burg becoming Berg etc. Is it possible a first letter or two was dropped when your name of interest was entered in a record?
Full text searches are not always perfect. On 19 February 2017 a search for the word “ufkes” resulted in two matches in the face of Lt. General James Brickel.
Using Indexes at FamilySearch Making the best use of indexed materials at FamilySearch requires a knowledge and understanding of how the indexes at FamilySearch work and how they do not. After providing an overview of search strategies to use at FamilySearch we will look at several examples where locating the person of interest was more involved than simply typing their name the search box and finding it the first time. This presentation will also briefly address organizing your online search strategy. Handout included. Order for immediate download.
We’ve mentioned this before, but some problems can be worked around or solved by thinking about every assumption we have made about an ancestor and “their situation.” Every assumption. Especially those that are near and dear to our heart. Those are the ones that can create the biggest stumbling blocks. If you don’t have documentation for a “fact” about your ancestor, then that fact could be incorrect. Even if you do have documentation for a fact, that documentation could be incorrect. Always consider the possibility that what you think you know could be wrong–and then ask yourself: what would I do differently if this “fact” weren’t true? And then do it.
Negative evidence generally is a conclusion that one draws from the absence of information that one would suspect. Not finding an ancestor’s name on a real estate tax list would be negative evidence indicating he did not own property in that area–because if he did own property, his name would be on the real property tax list
When taking pictures of gravestones, always take at least one picture showing the relative positions of all stones you’ve photographed. The positioning may not hold clues, but it’s a good piece of information to get while you are in the cemetery. Pictures showing the relative position of the stones in the entire cemetery–or at least near landmarks within the cemetery–is a good idea as well. With digital images, “wasting film” isn’t a concern. The best time to take the pictures is while you are right there at the source.
Two years ago one of the fee-based websites that has digital images of newspapers had images of my hometown newspaper for the year in which I was born. I am absolutely certain of it. I downloaded a copy of my birth announcement, my grandfather’s obituary, and my great-grandfather’s obituary. Two days ago, I went back to search for another item from that same time period. The newspapers were not there. Always search and download when you can. You never know when that website may no longer have the database you need. Or that you simply can’t find that item that it took you hours to locate.
At Genealogy Tip of the Day we want you to think about your research: how you decide what material to research, how you find material, how you analyze material. We want you to think about what sources you may not have looked at, what assumptions about your ancestor may not be true, and what conclusions regarding your ancestor may need to be re-evaluated. Think, engage, and interact with what you find–don’t just react.
“The couple waited to get married because they were on the frontier and there were no preachers to marry them.” In Ohio in the 1810s that could happen. That probably does not explain the situation in Illinois in 1890. “The county boundary was always changing and that’s why I am having research difficulties.” In Virginia in the 1600s, that could be the problem. That’s probably not the difficulty in Iowa in 1910. (County boundaries can always change, but tend to happen more when territory is frontier and in the early stages of being settled.) Any justification for not finding a record should make sense in the time period and the location in which the ancestor lived. Just because someone else used that “excuse” for why they could not […]
If you “lose a child” of a couple on which you are working, don’t assume the child died? It’s possible that he went to live with a relative or even a stranger if the family had too many mouths to feed or if the relative needed extra help on the farm or with the household chores and young children. It was not unheard of to “farm out” children to others–and this applies to farming and non-farming ancestors. If the child disappeared, consider that she could be living with other relatives. If that relative lived a distance away, the child may have ended up settling in that area.
How often do you ask the clerk to look for you again for a document? I have lost count of the number of times a clerk or someone could not find a record in a courthouse or other facility only to have someone find it several years later. There are things that are lost or were never recorded. But if it’s been a while since you looked or had someone look, it might be time to have another person to look for the item. Especially if there is new clerk or office staff.
Do I Cite it All? Making “your case” is more than simply citing every document that mentions a date of birth, a date of death, a marriage, a parent-child relationship, etc. It is determining what to cite, and if no one document states the fact clearly, including all the relevant documents. Depending upon the situation, making your case may involve deciding what documents to use if you have fifteen sources that all provide a date of birth. We will see how to pick and choose sources when there are many of them and how to make your case when it takes multiple sources to reach a conclusion. We will look at three different examples (at least) from the 18th and 19th centuries. Purchase media file and handouts. Download […]
When heirs are selling property after a death, always look to see where the deed was acknowledged. The deed will have to be recorded in the county in which the property was located, but heirs may acknowledge the deed before a local official where they live. That local official will indicate the location in which he was authorized to act as a notary, justice of the peace, etc. That location can help you to determine where the person was living at the time the deed was acknowledged, even if the deed itself does provide any residential information on the grantors.
A chronology of school attendance can be good for you to develop for yourself or as something to ask someone you are interviewing. People who moved around a lot as children may remember names of schools they attended better than specific addresses. I’ve posted mine as an example. My residence never changed, but the school district moved us around a little bit: kindergarten-second grade–Ferris Elementary School, Ferris, Illinois [where my parents both went to grade school for time] third grade–Lincoln Elementary School, Carthage, Illinois [where my mother taught elementary school for over thirty years] fourth-fifth grade–Union-Douglas School, east of Basco, Illinois sixth grade–Ferris Elementary School seventh-eighth grade–Scofield Junior High, Carthage, Illinois [it was the high school when my maternal grandmother attended it] ninth-twelfth grade–Carthage High School, Carthage, Illinois […]
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