Don’t assume your ancestor would not be in a paper, because “our family didn’t warrant any mention.” You never know when your ancestor might have been in an organization that caused him to get mentioned, got into legal trouble, received a pension, or any of a number of things that might have caused his name to appear in print. He might have even written a letter encouraging his fellow farmers to grow more winter wheat as the United States approached the first World War. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Obituaries and death notices, particularly more recent ones, may not mention previous spouses or the factthat children of the deceased are not full siblings. Be careful before concluding that the children listed in an obituary share the same set of both parents. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Review all the materials you have on “your” ancestor. Are you certain all those references to “your” ancestor are actually “your” ancestor? How would your conclusions change if one of those references actually was not to your ancestor? ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Search Google Books (http://books.google.com) for every ancestor or relative. You never know who might appear in a printed reference. Sometimes the most unexpected names appear in print. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Your great-grandfather disappeared in the 1920s. Descendants “know nothing” and searches in the area are unsuccessful. Consider tracing the great-grandfather’s sibling and his aunts and uncles and their descendants to see if any of those individuals know where your great-grandfather “condensed.” Sometimes more distant family members know more than a person thinks. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
It is easy to search without looking to see if the record even exists. Ancestry.com “let” me search the 1810 census for a man who should have been living in Ohio. Problem is that most of the 1810 census for Ohio was destroyed in the War of 1812. If I never get past the search box, I don’t realize that. Are you making certain it really exists before you click “search?” ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
If you need maps of county boundary changes, complete with animations, try this site hosted by Chicago’s Newberry Library. http://publications.newberry.org/ahcbp/index.html ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
If you can’t find an ancestor who should be a head of household in a pre-1850 United States census, consider that he could be living with someone else and not listed by name. I was looking for an older ancestor in 1840. Then it dawned on me that, given his age in 1840, he might have been living with one of his children. The ancestor would not have been head of household and would be “hidden” in one of those tally marks. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
I was asked to give people a little advance notice about our next offering of “Organizing Your Genealogical Information.” Our next series of classes and follow up sessions will begin in January 2013. More details are here. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Don’t stop with asking one relative about the family. Ask as many as possible. Even siblings close in age may remember different aspects of Grandpa’s life or have a different perspective. Exhaustive searches should apply to people as well as paper materials. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Chances are you are not the only descendant of your “brick wall” ancestor. Have you attempted to locate as many descendants of your “brick wall” ancestor as possible? Others may have researched him, have additional information, or even have apparently meaningless clues that, when combined with your apparently meaningless clues actually mean something. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Have you done Google and other searches to see if others are researching first (and more distantly related) cousins of some of your “lost” family members? This may be a good way to connect with others and researchers of these families may not “know enough” to have names that they can post on earlier generations. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
A relative giving information for a record could easily get similar (or not so similar) names confused. Any chance a relative got the names John and Tom confused? These are not the same names, are not derived from the same name, but a mixup could easily take place. This is more likely the case if a minority of documents give a name that does not appear anywhere else. ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Half of our ancestors are female and yet researching them adequately (or even not so adequately) often takes more than half of our time. This webinar presents some suggestions for tracking the ladies in your family tree along with pitfalls and a discussion of why researching females is different. Presentation is made through examples and specific situations which explain methodology clearly and succinctly. Researching female ancestors is not difficult, but does require the researcher to get outside of techniques that may emphasize male ancestors. This presentation is geared towards advanced beginners or intermediate researchers. True beginners might find it valuable as well–if only to make them aware that there is hope. You can order the download of “Female Ancestors” today for $4–using the link below. Download links will […]
Please let your genealogy friends know about “Genealogy Tip of the Day.” Old tips are on our blog at: http://genealogytipoftheday.blogspot.com. Tips can be received in your email daily by subscribing on the link on the right hand side of our blog. Our Fan Page on Facebook usually has additional conversation and tips: https://www.facebook.com/genealogytip Thanks! ———————————— Check out GenealogyBank’s Offer for Tip of the Day Fans!
Recent Comments