[Genealogy] Brick Walls, Sponsor Names, and more

Thu Jan 29 15:22:47 CST 2026

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29 January 2026
Genealogy Update

** Brick Walls
** Research Trips
** Named for Sponsors--How Common Was It?
** Full-Text Searching Webinar Intro Price ending--save $7.50
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Brick Walls
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I’ve been thinking about “brick walls” for a post I’m writing on my blog
where I post lengthier pieces. Some say brick walls exist. Others say that
there are no brick walls at all and that it’s your methods and lack of
knowledge about resources and genealogy in the area and time period that
are the problem.

I’m a huge believer in genealogical education–in knowing about all the
records that were created at all levels in the time and place when your
ancestor lived and in knowing why those records were created, how they were
created, how they were maintained, and how you came to view/access them.
I’m a huge believer in knowing about the history of the area and time
period in which your ancestor lived–including details about your ancestor’s
background, social class, educational level, occupation, religious
experience, etc. And I’m a huge believer in understanding the laws and
legal system during the time and place in which your ancestor lived. And
it’s good to organize your information to see if there are patterns or
approaches that you may have missed.

It’s also good to reach out to others with accurate knowledge of the time
and place in which your ancestor lived–and not knowledge they acquired by
reading random social media posts by influencers who don’t necessarily know
anything.

After all that…you may be stuck.

You may get to a time period where there simply are no more records. It
happens. Of course you should make certain you’ve searched thoroughly, but
there are times and places where you have hit the end of the road in terms
of the paper trail.

You may also get to a person who for one reason or another, intentional or
not, seems to have appeared out of nowhere. There are approaches to try on
these people–sometimes they work and sometimes they do not. Sometimes DNA
helps and sometimes, depending on how far back the problem is, how many
descendants the person/family had and what paper trail there is, sometimes
it does not. Autosomal DNA has its limits as one goes further back in the
pedigree and strict maternal and paternal tests have limits as well.

Of course a person keeps trying and staying aware of finds or approaches
that may help or things that might have been overlooked. But sometimes you
do really reach the end of the discoverable lineage.

Just my two cents.
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Join me on a Research Trip
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   - Midwest Genealogy Center-Independence, Missouri, May 2026
   <https://genealogytipoftheday.com/index.php/mid-continent-genealogy-library-october-2025-research-trip/>
   - Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia, March 2026
   <https://genealogytipoftheday.com/index.php/2025-library-of-virginia-research-trip-richmond-virginia/>
   - FamilySearch Library, Salt Lake City, Utah, 12-19 August 2026–details
   just announced
   <https://genealogytipoftheday.com/index.php/2022-family-history-library-salt-lake-city-trip/>
   - Allen County Public Library, Ft. Wayne, Indiana, September 2026
   <https://genealogytipoftheday.com/index.php/acpl2022/>

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Farmers Without Their Own Land
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Those who worked in American agriculture but did not own their own farm are
more difficult to research than those who owned real estate. In this
presentation, we focus on farmers and farm families, but concentrate on
those who did not own farms of their own.

Tenant farmers and farm laborers comprise a significant proportion of those
involved in American agriculture. The challenge is that they tended to
leave fewer records than did landowning farmers. In this presentation we
will look at specific challenges involving these families and what records,
sources, and methods should be utilized in order to research them as
completely and effectively as possible. While there are never any
guarantees in genealogy research, there are ways that we can maximize the
chance we find as much about our non-landowning farm ancestors as possible.

The presentation will be given with the premise that the person being
researched did not own any real estate.

Concepts covered include:

   - Determining the residence as precisely as possible.
   - Documenting others with whom the ancestor interacted.
   - Documenting moves and migrations where possible.
   - Determining if the same person has been located.
   - Strategies to locate as many references to the ancestral name as
   possible.

This is not a live presentation although those who purchase the
presentation before its release are encouraged to submit questions for
possible inclusion in the presentation. This presentation focuses on
research in the United States.

Purchase includes video of presentation and handout. Immediate download for
$24
<https://michael-john-neill.dpdcart.com/cart/add?product_id=247703&method_id=270569>
.

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January 2026 Full-Text Search at FamilySearch Webinar

Intro price ENDING at end of January--regularly $37.50--save $30

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We’re excited to offer this revised presentation on the full-text searching
at *FamilySearch*--reflecting changes made to the site since this was
recorded in August 2025. We’ve redesigned our presentation as this
functionality continues to change. And…we have an extensive handout
complete with forms to help you find more people.

If you have purchased an earlier version of this presentation--email me at
mjnrootdig at gmail.com for the code to order this revision for $10.
Fully Utilizing Full-Text Search: Revised for January 2026

Your purchase includes:

   - *A 90 minute (or more presentation)* you can view as often as you want.
   - *Detailed handout* with charts and forms to help organize your
   searches. Charts and forms sent as separate files you can edit and
   customize and not as a locked PDF you have to re-create yourself as a new
   document.

We’ll be including and discussing:

*Determining what is in Full-Text Search—*what you can access at home and
what you will have to be in a FamilySearch facility or affiliate to access.

*Seeing How AI Transcriptions are different*—they aren’t like the
transcriptions made by humans. That can change your approach.

*Remembering that Full-Text means every word*—approaches need to differ as
we aren’t looking up a name in an index any more.

*Asking Who* is in the record? We aren’t just searching for the main person
like we did with traditional indexes. We’ll discuss how to determine who
could be mentioned in a record.

*Determining How to search?* There are a variety of ways to search and
filter results. We’ll see how each one works to help determine the best
strategy.

*Creating search strategies*—how full-text search changes your approach and
why just dumping terms in search boxes is not always effective.

*Determining what you found* The interface does not always make this clear.
We will show you how to get beyond the confusion and help you get enough
detail for a citation.

*Creating effective problem-solving approaches*—what to do when you cannot
find something you want.

*Demonstrating practical examples*—completely new people and families from
our previous presentations.

Available for immediate download for $30
<https://michael-john-neill.dpdcart.com/cart/add?product_id=246272&method_id=268990>.
Complete handout included and additional forms.

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Named for Sponsors--How Common?

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“Children are named for their baptismal sponsors.”

Sometimes they are and sometimes they are not.

The best way to know what was going on at the time and place of interest to
your research is to read the baptismal entries for 3 pages before and 3
pages after your person of interest. How many entries were there? How many
were named for their sponsors? How many were not?

Now you know what was going on in the time and place where your person was
baptized and you are not repeating something you don’t know is true.

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Michael John Neill
Genealogy Tip of the Day

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