There is a large number of older generations who still use the early publications of the researchers from 1970-1990s that were self published. That's fine for a base to start. However, what we have found that because these researchers did not have easy access to all the files available to them, their research was often flawed. In cases where there were five or six John Smith's in the same area, it was easy to miss a distinction between John and John Jr, or Cousin John or in some cases John who was of a totally different family.
One major issue is that many of these self published books were not sourced. They may give a brief description of what they found, but 9 out of 10 times, they did not give a complete source report. Repeating the research in the modern time period we are in, is nearly impossible. Another issue is that because of the scarcity of the documents at the time, some things were missed, never seen or showed that they were on the wrong path and disregarded as being someone else. Many of the books are now totally wrong with incorrect or incomplete information. I want to caution anyone reading to look at these self published books from the time period as a stepping stone but not a valid source. While I'm mentioning sources - I want to also caution those who swear by DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) applications. Not only were they often incorrect, wrong dates, wrong person used, incomplete, but there was a period of time where the DAR short forms application team was not diligent about confirming the information and there for the lineages will need to be proven before being readmitted. With that all said, if you find sourced information in these resources, and can find the actual documents spoken about, by all means use the document and original source instead of the lineage book and also, use the lineage book as a back up extra "by the way" kind of source. But do not rely on it for your base information. Now get out there and Enjoy those Adventures in Genealogy.
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One thing I often talk about to new people is the use of Assumptions. We all know the saying "You know what they say about the word assume? ... It makes an Ass out of U and Me."... I have to disagree when it comes to genealogical research.
Look, most of the time we are finding bits and pieces of information at a time. Occasionally all we will EVER have is a small glimpse, one or two documents and we have to base everything we know off of those few items. What I want you to do is be smart about your assumptions. Base the facts off of a logical timeline between those documents. You MUST assume at some point in order to find information. Sure, sometimes we might assume wrong. It's a given in this field. Just make a note that this fact is being assumed and how you came to that conclusion. I want you to practice using the information you gather and fill in the blanks in between. If you only have two census documents 1860 and 1880, and you know they were in Topeka in 1860 and San Francisco in 1880 - and two children born in 1880, 1882 were listed as being born in Topeka, you can probably assume that this information is incorrect. Do you have a document showing it? No. But does it make sense? Nope. Could they have moved back to Topeka? Maybe. Maybe not. You don't know they did, you can only base the information on what you currently know, which is they were in San Francisco. Do I want you to always assume? No Ma'am! (or Sir). Use the facts first. Then use that brain the Creator gave you and fill in until you have evidence. Practice makes perfect and unless you have a doc, you will HAVE to assume. I am going to Assume you Enjoy your Adventures In Genealogy. I admit, I honestly don't have a ton of time. In fact, I have a blog (this one) that I often have to catch up on, such as now, where I am writing. I do love volunteering. I just don't often have the time to do it during the time that the places want me to.
I have been a member of our local Historical Society. One thing that I was able to do was earn the trust of members and be granted a Key to the building. In my free time while they were closed even, I was able to go in and take a complete and full inventory of items in their possession. I made a written inventory and a digital inventory. A spread sheet with important information and photos of each item will help if there is ever a need for an insurance claim. Another thing I was able to do while this process happened was to complete a standard repository label system. Any archivist (pro or amateur) could go in and know exactly how to find the info using this standard format. In the last Covid Year, I have not had much free time, believe it or not. Isn't that funny how that works? However, I've recently left my job that was taking up the majority of my time and hope that volunteerism will be back available to me. What can you volunteer for in your local community and what do you bring to the table that could help out? There is always something you can do. Everyone has some value. Enjoy your Adventures in Genealogy by volunteering. I mentioned in my previous post last week that I also enjoy newspapers. I don't spend a ton of money on excess research subscriptions. I really REALLY enjoy my free research. HOWEVER, with that said, I do subscribe on a regular basis to Newspapers.com. I don't remember a time that I did a search for a topic or person or place, where I did not go into newspapers.com an use at least a dozen terms to find information.
What I like about a newspaper is that just about everyone ended up in it at one time or another. In later years, people who had children had it announced without their permission even. In earlier times, those who wanted distant relatives to know something quickly would have it put in the newspaper. Towns would comment about people coming and going for business. Sickness and large events were there. In some cases, newspapers were the only connection to what was happening outside of their small world. Some editors/publishers found a funny joke or two and added them in to break up the seriousness of the information. Advertisements for your family store could be found in there. Marriages, divorces, births, deaths, military training and when they would come home on leave, Estate lists and documents, loss of livestock, fires, tragedy and triumph. ... . there just is so much information. Newspapers.com is only ONE of the many places to find information. NewspaperArchives, Google News Archives, Fulton History, NARA, Library of Congress, and many local newspapers have their own archives as well. Explore all the options and find out what suites your research best. When you do research you want to make sure you are finding every possible piece of information. Why not make searching newspapers part of your routine? Get out there and enjoy that Adventure in Genealogy. My absolute favorite things are census. Wait, maybe it's newspapers. hmmm maybe it's really Wills and Estates. Anyway - Census records are full of information while still lacking on things you need to know because they are done so far apart.
Many of you know that a Census was taken every Ten years. Some of you know that states at certain time periods also took a census of their population in between those time periods as well. Usually around times like 1866 or 1867, 1878 etc. Many states did these. Go to Google and type in the state and census year, and see what comes up [example "Alabama State Census Years"]. Then go see if there is one available for the person you are looking for. Another thing to know is that some of these federal census have alternate documents. For example there are some who have "agricultural census". There are many pieces of information on some that can tell you about the lives of those who were in that household so make sure you examine each and every column, not just name date and place of birth. Fill in the blanks between empty years. To do this, check out the city directories for the years between a census for your head of household. If a male child comes of age in the same place, look to see if they are in the city directory. Most of these are for the early to mid 1900s, but you can get lucky sometimes with older cities who have a long history such as New York City. The city directories can tell you if they are married, if the street was renumbered at some point, what occupation they had (and you can track them pretty easy that way), and what family lived near them. Census is a wealth of information about your family. I probably don't have to tell you about that. If you have some old research though, go back and take a fresh look and see if you missed any information that now makes more sense. Enjoy your Adventures! One of the biggest comments I find on a post about cemetery searches is "Call the cemetery office". I'd like you all to stop saying this to people and here is why.
While it's true that some churches and some cemeteries have an office, many MANY do not. Let me just say that in states like where I am (Alabama) there are zero cemetery rules. In fact, there is no mandatory registrations out there of burials. This leads to cemeteries who have zero need for a records office. The majority of cemeteries in my immediate area are in fact open to burials on your own and you don't even have to have a funeral home involved if you don't want to. Several years ago, I interviewed a man who was working on a local cemetery to clean up one of the oldest sections that had been buried under decades of leaf debris, downed trees and left to return to the earth on it's own. His great grandfather was a civil war soldier and was buried in this old section. He made it his personal mission to clean up the whole place. The cemetery was on a small hill outside of a very small town hidden in some trees. There were no gates, no night time lights, no fences or security. He spent many many months, and long long days in that place. He not only cleaned up that area, but became a sort of guardian over the cemetery. What he did find out was that many young Mexican mothers who most likely were illegal here would come in at all hours of the day and bury infants where ever in the cemetery. This is hugely sad, just for the fact that these children will never have a written memory, but also because these young families were just picking any spot and digging a few inches down. This cemetery was previously already filled up. Not all burials had markers. These families were burying young infants and children on top of other unmarked graves. We know this to be true. On the flip side, I once visited a cemetery in Muskogee, Oklahoma. it was a city cemetery and it also had a main office. While the office was very small and only open on occasion, I happened to hit a good day. Not only did they have a record of where the ancestor was buried, they had kept file information from that burial in 1908. These records of the unmarked plot said who was in each grave, what they died of, who paid for the burial, and also a bunch of other things. What I'd like you to advise people about instead of to visit the office, Ask them to find local burial regulations first. If there are NONE in that city, county or state, they may be better off going to newspapers instead and saving the gas money. I'd also like you to ask them to find a local cemetery buff. People in just about every town are interested in this and many know more than you can ever find in documents. And just to make a hundred or more of you even more mad at me - FindAGrave(FG) is NOT a valid source of information. Sure, you might get some there - someone posts an obituary or a photo. But all the info is User Entered. Any familial connections are prone to errors. Use it as a "Hint" to things and NOT as a primary source. I'm not a fan of FG. Never have been. It is always the LAST entry I look at on sites like Ancestry. And many times I will totally disregard the information. So while you are searching for churches and cemetery offices, make sure you know if they are required to keep information or not. You sure could save yourself a lot of headaches and time with those Adventures in Genealogy. Every so often my good friends who know me will purposefully say something about a research topic and just leave it hanging. They clearly know that I can't just walk away with unanswered questions. Off I go on a rabbit hole search. Sometimes I find great information an occasionally, I find absolutely nothing at all.
I've heard many professional genealogists tell their followers that you can save time not repeating a search if you write things down such as sources, where you looked, what the results were and that sort of thing. I'm all for that. You absolutely should keep track of what you've searched and what you have or have not found. What I'd like to add to this however is this: If you have a negative result, didn't find any information in a particular source, don't give up on it. repeat your searches often. Go back every few days and try the same search again. Better yet, add to that search by using different search terms and variations. The problem with giving up after a search in this digital age is that every single day of our lives, there are hundreds of thousands of people scanning documentation and transcribing it into repositories. There are things added each year that if we had given up, we may not see the new items. Take some time and review your family tree from yourself backwards several generations. Update the information. If you don't find new items, great. Mark it and move on. But on the off chance that a new fact has appeared, it could very well lead to a breakthrough! And wouldn't that be awesome?! Repeat your searches - and enjoy that Adventure in Genealogy... I know it's not the New Year yet. I do have a resolution for that (make more timely blog posts).
I am talking about resolving issues in your family tree research. One thing I have learned over the years is that when you first start your family research, you just are so excited to find information that you are not quite as focused on whether or not it's fact and if it applies to your person or not. As time goes on, as you learn more about the significance of details, and as you realize that not everything is cut and dry you understand that your methods are not set to a specific standard. With the recent years developments in the DNA world and the ability to chart a family tree with not only documents but science, it's been pretty obvious that my tree also has quite a few historical folk lore. Historical folk lore to me is worse than family stories passed on from generation to generation. These are documents that have been researched by well meaning ancestors who followed a valid paper trail by walking foot-to-ground and uncovering information in person. The documents they found supported the evidence they had which was then compiled into pamphlets, books and histories then published and populated in local and regional areas - sometimes even crossing the country. The problem with many of these is the same problem we still have today. Much to our surprise there were more than two people named Thomas Jefferson Duke in the state and locale of research. WHAT?! .. it's true. Dozens of them. T J, Thos J, Tom J, J T, J Thomas..... it truly is exhausting. Many of them born within a few years of each other and most of them related in some way all born within a 50 mile radius. But, when you are limited to the documents within your reach physically, it is impossible to know this. With the advent of digital access to all this information combined with DNA testing, we are able to see issues, recognize hundreds of name variations and family connections as well as resolve issues that we might never have seen 10 years ago. Many of us joke about "starting over". In some cases, it may be completely necessary to resolve some of the historical folk lore in our trees and use only well researched and documented facts combined with a great DNA resource. Whatever you decide to do to resolve your folk lore family research, make sure you stay connected to the living while enjoying your Adventures in Genealogy. I was born in New Jersey and raised in Pennsylvania. My father always called my mom a rebel and she always said we were damn Yankees. We'd all laugh. We made the choice to enjoy our heritage and revel in the differences.
Growing up, however, I was never really told about our family heritage. My mom always said, "You are a league of nations - a Heinz 57." That's where she'd leave it. As I got a little older, I heard a bit about my father's father. I would talk about history and wanting to learn about it all and my father would say, "The past is the past. What good is it?". It never changed for me. I was always interested in the who, what, why, when and where. Have you wondered why your ancestors came to the place they lived? How did they get there? What made them leave where they were? When did they go? If you said yes, then you are already addicted to this passion that has taken hold of America. Genealogy. When I moved to Alabama in 2008, I had only a vague idea that my family lived in the south, at least for a little while. I always pictured that they'd all come from Europe somewhere with me being a Heinz 57. The more I looked for them, the more I found out, I began to realize that I had migrated in nearly the same fashion that they did but only centuries later. The Great Valley Road was an early path that was taken by Colonial settlers to parts of the south. Until recently, I had no idea how some of my family ended up in middle Alabama from North Carolina. On a trip to a local archives, a very smart, and enthusiastic Archivist reminded me of a map that hangs on her wall. It was trade routes showing how people came to Athens, Alabama from Virginia. One of the legs of the trade route went to Georgia. The other went through Tennessee. It was like a light bulb. Suddenly, it was all clear. I could see in my head (like the writing on the wall-literally), the wagons moving across the mountains and the children growing up on a farm. I saw the items in their home as if I was there using them. The bed frame, hand made by paw with woven rope and a thick feather mattress. I saw the quilts that my ancestors made and the plow they used in the fields. I knew what they paid for them both monetarily and physically. It was if the bigger picture was suddenly visible. From Colonial Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. To Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi. I knew the struggles and the why along with my who and where. It's easier to research them now that I can see it all. I truly believe that everything you do in your research should involve finding out why they were where they were and how they got there in the first place. If you focus on the side research - learn about the people and places they worked, the stores that were in their towns, the major events that happened around them - then your whole story will just suddenly unfold around you. No major work on your part needed. So while you are researching, take a moment to look around town. Use your minds eye and see it. Really see it! While you are make sure you are enjoying this awesome, wonderful, magical Adventure in your Genealogy!! Most of us really take our time here for granted. For genealogists, we understand the value of time based on our research. To go into it deeper, we often see the degree to which time has an effect on tombstones for example. They weather, break, erode, are damaged by trees, brush and people. This week, while out exploring a local cemetery, I found what I think is probably the oldest stone that I personally have seen so far in my own research and documentation. This is not to say that it's the oldest out there. I find that this fascinates me because it isn't even someone that I am researching or in my tree, but a complete stranger that is now peeking my interest, only based on the date and place of his birth. I'd like to point out that this script on this stone is so well preserved and readable, that I found this also to be an odd thing. I've come across so many even into the late 1800's whos stones are all but blank now. This one, has stood the test of time. It takes us back to the days.... back in time. I hope that as you are researching that you consider all the things you see, from the very new pink silk flowers, to the degree of mold, to the position of the stone compared to others around it... what little things did you find out? What kind of adventure will they lead you on next? Wherever you go, enjoy your Adventures in Genealogy! |
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AuthorMichele is an obsessed mother of 4 residing in North Alabama. Hobbies include long walks in the woods, on the beach and in strange cemeteries and libraries. Genealogy friends need only apply. Categories
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