Tomorrow I will be at home pretending I am at RootsTech with
all the entertainment, selected classes being live-streamed, and #NotAtRootsTech
on social media. For me right now this
the perfect way to do RootsTech. I feel
so relaxed; no airplane, no hotel, no eating out, and no snow that might delay
the trip home. But before I start RootsTech,
I thought I would send out a few ideas that we talked about at our last Genies
meeting.
We really rocked it. It’s
always better in person but here are a few highlights for people who couldn’t
make it. Margie C. and her family had a
very fun and emotional reunion in California with their niece who was unknown
and lost for 50 years. Success was not
due to genealogy but persistence. A good
reminder to stick with it.
Sylvia continues to use DNA matches and building other
people’s trees to work on finding her birth father. She shared her own forms and individual folders
to keep organizing info about her matches.
David R. has been working on Italian research for the first
time. We think moving borders and social
customs will play a part in his research.
He reminded us that there are lots of free sources for various records
that may be subscription records at Ancestry.
One example is a collection of Norwegian birth records at the University
of North Dakota. You can always google
to find those more obscure, but valuable, collections.
David R. reminded us that “genealogy without sources is
mythology”. Many similar quotes have
been researched by people more patient than I without finding anyone to
attribute this quote to. The point is
well-taken. Most of us are not giving
credence to genealogy without sources cited.
I also like a quote from Eric Stroschein who says “Researching
without a question is like sailing a ship without a rudder. You will wind up frustrated and going nowhere.” He also cautions us to keep the questions
narrow in scope and focused. Narrow
questions and citations were important in my mini-challenge.
Some people at the meeting hadn’t heard of the Internet
Archive Wayback Machine. Have you ever
used a link that didn’t go to the place intended? Of course, you have. Old links have a way of failing, don’t they? This site has saved over 349 billion webpages
over time. Next time give it a try. https://archive.org/web/
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We discussed the Research
Like a Pro seven-step research process that I have been mentioning here for
the last few weeks. Diana and Nicole at
the Family Locket site have provided us with templates and work samples that
can be found at https://familylocket.com/RLP/. This page gives links to the templates which
are stored on Google Drive. They are
created in Google sheets word processor and Google Sheets spreadsheets.
The Research Project
Document Template outlines the whole process and provides a place to store
all writing related to your project.
The Timeline Analysis
Spreadsheet is helpful to organize the Known Facts before you get started
with research.
The Locality Guide
was new to me. It’s a document to
collect information about how to research in a certain local. I’m thinking I will want a guide at the state
level that applies to all counties in the state. The state guide would be used with my county
guide.
The Citation Template
is for learners like me. It is a spreadsheet
of 80-some citation samples for different record types. I also stored the samples I wrote in the
template.
Lastly is a Research
Log Sample and Template.
In my mini-challenge I also found that I needed to stop
writing on a pad and start using some of my worksheets. First, the online Timeline
Analysis was invaluable for organizing events in date order and also adding
citations for each fact. Secondly, since
I was working in three generations, I used a Family Group Record for each of the
couples and their children. I have
Family Group Sheets I can share but it is common form you can google. And lastly, I have two different Census
worksheets that I can share.
Since our meeting I found two Family Locket podcasts about the
U.S. Federal Census. In the show notes
for Part 1 https://familylocket.com/rlp-25-u-s-federal-census-records-part-1/,
they have links to a Cheat Sheet and Census Tables for Reports docx file. This a Word document that you can easily add
rows to. I like that it is so flexible. You
can add rows many children and even neighbors.
It’s so flexible compared to a paper form with limited lines. They also have a recent podcast #30 called “Put
it in a Table” about using a table to analyze information. It reminds me that I can use a spreadsheet
too and make it serve my purpose exactly.
Diana and Nicole offer many gifts to our community. They have also written a book Research
Like a Pro; a genealogist’s guide by Diana Elder. It’s a book or e-book available on
Amazon.
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I’ve jumped around a lot and that is the way our meetings
are. You can ask your questions and we
will try to help you out. Next meeting,
back to 3rd Mondays, March 18.
Until then, Happy Hunting!
