If you have spent any time at all on new family search, you soon realize that there is a ton of really rotten research posted there. While there is an easy way to document where the information came from, not many people have done that. As you correct your family data on nFS, be sure to document your sources. As I mentioned in the posting on documention, you should list where you got your information---whether it is from a solid source or not. Evaluating the sources is a great way to tell if information can be trusted or if more research needs to be done. Here are some hints.
Primary Sources: Obvious. A first hand account from a person involved in the event. It is best if it was recorded near the time the event occurred. A primary source is generally considered one of the most accurate sources---but not always. In the late 1800's, Judy Persinger copied information into her precious family Bible. She asked her father-in-law, William, for information on his three marriages. Later, a researcher found a marriage bann for William and his first wife, about 1790. It didn't match the date in the Bible. Polly had been gone for many years, not there to remind William about their anniversary, so he had gotten it mixed up in his old age. And my dear husband, present at the births of our five children and their subsequent birthday parties, couldn't tell you the birth day or year for any of them. For some obscure reason, he can tell you that we used my china for the first time on February 4th. So if I ever needed to document that, he'd be perfect.
Secondary Source: A secondary source would be information from someone who is not an eye witness or was removed from the event. There is opportunity for the information to be misunderstood or changed. Such a source may be all you can find and should not be discounted. If, however, there is conflicting information documented from a Primary Source, it should take precedence over a secondary source. An example: A friend reported that she had misspelled her name her entire life and didn't know it until she had gotten a certified copy of her birth certificate to apply for social security. Her mother had taught her to write her name----Mom was a primary source since she was the one who chose it. The hospital clerk, the recorder at the state, even Dad, could have entered in the wrong spelling. So while a birth certificate is usually considered a very accurate source, I feel that Mom knew best.
Original and Compiled Records: Always look for the original record if you can find it. We have a tendency to get lazy when we search online. Search for a census record on ancestry.com or other site and you will come up with an index. This is a compiled record. Someone looked at the original record and tried to copy down what it said. Their intention was good and they tried to be as accurate as possible. But if you have ever done indexing, you know what a hard task that is! Mistakes enter in. Be sure to take the little time required to click on the original record and see what you think it says. Better yet, save a copy and attach it to your PAF file. Sometimes when you know a little bit about the person, you can decipher the hen scratches of the census taker better than someone unfamiliar with the family. Always note whether you looked at the actual census or at the index. It can be embarrassing if someone calls you on it later.
Sometimes it is tricky to figure it all out. I found a marriage record in an old book in the Cassia County Courthouse for my great aunt Meg in 1879. The book was hand written by --oh, dear, I have forgotten his first name---Mr. Weatherman, the first recorder in Cassia County. I assumed it was a Primary source. Later I learned that our county was part of Owyhee County at the time of their marriage and that Mr. Weatherman had traveled to Silver City where he carefully handcopied all of the Cassia County records from the original Owyhee book. We visited Silver City many years ago. It was a daunting drive in our pickup, and not an easy task for a man on a horse. And as careful as I am sure he was, he may have made a mistake. The original records are in the Owyhee county courthouse in Murphy, Idaho. Twin Falls County was created from Cassia County, so they likewise have copied records of their early events, and Cassia County has the originals. I probably won't make it to Murphy to check their early marriage records, but I did change the notes in my sources to explain that it was a copy of the original record. It really made me appreciate Mr. Weatherman and all of those others who so carefully recorded the information we are seeking now.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Monday, August 16, 2010
Documenting your Research
If you are just starting out in family history research, LEARN TO DOCUMENT YOUR SOURCES FROM THE START! I hate to admit how often I have looked back over my years of research and wondered where I found that really "good" piece of information. Sometimes I have gotten a great gedcom from a distant cousin----but with no clue as to where the data was obtained and how accurate it is.
Documenting doesn't have to be hard. You just tell where you got the information. If you copied the names and dates from Grandpa's Book of Rememberence, that is your source. If Great Aunt Sally told you the story of your family settling in the area, she is your source. If you read an index of a census, then indicate that it was an index that you noted as opposed to seeing the actual census. The idea is to for you or someone else to be able to know where the information came from. A cousin may want to see for themselves where you found the information---or they can evaluate use it to evaluate the accuracy of the source. (See the posting on sources)
PAF and other personal family history programs offer a great way to source the information. Your ward family history consultant can help you learn to do this, or come to the Declo Family History Center on Thursdays for personal help. If you find several family members in the same census or the Western States Marriage Index, etc., you can enter the source once in the source list. You just click on that source to add it to any person listed in that source. Even better, you can personalize that person's page to show not only the source, but the specific information for that person. I'm not explaining it well, but it works great and is easy to do once you know how.
I use the notes page in my PAF or Ancestral Quest programs to save information. In the "olden days" we were encouraged to submit our PAF records, including notes, to the Ancestral File or Pedigree Resource File. With the new family search, we do not do that. So my note page is "mine" now. I use my notes page to copy information that I may not have room to put into the sources page. Before that, I would write my findings---or my thoughts on where to look next---on little pieces of paper which are somewhere in the house, I hope. Now I put them in the individual's notes. I like to date my entries. It is fun to go back and see what I was thinking about a family and realize that I have made progress. Any sensitive material should be entered under confidential notes (see your instructions) or kept in another file. Be sure when sharing histories to click the box that prevents confidential notes from being transferred. Some sensitive information in our family tree was inadvertedly added to Ancestral File and is now permanently recorded in new family search. Whoops! The relative who did it would be really upset if she knew she had shared that with the world.
One of the helpers at the Burley Family History Center insisted that I not only make a copy of the page of a book but to copy the Title page and the page with the publication information and staple them together. That goes for scanning books as well. I was in the basement of the Burley FH Center a while ago searching through their Missouri section. I picked up a book, flipped through it, and found an entry that a James Gray accompanied a family from Bourbon County, Kentucky, to Clay County, Missouri. WOW!!! What a clue!!!!! So I copied the info quickly into my planner----but left off the title of the book. So a few months later, I was downstairs again, rummaging through the bound books, hoping to be able to be find that paragraph again. It took me a while---a long while. So learn to document! It saves a lot of frustration!
Documenting doesn't have to be hard. You just tell where you got the information. If you copied the names and dates from Grandpa's Book of Rememberence, that is your source. If Great Aunt Sally told you the story of your family settling in the area, she is your source. If you read an index of a census, then indicate that it was an index that you noted as opposed to seeing the actual census. The idea is to for you or someone else to be able to know where the information came from. A cousin may want to see for themselves where you found the information---or they can evaluate use it to evaluate the accuracy of the source. (See the posting on sources)
PAF and other personal family history programs offer a great way to source the information. Your ward family history consultant can help you learn to do this, or come to the Declo Family History Center on Thursdays for personal help. If you find several family members in the same census or the Western States Marriage Index, etc., you can enter the source once in the source list. You just click on that source to add it to any person listed in that source. Even better, you can personalize that person's page to show not only the source, but the specific information for that person. I'm not explaining it well, but it works great and is easy to do once you know how.
I use the notes page in my PAF or Ancestral Quest programs to save information. In the "olden days" we were encouraged to submit our PAF records, including notes, to the Ancestral File or Pedigree Resource File. With the new family search, we do not do that. So my note page is "mine" now. I use my notes page to copy information that I may not have room to put into the sources page. Before that, I would write my findings---or my thoughts on where to look next---on little pieces of paper which are somewhere in the house, I hope. Now I put them in the individual's notes. I like to date my entries. It is fun to go back and see what I was thinking about a family and realize that I have made progress. Any sensitive material should be entered under confidential notes (see your instructions) or kept in another file. Be sure when sharing histories to click the box that prevents confidential notes from being transferred. Some sensitive information in our family tree was inadvertedly added to Ancestral File and is now permanently recorded in new family search. Whoops! The relative who did it would be really upset if she knew she had shared that with the world.
One of the helpers at the Burley Family History Center insisted that I not only make a copy of the page of a book but to copy the Title page and the page with the publication information and staple them together. That goes for scanning books as well. I was in the basement of the Burley FH Center a while ago searching through their Missouri section. I picked up a book, flipped through it, and found an entry that a James Gray accompanied a family from Bourbon County, Kentucky, to Clay County, Missouri. WOW!!! What a clue!!!!! So I copied the info quickly into my planner----but left off the title of the book. So a few months later, I was downstairs again, rummaging through the bound books, hoping to be able to be find that paragraph again. It took me a while---a long while. So learn to document! It saves a lot of frustration!
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Rethinking Census Records
We just had a great family reunion. Our common ancestor was born in 1814, so it is pretty much oriented towards family history. We've met for about 10 years now, and established some pretty special cousin relationships in addition to working together on our Lewis ancestry---and descendency.
One cousin, Lyn, had just returned from a BYU Family History Workshop. Her favorite class was aimed at helping researchers get more out of the census records. Lyn's tips: (Along with some tips from another cousin).
Cousin Aletta wrote several years ago: "Families often moved together when settling new areas. It was if they travelled with a ready made community that they would transplant to a new area. Spometimes a family or two would settle in a new area, then communicate with the other families, urging them to come. Once the families start intermarrying, the bonds would become even stronger".
Lyn's tips are based on this observation. Most of us know that when you are searching a census record, you should look a couple of pages before and after your family's listing. You will most likely find other related families in your search. Lyn said that the instructor had come across a land plat showing a map of the landowners in the area where her family lived. It was drawn about the same time as the federal census. The instructor looked at the dates at the top of the census page and made a note of the families who were enumerated on the same day. She then compared that list to the land plat. She discovered that the census taker had basically gone down one side of the road and then several days later, turned back and enumerated the other side of the road. Relatives living across the street were listed in the census twenty six pages after the first family. If you don't want to spend the time necessary to read the whole census for that town or district, at least do a search in the database for family members who might be in the area.
The instructor noticed a family living next door to her ancestors. The wife was born in the same state as her ancestors. Searching proved the wife to be a sister. Cousin Aletta already knew this principle. I had searched the 1860 Census and found my great great grandpa Dave Lewis and his father, Lemuel listed next to each other. End of story. Aletta sent me copies of her research. She had recognized that Lydia Canoy who lived on the other side of Lemuel was his daughter. Her given name, birthplace, and age helped uncover her identity. It also opened up a new descendancy line which was pretty exciting.
Another find. The instructor had come to a dead end on her family research. She was looking at a census and noticed that a neighboring but unrelated family came from the same state as her family. She did a quick search on that family and was able to find them in an earlier census. Sure enough, a few houses down she discovered her family. There had been a problem with the indexing which kept them from showing up in her ancestry.com search. You just never know.
One cousin, Lyn, had just returned from a BYU Family History Workshop. Her favorite class was aimed at helping researchers get more out of the census records. Lyn's tips: (Along with some tips from another cousin).
Cousin Aletta wrote several years ago: "Families often moved together when settling new areas. It was if they travelled with a ready made community that they would transplant to a new area. Spometimes a family or two would settle in a new area, then communicate with the other families, urging them to come. Once the families start intermarrying, the bonds would become even stronger".
Lyn's tips are based on this observation. Most of us know that when you are searching a census record, you should look a couple of pages before and after your family's listing. You will most likely find other related families in your search. Lyn said that the instructor had come across a land plat showing a map of the landowners in the area where her family lived. It was drawn about the same time as the federal census. The instructor looked at the dates at the top of the census page and made a note of the families who were enumerated on the same day. She then compared that list to the land plat. She discovered that the census taker had basically gone down one side of the road and then several days later, turned back and enumerated the other side of the road. Relatives living across the street were listed in the census twenty six pages after the first family. If you don't want to spend the time necessary to read the whole census for that town or district, at least do a search in the database for family members who might be in the area.
The instructor noticed a family living next door to her ancestors. The wife was born in the same state as her ancestors. Searching proved the wife to be a sister. Cousin Aletta already knew this principle. I had searched the 1860 Census and found my great great grandpa Dave Lewis and his father, Lemuel listed next to each other. End of story. Aletta sent me copies of her research. She had recognized that Lydia Canoy who lived on the other side of Lemuel was his daughter. Her given name, birthplace, and age helped uncover her identity. It also opened up a new descendancy line which was pretty exciting.
Another find. The instructor had come to a dead end on her family research. She was looking at a census and noticed that a neighboring but unrelated family came from the same state as her family. She did a quick search on that family and was able to find them in an earlier census. Sure enough, a few houses down she discovered her family. There had been a problem with the indexing which kept them from showing up in her ancestry.com search. You just never know.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Timelines
Timelines are a big help in family history research. A timeline can be simple or complex. Several of the personal ancestral programs and many websites have a template to help set up a timeline. I generally use a paper and pencil because that is how I think best. It doesn't matter how you do it. A timeline helps you see what you know about your family and where you need to look to fill in the blanks. Here is a brief example.
My Grandma told her children that her father was born in Clay County, Missouri, in 1832. He brought his family to Albion, Cassia, Idaho, from Daviess County, Missouri, in 1875. He died in Albion in 1898. Grandma spoke of her half brother, Charles. So......
1832 Charles Monroe Gray, (CMG) born 8 August 1832 in Clay County, Missouri.
1875 Charles and Sarah Elizabeth Stephenson came to Albion, Cassia,Idaho.
1898 Charles died in Albion on 25 Sept 1898 and was buried in the Masonic Cemetery.
Three events, but they give us a lot of clues as to where to research. Census records are always a good place to start. The 1850 census was the first one to list each person by name, age and place of birth. It does not show relationships. In the olden days, we would have had to search both counties (hopefully no more) name by name on the old microfilm machines. Now we simply do a search in Ancestry.com and find Charles in the 1850, 1860, 1870 and 1880 censuses. The 1890 census was destroyed.
Our timeline can be updated with lots of new information.
1832 CMG born in Clay County, Missouri
1850 CMG living with his parents, James and Mary Gray, in Daviess County, MO.
1860 CMG in Daviess County, Missouri. Wife, Susan. Children listed
1870 CMG in Daviess County, MO. Wife, Susan. Some children added,others gone.
1875 CMG and Sarah come to Albion
1880 CMG in Albion, Cassia, Idaho. Wife, Sarah. Children, some different.
What can we see now from our timeline?
Charles was married, likely in Daviess County, by 1860, to Susan. Susan died between 1870 and 1875 and within that same period of time, he remarried. A search of the marriage records of Daviess County shows both marriages.
A distant cousin had an old handwritten record giving the births and deaths of Charles' family members. Susan's death is recorded as 7:32 P.M., showing that the person who recorded it had personal knowledge of her passing.
Historical Context is also important in developing a timeine. What historical things happened during his his lifetime that would have influenced his life? The Civil War and the movement westward. Again an Internet search reveals his military record and details of his service. So.....here is an abbreviated timeline of what we now know.
1830 James and Mary (Polly) Gray married in Clay, Missouri
1832 CMG born in Clay County, Missouri
1832-1850 Polly and James moved to Daviess, MO.
1852 Monroe Gray and Susanna Morgan married in Daviess, MO
1854-1863 Five children born, three died as infants or toddlers
1863 CMG mustered into the 23rd Missouri Volunteers, captured at Shiloh,
POW camp in Georgia, Prisioner exchange, home briefly.
1864 Marched with Sherman across Georgia, mustered out before Atlanta
1872 Susan died, Charles married Sarah, daughter Rebecca died.
1874 Son Theodore born. Susan's brothers and Sarah's uncle go west.
1875 Family comes to Ogden via train heading for Oregon, end up in Albion
1880 More children born. Older children marry and leave home
1880-1898 Albion records show CMG as a county commissioner, Mason, carpenter, etc.
1898 Cousin shares story about CMG's death of heart attack, tombstone, will at the courthouse in Burley lists his living children and their residence.
You can see that the timeline guided us as to when and where to search for records. If we know that Charles moved to Idaho by 1875 then we won't be looking for his records in Missouri during that time. The 1850 census proved his parents' identity and we found their marriage record in Clay. History books, local histories, etc. can also add a lot of information. For example, Grandma wrote that her family came by train to Ogden, but history tells us that the transcontinental railroad was completed by 1869, so they obviously wouldn't have come across the plains by wagon train.
I use a timeline for research and also as an outline as I write histories. The timeline is really just an abbreviated outline of one's life.
My Grandma told her children that her father was born in Clay County, Missouri, in 1832. He brought his family to Albion, Cassia, Idaho, from Daviess County, Missouri, in 1875. He died in Albion in 1898. Grandma spoke of her half brother, Charles. So......
1832 Charles Monroe Gray, (CMG) born 8 August 1832 in Clay County, Missouri.
1875 Charles and Sarah Elizabeth Stephenson came to Albion, Cassia,Idaho.
1898 Charles died in Albion on 25 Sept 1898 and was buried in the Masonic Cemetery.
Three events, but they give us a lot of clues as to where to research. Census records are always a good place to start. The 1850 census was the first one to list each person by name, age and place of birth. It does not show relationships. In the olden days, we would have had to search both counties (hopefully no more) name by name on the old microfilm machines. Now we simply do a search in Ancestry.com and find Charles in the 1850, 1860, 1870 and 1880 censuses. The 1890 census was destroyed.
Our timeline can be updated with lots of new information.
1832 CMG born in Clay County, Missouri
1850 CMG living with his parents, James and Mary Gray, in Daviess County, MO.
1860 CMG in Daviess County, Missouri. Wife, Susan. Children listed
1870 CMG in Daviess County, MO. Wife, Susan. Some children added,others gone.
1875 CMG and Sarah come to Albion
1880 CMG in Albion, Cassia, Idaho. Wife, Sarah. Children, some different.
What can we see now from our timeline?
Charles was married, likely in Daviess County, by 1860, to Susan. Susan died between 1870 and 1875 and within that same period of time, he remarried. A search of the marriage records of Daviess County shows both marriages.
A distant cousin had an old handwritten record giving the births and deaths of Charles' family members. Susan's death is recorded as 7:32 P.M., showing that the person who recorded it had personal knowledge of her passing.
Historical Context is also important in developing a timeine. What historical things happened during his his lifetime that would have influenced his life? The Civil War and the movement westward. Again an Internet search reveals his military record and details of his service. So.....here is an abbreviated timeline of what we now know.
1830 James and Mary (Polly) Gray married in Clay, Missouri
1832 CMG born in Clay County, Missouri
1832-1850 Polly and James moved to Daviess, MO.
1852 Monroe Gray and Susanna Morgan married in Daviess, MO
1854-1863 Five children born, three died as infants or toddlers
1863 CMG mustered into the 23rd Missouri Volunteers, captured at Shiloh,
POW camp in Georgia, Prisioner exchange, home briefly.
1864 Marched with Sherman across Georgia, mustered out before Atlanta
1872 Susan died, Charles married Sarah, daughter Rebecca died.
1874 Son Theodore born. Susan's brothers and Sarah's uncle go west.
1875 Family comes to Ogden via train heading for Oregon, end up in Albion
1880 More children born. Older children marry and leave home
1880-1898 Albion records show CMG as a county commissioner, Mason, carpenter, etc.
1898 Cousin shares story about CMG's death of heart attack, tombstone, will at the courthouse in Burley lists his living children and their residence.
You can see that the timeline guided us as to when and where to search for records. If we know that Charles moved to Idaho by 1875 then we won't be looking for his records in Missouri during that time. The 1850 census proved his parents' identity and we found their marriage record in Clay. History books, local histories, etc. can also add a lot of information. For example, Grandma wrote that her family came by train to Ogden, but history tells us that the transcontinental railroad was completed by 1869, so they obviously wouldn't have come across the plains by wagon train.
I use a timeline for research and also as an outline as I write histories. The timeline is really just an abbreviated outline of one's life.
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