Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Florida State Genealogical Society announces its free webinars

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Here’s another great resource for genealogists. The Florida State Genealogical Society has announced the lineup for its upcoming “Poolside Chat” monthly webinar series. The webinars are available live free of charge to non-members. FSGS members are able to download the handouts as well as view archived webinars. An individual membership to FSGS costs just $25 a year. I think FSGS is making an amazing contribution to the genealogy community through this series, which they’ve been presenting for some years.

I was excited when I saw the line up to see that Julie Potter Miller is speaking on the Anatomy of a Civil War Pension File. I took her class at the 2015 NGS conference and it inspired me to immediately order my three Union veteran ancestors’ pension files from the National Archives and it helped me figure out what the heck to do with them. Julie’s webinar will be on July 18.

Other topics and presenters include J. Mark Lowe on early census records, Bob Inhoff on organizing genealogy records using OneNote, and Victor Dunn on scrutinizing evidence. Go to this page to see the line up. They still have a few webinars to schedule.

I’m not sure I have the availability required for live viewing, so I think I might pop for the $25 membership to allow me to watch on my schedule (and get the handouts).

I’m very excited by this learning opportunity. Thank you FSGS!

I’m a guest on Generations Cafe!

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Do you listen to Amy Johnson Crow’s excellent podcast Generations Cafe? If you have read my blog for awhile, you know I’m a big fan of Amy’s. (Here’s her How They Do It interview on this blog from 2017.) She started her podcast in September and I’ve really enjoyed listening to it. So when she asked me to be a guest, to talk about genealogy organizing, I jumped at the chance!

The episode was published on Wednesday and I am really happy with how it turned out. If you haven’t already (I know Amy has a HUGE audience, so you may already be aware of it), please check it out by clicking on this link or subscribing to Generations Cafe wherever you listen to podcasts.

Thank you, Amy, for the opportunity to talk with you and your listeners!

New year, new 30 x 30 challenge

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It’s January 1. Happy new year!

There’s nothing like a new year to make me want to start up a new 30 x 30 challenge, in which I challenge myself to doing 30 minutes of genealogy research each day for 30 days. My last 30 x 30 challenge was in October 2018 and in the wrap-up post for that, I said I’d offer it up again in January. Do you care to join me?

I love this challenge because it’s not too difficult, but it is very beneficial. Doing a half hour of research a day is not a hardship (for me, anyway) most days. And the challenge makes me prioritize daily research. Otherwise, it can fall lower on my list of priorities and then it just doesn’t happen. In fact, my November and December were not great for my research, though I was able to pick it up again over the holidays.

I find daily research to be really beneficial. For me, 15 hours of research split over 30 days is much more valuable than a weekend of research where I work 7.5 hours a day. By researching this way, I stay in touch with my research and I stay focused. It also has helped me ingrain a habit of using my Evernote research log.

Please let me know in the comments if you’re up for joining me in this challenge. It’s a great way to start the new year!

Fun with ethnicity estimates

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I had my DNA tested by Ancestry a few years back and I’m just now figuring out how to use it in my genealogy research. I found the ethnicity estimate interesting. And then I found it even more interesting when Ancestry updated its estimates.

My brother, Larry, lives in Australia and when he visited recently he agreed to submit a sample. I was curious about how ours would compare, in terms of ethnicity. I was also curious to see what migration group was provided to him. (I was given North Alabama Settlers.)

When I first asked him, Larry’s response, “Don’t we have the same DNA?” I responded that while our DNA comes the same sources (half from our dad and half from our mom), what we get from each of them is different so our ethnicity results might be different.

The results arrived yesterday and I was tickled to see that there were what looked to me like some fairly large differences. Here’s a screenshot of our two results side by side:

 

As you can see, I have a higher percentage of Irish ancestry showing up in my results (41% vs 34% in Larry’s) and his results show 8% Germanic Europe, where I have none. I have a smidge of Greece and the Balkans and he has a smidge of Sweden. Fun stuff!

Oh, and the migration group provided to Larry was Lower Midwest and Virginia Settlers.

Have you compared ethnicity results with a sibling? I’m curious how different your results were.