Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Figuring out what’s relevant

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Figuring out what's relevantWhen you’re doing genealogy research, it’s easy to stumble on facts you’re not looking for. Let’s say you’re researching your great grandfather. Ancestry gives you all sorts of information about his brother. Do you take the time to carefully document the information on the brother?

This isn’t exactly hypothetical. This happened to me this morning. Five years ago, I would have skipped that information and kept my focus on my great grandfather. Now I know better.

After about ten years of genealogy research, there’s one thing I’m pretty sure about.

Every documented fact is relevant. Or might be some day.

Why should I bother to document the marriage certificate and draft registrations for Garry Jeffries (brother of my great grandfather James E. Jeffries)? Here are a few reasons that pop to mind:

  • I get a clearer picture of my family.
  • I might be able to help one of his descendants, a cousin of mine, one day by including this information in my family tree.
  • Down the road I may learn something about the relationship between my great grandfather and his brothers and this information might help connect the dots.
  • As commenter Marcia Philbrick said, “Those brothers, sisters and their descendants may be the clue to break through brick walls.” (Thank you, Marcia!)

I’m sure that’s just the beginning. Basically, I’ve come to the conclusion that since I can’t see what puzzle pieces I’m going to need in the future, it benefits me to take the time to record and download all the documents I come across, even if they’re not for my direct line ancestors. (Here’s how I process that information.) It can feel tedious and also feel like it’s taking me away from my “real” research. But I think it’s worth it.

After all, genealogy research is a marathon, not a sprint.

Why I like to do cemetery research in person

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I am so grateful for the volunteers who post pictures to Find A Grave and Billion Graves. It is such a selfless act and when I can’t see a grave in person I am thrilled when I find ancestor’s grave on one of these sites.

I have a tendency to want to see sources (or a scanned image in the case of documents) with my own eyes when I add them to my family tree. With Find A Grave, seeing a picture is often a terrific substitute.

Recently when doing some research on the McEuen family (part of my Adams line) I was puzzled to see reference to a death date of 1929 on Find A Grave for Ellsworth McEuen (b. 1863), the brother of my great great grandmother, Henrietta Clay McEuen Adams. In my Reunion software, I had his death year as 1928. So I checked the source I’d associated with that 1928 date and it included a personal viewing of his gravestone. When I looked at my photo, I saw that it indeed said 1928.

The Find A Grave photo was less well lit and harder to make out. The wonderful volunteer who took the photo and uploaded the information, Anita Austill, interpreted it as 1929.

Looking at her photo, you can see why:

ellsworthmceuenfagrave

On my visit to that cemetery (the Cumberland Presbyterian Cemetery in Sacramento, Kentucky) two years ago, I was fortunate to have great lighting when taking a picture of that same gravestone. The 1928 date is crystal clear. (Click on the photos to see larger versions).

gravemarker-ellsworth-mceuen-mclean-ky

I’m not criticizing the volunteers who contribute these photos. I know that this gravestone was one of many that the photographer took and uploaded, whereas I was focused on my family members. But it does motivate me to take cemetery trips–which I enjoy!–even though photos are often available online.

Sometimes you gotta browse

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Sometimes you gotta browse recordsI was going crazy looking for my great great grandfather, Benjamin Franklin Igleheart, and his family on the 1880 census. None of my searches of various sites turned him up. I really wanted to find that census, because I knew from the 1900 census that his wife, Mattie, had given birth to 11 children, only three of whom were alive in 1900. I had found five of them, but I assumed that finding the 1880 census would reveal the names of more. (Mattie was 25 in 1870.)

So I decided I would browse my way through the census looking for the family. I had a good idea they were living in McLean county, Kentucky, where he lived before the Civil War. (He fought in that war.) I knew that in 1870 they lived in Arkansas, something I initially doubted but was confirmed in his Civil War pension record. But since they had a child born in 1881 in Kentucky, I felt comfortable trying Kentucky first.

I had found Ben’s mother and stepfather in the 1880 census in Sacramento, McLean, Kentucky, so I started there. I browsed forward a page at a time, scanning the handwritten names. After a few pages, I decided to start looking the opposite direction, so I went back to his mother and started scanning a page at a time backward. Sure enough, just two pages behind his mother, there they were! The words “Igleheart, B.F.” jumped right out at me. His age and his family members’ names and ages matched up. Eureka!

So why didn’t they show up on a search? A simple transcription error. The name had been indexed as “Lylehuist.” When I look at it, I can see why. (I bet you can too, if you squint at the image above.) In Ancestry, where I found the document, I edited the record to add the name Igleheart in order to help others. I don’t see that record coming up on a search of Igleheart, though.

The 1880 family included two children, born in the 1870s whose names I didn’t have. They’ve now been added to my family-tree software. I still have four more children to find.

I have to say, it was really exciting to spot this family. I was in a college library among strangers, so I managed to keep from shouting out.  I did raise both arms in victory, though!

Walking the paperless walk

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nofilesI’ve been blogging here through the years about my growing disenchantment with paper. I’ve stopped printing out documents I find digitally and instead save them to my computer and file them by surname. (That’s what works for me…you may choose to file differently.) I’ve started scanning notes and other genealogy paper that comes across my desk and discarding much of it after scanning. I do keep original documents as well as documents I’ve sent away for. But the vast majority of my genealogy information is not in my paper files

Last week when I was at the Allen County Public Library–I promise I’ll stop talking about that trip soon–I didn’t photocopy a single thing. Instead, I used the library’s copying machines to scan the documents I wanted to take home. I brought along a flash drive for that purpose and the process was very easy. The machines even allowed me to put all the documents from one source into a single file, rather than a file for each page. It does mean I had to rename each file and drag it to the appropriate folder on my hard drive. But I didn’t have a bunch of paper to process when I got home! Nor did I have paper to lug home. Or carry to the hotel from the library. Moreover, I was able to easily zoom in text to read it more easily. Not once did I wish I had a magnifying glass.

And here’s the kicker: The library (understandably) charges for paper copies. But they don’t charge a thing to scan to a hard drive, which was literally no more challenging than making a photocopy.

I feel better and better about limiting  paper in my genealogy research. It’s kind of amazing to me that just 3.5 years ago I was still printing much of what I found.

I was really pleased that my paperless inclinations were reinforced on my library trip!

Photo by Tom Woodward via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.

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