Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Find historical maps on MapofUS.org

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mapofusI’m not sure how I happened across the website MapofUS.org, but it seems like quite a find for history and map lovers, and, of course, family history researchers.

The site consists of links to many, many high-resolution historical maps of the U.S. (and a few other countries), as well as a small selection of battle maps for the Revolutionary War, and Civil War maps promised to come soon.In addition, there is a Historical  Atlases section, which provides some city maps as well. I was able to see 1852 and 1880 maps of St. Louis, where I live. They were fascinating.

It also offers an interactive U.S. map where you can watch the territories and states as they’re established throughout time. Each state also has an interactive county map.

The maps are available free of charge (at this point anyway). This seems like a really easy way to check county (and other) boundaries on various dates while you’re doing your genealogy research.

 

New Hack Genealogy Boot Camp: Get Your Genealogy Groove Back

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Get your genealogy groove backI just signed up for the Get Your Genealogy Groove Back Boot Camp from Hack Genealogy. It will be held on Saturday, January 25 from 10 am to 1:30 pm central time. (Recordings are available to registrants who can’t attend live or wish to watch it again.)

This boot camp series is organized by Hack Genealogy, the blog run by Thomas MacEntee, founder of Geneabloggers. This particular boot camp consists of two webinars that are right up my alley:

  • Genealogy Goals: How to Set Them, How to Keep them, presented by Lisa A. Alzo
  • Managing the Genealogy Data Monster, by Thomas MacEntee

I’m really looking forward to hearing what these experts have to say!

The boot camps are very reasonably priced. I paid only $9.95 to register. That includes a $3 discount for ordering before January 20.

There are so many learning opportunities in the world of genealogy. I was attracted to this one because of the expertise of the presenters, the fact that it’s live (sometimes recordings just languish on my hard drive), and the very reasonable tuition. Can’t wait!

Help me help you

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OYFHannualreportWordPress was kind enough to send me an end-of-the-year statistical profile of Organize Your Family History today. And it included a link to last year’s report as well.

The report likes to make the stats fun:

  • Last year, if the blog were a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, it would take three trips to carry as many people who read the blog that year (which is not very many people, in blog terms)
  • This year, if the blog were a concert at Sydney Opera House it would take about seven sold-out performances for that many people to see it

In actual numbers  that means that last year (which, to be fair, was half a year, since the blog debuted in June) the blog had 860 pageviews. This year, it’s been viewed over 18,000 times. That’s real growth, and for that I’m grateful. I really appreciate your reading and recommending the blog.

I’d like to make Organize Your Family History as useful to you as I can, so I created a little poll to get some input on the type of content that would be most useful to you. Feel free to select as many topics as you’d like.

 

I really appreciate your expressing your opinion and I thank you in advance!

The iPad for genealogy?

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iPad Air - my new genealogy friend? I’m an unabashed Apple fangirl. I bought my first MacBook in 2008. (I replaced it with a MacBook Pro in 2011.) A couple of months later, I bought an iPod Touch, which rocked my world. In 2010, I bought the original version of the iPad. I loved it. I bought my first iPhone (a 4S) in 2012. I adore it even more.

After I got my iPhone, my iPad lay dormant. The newer iPhone was so much faster than the older iPad that I couldn’t even tolerate using it. So I ended up selling it to Gazelle for $100. (I hope that doesn’t make me sound fickle!)

Now I’m giving serious thought to buying an iPad Air within the next month or so. One of the things I want to use it for is genealogy research. So far, my research has been pretty much restricted to my computer and my home office. But I’m planning for that to change in 2014 and I think I’ll venture into family history libraries and other record depositories. And I’m going to RootsTech.

So I’m curious. Do you have an iPad and, if so, do you use it for your genealogy research? Do you love it? Why or why not? Please help me decide!

Join the mailing list!

When you first join the list, I’ll send you a few emails to help you organize your family history. After that you’ll hear from me at the end of every month when I send an email with links to that month’s posts. And every now and then, I’ll let you know when I have something special to promote.