Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

How They Do It: Diahan Southard

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I’m so happy to present the fourth installment in my How They Do It series, in which I ask well-known genealogists how they organize their own research. The series runs the first Tuesday of each month, though this week I forgot! (Yes, even professional organizers mess up their schedules sometimes.)

This month I interview Diahan Southard, Your DNA Guide. Diahan is an expert in genetic genealogy and is a regular speaker at genealogy conferences. She manages to make the confusing topic of using DNA in genealogy understandable, no small feat, in my opinion. I’ve  had the pleasure of doing a consultation with her about my own autosomal DNA results, which was a very valuable experience! For this interview, we focused on Diahan’s genetic genealogy research.

How They Do It: Diahan Southard

How long have you been doing genealogy?

I have been involved in genetic genealogy since the beginning, so about 17 years.

What’s your favorite part of doing genetic genealogy?

My favorite part about genetic genealogy is the unexpected tangible connection that I feel with my DNA cousins that I have never met.

Do you consider your genealogy research well organized?

I honestly spend more time helping others than I do on my own research at this point, so while I feel like I have some good organization in the DNA realm, I know my traditional research could use some help.

What type of software do you use for organizing your genetic genealogy research?

Each testing company does offer some limited means for keeping track of your matches in the form of notes. When I look at a match, I just make a quick note in that person’s profile about what I did and what I found, especially if I was able to find the common ancestor. This makes it easy for me to remember when I go back weeks later.

Do you have a tree on Ancestry? If so, is it public or private? Why?

I do have a public tree on Ancestry as it gives me access to all of the best genetic genealogy tools at AncestryDNA. With a public tree I get access to the DNA circles and New Ancestor discoveries features, as well as the shaky leaf hints. Having my tree public also allows me to take advantage of other people’s research time, meaning that my tree is out there for them to peruse so that my DNA matches might be able to identify our connection even if I haven’t had a chance to look yet.

What’s your biggest challenge when it comes to organizing your genetic genealogy?

The biggest challenge in genetic genealogy is figuring out what to do with all of those fourth cousins! Most of us have so many. The best thing to do is to pull your Best Matches out of the longer list and focus on those. Your best matches have shared surnames, shared locations, or are your best genetic matches.

What’s your biggest piece of advice to beginners in genetic genealogy in terms of keeping track of their research?

If you are just getting started in genetic genealogy, please don’t get overwhelmed by the more experienced people telling you that you HAVE to have this fancy tool or you HAVE to transfer your data to another database. Spend at least a year getting to know the database you were tested in and don’t worry about anything else for now.

What do you think is the most important thing for people to do to stay organized when it comes to family history research?

Stay focused on one goal. Don’t get distracted by other shiny objects.

If you were starting out new in genetic genealogy what would you do differently?

I would test more of my ancestors before they passed away. If you have parents or grandparents, or aunts or uncles still around, go order them a DNA test!!

Do you keep paper or electronic files (or both)?

All my genetic genealogy is electronic.

Do you use Evernote, One Note or any other electronic organizing system for your genealogy? If so, how do you use it?

I do use Evernote to clip particularly helpful articles or charts to help me make sense of my genetic genealogy results. I also use it to save screenshots of DNA circles and New Ancestor discoveries, or important matches.

Do you have anything to add?

While the ins and outs and ups and downs of genetic genealogy can take you down many paths with many twists and turns, keep in mind that it really comes down to a simple concept: if you share DNA, you are family.

Diahan obviously has a lot to teach those of us struggling with knowing what to do with our DNA results! I really love her advice to stayed focused and to spend a year getting to know the database you’ve tested with before branching out to other databases or trying new tools. And, of course, her advice to test your older relatives now, while they’re still with you, is so important.

My (very informal) research log

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A few commenters have asked me for samples of my research log. I hesitate to supply it because mine is so informal and not necessarily a good example for others to follow. But in the spirit of helping others, I offer it up.

I keep my log in Evernote. I have a notebook there called “2017 Research Log” and each time I do some research I try to create a log entry. I create a new note in the aforenamed notebook and head it with the date. Then I just type notes that I think might be useful in the future. I try to include what I was looking for, what I found and what next steps would be.

Here’s why it works for me:

  • First and foremost, it is easy for me to keep up. I just jot some notes to my future self and don’t get hung up on filling out a complicated spreadsheet or making sure I have every bit of information. For me, making it easy enough so I’ll actually do it trumps making it more complete.
  • It’s searchable, so I can easily search by person or surname. I could tag it by locality, family line or other category, though so far I haven’t done that.
  • Did I mention it’s easy?

Here’s a screenshot of a recent entry that’s fairly representative.

My genealogy research logI used to use a template in Evernote, one that I created when I was partnering with the dear departed Springpad. (I put that template at the top of this post; click on the image to make it bigger.) But I find I do better writing free form–I think it brings more information out of me.

Earlier this year I was experimenting with using the Log function in Reunion, also writing free-form notes, but I’ve discovered I prefer Evernote. I use Evernote on a daily basis for various aspects of my life and business, so I’m very comfortable with it.

I should mention that one downside to using Evernote as a research log is that it’s not sortable. It is searchable and taggable, but I can’t sort it like I could a spreadsheet. So far that hasn’t been an impediment to me.

I don’t think there’s any one right way to do a research log, but I’m pretty sure there are better ways than mine. But it’s working well for me at the moment.

If you are a spreadsheet person and aren’t intimidated by the opportunity to enter a lot of data, by all means check out Thomas MacEntee’s amazing research log spreadsheet.

Also, if you haven’t already feel free to join my Genealogy Research Loggers Facebook group for more conversations about research logs (as well as some samples from others).

For detailed information on how I organize my own genealogy research (including my research log), check out my Orderly Roots Guide, How I Do It: A Professional Organizer’s Genealogy Workflow, available for $19.99.

30 x 30 wrap up

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My March 30 x 30 challenge ended yesterday. I challenged myself to do 30 minutes of genealogy research every day for 30 days (in this case, March 1 to 30). Some of you said you’d join me.

For me, this was a successful challenge! As in my November 2016 30 x 30 challenge, I spent a lot of time transcribing. I will say that having a project like that makes the challenge easier because it was always there for me to turn to. But it wasn’t completely about the transcribing. Here’s what I accomplished:

  • I did at least 30 minutes of research for probably 28 days (a couple of days I forgot!).
  • I transcribed 24 documents in the Civil War pension file of my 2nd great grandfather, George Washington Adams (1845-1938).
  • I abstracted six documents in that pension file.
  • I made a few breakthroughs in researching that 2nd great grandfather’s second family.
  • I managed to stay focused on the Adams family, my goal for 2017.
  • I remembered to log each of my sessions! (Full disclosure: For the transcriptions, I counted checking off a document on my checklist logging.) I feel like I’m slowly building up the research log habit.

I can tell you in all sincerity that if it weren’t for this challenge, a fraction of those things would have been accomplished. Some days I just didn’t feel like thinking about my research, but because of the challenge, I pulled out that pension file and started transcribing. It has 138 documents and I’ve transcribed 89 if them (almost two-thirds!) and abstracted 31. I still have a ways to go, but thanks to this challenge, the light is starting to shine at the end of the tunnel.

How about you? If you participated in the challenge (or a variation of it), how did it go?

AncestryDNA announces Genetic Communities

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When I was at RootsTech, an executive from Ancestry showed a tantalizing video during an opening session about the “genetic communities” that Ancestry DNA customers would see in their profile.  It’s a big step beyond the ethnicity estimates they previously offered.

Yesterday, Ancestry announced that the genetic communities are starting to be rolled out. They also provided a help page with more information on genetic communities. Here’s the accompanying video:

You can bet that I rushed over to my Ancestry DNA results to see if I’d been placed in any genetic communities. I was delighted to see that I had one genetic community listed in my profile (so far). It is the Settlers of Southern Appalachians community and reflects my father’s mother’s side of the family (the Rascos) who were Alabama settlers.

The whole thing is a bit mysterious to me (but that’s true of DNA in general) and I’m anxious to learn about this new feature and whether I might eventually be connected with more communities. So I signed up for a free webinar from Legacy Family Tree called Exploring AncestryDNA’s New Genetic Communities, presented by renowned genetic genealogist Blaine Bettinger. It’s tomorrow, March 30, at 1 pm Central time. I’m not available at that time but I was thrilled to read that the recording will be available free of charge for seven days.

I’ve been ignoring my DNA results for at least a year now, but I sense that might be ending, since yesterday I purchased the Getting Started with DNA and Genealogy Boot Camp from Hack Genealogy. It’s $25.95 for three hours of recorded webinars and 10 pages of handouts, available for a year. I used the coupon code GETDNA to get $6 off that price. (That code expires March 31.)

I don’t want to get too distracted from the single family line I’m exploring in 2017, but I am looking forward to learning more about how DNA can help me in my research. AncestryDNA’s Genetic Communities might be really helpful!

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.