Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Quick tip #30: Don’t forget to have fun!

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Here’s the next in my occasional series of bite-size Quick Tips. Click on the Quick Tips tag for my other Quick Tips. Because I tend to write longer posts, I wanted to provide a quick-to-read (and quick-to-write) post every couple of weeks on a small topic that pops into my head. This is one I need to remind myself about when the going gets tough.

Don’t forget to have fun

Those of us who aren’t professional genealogists are more than likely pursuing this passion for the fun of it. But sometimes it doesn’t feel like fun does it? Butting up against a brick wall can make your head hurt!

When I start to get frustrated with my research, I remind myself that I’m doing this because I enjoy it. And then I step away from the frustrating problem and do some genealogy activity that I find particularly fun. Your idea of fun will certainly be different, but you might give this a try. You might even keep a list of fun tasks that you can turn to when you to reignite your love for genealogy.

Remember, this is supposed to be fun!

Photo by Sam Dan Truong on Unsplash

My 2022 genealogy goals

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Are you a goal setter? I sure am. Every year I set aside a day to work on my personal and business goals. This year, I did it on December 16. But I ran out of time to consider my personal genealogy goals, so I did that this morning.

I sat down with a pad of paper and I did a little brainstorming session with myself. I achieved some clarity really fast. The release of the 1950 census on April 1 creates a natural break in the year. I decided to focus the first quarter of the year on preparing for that day and cleaning up my existing research. The latter three quarters will be about new research and avoiding a backlog.

So here’s what I decided:

First quarter 2022:

Rest of 2022:

  • Glean as much information from the 1950 census as possible
  • Shift my family focus to the Jeffries line (that’s my maternal grandmother’s line)
  • Do a deep dive on my Civil War ancestor Richard Anderson Jeffries

One overarching intention for the year is to try harder to do daily research. For the last few years, I’ve found that in the absence of a 30 x 30 challenge, I ignore my research. Sometimes, I’m able to sustain daily research for months at a time, but that’s fallen by the wayside. In 2022, I’m going to try to do at least a little something every single day to keep my mind in the game. I know that, for me, that means researching in the early morning. Perhaps I’ll try to go to bed a little earlier so I can get up earlier to accomplish this. I plan a 30 x 30 challenge starting January 1, 2022, so I’ll have that support as I kick off the year.

I realize that I didn’t so much set goals this year as clarify my focus. And that’s good enough for me. It feels great. The plan for the year feels simple and attainable.

If you’ve set goals that you feel like sharing, please share in the comments. I’d love to hear them!

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

Preparing for the 1950 Census

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I’ve had April 1, 2022–the year that the 1950 census is made public–on my calendar for ages. But that distant day started to feel real when I attended the terrific webinar “Get Ready for the 1950 US Census!” presented by Marian B. Wood for the Kentucky Genealogical Society last night.

To be honest, I hadn’t thought much about all the things I could do to prepare for the census release in advance. But now I’m very excited to get to work so that on April 1 I can find my people on the census easily.

Here are some of my takeaways from the seminar. You can bet I’ll be blogging more about it!

  • The National Archives announced a few days ago that it is going to use artificial intelligence and optical character recognition to create a (probably crude) surnames index available on April 1. They’re also spearheading a public transcription effort. Check out their news release about it.
  • I’m not going to count on that index and instead intend to look for the Enumeration Districts for my ancestors so that I can browse the 1950 Census with ease. Marian Wood suggested creating a spreadsheet of ancestors, their 1940 addresses, their 1950 addresses and the corresponding Enumeration Districts. I can’t wait to dig into that.
  • To find the Enumeration District for an address, go to Steve Morse’s website to search the Unified Census ED Finder. Marian Wood suggested using Google Maps to narrow down the intersection and thus the number of Enumerations Districts you have to browse. I remember doing this for the 1940 Census but I’m looking forward to preparing in advance this time.
  • There’s a public Facebook group called 1950 US Census for Genealogists that will share resources about the 1950 census. I’ve joined and look for keeping an eye on the news there. It already has some great resources listed.
  • FamilySearch has created a landing page for the 1950 Census where you can sign up for updates.

In the webinar, we learned about some of the questions asked on this census and the instructions enumerators were given in recording the answers. Hidden assumptions were revealed! I’ll blog more about it later.

The release of the 1950 census is a big deal for those of us in the United States. I can’t wait to see the snapshots of my ancestors’ lives it reveals.

Gifts for the genealogists on your list

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As a professional organizer, I see over and over again how difficult it is for people to let go of items they were given as a gift, even if those items no longer serve them. This observation has changed the way I give gifts. As I’ve written repeatedly on my organizing blog, I think it’s much kinder to give a gift that doesn’t have a chance to turn into clutter.

Luckily there are many non-tangible gifts that won’t turn into clutter. And if you have a genealogist on your holiday gift list especially easy, since there are so many fun, clutter-free gifts available, even at the last minute. I’ve updated the list I last published in 2016. I hope you find it helpful. Here are my ideas:

As much as I love clutter-free gifts, I do have a suggestion of a physical gift for the genealogist in your life who wears necklaces. It’s the family tree necklace from Lisa Leonard Designs, which you can have made with your own surnames. (Currently, there’s a limited-edition version with leather and turquoise that is especially tempting!) I adore the one I gave myself back in 2014.

Illustration by Traci Gardner via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.

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