Search Results for: how they do it

Meeting cousins, visiting cemeteries

February 5, 2013 By Janine Adams 2 Comments

One of the huge benefits of starting this blog is becoming acquainted with my mother’s first cousins, the children of my grandfather’s siblings. They’ve shared genealogy info and family photographs and have been welcoming and interesting people.

I’m very excited because I recently learned about the Midwest Genealogy Center’s Ancestry Day, a family-history conference that will be held in conjunction with Ancestry.com on March 16 in Blue Springs, Mo. That’s a 3+ hour drive for me from St. Louis, but I like a road trip, so I eagerly signed up.

What makes it more enticing is that my grandparents Crawford Brown and Susie Jeffries Brown, grew up in western Missouri and I’ve arranged to spend the afternoon with my cousin, Penny, and visit the cemeteries where my great grandparents (her grandparents), Arthur John Brown and Rhoda Wheeler Brown, are buried, in Milo, Missouri. I hope to visit her mother, my grandfather’s sister, who just celebrated her 99th birthday. In addition, I think we’ll go to Appleton City, where my grandfather grew up. Penny says that his picture (or perhaps it’s his brother’s picture) still hangs in Appleton City High School.

I have family on my grandmother’s side who are buried in Appleton City. I need to do a little digging to see if I can find exactly where, but according to my records (I’ve been really successful in finding death certificates for this little branch of the family), my great grandfather, Earl Jeffries and both his parents (John D. Jeffries and Susan Price Jeffries) AND his grandfather, Richard Anderson Jeffries (my great great great grandfather!) are buried in Appleton City . I’m very excited at the prospect of seeing all these gravestones. Perhaps I’ll find other family members graves there as well!

I’m very excited for a triple whammy that weekend: meeting cousins, visiting cemeteries, and going to a family-history conference. Life is good.

If you’re planning to attend Ancestry Day at the Midwest Genealogy Center, please post a note in the comments. I’d love to meet you!

The genealogy research log

December 28, 2012 By Janine Adams 4 Comments

I’ve been really bad about keeping a genealogy research log. I’ve seen references to the importance of them and I even tried keeping a handwritten one in my genealogy spiral notebook when I first started back on this journey earlier this year. But that soon fell by the wayside.

Just this week, as I was thinking about my research while using the elliptical trainer at the gym. (It turns out that the elliptical machine and the shower are where my great ideas come to me–and they’re both places where it’s hard to write those ideas down.) I realized that a research log would be very helpful to avoid duplicating research and to see where I’d left off.

I thought about how the log really needed to be searchable, so it should probably be a spreadsheet. I’m really not a spreadsheet kind of gal–they seem so restricting to me. And I pondered if I could get away with it being in a Pages document. (I’m a Mac user–Pages is the Mac’s version of Word.)

I intended today to fool around with creating a Pages template for a research log. But then I opened the January/February 2013 issue of Family Tree Magazine and read an article called Logging On, all about creating a research log. It made me realize that sorting was as important as searching for my log. So I guess I’ll be using a spreadsheet. I could use Numbers (Mac’s version of Excel) or Google Docs. Call me nuts, but I have a distrust of the cloud. I want this info stored on my computer. So I’m going with Numbers.

Happily, the article also gave some really clear guidelines on setting up the log, including suggested column headings. (They include date, name, record or resource, info sought, source citation, etc.) Also included in the article is a sidebar with a list of blogs and websites with how-tos on setting up a research log. One really kind of excited me. It’s Miriam’s Census Spreadsheet, in which Miriam has created a great way to keep track of what census and vital records data she has found for her ancestors. I think that in addition to a research log, I’m going to try to create a similar spreadsheet.

Setting up the spreadsheet for my research log will be the easy part. The hard part will be creating the habit of using it. I teach workshops on building habits and routines, so I might be a step ahead of the game. I know that I’m very capable of creating habits. (I whittle my email inbox down to zero every day and go to the gym three times a week, for instance.) The first challenge will be remembering to do use the log. Something as simple as a sticky note might help with that.

Intellectually, I understand the value of the research log. I think once I start using it, I’ll quickly experience its value. And that reward will help me create the habit.

December 28 is a great day to decide to create a new habit. I’m hopeful that within a few months I can proudly say that I keep a genealogy research log without even thinking about it!

Taking stock of my records

December 18, 2012 By Janine Adams Leave a Comment

I love the last couple of weeks of the year. This is when I set goals and resolutions. And I also typically try to do some decluttering and organizing around my house. I’ve already started the goal-setting process for my genealogy work. But I realized this morning that I needed to spend some time organizing my genealogy records and see where things stand.

I started doing genealogy research back in the first part of the 21st century. My records then were all paper. In fact, I hand wrote my ancestry charts. Since taking up the research more seriously this year, I’ve done more electronically (my family tree is now entered into software), but I do have a tendency to print things out and file them. I blogged awhile back about how I organize my genealogy files.

Above is a photo of the file cart that holds my genealogy files. As you can see it’s looking a little unruly. During that lovely week between Christmas and the end of the year, I think I will go through those files, see what I records I have and what’s missing and tidy things up. I’ll also explore the contents of the files I created years ago called “Census possibilities,” “Places to go,” and “Research tips.” By the end, I hope to feel like I know where things stand with my research. I suspect I’ll end up with a list of things to research, mysteries to solve and holes to fill.

If time allows, I’ll also spruce up my electronic files. They’re in decent shape, but there’s definitely room for improvement. I’ll write a post when that process is over and share the benefits I gained from this effort!

Picking my parents’ brains

November 29, 2012 By Janine Adams 2 Comments

I’m going next week to visit my parents in Walla Walla, Washington. I’ve kicked myself over the past year for not asking them more questions (or listening better when they volunteered information) about family lore and ancestors when we were all younger. Their memories aren’t as good as they were twenty years ago, naturally.

When I’m there visiting, I plan to ask a few questions that have come up as I’ve been doing genealogy research this year. I don’t know if they’ll be able to answer them, but I have to ask.

And here’s the tiny thing I’m doing that feels kind of radical. I’m actually writing down the questions, even the small curiosities. I’m not relying on my memory. I’m not going to assume that there will be a natural opportunity to ask these questions. I’m writing them in my notebook and at some point I’m going to pull out that notebook and interview my parents. And the notebook will be handy for writing down their responses.

My parents’ memories aren’t the only ones deteriorating with age. My memory is definitely not what it used to be (I’m 50) and I’m not going to take any chances.

If you’re visiting with family members over the holidays, you might jot down some questions to ask them. I so wish I’d done it years ago!