Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Free Virtual Genealogy Fair offered by National Archives

By 2 Comments

While doing some research, I visited the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) website and stumbled on the notice that they’re once again offering a free Virtual Genealogy Fair. It’s next week, October 26 & 27 from 10 am to 4 pm eastern time each day. You can watch all the sessions on YouTube. Registration isn’t required. All you have to do is put it on your calendar so you don’t forget.

You can read the lineup here. There will be six one-hour sessions each day, all surrounding NARA’s holdings. I’m hoping to pay a research visit there next year, so I’m really excited to learn more. There’s even a session about the latest accessions of the National Archives branch here in St. Louis, which I’m also interested in, naturally.

I think I’m most intrigued by the talk entitled, “The Best National Archives Records Genealogists Aren’t Using,” which will be presented by Lori Cox-Paul at 11 am on Wednesday.

I’m very grateful for this free learning opportunity and hope to be able to spend at least a part of each day watching!

 

Preparing for my repository trip

By 4 Comments

Preparing for a genealogy research tripOn August 14, less than two weeks from now, I leave for my week-long research excursion to the Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center in Ft. Wayne, Indiana, a six-hour drive from my home in St. Louis. This is a National Genealogical Society research trip. I paid $750 (including hotel) and I am really excited to get my money’s worth!

I know I need to spend some time preparing so that my time there is well spent. With all the possibilities of things to research, narrowing it down is one of my biggest challenges. I went to a talk at the Midwestern Roots Family History and Genealogy Conference earlier this month on preparing for a repository trip (see my last post), so I have a game plan. After hearing that talk, as well as a talk on the library’s holdings, I’m planning to focus my research on one locality. I have a cluster of ancestors who lived in Kentucky in the 1800s to early 1900s. I’m going to focus on McLean and Muhlenberg Counties.

I have a multi-pronged approach to this research preparation:

  • Searching the library’s holdings for information on this locality and adding to a spreadsheet of specific books and microfilm rolls I want to look at.
  • Making sure the items I’ve found aren’t readily available on the internet, so I know my time at the library is spent looking at resources I can’t readily find elsewhere.
  • Looking through my existing research for holes, mysteries, and clues I could explore at the library. I’m adding those to a separate sheet on the spreadsheet. I won’t necessarily ignore non-Kentucky mysteries, but I’ll put them lower on my priority list.
  • I also plan to go through my paper files for those ancestors to make sure there aren’t any resources there that I didn’t manage to get on my hard drive. I’m thinking that I’ll take along my computer, but not my paper files, so I’ll try to scan and file anything I’d missed.

That’s a pretty labor-intensive list for two weeks but I’m trying to do a little each day and also spend more time with it on the weekends. I know that any effort at all will be beneficial, even if I don’t get to all of it.

I love the idea of homing in on one locality. That’s helping me stay focused and not feel overwhelmed.

Do any of you experienced researchers have any advice for me that you’d like to share?

Just a little bit counts

By 2 Comments

10minutetimerI’ve been trying hard to adhere to my new routine of doing genealogy research first thing in the morning. The trouble is that some mornings are busier than others. When I have an 8:30 client appointment it can be challenging for me to find the time to do research. My genealogy research is important to me, but it’s not urgent.

For the last month, I’ve done at least a little research almost every morning. I’ll set my timer for as little as ten minutes and research for that short amount of time. Since my current project is systematically going through my source documentation–which is actually proving to be really interesting and enjoyable–I know exactly where to start and I know that a little bit of focused time will move me along.

What I’ve discovered in doing this is that the benefit goes beyond furthering my research. Keeping myself engaged in my research on a daily basis makes me more excited to work on it. It also makes me feel more connected to my ancestors and helps me remember names and dates.

For the first half of the year I thought a lot about my genealogy research but I didn’t do a lot of it. Mostly I just felt anxious or guilty about not taking the time to work on it. These days, I’m still thinking a lot about it, but my thoughts are happy and productive. That’s a wonderful shift.

Doing just a tiny bit of daily action reaps big results. This is true in family history research. It’s also true in organizing your family history research. And let’s face it–it’s true in many other aspects of life, like exercise and healthy eating.

Daily habits are the foundation of an easy life. I’ve said that for years as a professional organizer. Now I’m seeing it come true in my genealogy research. I love it!

Looking forward to next weekend’s Midwestern Roots conference

By 4 Comments

On Thursday, I head to Indianapolis for the Midwestern Roots Family History and Genealogy conference. I’m very excited. I see that it’s sold out! I’m sure it will be a stimulating, educational experience. I love conferences in general and especially love  genealogy conferences. I haven’t been to one in almost a year, so I feel past due!

The syllabus was posted yesterday and I just checked it out. I’m all the more excited! It looks like a terrific program. I see that there are a couple of sessions that will help me make the most of my week-long research trip to the Allen County Public Library next week. I’m so happy about that.

I saved the PDF of the syllabus to Evernote for easy access during the conference on my computer and phone, so I feel like I’m all set. (Hint for people who have registered: The password to open the syllabus is in the reservation acknowledgement email, with the subject line “IHS Confirmation.” It took me a minute to find it so I thought I’d save you the trouble.)

When I registered, I posted here and heard from a few readers who are also attending. I’ll be getting in touch this week to arrange to get together. If you’re attending and you’d like to meet (and we haven’t already communicated about it), please leave a comment or send me an email.

I’m very excited about this learning opportunity. And I look forward to multiplying the benefit by meeting readers of this blog!