Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

My research plan

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Earlier in this blog I wrote that I was torn between wanting to verify facts in my family history but also wanting to explore the stories behind the facts. I also mentioned that I was overwhelmed by all the unverified data that I’d collected and didn’t know how to proceed.

Well, I’ve developed a plan and I realized I should share it here. I have over a hundred pages of five-generation ancestral charts filled out by hand back when I was just writing stuff down willy nilly without regard for accuracy. They provide some nice clues, but I’m treating as clues and nothing more.

I’ve installed Reunion on my Mac and, starting with my parents and going back in time, I’m adding family members only after I have verified their existence through vital records or censuses. (I do recognize that censuses are rife with inaccuracies, but I’m using consecutive censuses to verify.)

So far, I’ve worked back four generations, to all 16 great great grandparents, and I have a few names in the fifth generation.

This feels so good.

My tree is growing and I’m confident in its accuracy. I know that every piece of information in Reunion has a source behind it.

I know that so far I’ve had it pretty easy. The ancestors I’ve been researching were all born in the U.S. and the earliest was born in 1845. So there are a lot of easily found records to look at. I know it will get harder as I go back in time and when I start researching immigrant ancestors.

The other thing I’m doing is entering every scrap of data, with sources, into the Reunion software. So far I have 83 sources in my source list. Sometimes the data entry can feel tedious, but I know I can’t rely on my memory for anything (nor should I). For example, I’m entering Residence for every year I find an ancestor on a census. That completeness is very helpful when I go back to look at individuals. At a glance, I can see how long they lived in a given location.

Having this plan has made me feel much less overwhelmed by doing family history research. It makes it very easy when I sit down to do some research to get right to work.

Now what?

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Where next?

When I initially dipped my toe into the enticing pool of family history research, I just started clicking backward on familysearch.org. As I mentioned in my last blog post, I was able to create over 120 pages of handwritten four-generaton Ancestry Charts.

I don’t know which data on these charts are correct. I’m sure there are mistakes, since I took what I read at face value and have very little in the way of verification, beyond some census forms I found. Rookie mistake, I know.

So now I’m trying to figure out where to go from here. When I think about sitting down and doing family history research, I feel overwhelmed. I have so many names on my charts. Where do I begin?

Some options

These are some of the options that occur to me. (Almost all the ancestors I know about were born in the United States.)

  • Try to find as many people as I can on censuses, starting with Chart 1 and moving forward (or back, as it were).
  • Study a period of time or an event and track my ancestors in it. For example, I could try to trace the involvement of all the ancestors I know about in the Civil War
  • Hone in on one particular line and learn as much about it as I can
  • Try to connect with relatives in discussion forums
  • Come up with some mysteries (I’m sure there are plenty to choose from) and try to solve them
  • Choose some software and transcribe all the handwritten data into it

I’ll keep you posted as I figure out what course of action to take. And, of course, I’m open to any advice anyone might have!

My quest to learn more about my family history

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It all started about ten years ago. I was on a trip to visit my parents (who live about 1,500 miles away from me) and my mother shared with me a print out of a family history narrative that a cousin of hers created some fifteen years before. On that same trip, my father’s sister shared some info from their side of the family. Through these documents, I found out that my family had connections with the early settlement of what is now New York City, as well (on the other side) with none other than Daniel Boone.

Back then I didn’t have a laptop, so I went to an internet cafe (remember those?) and started looking around on genealogy websites to see what I might learn. I was amazed at how easy it was to find out more. Granted, I wasn’t verifying any information, just taking it at face value, but I quickly learned that on both sides of my family we have deep American roots.

I joined Ancestry.com and consulted familysearch.org and started creating handwritten Ancestry Charts. Before I knew it, I had over 120 pages of four-generation sheets.

Overwhelm rears its head

Then I started feeling overwhelmed about next steps. And then I got busy starting my business as a professional organizer. While the interest was still there, the time wasn’t so my family history research went on a hiatus.

But now I’m back. And I want to get started again. Ancestry.com looks different than it used to and I can tell there’s a whole lot more information available.

As I contemplate getting back into researching my family, I feel myself a little paralyzed by perfectionism. (This is actually unusual for me–I’m not much of a perfectionist.) I want to do this thing right and I’m not sure exactly where to go from here. I do know that I want to keep it organized so I can put my hands on information when I want it and to keep my mind from feeling muddled.

Where to start now?

That’s what this blog is going to be about: figuring out what to do, how to do it, how to organize it. I’ll also be sharing the discoveries, the mistakes and the joys that come along the way.

Thanks for reading and sharing this quest with me.