Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Reviewing my source documents

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Last weekend I had the great fortune to hear genealogist and speaker Amy Johnson Crow give several talks at the Missouri State Genealogical Association‘s terrific conference. One of her talks was called “How to Milk a Source for All It’s Worth” and in it she shared tips and techniques for harvesting every bit of information you can from a source.

That got me thinking about the source documents I had found early on in my genealogy research, six or seven years ago. Back then, I was focusing on direct-line ancestors, so I’m sure I left a lot of information on the table. Rather than entering every scrap of information into my genealogy database (Reunion), I would have just glossed over it.

That was confirmed yesterday when I was going over an Alabama Census of Confederate Soldiers questionnaire my 2nd great grandfather, Laban Taylor Rasco (1844-1926) had filled out in 1921. I had found that source in 2012. (It’s source #127 in my database; I now have 834 sources.) I was shocked to see that I hadn’t recorded the information about his living children that was shared in that questionnaire. They were in my tree, because I’d added them at a later date, but back in 2012 I just wasn’t adding collateral lines. (I know, I was short-sighted.)

So I started adding that info and in doing so solved a little mystery. My grandmother Beatrix Rasco Adams, who was born in 1907, was living in Memphis, Texas, with her family on the 1920 census. In 1910, they were in Alabama, where she was born, and in the 1930 census they were in Washington state, where she lived the rest of her life. I never knew why they lived in Texas in 1920 (though I didn’t try very hard to find out). But I learned yesterday by focusing on that Confederate census, that her uncle, Joseph Taylor Rasco (1872-1964) was living in Memphis, Texas in 1921 and is nearby in the 1910 and 1920 censuses. Her family must have joined him. Mystery solved, or at least illuminated.

That made me realize that I have a lot of work to do with the source documentation that I have already downloaded and entered into Reunion. My genealogy research skills have improved so much that I find myself drawn to look at all those less recently found documents so I can pick all the meat off the bones.

Two summers ago, I started systematically going through my source documentation, primarily to correct the citations and to make sure that each source document was attached as a multimedia file to the source record in Reunion. At the time, I had 300 sources in my database. I got through Source #85 by the time I stalled out on that particular endeavor.

Fast forward two years and I now have an additional 500+ more sources, but I’m hopeful that the last several hundred were much better analyzed.

Last month, I shifted my focus on my father’s maternal line, the Rascos, and plan to work on them for the rest of 2018. So this is what I’ve decided to do: I’ve created a list of all the sources that pertain to the Rascos and I’m planning to systematically check each source record, making sure the citation is correct, that the source document is attached to the source record, and that all possible information is gleaned. When I see clues for further research within a document, I will either make a note of it in Evernote or, depending on time constraints and my whims, go ahead and pursue that clue.

I think this process will give me more confidence in my source citations and it will help me feel comfortable that my research is thorough–plus it will doubtless garner a lot more facts to add to my database! I also love that it will give me an easy starting point for research each day.

I’ll let you know how it goes!

Shifting my focus

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My strategy for focusing my genealogy efforts in 2014Looking back at May, I realize that I wasn’t able to research a whole lot. Life got very hectic in the middle of the month when my husband was in a bad car accident that left him unharmed but his car very harmed. It was a total loss and we had to shop for a new car, which is always surprisingly time consuming. Between that and his negotiating for and accepting a new job, I probably went two weeks without doing any genealogy research.

I love doing daily research, so this made me feel really disconnected from my ancestors. Over Memorial Day weekend, I got back into it, thank goodness. I went to my research log and was reminded that I’d been transcribing deeds recently.

I’m here to tell you that transcribing deeds isn’t my idea of a great time. Which is probably why I didn’t get an itch to research when other priorities took over. So I shook things up a little, just to make things more interesting.

I’ve been researching my Adams family line for the last 16 months. Desperate to get away from deed transcribing, I poked around on Ancestry and took a look at the small family tree of my first cousin (my father’s sister’s daughter). She had the parents of our great grandmother listed (though not sourced). I took that clue and ran with it. I found conflicting evidence and I have not yet resolved who my second great grandparents are, but I’m all energized by the possibilities. I enjoyed the digging and the problem solving.

I think that I will shift my genealogy focus from my father’s paternal Adams line to his maternal line, the Rascos, at the end of the quarter (or perhaps before). I’m feeling the need to explore some fresh names.

I loved being focused on the Adamses for so long because I was able to remember who was who and it kept clarity in my research. But after more than a year with them, I’m taking the blinders off and shifting to the Rascos. I’ll stay focused, just on something else. That feels good and exciting to me.

How about you? Do you focus on a specific family group or line in a single session, month or quarter? Or do you like to mix it up?

Staying connected with my ancestors

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In June, I completed the 30 x 30 challenge in which I did at least 30 minutes of genealogy research a day the whole month. Then I kept it up into July, managing to research each day through July 9. I’d created a wonderful routine of doing genealogy research first thing in the morning. It was a great way to start the day.

Then my routine was disrupted by a pre-planned trip to visit my dad in Walla Walla, Washington. Unfortunately, he ended up being hospitalized after a fall the day I arrived. So my days have been spent first at the hospital, then the rehab facility. He comes home in a couple of days and I go back to my home in six days. So I just haven’t had the luxury of time alone to do research. (This also explains why I didn’t blog last week!)

I was really struck yesterday by how much I miss researching. I miss my connection with my ancestors. And I miss making progress. I also miss my peaceful morning routine.

I’m trying to stay connected with my ancestors by talking with my dad and my aunt (his sister) about family history. I’ve been able to share some information that they didn’t know, uncovered in my research. And my aunt gave me the beautiful photo above of her mother as a baby, with her sister and parents. (The parents are William Reese Rasco, 1878-1957 and Louella Watts Rasco, 1879-1953. The kids are my great aunt Lessie Rasco, 1901-1994, and my grandmother, Beatrix Rasco Adams, 1907-1987.)

I hope having researched daily for 39 days will help me get right back into the swing of things when I get home next week. Perhaps I can get started before that, once once my dad is in his home and I’m hanging out with him there.

What I want to avoid is losing my mojo and getting out of the habit of researching. So you may see another 30 x 30 challenge coming up sooner rather than later!

Making migration more visible

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A map, cork board, foam core and frame make a great way for me to map my ancestors!I love looking at my genealogy map, which hangs on the wall in my office. Using color-coded pins with little label flags, I pin my ancestors’ birth and death places.

As much as I enjoy adding pins to the map, I probably let a year lapse between pinning sessions. But just the other day I took a little time (as part as my weekly genealogy research commitment) and added ten ancestors to the map. It was a fun exercise — and it was educational too.

Focusing on ancestors’ birth and death places helps me think about migration. Looking at the map makes that migration feel more real.

I added a generation in my latest pinning session, so I now have five generations pinned on my map. I was born in Washington state; as I go back in generations, I go farther east with the pins. (Not a big surprise, I know.)

In this past pinning session, I reached an eastern seaboard state, Georgia. A glance at the map showed me that the distance from Georgia, where my great great grandmother, Margaret Elizabeth Dye, was born, to Alabama, where she died, wasn’t as far as I’d thought. Margaret was born in 1844 in Henry County, Georgia and was married in 1865 in Shelby County, Alabama. Her husband, Laban Taylor Rasco, was born in Alabama and did fight in the Civil War in Georgia, so maybe she was a war bride? (I’m thinking not because there were many Dyes in the cemetery where she is buried in Cullman, Alabama.) These are the kinds of stories I hope to suss out as I look to go deeper, rather than higher, in my family tree.

The map helps bring questions to light, making migration patterns more visible. I know that there are higher-tech ways to do this. But my old-school map and pins make me happy.