Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Giving DNA another chance

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Confession time: I have the hardest time understanding genetic genealogy. I have spent hours in seminars at various conferences. I even had a one-on-one consultation about my DNA results with genetic genealogist and consultant Diahan Southard, Your DNA Guide.

For some reason, these concepts are hard for me to grasp and retain. As a result, I do very little with my DNA results. I occasionally check matches to my autosomal test (which I did through Ancestry DNA and transferred the results to Family Tree DNA) but that’s pretty much it. Every year I hope (but don’t plan) that this is going to be the year that I harvest the power of DNA in my genealogy research.

An opportunity to learn more was just handed to me on a silver platter. Diahan Southard is coming to St. Louis for a Summer Speaker Series event put on by the St. Louis Genealogical Society on July 28. I just registered. (If you’re in St. Louis and interested in going, today July 10, is the early-bird deadline. Tomorrow the price goes up by $10.)

I know what a great speaker Diahan is and it couldn’t be more convenient for me to go. So I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to hear her speak. (Plus Diahan holds a special place in my heart because she was one of the first people to consent to being interviewed for my How They Do It series.) I’ll be attending her talks on July 28 with an open and curious mind and I’m hoping that they will help me incorporate more genetic genealogy into my research.

If you’re in St. Louis and going, please let me know so we can meet!

Unmodified photo by Alf Melvin via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.

Are you taking advantage of your local library?

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I’m a huge fan of the St. Louis city and county public library systems (and, by extension, all public library systems). Even before I started doing serious genealogy research, I was a heavy library user. Before I got my first Kindle e-reader five years ago, they knew me by name at my local branch of the city library. (I still borrow books all the time but now they’re electronic, so I don’t get into my branch very often.)

St. Louis City and St. Louis County are separate government entities. (The city seceded from the county in 1876.) As a result there are two independent library systems, each with their collections. Residents of either entity, however, are welcome to use the other. So I’m fortunate to have access to two great library systems!

I’m so grateful for the genealogy resources the libraries. Both city and county headquarters here have genealogy collections. The St. Louis County library has two floors (Tiers 4 and 5) set aside for genealogy and history. Patrons can visit Tier 5 at any time the library is open and get the assistance of the very helpful employees. Tier 4 is closed to the public, though materials housed there can be requested. On the second weekend of each month (this month it’s July 14-15) Tier 4, is opened to the public. If you’re in St. Louis you might consider taking advantage of the opportunity to browse more than 130,000 family histories and other materials shelved in this area not usually open to the public.

I love using Tier 5 and try to get there at least once a quarter. One reason I go is that patrons of public libraries that are affiliated with the Family History Library (like the St. Louis County library) can access some of the documents online while at they’re library branch that they can’t access at home. It’s so much easier for me to travel fifteen minutes to the St. Louis County Library History & Genealogy Department than it is for me to travel to Salt Lake City!

In addition, my libraries offer free classes that help me build my genealogy skills. I bet yours does too.

My library card can help me do online research, without even having to go to the branch. The libraries I have access to allow me to search dozens of databases, simply by entering my card number and PIN. I have found information on newspaper databases and obituary indexes, for example, that I didn’t find elsewhere.

When I’m researching at my computer, I always start with Ancestry and Family Search. But sometimes need to remind myself to turn to the many digital library resources available to me!

The public library system throughout the country is such an amazing resource, for genealogy research and just general enrichment and education. If you don’t know already, I encourage you to reach out to your local library and see how it might help you in your family history research!

Don’t ignore your old paper files

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If you’ve read this blog from its start six years ago, you know that I used to be a paper person with my genealogy research. Storing documents on my hard drive made me nervous before I had a solid folder structure and file-naming system in place. So I put together a couples-based folder system that worked for me.

It turns out there were some documents that I couldn’t easily file by couple and I put them into a separate file. Then I committed the cardinal sin of paper management: I didn’t label that file.

For years now, I’ve been paperless with my genealogy. I can’t remember the last time I printed something I would have to file.

Yesterday, though, I remembered a family history written in the 80s by a cousin of my grandfather.  I wanted to look at but it wasn’t on my hard drive, so I dug into my paper files looking for it. It wasn’t where I expected to find it, so I kept looking. And that’s when I found the unlabeled file of miscellaneous papers.

Happily, the family history was there and it’s now scanned and filed on my hard drive, with the paper version filed where I would expect to find it. (I suppose I could part with all that paper, but it’s not doing anybody any harm, so I haven’t pulled the trigger on that.)

Also in that mystery file, I found a packet of papers about my Adams line that had a sticky note on it that said, in my handwriting, “Return to Aunt Gwen.” Yikes. Aunt Gwen is my father’s sister. I haven’t even looked at it yet, but I brought it to my desk to process and scan. Then I’ll return the papers to my aunt.

How about you? Do you paper files of genealogy research that you no longer use? It might be worthwhile to dive in there and see if there are any fun documents (filed or otherwise) that you’ve forgotten about!

How many trees?

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How many family trees should you have?I’m occasionally asked how genealogy researchers should split up their family trees. Should they have a separate tree for each parent’s line? Each grandparent’s line? Just one tree?

It’s a question that I didn’t even consider when I set up my family tree in Reunion (the genealogy software I use on my Mac) and in Ancestry. To me, it made sense to start with myself and just work my way up one tree.

(If I were doing my husband’s tree, which may happen some day, I would have a separate tree for him, since our ancestors come from completely different places and have no relevance to one another.)

One thing I like about having all my ancestors together in one tree is that I can easily access a different ancestor if I’m chasing a clue. I use the quickbar button at the top of the Family View for instant access to my most researched ancestors. Or if a name seems familiar, but I’m not sure it’s my person, a quick search will reveal where that person resides in my tree. It’s easy and it works for me.

All that said, I have only 570 people in my tree. (Only verified people with cited source documents I’ve seen are added to my tree, which is my excuse for that number being so small.) If I had a much larger tree, perhaps I’d be singing a different tune.

So I’m curious: How many trees do you have? How have you divided them up? Do you have any regrets?

Unmodified photo by Nichole Renee via Flickr. Used under Creative Commons License.