Unfortunately when people are expelled from areas, civility is not always, or perhaps even generally, the rule. Such was the case in Poland.  The Polish Communist government was eager to lay claim to its newly obtained German lands and expel all Germans not simply from the lands but also from memory and history. Over time however even this changes, as is noted in my earlier posting about the Zeyer Cemetery. However as the following story from Fred Rump relates, it was not always that way. “I actually found some cemeteries hidden in a forest and all overgrown out in the rural parts of East Prussia and there are some WW1…

It seems many people believe that genealogy, or family history, is some sort of competition or contest. Their ancestors were better, were more important, traveled further, worked harder, suffered more, were more regal… Genealogy and family history is conceptually straightforward, it simply involves accurately identifying our ancestors, family and history. Every family has had its successes, failures, highlights, lowlights. People have lived for long times or short times, in good places and bad. They have been ruled by good people and evil. There has been war and peace. Children have been healthy and sick. Such is the nature of life. As genealogists, we seek simply to understand their stories, their…

All of us have DNA. Even if we do not know the names of our ancestors, we have DNA. Our family has decided to gather and analyze its DNA materials (matrilineal and patrilineal lines) and see what these DNA lines have to say. We have elected to do this through the genographic project, a partnership between the University of Arizona Research Labs Family Tree DNA association, National Geographic Society and IBM rather than to switch to the program offered by Ancestry.com.  Our reasoning is fairly simple; my father-in-law’s DNA is with NatGeo.  Also, the Genographic program is older and more established; and, this seems like the lowest risk approach. Information…

Do you use Zotero in doing your genealogy research work? This is a question I have toyed around with for quite a while now.  I don’t have a good answer for myself although the toolset seems well suited to gathering web-based information, collating, and processing it.  It is also tightly coupled with the browser I use most frequently, Firefox. Still I have been unable to find and good roadmap on how to make this toolset work to my advantage.  I am constantly in search of tools that link tightly with websites (i.e., Ancestry.com, etc.), online documents, image libraries, etc.  Zotero claims to do all that and more.  Sounds good to…

Acknowledge your sources! Today I received a note from a very important genealogy friend. She asked me if I hadn’t perhaps confused two family members who had similar names thereby giving erroneous credit to the ‘wrong’ person rather than the ‘right’ one. A very important question. It is absolutely essential to provide good and clear attribution to those from whom we source our data. It is important to be as correct as possible in any quotations, images, bibliographies and links. Accuracy requires proofing by your readership (proof-readers, if you are lucky enough to have them) and modification by the family genealogist to reflect appropriate corrections, etc. It is also, unfortunately,…

What do you do when there are no names or dates to work with? Well quite simply, there has to be something or else you are in deep trouble!  Having said that there are many times when the names are and dates are unclear, indefinite or conflicting. I have found a few options that work with regularity, at least for me they do!  In no particular sequence, they include: Census records. Look to see if you can find a cluster of family members that resemble those you seek.  In one of my best examples, I found a Peter & Julie Deyo family.  I was seeking a Joseph and Julia Deo…

Ever have a person without a clear name or birth/ death dates? I seem to regularly encounter family members for whom the names have become vague and the dates muddled. Because this situation is fairly common, there need to be simple methods for getting around these situations. I have found the following approaches to be useful. Phonetics. Remember the days when teachers attempted to beat phonetics into your head; well, here’s a place they can become useful. However it is worth noting that the phonetics ‘of genealogy’ almost always involve two or more persons: the person saying or giving a name -and- the person(s) hearing the name spoken This is…

Over the past few days my email has been clogged with questions about whether or not anyone- everyone was related to royalty.   Well being the geek that I am, I decided to a quick bit of research and here’s what I found out  (these are excerpted for the articles noted at the end of this posting… feel free to read them in their entirety). [A] mathematical study of genealogy indicates that everyone in the world is descended from Nefertiti and Confucius, and everyone of European ancestry is descended from Muhammad and Charlemagne.- Dick Eastman …everyone of European descent has royal ancestry. – Steve Olsen The mathematics of our ancestry is…

Finding a lost family connection can be daunting, exhilarating and exasperating.  The human need for connection to family and community is strong.  And, the desire to find lost family members can become nearly all consuming. In order to succeed in this search, here are 5 pointers might be helpful (especially if you are new to genealogy). Find as many family member names are you can, even those that are a vague part of your personal or family recollection are useful. Identify places or place names.  It is best if they are ‘close’ to accurate but even inaccurate places names can provide guidance and pointers. Dates, creating a list of dates…

Using GRAMPS as a primary management, storage and presentation tool for our genealogical data came about slowly. As many of you may recall, I tried and still use numerous family databases such as TNG, RootsMagic etc.  However, moving genealogical data back and forth across three or four tools before placing it in a single secure location took a lot of extra time.  As luck would have it, I have need to create both hard copy and on-line versions of a branch of our family tree this week.  All weekend I was moving data around, sourcing new information, merging old files and images.  Doing all this in one place is a…

One quick trick I discovered for repairing problem Genealogy data involves using an editor -I like geany and gedit… probably because I run on Linux. But truth be known, any editor with a global find & replace function should do just fine! Here’s the typical scenario.  You have a data corruption problem that occurs throughout your database.  I always encounter problems like foreign character corruption… you have probably seen words like A@$0n in your files, too.  To make matters worse, they appear in various fields and across numerous records.  What to do??? Well the obvious, but painful, answer is to sit and retype everything using characters that don’t get jumbled…

Genealogy of Canada is a great site for researching French Canadian ancestry.  I discovered the site two days ago when I was stumped trying to locate some relatives. The site is developed primarily for native French Canadian language speakers and offered in translated English.  I have had no major problems with the English variant; it is much better than my French! I have encountered a couple of minor problem issues that are worth noting: source references are difficult, if not impossible to view. it is difficult to send bulk data to the site for inclusion in their database These are small prices to pay for what is an excellent, albeit…

As you work on your genealogy be sure to work on branches and items in logical groups.  Do not scatter your efforts too much or you risk becoming confused, muddled and inaccurate. I find that my best and most productive work comes when I work in a single or focused area of my family either by picking a ‘branch’ or following a group or family history theme. Working in this manner I find I develop much better control by being attuned to the following: Local history, more precisely history of the time and place, is much easier to keep in mind. History can greatly affect the movements and choices your…

Honesty is one of the most important dimensions of good genealogy and family history.  We all have backgrounds that we would like to say were ours. However, sometimes we have to settle for the fact that we are who we are. If you truly want to provide and accurate family history and genealogy, you need to look at things as they are, not as you wish they would be.  Facts, information and knowledge form the basic building blocks of good genealogical research.  Your family history requires not only knowing who your people were but why they may have done what they did, chose what they chose. Like you, remember they…

Yesterday while working on my genealogy, I accidently got carried away.  Hard to believe but true.  Here is what I found myself doing, then questioning and finally fixing. I was conducting initial research on Ancestry, seeking the basics about who was born of whom and where.  As is typically the case, I was using the Ancestry hints as pointers on where to look and attempting to ascertain what was real versus imaginary, in terms of facts, individuals and data. You may or may not be aware, but when you research this way on Ancestry, Family Tree hints indicate whether or not a “user family tree” contains sources, stories, images, etc. …

Family stories are not always true. If you have been doing any amount of genealogy perhaps you have discovered that out. If not, you may be in for a rude awakening. My family, like most, comes with it’s fair share of myths and fables. Certain family members are seen as being larger than life, other are viewed as being evil villains. The truth, as it turns out, is both more exciting and at the same time mundane. In all the literature you are told to gather oral traditions regarding your family, as the start of establishing your family history and genealogy. Although that is a good idea it also a…

For those of you who have not used genealogical source data before, I can assure you this is an adventure. In most ways, my experiences have been very positive as well as curious. I should also admit that almost all source material I have used has been either German or French Canadian. I have never either needed or used US English materials beyond that which is available in an online, computer accessible format for my research. Whether your source materials are online or microfilmed they often provide many of the same challenges: Script is often old and presented in unfamiliar styles ie. Fracteur or Gothic for German, Latin or Latinate…

Probably one of the most valuable primary sources of genealogical information today is provided by the LDS (Latter Day Saints- Mormon) Church- FamilySearch.org. The website itself is not really the most useful aspect of their service. In truth, I personally find the online components to their site to be less valuable then that of their primary competitor- Ancestry.com. So what is good about the site you might ask. The best part of FamilySearch is their ability to find microfiche/film within the LDS archives and make it available to you! Squirreled away in a very hard find, dark corner are two crucial search functions: one finds allows you enter an area…

A very important dimension of genealogy involves history and context. You may already know that and if so, perhaps this posting is not for you. However for those of you who do NOT remember your geography and history, here are some recommendations. These recommendations are based on the assumptions that: our ancestors lived in a time and place where governments existed, boundaries and regions were known, customs and mores prevailed, and languages were spoken, written, and read. (Note: Please be attuned to the fact that any one of the above can and will impact your ability to understand and interpret the data you “dig up.”) Having set this simple stage…

Maybe your family is like mine. We come from a long line of hard working, salt of the earth people. Yes, that means many of them could not read or write.

Where does one get good genealogy data? Unfortunately, there is no single correct answer to this question. The answer depends in large part on where you are researching and what you need.

So how do you prevent yourself from becoming a contributor to the vast amount of bad genealogy data?

Beware of the free hints at Ancestry.com. One of the biggest problems with Ancestry.com hints is in the poor quality of the research that backs up the actual hint recommendations. Couple that with poor heuristics used by Ancestry for ‘hint’ data validation and you can some real genealogical data disasters. As I noted in an earlier post, beware the quality of ‘other peoples’ work’ and ‘information’. Rely on source information if at all possible. There are plenty of risks in doing genealogy work without taking on another’s mistakes. There are also a number of ‘easy’ ways to mitigate the risk of assuming bad data, no matter the source. Included among…

One of the great genealogical research problems, for me, is my recent relatives. The folks I am refering to are either still alive or recently deceased.  In either case, they are near enough that their data is most difficult to ferret out.  Most marriages, births, etc that have occurred in the last 50 years and are hard or REALLY expensive to get. I guess that’s because of identify theft, etc.  In any event, there are times when you (or at least I) need some of this information in order to get accurate genealogical data for select branches of the family.  So are there any tricks?  Well I have come up…