Genealogy

The beginning . . .

After retiring in January of 2001, I finally had a bit more time on my hands to begin my own genealogy research project.   It was something I'd wanted to do for years.   A couple of family historian/genealogists had labored for decades documenting various branches up and down our family tree, drawing out pedigree charts, collecting old family pictures, attending family reunions and digging through dusty records in the basements of old county court houses.  These guys and gals were more than happy to have another join their rank, as the work is mostly thankless in the near-term and quite exhausting and frustrating in whatever term.   Help from any quarter is always greatly appreciated.    Lucky me, though, I had lived long enough to have something come to my aid that didn't exist twenty or thirty years ago - - - the world wide web.    Soon, I'd found a cornucopia of information and genealogical databases being posted on the internet in what seemed like real-time.     From very humble beginnings, some of these genealogy sites soon became awash with data - - - a virtual treasure trove of census data, family stories, legends and hard documentary evidence from bibles, wills and official documents.

Questions without answers . . .  

Shortly after beginning my quest, I prudently decided to work at it in stages.   There was much more to life than genealogy; I soon convinced myself.     I had irons in many fires - - - more interests and hobbies than time allowed.    Every few months I seemed to run into another brick wall, get tired or overly frustrated.   I'd box up all my hardcopies, backup my computer data and wander off to other things.    But the persistent yearning to find just a little more is always there.   Like the recovering drug addict or the gambler impatiently expecting his next winning hand, there always seemed to be an itch I couldn't quite scratch.    After a few months of this, I found myself opening multiple browser windows on my computer late at night or in the wee hours of the morning.   While checking email, reading fan fiction or downloading programs for other hobbies, I'd go about running searches for newly posted family databases in the background at the same time.

Research aids . . .

To help you along with your research, I'd like to make a few suggestions that will eliminate some of the unnecessary footwork.    First, I decided to join a number of message boards at Ancestry.com, RootsWeb.com and Yahoo.com under each of the family names I was researching.   That was one of the best moves I ever made.   When you join such boards yourself, I suggest you sign up for the digest.   Every time someone posts to that specific board, you receive an email with a brief summary of the posting.   If you wish to read the entire posting or submit a reply, you simply click on the provided hyperlink and you are there.   I've made a number of family contacts that way, locating many distant cousins.    Some folks just want to exchange a few emails, sort of touch base to find out if you knew Uncle Charlie, or another might want to see what information you might be secreting away.   Still others offer up whole GEDCOM files of family data.    But the bottom-line was that I immediately had established a 24/7 presence in cyberspace working tirelessly for me without having to go through all of the tedious, time-consuming procedures, keyboard clicking and other processes required to check the large number of message boards I wanted to shadow.

The money thing . . .

If you're like me, you hate to shell out money for information.   That especially goes for information on your own family.    Some of the genealogy sites are now driven solely, it seems, to generate huge amounts of cash at the expense of service.   A few of them used to be provide free access, too.    Some actually were better when they were free.    There is now a number of folks protesting the exorbitant fees being charged to secure what usually amounts to very little useful information.    Granted, there are a number of folks just starting out with nothing more than a pencil and a clean writing pad.    Before the internet became easily accessible to everyone, one might have to spend months or even years gathering up the same genealogical data one can find in just hours nowadays on a great genealogical site.   Folks who are new to the game will benefit greatly by initially joining one of the large genealogical sites and plopping down the rather large stack of bills required.    But I'm now at the point, as are many others, where I'd rather pay a la carte, if I pay at all.

So here is my second suggestion:   If you are just starting out and can devote plenty of time to research, by all means, go to one of the large sites and pay the yearly fee (best price) with all the bells and whistles.    Do this only, however, at the point you feel you will be able to grab as much information possible off of the site before your subscription runs out.    Make sure you set aside plenty of subdirectories to keep things in order and download everything you can while you still have access.

Computer suggestions . . .

One must consider several things when doing  genealogical research on a computer.   Most important is to back everything up to a separate medium anytime you add to your database.     The last thing one wants to experience is a major system crash and the lose of months of hard work.     A cheap but prudent investment is the purchase of another hard drive for a one drive system.    Next best would be an external drive.    Although these will cost a bit more, they are very easy to install and setup.   Plus, anytime you desire, they can be unplugged and moved quickly to another computer.    Another option often overlooked is to use the CD-R drive most machines have as standard equipment nowadays.    Blank CD-R disks are cheap, easy to use and are a great way to archive your records.    Again, backing your data up should be your first priority.

So what is there to archive?   Everything!   Every single scrap of information should be save and organized.   To be practical, however, one must be able to store it quickly and have little problem finding it later. 

Organization . . .

My fourth suggestion, therefore, has to do with organization.    Believe me, you will soon have great gobs of stuff to put away until you are ready for it.    I've often found information on one family line while researching a related family line.    Whenever that happens, one needs to have separate folders or subdirectories to send it to with just a few clicks on your mouse.   The organization thing must also be done with your hardcopies.    Buying cheap colored folders is a great way to get started.   You'll need plenty, too, believe me.    When I first began, I only had two main folders.   One was for my Merrell (paternal) line; the other was for my McMurrey (maternal) line.    Needless to say, they have now far exceeded their holding capacities, and I've added folders with family names I'd never even heard of before I started.

On your computer, you should organize your directories much the same way you have your family tree archival software setup.    For example, on my computer I have a separately partitioned drive for just my genealogical research.    The main folder will be the "Family" directory.    This, in turn, should have two main subdirectories:  "Paternal" and "Maternal".    Within each of these directories will be found the next subdirectories named after their respective family names.   For example, my "Family" directory opens up into the "Paternal" and "Maternal" subdirectories.    When I open up my "Paternal" subdirectory, I find others:   "Merrell"; "Ratcliff"; "Page"; "Craven"; "Stokes"; "Harned"; "McBroom"; "Heninger"; "Richards"; "Johnson"; "Pryer"; and so on.

Make separate directories for photos, census images, scanned documents, and so forth within those subdirectories.    I know this seems like a lot to do, but it only takes about an hour to set up all the directories and move the first of your data into their respective folders.    A few minutes spent on organization now will save you hours and hours later.

Lastly, never hesitate to rename a file when you store it.   For example, you might retrieve a family photo of Uncle Paul.   The file is named dsc0004.jpg or some such thing.    Rename it when you save it.   I suggest you use only lowercase letters and no spaces between characters, as you may one day want to put up a webpage and believe me, mixed cases can mess things all up.   If you need a space, use the underscore key.   Let's say Paul's family name was McBroom.    The photo was taken, you find out, back in 1946.    I would rename the file "paulmcbroom1946.jpg", for instance.   If you should have a number of photos of him taken in 1946 you could place an "a", "b" or "c" behind the date to help you better manage the pictures.

Everything above are simple but essential suggestions.   You might have even better ones.   And, of course, how you handle the management of data might be different than the way I do things.   This isn't a bad or a good thing.    We're just different.   The bottom-line is to always have data backup, storage and organization in mind as you go about your genealogical work.   Believe me, you'll one day thank your lucky stars you did.

Links and things . . .

As I mentioned earlier, use the links over in the left column to search out databases and message boards.   In your internet browser, under your "Favorites" folder, make a new folder named "Genealogy".    As you link to a new page you feel you might wish to visit again, just save the URL in the folder.    You'll soon have your own ready reference library, which are just a click away from the information you need.

Again, best of luck on your quest . . .