Discovering Family Histories and Mysteries

Jan Whitaker

Ed: This article is based on a presentation that Jan Whitaker gave to the Monthly Meeting on October 2 2019. If you’d like to see the full presentation please go to https://tinyurl.com/y2v5q5c4

Why do genealogy?

• Discover awesome family stories: the highs, the lows and the heartbreaks
• You’ll be in awe of your pioneering ancestors
• Find the bad boys and girls in your family
• You’ll find long lost cousins all around the world
• Finding old family photos is seriously cool
• The thrill of the hunt, and of course, the find
• It’s a jigsaw waiting to be solved
• Research 24/7 in your pyjamas
• You’ll make so many new friends

My motivations

• Curiosity
• Can easily access information from “back home”
• “Back home” has extended to places I never expected

The motivations of others (from a Facebook post)

• Love of family stories and wondering about the people in family photos
• Why did people move?
• Love of a good mystery
• Love of history
• Brings together many interests, e.g. history, geography, biology, writing, solving puzzles etc.
• Looking for lost family
• Pending retirement, looking for a hobby

Where do you look for your family information?

• Major Genealogy Conglomerates
  • Family Search – free, many databases
  • Ancestry (.au) – fee, more databases and ancillaries (Newspapers.com for extra $)
• Others
  • Find My Past – UK focus ($)
  • My Heritage – European Focus ($)
• All of them overlap
• Some have .au versions
• Government record and archive services (free and $)
  • national and state libraries, agencies, and departments
• People
  • family, genealogists (free and $), librarians, historical societies
  • amateurs like us: interest groups, classes
• Facebook groups
  • genealogy general and locales for local information access

Australian sources

• Trove for newspapers and MUCH more: https://trove.nla.gov.au/
• State Library of Victoria:
  http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/help/family-history-faq
• National Library Australia:
  https://www.nla.gov.au/research-guides/family-history
• Family History Connections (Blackburn)was AIGS (membership or per day fee)
  https://www.familyhistoryconnections.org.au

Choosing a genealogy service

• MOST important:  Geographic coverage – do your research
• Services provided – databases and sizes and organising (tree creation), personal storage
• Budget
  • Free
  • Half-price sales, or buy one month to try
• Alternate access: Libraries and family history centres
  • Library edition of subscription services
  • Books, microfilm, microfiche, family and location histories

What is a record?

• “Official” information about a person or event
• Name, date and place minimum
• Held by a government bureau or church so it can be verified
• Physical or digital
• Common records: census, land, tax, birth, death, marriage, wills, military service, immigration

What is an index?

1. Information transcribed from a record
2. An alphabetical listing of records kept by the original source (think a telephone directory or volume index or book index)

• Can introduce errors because the transcriptions are secondary
• Don’t rely just on index/transcribed information

What to save from and about a record?

• The index information AND the ACTUAL Record
• Citation information so you can find it again
• Try different tools provided on the website – download v print v save
• TIP: Print in Ancestry tools provides option to capture record AND citation info
• Set up a local file system that makes sense – surname per folder is a good start

Where do you keep your tree and information?

• Why: Structure and sharing ancestors and research – To find what you collect!
• Online provides access from other locations (libraries, traveling)
• Offline allows for local control and protection from disappearing records
• Family Search is a common world tree; Ancestry is yours, public or private
• Best: online and offline with a back-up

How do you keep your tree and information?

• Family Treemaker (414!)
• Ancestry (259)
• Family Search
• Roots Magic (224)
• Legacy (143)
• more than one (74)
• Reunion
• Ancestral Quest
• The Master Genealogist
• Brother’s Keeper
• Mac Family Tree
• My Heritage
• Family Tree Builder
• Word and/or Excel
• Family Historian
• Paper
• Heredis
• GRAMPS (open source)
• Clooz
• FTAnalyzer
• Ages
• Wikitree
• Zoompast
• Google Docs spreadsheets

Fit For Purpose

• “Ancestry to create files, Family Treemaker for backup and publishing”
• “Reunion for my laptop and main tree but backups on Ancestry and Family Search”
• syncing between online and local
• Free versions available to try out (they have long learning curves, so don’t expect to learn all the features)

Further help for ‘doing’ genealogy

• The service you subscribe to: videos, webinars, guides and wikis
• How to use the service AND how to do research on specific topics
• In person groups and online networks
• Melbourne PC User Group SIGS

Melbourne PC User Group SIGS

• 5 SIGS are specifically focused on genealogy and family history
• 1 has added a DNA specific meeting
• Melbpc Yammer has a genealogy discussion forum
• Individual general SIGs may have talks on this topic occasionally
• Genealogy East SIG, 3rd Sunday of the month, 12.30-2.30pm, Vermont South
• North East Genealogy SIG, 1st Wednesday of the month, 10-12noon, Heidelberg
• Mornington Family History SIG, 3rd Monday of the month, 1.30-4.30pm, Mornington
• Mornington Peninsula SIGAdvanced DNA,
  4th OR 5th Wednesday of the month,2-4pm
• Yammer Genealogy Discussion Forum, all day, every day

Other Help Sources Online

• Familysearch Wiki – 90,000 articles (90,699), International help
  https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Main_Page
• Cyndi’s List
  Categories, Free and fee sites
  https://cyndislist.com/
• Facebook – LOTS!
  The Genealogy Squad – 20,000+ members
  Local Facebook groups
  Specific services: translation, photo identification, families