7 Suggestions for Solving Your Genealogy Research Problem

Walker Co. Genealogical Society, Huntsville, Texas

Last month I had the privilege of speaking to the Walker County Genealogical Society. What a warm group they were! And inquisitive, too, which is a very good trait for us family history researchers, right?

We talked about how to use online catalogs for libraries and archives. I didn't have to tell this research-savvy group that not everything is online. Nope. They already knew that.

What I was able to share with them is how to use the Internet and its vast resources to narrow down where the information is if it's not online. I mean, how badly do you want to solve your genealogy research problem? And I like to ask that question a lot because it's a not-so-subtle reminder of why we spend countless amounts of money, time, and brain-power on researching our dead kinfolk.

And if you haven't caught on yet, I like to solve research problems so I can gather family stories and secrets like a kid gathers candy on Halloween night. Hence, why I try to find more and more resources and tools to help me out. And apparently the members of the Walker County Genealogical Society like to solve their research problems too. {Thank goodness. It can be *clears throat* very challenging to listen to someone go on and on about their research brick wall like they're married to it and then they act like I'm trying to break up their marriage when I suggest online and offline resources they haven't checked yet -- some of them free, mind you. My brain just doesn't compute that attitude.}

So I shared with this group tricks and tips {but no candy} on searching online catalogs and one of the tips was to suggest an efficient process for online researching by looking for repositories in the location your ancestor might have done anything in their lives. The easiest way to do this is to check out your pedigree chart or perhaps your family group sheet, or maybe your online tree and look at your target person {the one you're researching} and notate their last known and proved-to-you {or rumored} location. Then you take that location and look for the following types of places that house documents, records of any type, and/or books that just might contain some type of evidence of your ancestor's life:

• Your local library especially if it has a genealogy department or room. You just never know what's been acquired by the library or what has been donated to them and by whom. {Perhaps your local genealogy librarian has personal research interests in Virginia. You don't think they'll try to acquire books about Virginia genealogy research? Please.} And here's an extra tip: Inquire at the reference desk for a genealogy research finding aid. One of the librarians might be a genealogist too and might have created a genealogy research finding aid for their library even though they don't have a genealogy department or room.
  
• Libraries near the location your ancestor {or someone your ancestor knew; a member of their FAN club - Friends, Associates, and Neighbors.} was or purported to be at some point in their lives. {I know. That narrows it down for you, right? I'm helpful like that. ;) }.
  
• Your nearby college library or archives as well as any college libraries or archives near where your ancestor or a member of their FAN Club  lived, worked, or did something that may have produced a record of some kind.
  
• Your nearby genealogical and historical societies as well as ones near where your ancestor or a member of their FAN Club lived, worked, or did something that may have produced a record of some kind.
  
• Your nearby archives {remember these could be city, county, regional, state, private, occupational-related, etc.} as well as archives near where your ancestor or a member of their FAN Club lived, worked, or did something that may have produced a record of some kind.
  
• If you're lucky enough to live near a genealogy-specific library, then ohmigosh get to it now! If you don't live near one, then spend a weekend {Yes, a weekend.} learning their website in and out, backwards and forwards and see if they'll do look-ups of some kind. Or ask someone in your social networks if they live near there and can do a look-up for you. Maybe you can do one for them as well.
  
• Then spend another weekend {or two} playing with Worldcat.org and its "sister site" ArchiveGrid.

We went over a bunch of other stuff, too, like where/how to look for these libraries and archives, what to look for, search examples, search strategies for Worldcat.org, and then we went over a search process {specific to them} on the library and archives websites that would help them get prepared to visit Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research because that's our local genealogy-specific library in Houston. {And by local I mean for them an hour and a half to two-hour drive and for me a 35-minute drive.}

All-in-all, I had a blast there and I even got a personal tour from the the society's librarian of their beautiful new genealogy room within the Huntsville Public Library. Everything the society has in that genealogy room is cataloged online via the Huntsville Public Library's website except for their microfilm drawers. Most of their microfilm is for Texas and much of it was for Walker County, but there are other Texas counties represented {And some not very close by. We do have 254 counties here in Texas. We're a big state, y'all.}. And a lot of this isn't online either, but some of it is listed on their website. Good thing I looked and took pics.

You just never know what you're gonna find and when or how you're gonna need what you have found. And libraries and archives just might have that clue or answer to help solve your research problem. You won't know until you look. I mean, how badly do you want to solve your genealogy research problem?

Happy Researching! 
~Caroline
© Copyright 2013 4YourFamilyStory.com -- All Rights Reserved.

---

If you found this article helpful, please share: