• The Daughters of the Republic of Texas' Library gets a new a name and will be taking appointments for visits starting tomorrow.
• On the Olive Tree Genealogy Blog, Lorine shows us some problems and workarounds with the Index for the newly released 1921 Census of Canada.
• On Genea-Musings, Randy reminds us that Rootstech 2014 is only 3 months away and he has a limited time discount for registration for us.
• Go learn more about women in WWII with Gena Philibert-Ortega's and Southern California Genealogical Society's upcoming free webinar on Nov 2nd.
• Because of their partnership with Billiongraves.com, MyHeritage now has millions of gravestone records and obituaries in their SuperSearch. {Super fly. ;) }

• Google Earth got a new update. {Are you using Google Earth to learn more about your ancestors and where they lived?}
• While I've been giving you updates all along, here's a nice clickable list from FamilySearch.org of all the new updates to their online collections that have been added and updated recently.
• Newspapers.com has new and updated newspapers to various U.S. states. Did your ancestors makes these papers?
• And USGenWeb volunteer contributors uploaded 246 files yesterday for the following U.S. states: Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Mississppi, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, and Virginia. Did they add something you can use in your research?

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

• Just in time for Halloween, here's an article that will scare the pants right off of you. A genome researcher has mined genealogical data from Geni.com and is suggesting his tree with 13 million people should be used to make genetic trait conclusions with. And we all know how accurate those online trees are, right? {Way to use unscientific data to try and be scientific, Mr. Researcher.} Hat tip to Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak for sharing this article on Facebook.
• Get some more function from your Google Drive withthese apps from EducatorsTechnology.com.

• Finally a well-designed stylus has been made and it's Penultimate and Evernote-friendly.
• Time to mark our calendars. On the Genealogy Blog Leiland shares with us the Illinois State Genealogical Society has released their 2014 webinar schedule.
• Yesterday, FamilySearch.org added or updated its online collections for India, Nevada, and Spain.
• And yesterday, USGenWeb volunteer contributors uploaded 462 files for the following U.S. states: Florida, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, Nevada, Ohio, Virginia, and Wyoming.

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

• On Genealogy's Star, James Tanner answers the question, "Is looking in online databases 'real' research?" I agree with what I believe is the intent of his answer -- encouraging someone to do what they can do. However, I also think it depends on what someone means by "looking." Are you looking and evaluating or just looking, taking whatever is found at face value and creating a family tree from the information you find without considering its validity? Searching means to look for something and researching means to look at something in a systematic way and implies critically analyzing it. So whether you're researching online or offline, you're still researching. If you can't make it to an archives or a courthouse or you can't afford to order records, you should notate that down in your conclusions because that obviously affects your conclusions because you haven't been able to look for and look at everything in order to evaluate it. But you're still researching. And if you're placing it all online to collaborate, you might find a generous cousin who has already ordered the certificates or documents that you need, and they just might share them with you so you can analyze them and make some more conclusions. So carry on, Online Researcher. =)

• Yesterday, FamilySearch.org added or updated to its online collections for Indonesia, Italy, and Putnam County, Tennessee.
• USGenWeb contributors uploaded yesterday 220 files for various U.S. States.
• Ancestry.com updated 2 collections: the 1921 Census of Canada and British Army World War I Pension Records, 1914-1920.

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

I had an awesome time last Saturday presenting "Digging Up Family Stories on Findagrave.com" to the Chaparral Genealogical Society and Library in Tomball, Texas. 

One of the things we concentrated on was the fact that people from all over the world use it for various reasons and that we have to consider why someone is putting the information on there in the first place. Knowing that helps to understand what we're looking at as family history researchers.

For example, there are some people who only do Findagrave.com photo uploads, some who only post obituaries or transcriptions, and then there are those who are linking memorials to each other because, for them, that is their family tree {of sorts}. And many aren't even doing genealogy and this might be their form of "family history" or they might not be doing family history at all. Maybe they're just "gravers."

Which reminds me of a roommate I had in college who liked to read obituaries in the Sunday newspaper and guess how the person died based on the clues revealed in the obituaries. She said her mom and her used to do it together and so my roommate got me addicted to doing it as well. {Genealogist-in-training and I didn't even realize it.} And I've always liked reading the wedding and engagements announcements and pondering if their lives were as perfect as they seemed in the announcements. {And now I have the skills and resources to follow up on those ponderings, but I digress.}

At Saturday's presentation we also went over carefully analyzing uploaders' profiles to not only understand why they might be uploading and creating memorials but also see if we're related to them based on their statistics and other memorials listed on their profile. And we went over some examples with some live searching since we had WiFi at the meeting. {That was very nice because it can be really boring and tedious presenting a search-based website with screenshots. It's much, much better for the audience to see searching done live.}

I also shared some personal researching and family stories that I have uncovered with the help from generous contributors on Findagrave.com including a sad family story that was uncovered due to me connecting with a 4th cousin via Findagrave.com and using its collaboration features. Who knew adding an image of my grandmother's brother to an existing memorial would lead to connecting with a cousin who had known him before and after the fire that killed my grandmother's brother and his 4 kids? He knew the town rumors and the family secrets surrounding their murders in that small, small town in Johnson County, Illinois. {And it turns out a member in the Chaparral Society has kinfolk from Johnson County, Illinois. So we'll be trading notes later.}

This is why Findagrave.com is such a wonderful collaboration tool. It facilitates contacting a possible relation, and while there are some in the community who don't play well with others, that's true of any community, unfortunately. But in this case the many things a researcher can do and learn on a free resource like Findagrave.com far, far outweighs the bad, in my opinion. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. It takes a village to make a family history. And Findagrave.com is an awesome tool that helps us do just that.

So. For those who have been using Findagrave.com share some of your "finds" in comments below to help encourage people to use this resource to its fullest capacity. What have you found there? Have you connected and collaborated with a distant cousin? Have you broken through a research brick wall? What have you done or found on Findagrave.com that has profoundly affected your research and led to unearthing a family story? Let everyone know in comments below. And if you're not using Findagrave.com, why not?

Happy Researching!
~Caroline

• Looking for a genealogy group on Facebook? Katherine R. Willson created and maintains a "Genealogy on Facebook" List. Currently there are over 3000 Groups listed on her list which is available as a PDF download on her website.
• Genealogyintime.com shares with us a handy list of common occupation abbreviations and what they mean.
• Do you have roots in Ulster? On The British GENES Blog, Chris informs us of the updates to the Great Parchment Book site. Learn more about the Great Parchment Book and how it can help you with your Ulster research by visiting their site. {Their short video is incredible.}

• The Next Web Blog shows us how Livescribe's new SmartPen works with iOS. Very handy for taking notes and drawing diagrams at libraries, courthouses, and conferences.
• The Legal Genealogist tells us what she thinks about the ethnic percentages DNA companies give us. {I happen to agree with her. They're cool, I guess. But they don't necessarily help with your research. For example, I'm mostly British, a little Irish, a little French, a little German, and a little Scandinavian and Finnish. My response to my percentages? Duh. I already knew that from my research except from my research I know how I am. What I didn't know from my research was that from my maternal haplogroup somewhere way, way, way back there my maternal line involves the Sami people, which is cool. I only have my maternal line back to Ireland in the early 1800s. And the only way I'll get to those Sami people is by doing, um, my research. However, I do have visions of Vikings swiping a Sami woman and whisking her away from her people and transporting her to Ireland. However, that's my imagination running away. Again. But, hey, I got a nice colorful pie chart that may or may not be correct. The best thing about DNA tests is the collaboration that can occur between potential cousins. However, I had no close cousins who had research done enough to be able to help me out. So for me, it's back to my research and blogging. Turns out my personal family history blog is my best cousin finder.}
• My Genealogy Hound has new additions and updates to their online biographies that include Arkansas, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Iowa, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, and Missouri. You can search their site as well as browse by state, county, and family surname.
• USGenWeb volunteer contributors uploaded 159 files for the following U.S. states: Alabama, Michigan, Nevada, Virginia, and Washington. Did they upload something you've been needing for your research?

Daily Resource Spotlight: Wikipedia: List of Online Newspaper Archives ~ Easily find out where all the online newspapers are located. Just click on a location and see what's listed. Did your ancestors make these papers?

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

Other days, other things that might interest you...

• 4 Genealogy Things You Need To Know This Morning, Sunday, 27 Oct 2013
• 10 Steps to Fix That Online Family Tree You Started
• Using a Kustomnote.com Template for Genealogy Evernote Notes

• Dear Myrtle shares with us this week's webinars, chats, and hangouts on air for the online genealogy world.
• On The British GENES Blog, Chris informs us the Scottish 1920 Valuation Rolls will be going online and why they can help you in your Scottish research.
• If you're an Evernote Power User {or would like to become one}, did you know you can automate some of your workflow in Evernote with this app? 
• Don't forget if you're waiting until the last minute to sign up for early bird registration for SLIG 2014, you're almost at the last minute, Oct 31st. There are some courses that still have seats left.

And? It's Sunday. A perfect time to take it easy and find your ancestors. =)

Daily Resource Spotlight: One-Step Web Pages by Stephen P. Morse

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

Other days, other things that might interest you...

• 5 Genealogy Things You Need to Know This Morning, Saturday, 26 Oct 2013
• 5 Free Resources for Texas Family History Research You May Not Be Using
• 9 Family Tree Apps for Your iPad

• Do you have Irish roots? {Yes. Yes, I do.} Mike from the Irish Roots Cafe Podcast gives us an awesome  video review of his new 4th edition of The Book of Irish Families, Great and Small.
• On The British GENES Blog, Chris informs us of a new photo archive, of a new online database added to The Scottish Association of Family History Societies as well as 4 more cemeteries added to DeceasedOnline.com.

• Ancestry.com's Death Record Challenge is back with daily challenges and prizes.
• Don't forget every day Fold3.com contributors and users add comments, annotations, connections, and memorial pages to documents on Fold3.com. Has anyone added anything for your ancestor. Great research collaboration going on over there. Besides, this week fold3 added some new images to existing databases. Has anyone added anything on fold3.com that could help you in your research?
• USGenWeb volunteer contributors uploaded 123 files yesterday for the following U.S. states: Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, Texas, and Virginia. Did they add something you've been needing for your research? Remember: USGenWeb is a free site.

Daily Resource Spotlight: Atlas of Historical County Boundaries ~ Over time county boundaries have changed. Thus, making it important to check for records in all surrounding counties near where your ancestor lived, worked, etc.

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

Other days, other things that might interest you...

• 7 Suggestions for Solving Your Genealogy Research Problem
• 15 iPad Apps for Genealogy and Family History
• 9 Family Tree Apps for Your iPad

• Are you putting citations on your documents? Doing so reduces headaches and confusion later. On her blog, Ancestoring, Michele Simmons Lewis shows us how she easily adds a digital citation to a document on her computer. If you're wanting to know how to digitally add a citation to a document when you're on-the-go with your iOS mobile device {iPhone or iPad}, here's a how-to blog post to show you how. 
• From PCWorld, Ian Paul gives us some handy privacy tips for some popular online services.

• Lincoln Spector from PCWorld shows us how to improve the Wi-Fi signals in our house. {Nothing like laying on the couch in our living room surfing Ancestry on our iPad and finding out the Wi-Fi is "spotty" there. Certainly, a "first world" problem, but still...}
• Looking to purchase some DNA kits for the holidays? At Olive Tree Genealogy, Lorine shares with us some specials from 23andme.
• Speaking of the holidays and specials, it doesn't get any more original than this. Janet Hovorka, the Chart Chick, has a sale going on for family tree charts. She offers a free consultation and lots of options, too. But hurry. The sale is only going on for one week.
• And Chris from The British GENES Blog tells us of one more special being offered by Pen and Sword Books.
• Are you trying to find more information about your Texas ancestors? The Texas resources I've been collecting for you grew so much, it now has its own resource page.
• On the Society of Genealogists Blog, Tim Lawrence informs us SoG Data Online now has 2000 original apprenticeship indentures. Searching the index is free and images are available to SoG members.
• Ancestry.com added and updated record collections yesterday including records for South Carolina, Kentucky, and the Virgin Islands.
• USGenWeb volunteer contributors uploaded 268 files yesterday. {268!} These uploads were for the following U.S. states: Alabama, Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Virginia, and West Virginia. Did they add a photo, cemetery transcription, index, record, clue, or something you've been needing for your research? 
• Want to learn how to "dig up" family stories on Findagrave.com? I have the honor of speaking at Chaparral Genealogical Society and Library's monthly meeting tomorrow morning {Saturday}, October 26th. The regular business meeting will be at 10am followed by my Findagrave.com presentation at about 10:30am. If you're nearby, come join us! We meet on the second floor of the Amegy Bank in Tomball, Texas. Here's a map.

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

Other days, other things that might interest you...

• How to Quickly Access the Genealogy Need to Know Morning Posts
• 7 Suggestions for Solving You Genealogy Research Problem
• 6 Genealogy Things You Need To Know This Morning, Thursday, 24 Oct 2013

Quick tip: Want an easy way to access the morning Genealogy Need to Know posts on the website whenever you want?

1) Scroll down.

2) Click on the Things You Need to Know This Morning Category.

And? A big thank you to all of you for reading! I really appreciate the support!:)

Happy Researching!

~Caroline

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.