If there were other children in your family, I’d like to hear about them. Who was the first-born child in your immediate family? What was their name, sex, and date of birth? Who came next: Keep going until you have listed all of your brothers and sisters in your immediate family. Was there anything unusual about the circumstances surrounding the birth of any of your brothers or sisters? I assume that your brothers and sisters were probably very central figures in your memories of growing up and even later in life. As we walk through your life memories, I will ask youmany more questions about your relationships with them. I just wanted to understand the birth order of yoru brothers and sisters. What about pictures of these people? Are their names written on the back to identify them? Where are these pictures located? In a box? Why not place them in an album?
Which of your grandparents were still living while you were growing up? Did they live close to you or in another city? Did you have a speicial relationship with any one (or more) of your grandparents? What was his/her name? Why were they so special? What did that gradparent do (or not do) that made you feel especially close to them? Can you think of any stories about your grandparents you would like to record here? Anything interesting? Any funny or favorite stories that thy liked to tell that you would like to record? Were any of your grandparents especially wise in some area? What “sayings” did they use quite often? What “bits of wisdom” did they try to pass on to you or to others? Were they happy or crabby type personalities? Why do you think they were this way? How did their personalities affect your relationship with them?
If your grandparents were here now and could read your “Book” is there something you would like to say to them? Or is there something you would like to thank them for? … Something you with they had done differently…? If there is anything else youwould like to tell me about your grandparents, please go ahead and type it in now…
Do you have pictures of your grandparents? Where are these pictures located? Are their names written on the back of the pictures to identify them? Ge these pictures out of those boxes and at least file them in some way. I really am a nag!
In starting my genealogy research journey I have been determined to be organized. I know that the information and amount of paperwork can get overwhelming and I want to not have any problems. Ideally, I should be able to pull out any source material quickly and easily. This requires a really good filing system.
So, here’s what I’ve done. I bought a file box with a lid on it to keep all my genealogy files in. There are two hanging folders, one for Troy’s tree and one for mine. Then, within each hanging folder is a folder for each family. I’ve sorted these alphabetically by husband’s name (last name first), then wife next, including their years because there are some sons with the father’s name. So for example, one label might say:
MILLS, Stephen (1799-1874) m. TRIGG, Sara (1799-1874)
Within each of these manilla folders I can file documents or printouts that relate to that family group (parents and children). I also included a Family Group Record within each file. I’m not sure that I really need that, since I have it all in my database. Plus, I keep adding new things and changing what I know so I would rather not reprint it every time.
Some of what I’ve read and listened to suggests giving each paper within the file a number and adding that to your database. So far, I figure that I can look through one manilla folder without much trouble and find what I want. Maybe as I keep going and collecting more documents I’ll need to do that.
Here’s one question I had: Since I am a child of my father and a wife of my husband, where do I put my own documents? Answer – file the document in the file where the person belongs at the time the document was made.
For example, my birth certificate is filed in my Father’s folder because I was a member of his family when I was born. Anything that happened on or after 9 Aug 2003 (my wedding date) will be filed in my Husband’s folder because now we are a new family. Easy!
How do you keep track of all your papers? Next time I’ll show you what I do with my digital files.
I started my genealogy journey, about a month ago, using the free PAF software from Family Search. I knew that there were not going to be any updates and that there were things I couldn’t do with PAF. So, I made the switch to Roots Magic, currently in version 4. Let me tell you, I am impressed! Particularly with the source capabilities! I can attach a source to each and every event for each person it applies to…love it!
I’ve also gone through and cleaned everything up a bit. Since I started with databases from my Dad and Troy’s aunt I had some overlaps. I combined duplicates and made sure everyone was linked to someone. The last thing I did – well, I’m still working on – is cleaning up place names. There were all kinds of duplicates that were just spelled differently or had USA or United States but were the same place. I’m still going through and combining duplicates and updating everything but I am really excited that it will all be nice and clean an organized!
Another thing I’m really liking about Roots Magic is all the reports I can print. In particular, the to-do list seems really promising. I’ve already added a bunch of to-do’s, like looking up particular microfilms or researching various questions that come up, and can’t wait to really dig into it.
Oh, and Roots Magic lets you link up to Family Search and match to people in the church’s records. So you can see when they have been Baptized, Endowed, etc. One thing I’ve discovered is that just about everyone has had these ordinances completed more than once! Wow, how great that we can now merge duplicates and have a more accurate and widely available record?!
So, here’s what my database is like today:
People – 2079
Families – 705
Events – 8266
Places – 585
Sources – 18
Citations – 434
To-do tasks – 11
Multimedia items – 32
As you can see most events (births, deaths, marriages, etc.) don’t have citations. Remember, I got these from others’ databases and they didn’t have sources. So far I’ve only cited about 5% of the events with a source…I have a lot of work ahead of me. I’ll keep you posted on how the database evolves.
Why, its the study of the Lund's, of course! I am jumping in to researching our family history and seeing where it takes me. We are the Lund's. We come from Lund's, Ranson's, DeMacedo's, Lima's, Anderson's, Warner's, Ferreira's, Da Silva's and beyond! Since my own side of the family is from Brazil, it is quite difficult to track things down. Troy's side, on the other hand, has proven to be much easier. So, I'll be jumping back and forth and all around to learn about where we come from.
Are you related to us? I'd love to learn more about you and share what I know about our common ancestors!
