Month: April 2017

What’s New This Week?

My hints have increased a bit this week, but I was able to work through enough that they didn’t increase significantly.

One major obstacle with the hints is that you wind up finding a wife and several children for each person you research.  Finding multiple people adds several more hints to work through.

As I find these additional people, I add them to my list of people to research.  Naturally, as I research those people, I will work through their hints and clear them from this list.  But, of course, working through those people will also add additional people to my list.

I’m reasonably sure I’ll never get my hints down to zero.  I’ll never be able to get through all of them unless I hit so many roadblocks that I run out of people to research.  I don’t see that happening…at least not any time soon.

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March 27 – April 2

This week, I focused a lot on researching people I had already researched earlier in the month. One of the Ancestry Academy courses I watched last week suggested that you always do a Global Search on each person. You never know what you’ll find.

So, this week, I focused a lot on doing a Global Search on each of the people I had already posted about. Their posts have been updated with the additional information I found in the Global Search.

I researched the following new people this week:

I haven’t yet hit a brick wall with the Applegate line.  I was at one, but when I researched George Washington Applegate, I was able to get that wall down rather quickly.  I knew her married name since I had already done Elsie Mae (his daughter).  I found a death certificate for George Washington Applegate that gave her married name as the informant, which provided a whole lot more details on him and broke down that brick wall.

I have not published posts for all of these folks yet, but as I do, I will return to this page and update the links to them.

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Plan Going Forward

In my previous Progress post, I laid out a plan for continuing my research. I need an organized plan to accomplish all of this systematically.

I planned to start with one generation and research everyone within that generation.  For example, I began with Viola Mildred Beyl.  Once I’ve researched her, I will also research her spouse, children, and siblings.

Next, I planned to move on to another person within the same generation. Again, once I finish that person, I will research their spouse, children, and siblings, including the spouse and children of each of the siblings.

I planned to continue from person to person until I had completed that entire generation.  Only then will I move back to the next generation.  This way, I will be able to balance out the work and ensure that I am researching each line and nobody gets left behind.

That being said, I started with Viola and had already done her siblings and parents, as well as her father’s siblings and parents. So, I was already a few generations back on her line. I also focused last week on Global Search. So, I have several other family members from Viola’s generation that still need to be researched. I will be focusing on them for now. That includes their spouses, siblings, and children.

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Extra Credit

I did a few additional things this week to advance my genealogical experience a little bit further. While these tasks certainly aren’t necessary for every family historian, they are beneficial to me and, therefore, I would recommend them to anybody pursuing their own ancestry.

Ancestry Academy Courses

I did not take Ancestry Academy courses this week as I focused more on research and graves.

Find A Grave Memorials

I try to conclude each person’s story with their burial. I do this because the burial represents their resting place. Previously, it was quite difficult for family historians to find the graves and headstones of their ancestors…unless, of course, they had a lot of time and money to go grave hunting in various places.

I do not have that luxury. So, the Find A Grave website has been an invaluable asset in finding out where my ancestors are resting and obtaining photos of their headstones.

In most cases, I’ve been lucky enough that somebody has already taken and posted a photo of my ancestor’s headstone on the website.  In some cases, no such luck.  When I find a memorial for one of my ancestors on the website, I double-check the accuracy of the information in the memorial against the research I’ve done so far on that ancestor.  If anything needs to be corrected, I submit the corrections so that the monument is accurate for other family historians and family members.

I submitted corrections for several ancestors I researched this week and linked them to the appropriate family members where possible.

When I don’t find a memorial, I will make every attempt to get a photo and create one for them. Unfortunately, if I don’t know where the ancestor is buried, I can’t create a memorial. So, I do have a few family members who still need memorials, and I am working to find the appropriate information to create them.

I requested photos of two graves this week, and those requests were filled promptly.  So I now have the graves for those folks and have updated their posts accordingly.  I also took a small road trip to visit Viola Mildred and Charles Beckett Buchanan.  I photographed their grave and created memorials for them on Find A Grave.

Grave Hunting

Grave hunting may sound a little creepy. What I mean by this is that I go hunting in nearby cemeteries for specific graves. There are people, just like me, who are searching for the graves of their family members for various reasons. If they are unable to find them, they may submit a photo request asking for someone in the local area to take a picture and post it online for them.

Since I rely on this to find my own family members, I feel it is important for me to give back. So when I find photo requests for graves near where I live, I’ll take a trip to the local cemetery and try to obtain a photo for them.

This week, I requested a photo for Elsie Mae Tudor. She was the only ancestor I worked on recently who didn’t have a picture and didn’t rest close enough for me to get it myself. I have not published her post yet, but when I do, it will have her grave included, as the request was filled promptly.

I know there are mixed feelings about people photographing headstones of people who aren’t their own family.  Unfortunately, some folks get offended by this, or when it causes unintended grief or heartache for someone.

From my experience, I can say that when I go out to a cemetery for this purpose, I pay the utmost respect to each grave I visit.  When there is trash around the area, I pick it up.   When overgrowth grows on the headstone, I pull it and clean it up.  When the flowers and memorabilia have fallen over, I pick them up and set them right.  This is my way of respecting our ancestors before us…whether they are my ancestors.

Grave Tagging

Billion Graves sends volunteers to local cemeteries to take photos of the headstones. As you take the photos, Billion Graves attaches a GPS tag to each headstone. This allows people to find the graves of their family members online and know exactly where they are on the map.

This week I tagged 430 graves in two local cemeteries.

They also have people transcribing the headstones so that they are searchable within the database.  This allows family historians like myself to find the resting places of their family members as well as obtain the dates of their birth and death.

This week I transcribed 605 headstones.

Wow, so I did a lot of extra credit work this week!  I feel good in that I can give back in these ways to help others do the same things I do for their families.  At the same time, Billion Graves has now rewarded me with a free month of BG+.  This gives me several super helpful features that will help me keep track of my ancestors on that site.

It was a busy week, but I didn’t get as much done as I wanted to. That’s alright. I’ve spread out my plans for this week a bit throughout the next three weeks so that I have more reasonable expectations of myself.

With that…it’s time to start next week!

Take care,

~Kris