Create a Source called “DISCONNECTED INDIVIDUALS” and then link this as a source to every such individual’s name. Then if you select this source in the “Sources” view, the “Links” tab displays a clickable list of all disconnected records.

I go one step further and associate a custom fact called “Reason Disconnected” with each such record where I give brief details of the item’s relevance.

1. A filter on the index to show only unrelated persons, to make it easy to find them again.
2. A new report that shows all unrelated persons and their facts and notes.
3. A way of linking an unrelated person to someone in your tree. When you display the person in the tree there would be a hyperlink to the unrelated person and a category (‘witness’, ‘possible brother’ etc.)

The first two would be very easy to do as they are just additions to mechanisms that already exist. The third would require work as it would need an extra link in the database.

Sorry my idea didn’t help you. I agree, Ellen Anderson is a very common name and with 25 records in your shoebox, it would seem you would have some member connects. I only know that occasionally I have had these “connects” and couldn’t figure why I was getting them until I checked my shoebox. I can’t explain the Ancestry inconsistencies. I have read in the blogs of people having all kinds of weird problems that I don’t have and can’t explain that either. Customer support does their best but even they don’t always have the answers.

You’re welcome! Glad I could help.

I do appreciate your recommendations, and will likely download and investigate both The Master Genealogist and Family Historian when I have more time to do so.

I would like to bring this comment back around to the original blog post, which essentially recognized a gap or a weakness in Family Tree Maker (although Tana didn’t specifically use those terms), and asked how users work around that gap. As a current FTM user who likes many aspects of the program, I wish that Tana or someone from Ancestry.com would at least consider this response to her question: bridge the gap programmatically in FTM itself. Add the ability to create unspecified relationships to FTM so that researchers can maintain those connections of evidence for future investigation.

You should try the 30 free trial download TMG offers. It really is worth the learning curve and once you are accustomed to it the interface isn’t really that bad.

Thanks for your suggestions. I have tried in the past to create a “shared” fact for two individuals not known to be related by blood or marriage, but FTM seems to assume that any shared fact means either marriage or some marriage-like relationship. That to me is a deal-breaker for using shared facts for this purpose.

I have resorted to including names in other custom facts, and creating custom facts for the purpose of tracking, say, witnesses on a marriage or death certificate. But, as PamDj noted, this does not create a relationship. It is possibly a little more elegant than a simple text note, although I am not honestly sure that it is actually any more effective.

Others have cited The Master Genealogist as the one application that does currently provide for relationships apart from strict family ones. I have not yet tried it, though I am tempted to. But even though I do not feel too threatened by its learning curve, I am not overly impressed by its user interface. Having powerful features does not excuse poor design or user-interface inconsistencies – and on this point I do credit Family Tree Maker. It is an elegant program that is relatively easy to use and understand.

I agree with Carol A. H. that adding a non-family-relationship feature to FTM is likely not on Ancestry’s list to-dos. If true, this disappoints me because I think the usefulness of such a feature would be obvious. FTM has added new features in the past (although I find the updates from version to version are usually tweaks to the user experience rather than actual new features). My hope is that this idea will reach the attention of someone who might be willing to explore it further. But until then, I guess I’ll be a voice in the wilderness!