Did you know that there are two ways to view global search results? When you search all the databases at Ancestry.com, you can choose to either have them “Sort by Relevance.” This gives you results from all the databases mixed together, with the results that most closely match the search criteria you’ve entered at the top. This is a great way to uncover surprises in databases you might not have thought to check.
The other option is to have the results “Summarized by Category.” This will group all of the census databases together, all the vital records databases, etc. You can then click through each database to see the results separately. It makes it a little more time consuming, but if you’re focused on searching a particular database, viewing all the hits may be helpful in refining your search. Plus, to the perpetually disorganized like me, it brings a little organization to the process that is somehow comforting. 
You can switch between the various views by making your selection in the drop-down box in the upper right hand corner of the box of search results. When you perform another search it will default to the view you selected last.
When we think about passenger arrival records, too often our focus is on immigrant ancestors. Don’t forget to look for other family members who may have been world travelers or who perhaps had to return to an ancestral home to visit family or settle the estate of a grandparent or some other relative.
And don’t forget that many immigrants went back and forth several times–and did not always pass through the same port. I found my great-grandfather arriving in the U.S. twice in the same year, once in July through Baltimore and again in October through New York.
So don’t stop looking once you find a passenger arrival for your immigrant ancestor. You may be pleasantly surprised at what else you find.
I suspect many of you begin your day like I do, browsing through my local newspaper over breakfast. I know some of my ancestors did the same thing. I can remember my grandparents coming to visit and poring over every item in the newspaper, exchanging sections, and discussing items of interest. In a letter he wrote home during World War I, my grand-uncle requests that my great-grandfather send him copies of the local newspaper to read while he was stationed in France.
These days we not only have the current news available online, we can travel through time and read the same news that our ancestors sat down and read over their morning joe. Ancestry.com doubled the size of its Historical Newspaper Collection last year and it includes not only newspapers from the U.S., but also from Canada, England, and Scotland.
Next time you sit down and browse through the local news, take a few extra minutes and browse through a local paper from an ancestor’s era. If their hometown paper isn’t available, look for the newspapers of nearby towns or larger cities. They’ll still carry the same national stories and discuss the latest trends, and you may run across stories relevant to your ancestor’s lives.
Click here to search the Historical Newspaper Collection at Ancestry.
The challenge of blurred or just plain sloppy handwriting in old records is one that has plagued genealogists for centuries. One trick for deciphering a hard to read character or word is to retrace it. Enlarge the word and then print it. Then trace over it with a pencil. Sometimes by retracing the lines you’ll be able to figure out the letters.
When you’re working on common surnames, it doesn’t take very long for things to get awfully confusing. This is especially true if you are working in big cities where there may be hundreds of unrelated people sharing the same last name. And in our case, those families with common surnames had no idea of how they would deepen our frustration by giving their children common first names like John, James, William and Mary. Fortunately, when I took my first genealogy class (way back in the last century), the instructor wisely taught us to keep track of all findings - even when the people found in the records appear not to be related to your family. She suggested keeping a “Maybe Related” file and I can tell you it was one of the best methods I ever learned.
Before we had the wonderful convenience of indexed census records on our home computer screens, we had to go to a library or an archive and tediously search through page after page of names. Frankly, I was impatient to zero in and copy only information that pertained to known relatives, but I’m glad I followed the instructor’s teachings. I’m not sure I’d have the patience to do it now, but I made an index card for every Dennis, Dyer, Kelly, Miller, Muller and Nelson that I ran across in census schedules, books and other records. It wasn’t feasible to copy every piece of information on every record, but I did copy names, ages, occupations, birthplaces or other identifying information, along with the name of the record in which the name was found, the page number, the name of library or archive in which it was found and the date it was found. In that way, I’m able to go back to a record if I ever need it again. It sure beats trying to remember where I saw something and wasting precious time wading through collections for a second or third time. In recent years, I’ve transcribed these index cards into lists and spreadsheets on my computer. I’ve also learned to keep track of people who may or may not be related when I search records on Ancestry.com and other internet sites. This file has helped me more than once to figure out who is, and who is not mine.
Keeping track of same-named ladies and gentlemen turned out to be enormously helpful when I went to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City earlier this month. As I looked for our James Miller in vital records, I found several possible candidates, but looking back on my “Maybe Related” file I was able to see how most of my new finds couldn’t possibly be him because of significant discrepancies in age, birthplace, family composition, or death dates. There’s one James Miller who looks pretty suspicious, however. His age matches, his wife’s name is right, but everything we have says our ancestor was German born. The enumerator noted that this newly-found fellow was Irish born. I copied relevant information anyway and hopefully one day soon, we will be able to sort it all out and know which one might be our ancestor.
If you have common name mysteries in your family, I highly recommend the “Maybe Related” filing system on your computer or even the index card method. Call me “old fashioned” but I still love to pull out the index cards and move them around and analyze them in different ways. As we add to these files, individual and family patterns will emerge and those hidden behind common names will finally reveal themselves. At least sometimes they do!
How do you deal with the “maybe relateds” in your files? Share your tips with us in the comments section below.
I am fortunate that my mother taped several interviews with my grandmother before she died. Several years ago, I transcribed one of those interviews and over the holidays I found the transcription very helpful. I was creating a family history book with MyCanvas for my grandmother’s sister who is now ninety-six years old. Her mother died when she was very young so she doesn’t remember her well.
In that taped interview, my grandmother had talked about her mother:
“She was very good to us. She never went anywhere–nor did my father–never went anywhere without bringing us a bag of candy and hugging us and kissing us. And our mother loved flowers, oh, did she love flowers. And she loved oleanders, and as a surprise, my father got her and on the porch we had two wash tubs, like this, and one pink and one white oleander. And my father says when they stopped blooming that something’s going to happen. . . And when they stopped blooming, my mother died.”
I included that quote (and another quote about her father) in the book.
If you have family interviews with stories or descriptions of family members, be sure to include them in your family history. They will give future generations a first-person look at your ancestors.
Click on the image to enlarge the page I created.
It’s inevitable. When you become interested in family history, whether you were a book lover before or not, you become one. In addition to family history reference and how-to books, you suddenly have a need for atlases, old dictionaries, local histories, social histories, ethnic histories, or anything that will give you a better understanding about what an ancestor’s life was like.
Book collecting can be expensive, but with online used-book sellers you can get some great deals on even recently released titles. One book I recently bought is still in print and usually runs $16.00, but I was able to get a copy through a used bookseller on Amazon.com for about $7 (with shipping). Abebooks.com and Alibris.com are other good places to check for reduced prices on books. Although the cheapest books have typically been used, most that I have purchased have arrived in remarkably good condition. Compare several sites to get the best deal on the books you need for your family history.
This Christmas I was able to give my mother a one-of-a-kind gift. A while back, I wrote about my Tobin hatters in an article that was posted to the 24/7 Family History Circle blog. A lady in England had happened across an old business card for “Tobin’s New Hat Store” in New York and posted it for sale on eBay. Thankfully, she did a quick search for more information online about Tobin hatters in New York and found my article posted on the blog. She left the information in the comments section of the blog and I was able to bid on and win the auction for that card. For a very modest sum, I was able to give my mom one of the best gifts ever! And the interesting image on the card had the whole family talking about it on Christmas night. What on earth does a donkey serenading a goose (Mother Goose?) have to do with a hat shop? If you have any thoughts on the meaning of the image, please share them with me through the comments section of the blog. I’d love to hear your ideas!
You don’t have to have a blog to broadcast your family history interests, although it is an increasingly easy and popular way to share your interests and finds publicly. Public Trees on Ancestry are a great way to connect with cousins or complete strangers who may have valuable information or long-lost heirlooms. Every day more people decide to explore their family history and search Ancestry.com looking for leads. If your tree is out there, that search can lead possible family members to you.
Message boards are another great way to share your family surname interests and leave a breadcrumb trail for those with information to share.
How much you choose to share is entirely up to you, but even just the names, estimated dates, and locations of your ancestors may lead you to a family treasure too!
Search local and ethnic newspapers for information about your immigrant ancestors. Obituaries and other notices pertaining to life events (birth, marriage, anniversary, etc.) frequently list the town or county of origin for immigrants. You may also find lists of new arrivals, immigrants who were treated in a local hospital, lists of arriving indentured servants or apprentices, queries about missing relatives or friends, and notices of probates of estates–all of which may include clues to the immigrant’s origins. And don’t just look for direct line ancestors. While your ancestor’s obituary may not list that town of origin, the death notice of a sibling or cousin could be just what you’re looking for.
Check for newspapers in online collections like those at Ancestry. Inquire at local and ethnic libraries and genealogical/historical societies as they may have or know of collections, indexes, or compilations. State libraries and archives are another good place to check.
When conducting on-site cemetery research, be sure to read the entire tombstone. Not everything on a tombstone is carved on the front. It is not unusual to find inscriptions on both the front and back of a stone and even on the edges. You may find the name and vital date on the face, an epitaph or poem on the back, the names of spouse, parents, children, and other information carved elsewhere. Look for initials, names, and/or the company name of the stonemason on the stone. Often the carver chiseled his initials or mark into a stone as a form of advertisement. His family may have been engaged in the stonecutting industry for generations and may have retained many or all of the family’s work or account files. You may be able to research the carver and therefore locate other records concerning the person who ordered and paid for the tombstone, its date of installation, and other data.
What have you found on the back of a tombstone? Share your story in the comments section.
