Family History Genealogy Research

Research Tips

 

I will be adding tips as time goes on.  Some general tips are included in my FAQ, so check that out as well.  There is no particular organization, though the latest will be listed first.  Some of these are found in various genealogy research books.    I will simply be adding those tips that I have found most useful (note that my examples do not include real data).  If you have any tips to share, feel free to contact me via e-mail (see Home page).

 

Regarding data from other family trees.  (Added 2/17/2015)  I never copy data straight off someone else's family tree since I have found such data to often be unreliable.  But that said, what if the tree is actually correct?  How can you tell?  First, some trees do contain source information and if so, you can obtain the data directly from the source.  If no source is provided, you can still "Look for corroborating info" (next tip).  The unsourced data may provide names, dates or other clues to allow you to search for and find the source information that you need.  Such clues are often essential to adding additional people to your tree.  You may know that Fred Jones was married to Mary, but you have no idea what her maiden name was and simply cannot find it.  But someone's tree has her as Mary Smith along with a marriage date.  With this additional data, you may be able to find a record of the marriage.

 

Look for corroborating info.  (Added 2/17/2015)  Just because you have some data that you are confident in (or maybe you are not so confident), it is still wise to seek more corroborating info.  In addition to adding to your confidence the new data may contain, guess what?  New data!  For example, in trying to confirm the spouse of an individual (even though I was pretty certain), I found a newspaper article that included the spouse (with maiden name) and eight children, which were more than I already had.  The ones I had matched up, so all was good.

 

Do not neglect Google searches.  (Added 2/17/2015) Of course, feel free to use any search engine.  There is a lot of data available online that may not be found in any subscription service.  One of the keys to remember is that you will need to try your searches with various spellings since search engines often look for exact matches.  And if you find useful data, include the URL in your source info.  If your search found a posted family tree, see tip 'Regarding data from other family trees'.  Just because someone has posted info on the web doesn't mean it is correct!

 

Do not neglect siblings!  (Added 2/17/2015) I am going to emphasize this by providing an example.  You have found your great-grandfather Johannes Schmidt in the 1900 US Federal Census, along with wife Dorothea, daughter Elizabeth and son Karl.  The problem is that Johannes was born in Nov, 1866 in Germany and his parents are not in the census.  In searching German records, you find a Johannes Schmidt, son of Anton Schmidt and Martha Strauss, born Nov 12, 1866.  Is this Johannes your Johannes?  Some more work is required.  You find that Anton and Martha also had a son Frederick (b. Sep 15, 1864) and daughters Victoria (b. Jul 3, 1870) and Magda (b. Mar 9, 1872).  When you originally looked at the 1900 census in ancestry.com, you just matched up the data.  But that match only includes the parents and children.  You go back and look at the census record and you see a Victoria in the household, sister to the head of house, born Jul, 1870 in Germany.  With this additional information, Anton and Martha go from possible parents of Johannes to extremely likely parents.   If you knew approximately where in Germany your family comes from and that is in the vicinity of the German records you have for Anton and Martha, you have near certainty.  A more general lesson to be learned from this example is that when you have data that seems to fit, but is in no manner certain, it is worth the effort to look for corroborating data (see tip above).