Really? I Have To Prove Everything?

I am constantly amazed at how gullible people can be.  From what I am seeing on Ancestry's Family Tree's many people believe everything they read.  And then put it on line as fact without ever taking the time to stop and research and confirm said things.

Obituaries are one of the best examples of this that I have found yet.  For some reason people believe so much of what is in obituaries and no further research is ever done to follow up.

In my GGgrandmother's obituary is states the following, "...He leaves two sons, Paul L. Sharters and five sons...." it then proceeds to state she left behind five brothers & a sister, which in fact was correct. 

The problem with this obituary is that -
A. He is really a she...  no biggie I know.  But it matters to ME.
B.  There were not two sons or five sons there were SIX...
C. None of her sons were named Paul L. Sharters. 
D. No mention of the two daughters, both of whom were living at the time of her death.

A bit of research would have shown the person on Ancestry Trees those facts and then the facts presented on his/her tree would be correct instead of so poorly listing false information. 

The moral of this story?  Don't take everything you find in an obituary to be true.  Remember that in some cases it may not even be a family member writing the obituary.  Many of the Brethren obituaries I have found were written by an elder in the church or by a family friend.  In some cases information given may simply be a guess.  When my grandmother died her place of birth was incorrectly given in her obituary.  She tried to get the person who had the correct information but that person was unavailable.  So she gave it her best guess.

Memories fade, papers get lost..  you really do need to make the effort to prove the things you find.  Even from obituaries!

Are You Really Who You Think You Are?

Are you like many of the people out there who tune in to NBC's- Who Do You Think You Are? every Friday night? Tune out the world and dive into the genealogy of the rich & famous? 

Don't get me wrong I think its a great show, and I've actually remembered to tune in. But there are a few issues.  The biggest one that I have is that they make it look so simple, and that commercial about logging onto Ancestry.com and finding their whole family tree makes me really NERVOUS!

I think the issue is that they don't mention the hours & hours it can take to do all that research, nor do they urge you to document all those goodies you find on the website!  Personally I think the show should add a disclaimer, but I doubt that's ever gonna happen!

Personally my descendants are important enough to me to make sure that each & every piece of information I find, whether its on the website featured on the show or anywhere on the web, is fully & totally documented with sources OFF the web.  You know - real research.  I know without a shadow of a doubt that what I have has been proven & fully documented. 

How about you?  Are you really who you think you are?  Is your work proven & documented or are you using the stuff off the line & assuming its correct?

Genealogist or Name Collector?

I really enjoy chatting with people about their genealogy research. When I go out on my speaking engagements - talking with the people who come to hear my talks is a really cool part of doing the talks. People inspire me - not only with new talk idea's but with research thoughts and success stories.

Inevitably I end up somewhere along the way with someone who has XXXX Thousand people in their data base & they are related back to XXXXX number of kings & queens - not that being related to kings & queens is a bad thing... we've all heard all those stories... I've even discussed them to some degree here.

My problem with this whole thing is multi-fold - let me explain -

• Documentation
• Research
• Documentation
• Research
• Documentation
• Research

As I see it there are two types of people working the genealogy circuit these days. There are those who truly do the research. They pull the records, the census, the vital records, the county histories. They know the work that goes into proving each person on the family tree. They've done it. They've done the searches, they been to the libraries, dug thru the newspapers and paid for the copies.

Then there are the name collectors - the "click & claimers*".... the ones who have no real idea of how to research or where to even begin. The ones who think that two weeks on Ancestry can provide them with everything they need to do their family history. The ones who are so gullible to believe everything they find online - without ever bothering to even prove one generation. You know the ones - their chart has the children born before the parents, in a state that didn't even exisist at the time.

Which are you?

Happy Researching!

Karen

*Click & Claim genealogy is the thought process that states if I can click on it I can claim it as my own forever & ever!

Monday Madness

Usually Monday madness is about a line that you have that drives you nuts. Although I do have a few of those type lines, today's madness is more about organization and the options that come with a re-organization of genealogy files.

The dilema? To pitch or not?

With 20 years of genealogy documentation stored in my office - sometimes things get out of hand. I go down to the husband's office and I think "gee look at all this clutter", of course he claims he knows where everything is, but from all the times I hear, "Karen, do you know where __________ is?", I must admit I do wonder.

My office on the other hand is organized, although at times a bit cluttered. Its all the research, I just get so into it, soon I have twelve books, three files and more all on my desk. This documentation is in notebooks and in my filing cabinets.

With the re-organization project I am hoping to eliminate some of the clutter. NO, I do not want to get rid of my books, but the large cumbersome notebooks and alot of the file folders I would love to get rid of. Of course doing this brings some questions to mind.

• If I have entered a will in its entiretity and scanned & linked the image do I need to keep the copy in the notebook?
• How about obits? How about death certificates?
• Does it matter if its an original or a copy?
• Should I save the documentation on the direct line only?

These notebooks are big & bulky - and now empty. Everything is out & in stacks on my floor as I scan and type, double checking everything as I go.

How about you? How do YOU handle this sort of stuff? Do you have your documentation scanned into your computer? Did you keep the originals? I'd love to hear your solutions to these things!

Its a discussion worth Monday madness for sure!

Happy researching!

Karen