Category Archives: How To’s, Hints & Tips

How To: Use Names, Not Just Relationships

When identifying people on pictures, writing about them in your research notes, or asking someone about them, try and avoid only using a relationship to describe the person.

Writing “John’s Grandma” on the back of a picture is helpful, but still pretty vague. Who was John and which Grandma is it?

When asking your own Grandma questions, asking her to tell you something about “Grandma” may result in her not talking about who you think she is talking about. Ask her about a specific person–referring to them by name.

When I asked my Grandma questions, I was less confused if I said something like “tell me about your Grandpa–John Trautvetter” instead of asking about “Grandpa Trautvetter.” When I asked about “Grandpa Trautvetter” it took me awhile to realize she was talking about her dad who was my dad’s Grandpa Trautvetter.

Try and avoid creating more confusing and don’t refer to people only by their relationship.

Compiled Trees Should Not Be Your Only Source

Compiled trees (regardless of the compiler or the book, site, etc.) should not be your only source for a fact, relationship, date of an event, etc. These trees can lead you to other sources and give you research ideas, but do not simply “copy it down because you saw it online.”

At the best, compiled trees provide references to original source materials.

At the worst, they are completely incorrect.

The truth is that most are somewhere in between. Use them as clues.

Note from Site Administrator: And Always, Always, Always document your source. In this case the tree where you obtained the information.

Provenance versus Providence

You may think divine providence caused you to obtain that picture of great-grandma or that family bible, but provenance is what we usually call the “chain of ownership” for a family relic or document.

The provenance of a family heirloom shows how it came to us. It’s important to track as much of the provenance of an item as we can in order to know what we have is really what we think it is. The provenance for item indicates we know who the previous owners were and how we came to acquire the item ourselves.

After all, is that great-grandpa’s hayhook, or did you just pick it up a farm sale?

Turn the Page

When a document is located on a relative, look at the pages before and after the document for additional references to your relative. Deeds sometimes get recorded in “batches,” when it is realized that they were forgotten. Children sometimes get baptized in groups when a minister finally arrives or someone decides it is time.

And occasionally there is a supplemental death certificate when a correction needs to be made.

Indexes will take you to a direct, exact page. It’s up to you to turn a few pages before and after that page to see if there’s an additional find.

How Did It Get To You?

Do you think about how a picture or other item came into your possession? Did the person who gave you the image really know who it was? How was the picture or other item identified? Just because someone on the internet said it was a picture of your great-great-grandpa does not necessarily mean that it was.

Most of the time things things are right, but occasionally errors are made. At least give a moment’s thought to the possibility that the picture might be labelled incorrectly.