Plan Your Work and Work Your Plan

This was a favorite statement of one of my former co-workers. The most recent issue of Family Chronicle magazine reminds me of this in my genealogy research. Michael Hait has an article starting on page 21 entitled Crafting An Effective Research Plan. I recommend you come in and read the whole article to figure out how it best applies to you, but here are a few of the highlights. 1. Define your problem - which line of your ancestors will you follow first? Which ancestor are you missing vital event data for? Which ancestor do  you have conflicting information for? 2. Investigate the Location - this means researching the place and time period and may include researching the laws or conditions in practice at a given time and place. 3. Identify records of interest - apply the Genealogical Proof Standard to your research. (for more about this Standard checkout our book at Gen 929.1 Ros). According to Mr. Hait "completing these three steps before you step foot in a library or archive will help you to make the most of your research time and help you produce professional-quality research all the time."

Church Records and Our Next Program

If you missed our program on Saturday you missed some good information from Tresa on researching church records. She has researched them stateside and in various other countries so she had some good advice and examples. I have a few copies of her handout with some web sites that might helpful to you. I'll put the copies in the brochures rack of the genealogy department. She also recommended a couple of books on that handout. We own one and I'll try to buy the other. Meanwhile, here are a few tidbits I remember.
1. When you pick up a source, take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with how the information was recorded. Each pastor, diocese, or other entity added their own "flavor" in recording church member information.
2. When working with foreign language records make yourself a sheet with the proper translation of your family members' names and keep it nearby when looking at the records so you can spot the names easier.
3. Check for an index, but be prepared to go page by page if you don't find an index, or anything in the index.

Next program - I've just confirmed our next speaker today. John Wylie will be here January 22, 2011 for a morning program. He'll talk about the benefits of using software to keep up with your family research and offer some advice on how to choose the program that will work best for you. 10:30 am is start time. John is a founding member of GENTECH and an active member of Computers in Genealogy subgroup of the Dallas Genealogical Society.

Saturday and Aloha

Remember our program this upcoming Saturday with Tresa Tatyrek. The topic is researching church records. Library doors open at 10:00. Program begins at 10:30 and lasts about and hour. We'll be in the Dulaney Meeting room of the Roy and Helen Hall Library as usual.

Aloha. I have just returned from a vacation in Hawaii. This trip is a "must do before you die"!. I stopped in at the Hawaii State Library which is the headquarters of the Hawaii State Public Library System. All the public libraries on each island are a part of this system. The one in Honolulu on the island of Oahu is where the records are kept you might want for genealogy research. The original Hawaiian people are the Menehune and they didn't have a written language so forget tracing your ancestry to them. In fact, there was no written language at all until the Europeans came along in the 1700s. Starting with records in the 1800s you can find lots of British and Scottish. To trace your ancestry to Hawaiian is the equivalent of tracing to American Indian in the mainland states. There are certain rights and priviledges afforded to those people, including owning some land that can only be sold to them. The islanders now are a mix of all the polynesian islands - Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Hawaii, and what is now New Zealand. Hawaii has a USGenWeb page so go on line and start searching.

Dallas County History from the Ground Up

That's the title of a new two-volume set of books in our collection. It is written by Frances James who has been leading bus tours for the Dallas Historical Society for years. While giving these tours and telling stories about the cemeteries and monuments she was often asked if there was a book with these stories in them. Since there wasn't one Frances wrote one - or two. Actually there's a third volume in the works too. These are terrific historical narratives about a piece of our nearby county, accompanied by some beautiful photographs taken at each cemetery. Come learn about these pioneer Texas cemeteries and some of the interesting people buried there. This source can be found on our new items shelf for the next couple of months. After that it's at R Gen 929.3764281 JAM

A reminder that I will be out of the office October 14-25.

A second reminder of our genealogy program with Tresa Tatyrek on October 30 at 10:30am in The Dulaney Room. No pre-registration required.

A few important items

Our new fiscal year has begun so watch for new books to begin arriving again soon.

October 11 the libraries will be closed for staff training day.

October 14-24 I will be on vacation. While my co-workers would like to be able to help you, they just aren't genealogy librarians. Come use the collection, but hold your advice questions for my return please.

October 30 is our next public program. Tresa Tatyrek will be our guest speaker again. Her topic is Researching Church Records. The doors of the Dulaney Room will open at 10:00. The program will start at 10:30 and will last until 11:30 or 11:45. No pre-registration is required.

Our collection is on the move. Due to several recent changes at the Roy and Helen Hall Memorial Library we now have twice as much space for the genealogy collection as before. I am slowly shifting to spread out the collection. The scope of our collection will not change, but now we can keep growing.

If you ever have any questions from anything I post on this blog please do not send it to me by replying to this message. Send me your email at tluscombe@mckinneytexas.org.

National Intelligencer

The National Intelligencer & Washington Advertiser was the first newspaper printed in Washington, DC. The Library of Congress owns the microfilm of the newspaper from it's first issue of October 3, 1800. Our library owns 7 volumes of the abstracts created by Joan M. Dixon beginning with 1800 and running through 1846. Should you check it even if you don't have evidence of your ancestors having lived in DC? Probably. DC was our nation's capital so there are names of  individuals from any number of places. As I look through the one for 1800-1805 I see mention of Vermont, Massachusetts, various US ships' crews, Virginia, a dead Revolutionary War general, Maryland, Charleston, SC, Detroit, MI, and Georgia. "The abstracts are advertisements, appointments by the President, House of Representatives petitions, passed acts, legal notices, marriages, deaths, social events, tax lists, military promotions, court cases, prisoners and maritime information." An explanation of the abbreviations used in the newspaper at that time are included in the front of the books. You can find these resources at R Gen 929.3753 DIX.

Persons of Quality

A book with the title The Original Lists of Persons of Quality 1600-1700 just makes you hope you have an ancestor in there. I mean “persons of quality” certainly sounds good. This book, edited by John Camden Hotten (originally published London 1874. reprinted Clearfield Co, Inc. 2003) is subtitled emigrants; religious exiles, political rebels, serving men sold for a term of years; apprentices; children stolen; maidens pressed; and others who went from Great Britain to the American Plantations. Now you have a better idea of what’s in the book and you still might be glad to find one of your ancestors in this book. The introduction tells us that of the groups of early emigrants “by far the greater number was composed of comparatively obscure men – men of little means, but possessed of hearts and consciences of too honest a nature to permit them quietly to submit to the intolerance which was forced upon them at home.” If your ancestors can from across the pond during this noted century you should come take a look at this, and a follow up book edited by James C. Brandow entitled Omitted Chapters from Hotten’s original lists of person of quality…and others who went from Great Britain to the American Plantations, 1600-1700 (copyright 1982 Genealogical Publishing Co.). They can be found shelved together at R Gen 929.3 HOT.