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Genealogy

Google Search

  • Guide to Google - http://googleguide.com - Will make you an "Expert" Google searcher
  • Good overview course on Google search http://www.powersearchingwithgoogle.com/ by a Google scientist.
  • Focused Searches: Precede your search with the tilde symbol to limit the search to synonyms... e.g. ~genealogy
  • Remove items - If you want to search for something and exclude results, add a word preceded by the dash symbol
  • Exact phrase - Surround a series of words by quotes e.g. "William Cullison George"
  • Search just for images http://images.google.com
  • Find Clipart... Google "clipart genealogy", or use Bing.com "clipart genealogy" and find even more genealogy clipart
  • Search for date ranges, add this to your query "1910..1930"

Finding Live People

I'm using this web page as a place to accumulate my favorite "live people" search sites. If you REALLY want to find out about someone, you can find an lot by using any/all of these sites. The latest one I added is http://www.zillow.com that estimates your home's worth if you supply the address. I read about it on Dick Eastman's Blog http://www.eogn.com.

  1. http://www.spokeo.com
  2. http://www.peoplesmart.com
  3. http://www.peoplefinders.com
  4. http://www.zabasearch.com * Very good
  5. http://www.switchboard.com
  6. http://www.411.com
  7. http://www.whitepages.com
  8. http://www.peoplesearch.com
  9. http://www.whowhere.com
  10. http://www.peekyou.com
  11. http://www.pipl.com * Gathers from Multiple sources
  12. http://www.zoominfo.com
  13. http://www.radaris.com
  14. http://www.intellius.com
  15. http://www.infobel.com (http://www.us-info.com this also points back to infobel - seems to be non-US oriented)

Correcting On-Line Family Trees

An excellent article by Kimberly Powell of About.com. It covers seldom-discussed on-line trees such as Ancestry's Online Family Tree, One World Tree, RootsWeb's WorldConnect Family Tree

How to Find Maiden Names

James Tanner had a blog post about this that also referred to a FamilySearch Wiki article and a more detailed Genealogy.com article. All were very informative.

Regional Research Assistance

New York

Find photos of Street Addresses and Values of Homes

  1. http://www.zillow.com - Provides real estate values.
  2. http://showmystreet.com - Key in street & see a picture of property via Google Maps

Newspaper Research

DNA Testing

My wife and I have "indulged" in DNA tests (37 Marker YDNA test for me and a Y DNA test formy wife's brother's son).We found very close matches with our same surnames, but unfortunately, neither of us has done research far back enough to identify who the common relative is. There is a lot to learn about genetic genealogy, especially if you want to understand what is being tested. It's complicated and geneticists have their own terminology, A DNA SIG was started by the SRVGS group in 2012 to help us understand it. There are all kinds of web pages and web sites that can shed light on the subject. One problem is that DNA testing is expensive and, I would imagine, quite profitable for the companies that provide the testing. Therefore there's a lot of advertising and inflated clains. YDNA tests cost between $125-$175 and mitochondrial test are over $20.. Here are some good links I've run across:

Genealogy Tools

Calculate birth date from death date and age on tombstones and death certificates http://www.ovs-genealogy.com/tools/

Behind your Name

These sites can be used to discover the meaning and history of your name.

TNG - The next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding (version 9)

After being shown some TNG web sites recently, I became very interested in this software. It appears to be a very flexible way to put your personal genealogy on the Web so that potential collaborators will see it and contact you with a wealth of new information. It has been installed successfully in August, 2011 and my wife and I are experimenting with it. They came out with a version 9 earlier in 2012 and it's working well. Some example sites are: Lisa and Roger, Author's TNG Site (Darrin Lithgoe), Linda's Genealogyand the Kloosterman family. It is very cool software, only costs $30 and has a review of an earlier version by Dick Eastman. See also a TNG web page I'm using to accumulate information about it.

Obituarieshelp.org

Lots of info about obituaries and a bonus is many manual chart forms that you can easily download from their site map.

Gedcom Issues

There appears to be a dearth of good information about the Gedcom format used to transfer genealogy data between computer programs. Maybe there's a book or web site that's so good, nobody needs to publish anything else! Well, I think that people concentrate so much on their own genealogy programs that they don't share data with other programs. So they don't have issues of sharing files between genealogy programs. I noticed a couple blog entries from geneamusings.com blog dealing with this very issue and I hunted down a couple other web sites that talk about Gedcom issues.

Find Cities and Towns - from Rootsweb

Publish Free Genealogy Web Sites and Files

Browser Access Web Sites

Free Sites to save file

County Boundary Historical Atlas

This is the excellent Ani-Map program from Goldbug.com they call the County Boundary Historical Atlas. Several web sites give credit to Ani-Map in generating their so-called County Formation maps. One is  N2Genealogy.com and another is Genealogyinc.com with an example using Pennsylvania Counties.

History - Growth of a Nation and World

  • Growth of a Nation - Ten minute Flash "Movie" on how the country was formed from 1789 to present. Gives good overview of when states were admitted to theunion and the big battles of the day.
  • Hans Rosling's 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes - Four and a half minute video of how health and wealth has grown and redistributed in the last 200 years. Very instructive

Ancestry Magazine Back Issues

Ancestry has ceased publishing the Ancestry Magazine. But all back issues are available from Google Books.

Genealogy Event Calendars

 

The Genealogical Proof Standard (GPS)

This is an authoritative approach to genealogy research that is approved by Board of Certification of Genealogists. It has been documented by the Thinkgenealogy.com web site and in a Lisa Cooke Episode 20 interview of Mark Tucker. Thinkgenealogy.com has a process map and a PowerPoint explanation to demonstrate the GPS. Tip: The thinkgenealogy.com uses Web 2.0 free slideshare technology to display the PowerPoint file.

The GPS is like a Process Map. The process map outlines the steps needed to meet standards and starts with defining your research goal or step and then follow the GPS.

  1. Conduct a reasonably exhaustive search.
  2. Need a complete and accurate source citation.
  3. Do analysis and correlation of what you've found so that all facts correlate with each other.
  4. Work to resolve conflicting evidence. Use additional resources to resolve conflicts.
  5. Write sound, reasoned, coherent conclusions .

After using this process, when you talk to a genealogy professional about your work, you will be talking the same "language".

Personalized Maps

Discovered this map-making gadget & couldn't resist showing our travels, mostly in the U.S., Mexico & Canada and UK with some Caribbean. The web site, bighugelabs.com has ALL KINDS of artsy craftsy web pages like this, from calendar makers to comic book captions.

Travels of Bill & Diane to date
Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com
Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com/map.php

 

The Genealogy Research Plan

To do family history research, you need to have goals and a plan.

Research Assistance

Search Your Family Tree Using Google

Macintosh Genealogy Resourse

TV Programs about Genealogy:

Local (to Castro Valley, California) Genealogy groups:

Regional and National and Regional Genealogy Groups

Census Analysis Tools

Very Helpful Tools when analyzing Census Records

Wikis

Eastman Online Genealogy Newsletter Entry describes Wikis

Genealogy Research Libraries - Bay Area

 

Genealogy Lineage Software

Linux

Macintosh

PC

Research Web Sites

Charts for Genealogy

Books (free)

Common Genealogical Data Format

Popular SF Bay Area Libraries

Photography Sites useful to Genealogists

Genealogy Blogs

There are some very informative Genealogy Blogs. A couple noteworthy ones are Dick Eastman's Online Genealogy, Genea Musings, the Genealogy Bank Blog and a terrific Resource, a genealogy blog finder.

Genea Musings' Randy Seaver has daily "themes" that are useful to follow. He was kind enough to create a special daily list for us, with these categories

"Some explanations about my "theme posts" (see suggested daily genealogy blogging prompts here):"

*  The Amanuensis Monday posts (amanuensis means to transcribe) may help other researchers by providing a transcription for a will, deed or other document.  I am contacted occasionally by researchers who share the person for whom I've transcribed a document.  Transcribing the document helps me - I often see details that I missed earlier, and leads to additional research for more family history data and documents. I've created an Amanuensis Monday page to make it easier to find these posts.

*  The Tuesday Tip's post series are to help other researchers investigate genealogy resources that I discover and mention.  I often explore a new genealogy website, or describe a record collection on a free or commercial website. 

*  The Wordless Wednesday posts are presentations of my family photographs, and an explanation of them. It seems that some of my readers have a better eye than I do, and tell me of details that I've missed.  At some point, my goal is to collect these posts in family groups and produce digital books of the photos and posts. 

*  The Treasure Chest Thursday posts are presentations of heirlooms and documents, and my analysis of them as they pertain to my family history.  When I post and transcribe or extract from them, I often learn something new that I've missed from earlier analysis.  Sometimes, these posts spark a reader comment that provides more pertinent analysis, or tells me that I've helped someone.

*  The Surname Saturday posts are pure "cousin bait" - somebody may do a Google search on an ancestral name and find my post, and either comment or contact me.  I try to add authoritative source listings to these posts.  Other researchers comment on these posts with suggestions for additional resources, or to point out problems or errors in my listings.

*  The Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (SNGF) posts are intended to add a little levity, challenge and fun to our genealogy week, and often lead readers to check out a new resource, test a software feature, or write a  post on a specific topic.

*  I often write blog posts about my current genealogy research in hopes that readers will comment on my findings, or suggest other research opportunities.  I'll take help from anybody, and appreciate it. I realize that I don't know "everything" about every locality, genealogy subject or record repository collection, but am willing to learn, and  sometimes my readers significantly contribute to my research effort.  Some examples of crowdsourcing my genealogy research include The Whittle Research Compendium and Crowd-Sourcing Cousin Edith.

*  All of these "theme" posts, and the others that fill out the week, keep me busy writing something every day, and I have fun doing them while learning something myself, helping readers with educational or challenging tips and techniques, and keeping me in the Genealogy Cave instead of out roaming the bars, bowling alleys and the mean streets of Chula Vista from early morning to late at night.  Linda usually knows where I am!  I do get out occasionally to genealogy society meetings (once or twice a week), cemetery excursions (rare now), and library visits (rare now), or to seminars and conferences.  

See this list of daily posts at http://www.geneamusings.com/search/label/Tuesday%27s%20Tip

Lattitude Longitude

Genealogy programs are becomming able to track lattitude/longitudes (l/l). Newer cameras can provide l/l in pictures. This web site lets you determine the l/l of your adress and look up a l/l. http://www.getlatlon.com/

Podcasts

Podcasts are very helpful. You can play them on your mp3 player (iPod or equivalent) and learn when you have downtime traveling or waiting. You just downlod the podcasts (mp3 files) and upload to your music player. iPods and iPhones make it very easy to automatically choose and get new podcasts using iTunes.

Webcasts

Ancestry.com

British Royals

Research Tools

Genealogy Inc - See also their list of county formation maps of most states. I use this one from Pennsylvania

Some Interesting Genealogy Sites:

  1. Family History 101 - Great Genealogy site http://familyhistory101.com/index.html - Contains much information including a nice selection of genealogy forms and how county map boundary formations evolved.
  2. Shoestring Genealogy - Save Money! - http://shoestringgenealogy.com/
  3. Genealogy for Librarians - General genealogy site, some good links
  4. Geni.com - Very compelling way to share your family tree and motivate relatives to provide biographical information.
  5. Genetic Genealogist web site - 28 page excellent booklet "I have The Results of My Genetic Genealogy Test, Now What?
  6. Surname Distribution in the world - Shows where people with your same last name are living in the world. Read about it.
  7. Free Genealogy Program, PAF (Personal Ancestral File) - This is an excellent, free Genealogy program from LDS. There also are help files and frequently asked questions available.
  8. Cyndi's List is a tremendous resource, at http://www.cyndislist.com/.
  9. Google Genealogy Search - There is also a clever genealogy search page using Google technology that's quite helpful at http://www.genealogy-search-help.com/index.html.
  10. Family Tree Searcher - This is a Multi-Site Genealogy Search utility that lets you search eight genealogy sites at once. It may save you some time. http://www.familytreesearcher.com/
  11. About.com. A good free resource for beginning genealogists is http://genealogy.about.com. They have podcasts and frequent email updates available as well as the web site itself.
  12. If you want the ultimate genealogy reference book, try http://www.everton.com, the home of the "Handybook for Genealogists, 11th edition". The book + CD is $60 plus shipping and handling.
  13. A free picture organizing and editing program Picassa (from Google), is available at http://www.get-picassa.com
  14. History of the Census
  15. Self-publishing site - books all by yourself at lulu.com
  16. Facebook.com Millions of users - Do a search on "Genealogy" to find friends, blogs, podcasts and web sites. Maybe get lucky and run into relatives (and maybe not).
  17. Self-publishing site for people who want to publish their blogs. http://www.blurb.com

Maps

George Genealogy Research

I am working on a brick wall, trying to locate any information about my third great grandfather. I have information about my second great grandfather Samuel George, b. 1815 Indiana cty, PA, d. 1889 Mercer Cty, PA. An 1880 census record indicates that Samuel's father is from Ireland. That's all I know about him. So I'm looking into immigration from Ireland to the U.S. before 1815 and families that existed in nearby Indiana, PA. I located a William George born in Ireland, who lived close to Indiana, PA and am tracing his family. Update 13 Oct 2009. Fairly likely guess at given name for 2nd ggf is "William" according to Irish family naming conventions. So I'm on the trail of William George, in early Pennsylvania (1810-1830), and before. My aunt and I commissioned some work by Salt Lake City LDS Researchers and found some additional information including a will, where a William George left Samuel George land and a home in Pennsylvania. It's looking like William George is our man.

I'm also researching the George line using Ancestry, Rootsweb and Family History Center sites.

  1. George Surname Origin & Last Name Meaning
  2. George Study
  3. George DNA Surname Project
  4. Rootsweb George Surname Mail List
  5. Memorabilia - Crests & gifts
  6. George Surname web sites on Genealogy.com
  7. My family is connected to Sir Godfrey Kneller, it is thought through family lore - But it isn't clear how, at the moment. To find out more Google Godfrey Kneller and visit this web site http://www.twickenham-museum.org.uk/detail.asp?ContentID=62 and the Wikipedia Page on him at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godfrey_Kneller.
Last Updated May 1, 2013 by bg
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