More searching tips, RootsTech 2022 & Other News: My Week in Genealogy 1-7 January 2022

The first week of 2022 has gone in a blur and the Christmas decorations are all packed away until December. I won't mention that there are hot cross buns in the shops but that is so wrong in my opinion. We should have time to savour each of the seasons and the special events in the year. 

Blogs

My Diary blog made the Top 100 genealogy blogs  - a number of other well known Aussie bloggers are also included so why not try and find some new bloggers to follow in 2022.

Hightville cemetery 2011, north west Queensland
where Thomas Price was buried in 1918

Read my Week 1 blog post on Thomas Price as part of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks. Thomas Price was my great grandfather born in Wednesbury, Staffordshire and the father of 10 children. He was a miner and eventually settled in Charters Towers, Queensland. At the time of his death he was working for the Hampden Cloncurry copper mine.

Participating in a weekly blog challenge certainly keeps you on your toes. But I like the focus and motivation.

New Resources

1 January signals the release of more records in the public domain including Australian BDMs, archives and libraries. Time to update all your genealogy databases and follow the clues. 

Look for blogs from the archives about what is being released in the public domain. You may be surprised.

FamilySearch have a range of monthly free webinars with a variety of topics - check out January to March offerings here. Categories for the three months include General, using FamilySearch, United States and Canada. Often there are webinars for the British Isles and Asia too.

Newspapers

Do you use Findmypast for newspaper searches? Or do you use British Newspaper Archive? Which ever one you should use both if you can. I was looking for a marriage that took place in Ireland - Henry Andrews Speed a British sailor married an Irish girl Mary Jane Justice in 1852. I had no luck with Findmypast Irish newspapers. I tried the British Newspaper Archive as the groom was English and found numerous references to the wedding in various Irish newspapers in the BNA. 

People often ask me which subscription database should I join? The answer is all of them as they all have slightly different resources. However most of us can't afford that luxury.  A genealogy society membership might be useful as you can normally access subscription sites in their libraries or via home eresources. Or your local library may have Ancestry or Findmypast. See what is available locally and virtually.

The rule is - search everywhere!

Preserving Your Photographs

As a break from writing I am now sorting out all my photo shoe boxes. It is amazing what you forget you have in the back of the warddrobe. Granny died 25 years ago and that is probably the last time I look at her loose photos. I have dragged the two albums out since then but not all the loose photos I had in a shoebox. I was stunned to find so many younger photos of Dad which I can't remember seeing before. Out of sight out of mind or perhaps it is just old age catching me up.

Love Dad's hat

Dad always loved his motorbikes

Behind his father's black FJ Holden
- many a Sunday drive in it

  Not only do I have my grandmothers, but also my mothers and my own photos in shoeboxes. There is some overlap and they take up two shelves in my wardrobe. Going through and tossing those that are not family related or good enough for a final digital album takes an enormous amount of time. Each photo seems to generate its own memories.

More are kept than tossed but the next stage is to merge the three collections and dispose of duplicate photos. I need a bigger table! 

Then the process of scanning, naming and placing into the correct digital family albums will take even longer I suspect. This part is incredibly boring and I have started watching webinars while scanning. Although you have to be careful that you name and file as you go too and not mix things up.

Given the size of this project I think it will be interspersed with writing up those family history drafts. 

RootsTech Connect 

Amazingly it is not that long now to RootsTech 25-27 February 2022 which is again virtual. 

The organisers are starting to release the names of keynote speakers. No doubt the whole program will be fantastic.

It is free to register so if you want  to  be part of the world's biggest geneaevent, register now.

Searching Tips

This week I had to cross check when Lavinia Cleaves died - I had 1914 in Victoria and someone else had 1911. I knew my source was Victorian BDMs online so I tried to find it again. 

No Lavinia Cleaves or Cleves for 1911 or 1914. In the end I searched on Lavinia no surname and between 1910 and 1915. There were only 47 matches but it didn't take me long to find it under Cleanes! Have now made a note in my genealogy database in case I have to find it again. Don't you just love spelling variants.

What's Coming Up?

February is going to be a super busy month as I have a number of talks, both in person and virtual. See my website Events for details.

Plus I am doing a 9 week English genealogy term at Bribie U3A (omicron permitting). 

Bribie Genealogy starts up again in February and trying to plan speakers is tricky with speakers not wanting to travel here. So we are looking at the possibility of speakers zooming in.

Enjoy your genealogy searching this week. I will be having a dive into the 1921 England and Wales census. Hoping to progress my son's paternal line. As I write this there is a degree of uncertainty about omicron and any further restrictions. So stay safe and well everyone. 

Brickwalls tumble, smart searching & other news: My week in genealogy 25 -31 December 2021

 It has been a brilliant week for doing my family history and writing. With no family around there is an amazing amount of time. 

Although it would have been nice to have some family for Christmas but perhaps next year will be the White Christmas I have promised myself for the last three years. 

Back Ups

If you are looking for an easy New Year resolution, why not adopt the good practice of doing genealogy back ups on the first day of the month. That's easy to remember and you can set calendar reminders as well. Nothing worse than losing your genealogy database. 

Blogs

Jill Ball (aka GeniAus) issued her annual Accentuate the Positive Geneameme. You can read my response for 2021 here.

Amy Johnson Crow's 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks has come up very quickly. There are weekly themes which are broad enough to have an examply somewhere in the family tree. At first I thought I would do the ones I know most about. But then I am not really progressing my research or analysing why I can't find anything on someone. So more distant direct ancestors are the target if I can find one that fits the theme. One a week for the next year. 

Thomas Price
Mum's great grandfather

Week 1 is Foundations and my choice is Thomas Price from Wednesbury, Staffordshire. He (and his wife Elizabeth Pollard/Judge) were the foundation of Mum's Price family here in Australia.

DNA

Trying to connect all those DNA cousin matches is daunting. But when you think we have 8 great grandparents for 2nd cousin matches, 16 great great grandparents for 3rd cousin matches, 32 great great great grandparents for 4th cousins and 64 great great great great grandparents for 5th cousins. 

If each ancester was one of ten children (as most of mine seem to be, especially on Mum's side) then the numbers start to be enormous. For maximum benefit we should be trying to trace down all those lines to the present to connect up with DNA testers. 

I have done that on most of my mother's family lines as way back in the beginning (1977) I had the idea to trace all living descendants of my emigrant ancestors. The problem lies in the fact that I have not kept up with descendants since about 2000. So I am missing the modern generation. So a bit of back tracking is necessary but my DNA is not so confusing now. 

Also tracing Dad's biological family put a spanner in his cousin lines so I have spent quite a bit of time this week working on all the Cleaves descendants in Australia. I'm surprised at how many Cleaves families came out from Somersetshire, England and Wales. It has paid off as I have recognised some of the surnames in my matches. 

For those who might be looking at 6th cousins, that is 128 great great great great great grandparents!

Searching Tips

It is how you search that often changes the result from 'can't find' to success. 

I have previously tried to find William and Hannah Cleaves/Cleves in the 1841 census. They were in the 1851 census so it was more than likely a spelling variant that was the problem. 

This time I searched for Hannah (more uncommon than William) left the surname blank, searched in the county of Somersetshire and used Littleton as a keyword (the place where they lived).  The surname was indexed as Clears. How easy in hindsight. Looking at the snippet it is easy to see how hard the indexers job was. 

1841 census via The Genealogist

Writing Family Stories

This week was a marathon effort with the Spencer Family from Cosby, Leicestershire. The trouble is every time I show it to Max, he suggests adding something else. The never ending family history is true. Before I do a final 'nice' print job, I am going to send out ecopies or print copies spiral bound for the older generation and will seek feedback or photos. Then I will incorporate and finish. Who believes that?

What's Coming Up?

January is traditionally a quiet month with most societies closed. Given I have four talks in February I can imagine that time will be spent preparing those talks. 

Bribie with the Glass Houses in the background

Also I am doing a term on English Genealogy at Bribie U3A so that's nine classes to prepare. So far I have set up the Powerpoint template and mapped out what each week will cover. I also have a session on student brickwalls and one has already been submitted by an experienced researcher.  She has clearly defined what the issues are, what she has done and ends with 'help'.

Of course I also want to keep pushing on with the writing up my narrative family histories for each emigrant ancestor. Plus decluttering the remaining paper files and folders.

And then again there is my part time job, if I want to get paid and meet contract obligations. Minor detail.  

2022 hasn't even started and already I think I may have overcommitted myself yet again. But I always get to the end of the year and think, that was a wonderful year.

Have fun researching if you get the chance this coming week. 

Happy New Year for 2022 and let's all try and stay safe and well in this challening time. I hope to see you some time this coming year. 

Shauna

Family Memories, Holidays & Other News: My Week in Genealogy 14-21 December 2021

Learning to surf at
the Gold Coast early 1960s

This week my little brother spent three days with us. We talked a little about past family holidays and it is not surprising I think that he has some memories that I don't have and vice versa. We looked at family photos and remembered when they were taken and recalled fun times. 

Where have six decades gone? Without the images (which I have scanned) there is nothing to remind others of what we were like as children. 

Blogs 

Jill Ball's (aka @geniaus) annual Accentuate the Positive meme is coming up and I am a regular contributor. It is a chance to think over the year on all the advances in our family history research. We do much more than we ever think, although our families would possibly say we never get off the computer. 

Anyone can join in the fun. Just follow Jill's directions.

Books 

I have just purchased a series of ebooks - the Ela of Salisbury Mysteries by J G Lewis. Ela was a real person who lived 1187-1261 which makes it more interesting I think. My White ancestors were from Wiltshire just near Salisbury (although I haven't traced them back to 1200s which is when these books are set). I loved the Brother Cadfael series by Ellis Peters and others have given the Ela series a good review. More Christmas reading!

My brother is a fan of Jo Nesbo so he brought up some of his collection for me, also to read over Christmas. Almost hoping for a lockdown so I can just curl up and read through the holidays.

Conferences

I managed to upload my two sessions for RootsTech 2022 in time. Good that is out of the way.

James Carnegie 1906

Still working my way through sessions from The Genealogy Show Winter Event before access expires on 2 January 2022. Then the rest of the sessions from the Virtual Genealogy Association conference from November, expiring in March. If I can do both before the end of the year I will start 2022 fresh.

But not for long. The 15th free Scottish Genealogy Indexes conference is on 15 January 2022. I have registered as I enjoy the differenct aspects of Scottish research and I am determined to advance my Carnegie and Ferrier lines. They haven't really moved in decades.

New Resources

One of the reasons I take so long with my family history drafts is that I recheck the big subscription sites and find new resources. This week I had major discoveries in Findmypast crosschecking some Hampshire families. There are 342 Hampshire record sets - how do we ever finish anything. Needless to say I had a few fantastic hours following up these new records. 

For example, Pragnell is a relatively uncommon name but when I search for it in Findmypast in Hampshire, England there are 10, 265 results without surname variants. When I put in Robert with variants there are still 188 results. Using date or category filters helps to narrow that down but I am still really surprised at the number of Pragnell results. 

The family were from West Tytherley in Hampshire and the records go way back. I popped over to Ancestry just to see if anyone was doing the same tree and there was - they had taken the Robert Pragnell/Mary Olding line back to 1610 in West Tytherley and cited sources. A couple of generations further back than me so now I have to cross check their research with the parish records. 

We absolutely have to review our research and use all the major websites as so much gets added over time.

What's Coming Up

Some talk preparation as I have accepted quite a few talks in the first few months of 2022. See the Events page of my website for details. This was in anticipation of my trip to Sweden in May/June which I'm still wondering if I will get there. Omicron seems to be throwing its weight around in Europe at present so more wait and see before I book.

Writing Family Stories

It has been a hard slog but I have finished Max's Spencer Family History in time for Christmas. I can always add things later and even just this morning Max was pointing out new photos and information that he would like included. Minor amendments but once it goes to the printer in January for wider distribution to family members, all changes will be held over for a second edition. 

I am continuing with my draft family histories for my own family lines. I need to pick one and finish it instead of going between the four histories. 

I hope everyone has a lovely Christmas holiday with family and friends. This is my favourite photo of my son at Christmas, about 30 years ago!

My next Diary update will be just before New Year.

Stay safe and take care.

Shauna