Saturday, June 13, 2009

These Three Things

This Saturday evening, Randy Seaver asks:

1) Think of three things that you learned about Genealogy or Family History today.

2) Tell us about them in a blog post or a comment to this post.


I seem to always learn more than three things a day about genealogy so here are the ones foremost in my mind tonight:

1. There are too many acronyms in genealogy!

Or at least so many that they can overwhelm a newcomer! Even I get perplexed when someone uses terms - the one that got me today was BMD. Means "births, marriages and deaths" and is common among my UK genea-friends. Someone also added the aka which is "hatch, match and dispatch" which I thought was kind of funny.

I think a cheat sheet or a lookup with genealogy acronyms would be great and right now I am finding some great resources on The Internets but they are not as comprehensive or as organized as I'd like. Hmmmm - sounds like a new project . . .

2. It pays to research those in-laws and siblings on your family lines.

I learned that this week in my search for Catherine Sullivan my 3rd great-grandmother. I located her son Francis Dennis O'Keefe and realized that his son Carlton D. O'Keefe was the same Carlton I had been trying to match up with a set of parents for over a year. Very often we stop at our own direct ancestors and then go on to the next generation not realizing there is quite a bit of information to be found in those sibling and in-law lines!

3. Don't get overwhelmed - get organized!

As Vera Charles said in the movie Auntie Mame, "Let's get organized! Now what day is it and what time is it?" It helps to have a research plan to keep you focused - but don't forget there are times when you need some leeway especially when you know you are about to break down that brick wall! A solid plan and well organized files will help you find what you need not only in terms of your tools for research but the data itself!

2 comments:

Twist said...

So many people forget to stray from the main trunk of the tree to the branches. I've found so many matches by researching sibs & wives families that the lesson bears repeating. Check Those Siblings!

Thanks for the reminder! :)

Barbara
@TwisterB

Caroline said...

"Hatch, match, and dispatch..." too funny. Never heard that one, but now I'll never forget it! You are so right. A comprehensive "dictionary" of genealogical acronyms would be extremely helpful for all researchers at all levels. With the amount of acronyms that there are, you'd think that genealogy falls under the Navy or something...

Caroline