James Tanner – Page 8 – The Family History Guide Blog

October 12, 2020

Underused Genealogically Important Websites: ArchiveGrid

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/ Quoting from the OCLC Research webpage, ArchiveGrid is a collection of over four million archival material descriptions, including MARC records from WorldCat and finding aids harvested from the web. It is supported by OCLC Research as the...

Country Research/Research

October 5, 2020

Genealogists! Free Yourselves from the Paper Prison

Note: This article by James Tanner was previously published on the Genealogy’s Start blog site and is used with the author’s permission. Regardless of how tech-savvy genealogists may be, collectively, we seem to acquire huge piles of paper. We can scan the documents, letters, certificates, photos, and other important paper-based items but we feel duty-bound to keep everything. Granted,...

Country Research/Records/Research

September 27, 2020

Learning about What You Don’t Find with a Google Search

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. Google searches give the impression that they are omnipotent but if you understand how information is stored and the amount of information that is still on paper and not visible to Google at all, you realize that...

Research

September 13, 2020

How Do Genealogically Significant Records Get Preserved? Part One

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. Let’s suppose that your great-grandfather wrote a journal during his lifetime and you are the member of the family that ends up with the journal. You might have a couple of concerns: how do you preserve the document...

Memories/Research

September 6, 2020

When Is a Brick Wall Not a Brick Wall?

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. As I have written and presented previously, the concept of a “brick wall” in genealogical research is not very helpful. Here is a video I did a couple of years ago about how to resolve the problem....

Country Research/Records/Research

August 30, 2020

The Genealogical Overburden of Duplicate Work

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. The definition of “overburden” that I am using here refers to the “rock or soil overlying a mineral deposit, archaeological site, or other underground feature.” Google Dictionary. In doing genealogical research it is necessary to remove the “overburden”...

FamilySearch/Research

August 23, 2020

Blinded by a Pedigree Chart

Note: This article by James Tanner was published previously in the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. This is an example of the “standard” or traditional pedigree chart used by genealogists in this format and many other similar formats for hundreds of years, primarily, in Western European countries. Here is an example of one from...

Research/Training

August 16, 2020

Spotting and Correcting Errors in an Online Family Tree

Note: This article by James Tanner was originally published on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. In this post, I will give an example from the FamilySearch.org Family Tree, of an entry that has some basic problems. I will then show how those problems can be identified and, if possible, resolved. This process of talking...

Case Studies/FamilySearch/U.S. Research

August 2, 2020

Will Computers Ever Change Genealogical Methodology?

Note: This article by James Tanner originally appeared in the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. I have been reviewing a few of the books from my collection of older genealogical publications dating back into the early 1900s. It is always amazing to me how much of what is written accurately reflects exactly what is...

Research/Technology

July 26, 2020

The Sixth Generation Barrier

Note: This article by James Tanner was previously published on the Genealogy’s Star blog site and is used with the author’s permission. A complete pedigree of six generations, counting yourself as the first generation, would have a total of 62 people including your parents and not counting you. If you count your parents as the first generation the total number...