Category: FamilySearch

5 Things You Might Not Know About the Family Tree Recents List

Note: This article by Kathryn Grant was published previously on the Hearts Linked Together blog site and is used with the author’s permission.   Recents is one of the options on the Family Tree menu. Although it’s right there in plain sight, it might be one of the least-used features in Family Tree. But it’s also one of the most helpful....

Reviewing Your Memories

Recently I had an interesting experience with several family members (names changed in this article) that reminded me of the importance of reviewing family history memories from time to time. As I ate lunch with my daughter Anna one day, she told me that she had found an old email from my brother Max about my parents. She began relating...

Giving Back to Your Community through Family History

Note: This article by Miles Meyer was previously published on the Miles Meyer Genealogy blog site and is used with the author’s permission. As family historians, much of our work is to record the history of our families and try to tell the stories of our ancestors. Some of us have specialized in specific parts of our research such as...

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”...

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...

How to Include the Family in Family History

When it comes to spending time with family, engaging in family history ideally should be inclusive and involving everyone, right? The question, though, is how to do just that. After all, it can be quite difficult to get the whole family to gather around a laptop and have them help you index or search for records. Besides, someone might say...

What’s New in The Family History Guide

Here are a few of the updates we’ve included recently in The Family History Guide and some additional details for each: Surname eBooks As described in  an earlier blog post, we’ve added over 900 links to online books on our Surname eBooks page. As a follow-up, we have included instructions at the top of that page for how to access...

Indexing in Other Languages: An Ever-Growing Need

A few days ago, my wife decided to do some indexing via FamilySearch while I was messaging my grandmother. As we were talking, I mentioned that my wife was indexing, and my grandmother made the following comment in response: “We’re running out of indexing projects for English.” This comment stuck out to me, knowing what I know about my grandmother....

The Basic Steps in Cleaning Up the FamilySearch Family Tree

Editor’s Note: This article by James Tanner was published on the Genealogy’s Star site and is used with the author’s permission. Whether you are currently deeply involved in researching and adding new names to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree or just now beginning to learn about how to sign on, we all have the same basic challenges. I know I have...