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Researching
Your Roots Using the Internet
Cyndi
Howells says that the Internet may not be what you think.
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The
Discovering Your Family Tree site is one of several
useful online resources from the Church of Latter-Day
Saints. |
There
are currently at least two schools of thought when it comes
to the opinions people hold regarding the use of the Internet
in genealogical research. At one end of the spectrum is the
expectation that the Internet is the answer to everything
and that a person will never have to step foot in a library
again, while people at the other end of the scale feel that
the Internet is a black hole and a vast wasteland made up
of irresponsibly shared, random data. Both groups are wrong.
Both groups are looking at the Internet and seeing what they
want to see there, as opposed to what actually is there.
The
Newbies
Many people who are new to genealogy and genealogical research
on the Internet come to this relatively new facility with
very high expectations for what they expect to find. Many
hope to be able to plug their surname into a database somewhere
online and have a completed family history pop up in front
of them. This is not a new misconception when it comes to
genealogical research. It has long been assumed by people
new to genealogy that you could do the same at a library,
or at an LDS Family History Center, through a society or with
the mysteriously, magical help of a professional researcher
(who, it is usually assumed, has a large pile of documentation
lying around for every person’s family history). Anyone
who has been exposed to the basics of genealogical research
knows that this isn’t possible under any circumstance.
The solution to this is to encourage those who are new to
genealogy to educate themselves by pointing them to articles,
books and tutorials that will get them started down the right
path for their research.
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| This
ad, which probably appeared in the Montreal Star, was
run to announce Lance Corporal Stanford's return from
service and to advertise the store's expansion and renovation. |
The
Oldies-but-Goodies
A large group of genealogists, made up of long time, seasoned
veterans who perform careful, documented, methodical genealogical
research, have followed the growth and popularity of the Internet
with concern and trepidation, some even with loathing or a
sense of foreboding. This group has been skeptical about the
resources found online. They have seen the overwhelming surge
in the popularity of the Internet and in genealogy. They have
read the wild claims that you “can find everything you
need on the Internet” or that you “won’t
ever need to go to a library again” and they, quite
rightfully, cringe and shriek. Further, they have investigated
some of the examples of personal genealogical research that
are being published online, and they find a great majority
of those examples to be lacking in documented source citation,
thus apparently lacking in quality background research to
begin with. These devoted researchers have tended to condemn
the entirety of the Internet based on the poor quality of
the few examples they have seen. To light a candle rather
than curse the darkness, this group must open up their minds
a bit and explore the Internet, ignore the mish-mash of undocumented
research, and instead delve into the quality resources that
abound.
The
Internet — A New Tool for Your Genealogy Toolbox
Genealogical research entails a process of methodically locating
and documenting each record available for each individual
in your own personal family tree. The Internet does not contain
a scanned image — a digital copy — of every record
or document that pertains to each one of your individual ancestors
and to each of those people’s lives on this planet.
Until it does, you will still need to use traditional offline
research facilities and methods. However, the same can be
said of traditional offline research facilities. None of them
contains a copy of every record or document for each of your
individual ancestors. They never have. Genealogists have always
had to use a combination of family sources, libraries, archives,
LDS Family History Centers, societies, professionals and a
variety of miscellaneous resources in order to cover the entire
gamut of records and sources necessary to document the lives
of your ancestors. Now you must add the Internet to that mix.
It is merely a tool that you add to your already existing
set of tools. It is the most powerful tool that you have to
date, because it helps to expedite many of your current processes
and has been proven to save time and money, as well as energy
in many instances.
Not All Sources are Perfect
Historically, genealogists have been reminded often that we
cannot trust everything we find in print. Humans create, write
and publish data, and humans can make errors. Books can have
errors. Transcribed or extracted records can have errors.
Genealogical research — methodically documented or quickly
slapped together — can have errors. The same can now
be said of electronic media, including CD-ROMs and the Internet.
The fact that the media is electronic, rather than pen and
ink on paper, does not change the fact that humans generate
the data. This means that not everything you find online is
guaranteed to be correct, in the same way that not everything
you find elsewhere is guaranteed to be correct. ’Twas
ever thus — the speed at which we find information (factual
or error-ridden) is all that has changed.
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GLOSSARY
E-mail or electronic mail is the means
by which we all communicate online. It is the single
most important tool that a genealogical researcher has
on the Internet. Effective e-mail communications are
the key to productivity online.
Mailing
lists are interactive forums with groups of
e-mail messages, sorted by specific topics, that can
be accessed by people all over the world. There are
genealogy mailing lists for specific surnames, ethnic
groups, localities worldwide, religious groups, software
programs or historical events. Messages sent to mailing
lists contain everything from general quesions to surname
queries, as well as requests for help, offers of help,
advice, or research hints and tips. You can browse,
read and post messages, as well as respond to other
messages contained in a mailing list and participate
in ongoing "conversations," also known as threads. Mailing
lists are free for you to subscribe to with the only
expense to you being the regular monthly cost of your
e-mail and Internet connection.
Message
boards are websites which allow the visitor
to post messages, generally genealogical queries for
specific topics, localities and surnames. Messages can
be read via the web page and visitors can reply to previously
posted messages through the same form. The messages
and subsequent replies end up forming a hierarchy of
questions and answers, making it easy to visually see
the thread of a conversation on a particular subject.
A
web browser is a software program such
as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer.
A
web page is a plain, ASCII text document,
written in the HTML programming language, stored on
an Internet server at a specific web address (URL -
uniform resource locator).
A
website is made up of several web pages,
usually with a common theme or belonging to one webmaster.
A
home page is the main index page, the
cover page, the front page or the front door to a website.
A
webmaster is the author and/or creator
and/or maintainer of a website.
A
link is a specific anchor (text or a graphic)
found on a web page, which will help direct you to another
web address on the Internet. Text links will usually
appear in a different color from the rest of the text
on the web page. Most often they will also be underlined.
You can identify a text or graphic link by passing your
cursor over the item. Your cursor will change from an
arrow to a hand with a pointing finger. This indicates
that the text or the graphic is a "clickable" link.
A
URL or uniform resource locator is
the address for a website.
HTML
stands for Hypertext Markup Language. It is the programming
language of the web. A web browser interprets the HTML
source code and displays the web page for you to view.
An
HTML editor is a software program that
creates web pages and writes the HTML code for you.
An
ISP is your Internet Service Provider. |
Primary
and Secondary Data
The objective has always been and continues to be locating primary
and secondary source data whenever and wherever possible. Primary
data is that which is known or recorded by a person who has
direct knowledge of an event in a person’s life. For example,
the information on a birth certificate is primary data because
the parents of the child are there, providing the information
about the birth of that child. Secondary data can be seen as
something that is basically second-hand knowledge. A death certificate
would contain both primary and secondary data. The date and
circumstances of the death are primary data because the record
is being created at the time of the death. Other information,
such as the birth of the person who died would be provided by
someone else (i.e. a child or spouse), and would be considered
secondary.
Finding
Aids
We must use a variety of finding aids to help us locate the
primary and secondary source data that we need. These finding
aids include:
• Personal resources (i.e. diaries, letters, photographs,
family Bibles)
• Libraries (i.e. books, microfiche/film, newspapers,
journals, newsletters, magazines)
• Archives and other records repositories (i.e. vital
records, census records, ship passenger lists, naturalization
records, military records)
• The LDS Family History Library and Family History
Centers (i.e. the IGI, Ancestral File, the FHL Catalog)
• Genealogical and historical societies (i.e. journals,
quarterlies, newsletters, locality-specific publications)
• Miscellaneous sources (i.e. ethnic collections, church
records, fraternal groups)
Now, the tricky part for both groups of researchers described
above: redirect your thinking so that you now view the Internet
as a finding aid as well. The Internet will help you locate
each of the resources described above and will help you learn
how to make the best use of those same resources.
In
What Other Ways Can the Internet be Defined?
Now you know the Internet doesn’t have every piece of
genealogical material you need for your own personal family
history. You also know that everything you find online isn’t
just a mish-mash of hastily slapped together misinformation.
So, what is the Internet? For genealogy, the Internet is:
• a classroom
• a meeting place
• a library or archive
• a reference library
• a shopping mall
• a forum on which you can publish your own family information
and research findings
You
Learn Something New Every Day
Traditionally, in order to learn about genealogical research,
much of the learning process would take place remotely. Genealogists,
rookies and veterans, gather together at genealogy society
meetings and seminars in order to teach, to learn and to share.
Many aids to learning about genealogical research can also
be found in magazines, journals and books. However, the audience
for such publications has always been narrowly defined until
recently. The Internet has opened up many possibilities for
people to publish articles and tutorials and for genealogical
researchers to locate and learn from these important resources.
As you come across a new topic or a new locality in your genealogical
research, turn to the Internet to see if there is any information
about that topic or locality. Take the time to educate yourself
and use the expertise being offered by others online.
• Beginner’s Guide to Family History Research
(biz.ipa.net/
arkresearch/guide.html)
• Family History SourceGuide - Discovering Your Family
Tree (www.familysearch.org/sg/DisTree.html)
• RootsWeb’s Guide to Tracing Family Trees (www.rootsweb.com/~rwguide/)
• Standards for Sound Gen. Research (www.ngsgenealogy.org/about/content/committees/gene_stan.html)
A
Global Meeting Place
One of the most productive uses for the Internet is as a meeting
place for genealogical researchers and long-lost cousins.
People are using message boards, chat rooms, newsgroups and
mailing lists to exchange information on common localities,
genealogical topics and specific surnames. Imagine exchanging
e-mail with a group of a few hundred other people, from all
around the globe, who are researching in the same region that
you are, or who are focusing on the same surname. Take it
one step further and imagine being able to share what you
know with these people and then learning from them in return.
Mailing lists are by far the leader in making the Internet
a global, 24-hour-a-day, virtual genealogy society meeting
place. There are currently more than 16,000 genealogy mailing
lists. These mailing lists are free for you to subscribe to
via e-mail. Mailing lists are very easy to participate in,
once you know a few of the basics. First, there are usually
two or more e-mail addresses used for mailing lists. There
is generally one specific address used for you to send your
initial “subscribe” message, which is also the
same address you use when you want to unsubscribe or leave
the list. There is a different address that you should use
to post messages to the mailing list. Once you subscribe to
a list successfully, you will receive a confirmation and a
welcome message. Read the welcome message to learn what you
need to know about the list. Save a copy of the message for
future reference. After that you will begin to receive copies
of messages that other subscribers send to the mailing list.
You can choose to read them, answer them, delete them or save
them. When you first join a list you should try to “lurk”
for a while. This is a common reference online, which basically
means that you can eavesdrop on conversations that take place
on the list. This gives you time to get acquainted with how
mailing lists work and how the people on each list interact
with one another. Once you feel comfortable with the basics
of the list, jump right in and post a message introducing
yourself. Let everyone know about you, your genealogical research
and what you hope to gain by participating in the mailing
list.
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The
Official Land Patent Records Site currently features
the records of the General Land Office for the eastern
US. The records for the western states are due to be
added in the near future. |
Mailing lists are made up of the same sort of people that
you know elsewhere in your daily life. You will find every
sort of personality and every level of genealogical expertise
represented by the other participants of your list. Some mailing
lists are very active and others have long dry spells without
much traffic. Some mailing lists have very active “list
owners” — the people responsible for setting up
and maintaining the list — and others do not. However,
when it comes right down to it, mailing lists are only as
good as the participants of the list. Would you expect to
show up at a genealogy society meeting, then have everyone
just sit and stare at one another? I suspect you wouldn’t.
Instead, each of the people in the group interacts, shares,
discusses and responds to one another. The same idea should
be applied to participation in mailing lists. Interact with
others, share what you know, offer to help and ask your own
questions. As you do this, you will find that your time spent
online is much more productive and every bit of energy you
spend in participation will come back to you tenfold.
• Genealogy Resources on the Internet: Mailing Lists
(members.aol.com/johnf14246/gen_mail.html)
• SierraHomeFamily Tree Message Board (forums.sierra.com/forums/familytreetopic/)
• AOL Keyword: Roots (In the Genealogy Forum choose
Chats)
• GenConnect at RootsWeb (cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/)
• FamilyHistory.com — Online Genealogy Community
(www.familyhistory.com)
The
Internet as a Library
Still in its infancy, the possibilities are endless for the
publication of records on the Internet. At some point in the
near future, it is easy to imagine the Internet becoming a
vast and comprehensive genealogical library or records archive.
There are already many projects online, the product of government
agencies, volunteers and commercial entities alike, with the
purpose of making records available to the online community.
Anyone with access to the Internet and permission to publish
or re-publish genealogical data, can transcribe or digitally
scan data and create a website to house that data.
• Scots Origins (www.origins.net/GRO/)
• The Bureau of Land Management — Eastern States,
General Land Office (www.glorecords.blm.gov)
• USGenWeb Digital Library
(www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/)
• USGenWeb Census Project
(www.usgenweb.org/census/)
• USGenWeb Tombstone Project
(www.rootsweb.com/~cemetery/)
When
You Need to Know Something, Look it Up
At your fingertips, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you
have access to genealogy dictionaries, foreign translation
tools, historical maps, and a myriad of quick reference sites
of every sort imaginable. What is a soundex? How do you use
it? Is there an LDS Family History Center close to your home?
How can you order a copy of a birth certificate from Illinois?
And how much will it be? What does “dower” mean?
What is the original parent county for Rockingham County,
Virginia? Instead of saving your question for the next trip
to the library or the next genealogy society meeting, use
an Internet resource to find the answer to your question.
• Vital Records Information - State Index (vitalrec.com/index.html)
• Calculating Birth Year Based on Census Information
(www.wdbj.net/~wdbj/gen/
birthyear/cenindx.html)
• Genealogy Abbreviations (homepages.rootsweb.com/
~sam/abbr.html)
• Genealogy Dictionary (home.att.net/~dottsr/diction.html)
• AltaVista Translation Service (babelfish.altavista.digital.com)
• Where to Obtain Land Patents/Warrants (homepages.rootsweb.com/~haas/
learningcenter/patentlocations.html)
• The Soundex Machine (www.nara.gov/genealogy/soundex/)
Shopping in Your Bathrobe and Slippers
Vendors have also found in the Internet a whole new marketplace
in which to advertise and sell their genealogical products.
Consumers can shop, compare, sample and purchase everything
necessary to stock their genealogical research toolbox, including
books, magazines, charts, forms, maps, software and an assortment
of other odds and ends. Just as the Internet is making the
average consumer much more savvy, it is helping to prepare
the genealogical shopper before they spend their money. Friends
and colleagues online share advice with one another via mailing
lists and chat rooms. Many websites for genealogy software
offer demo versions so that you can try before you buy and
shareware vendors have an even easier method by which to make
their programs known. Customarily, mail order through paper
catalogs was the way for people to learn about and purchase
genealogy books. Now many people are finding the Internet
to be a great tool for helping them to learn about what sorts
of books and other published materials are available to aid
in their genealogical research.
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The
Vital Records Information State Index site tells where
to find birth, marriage divorce and death records for
each state and territory in the US. |
Become
an Author and a Publisher
For most genealogists, the ultimate goal is to be able to
publish their genealogical research and share their years
of work with their family and the world. In the past this
has meant that most people waited as long as possible before
publishing their work. They wanted to have it as complete
as possible before finally committing it to paper for all
eternity. Often there is quite an expense involved in publishing
a book, so there are usually a limited number of copies made.
Once the work in published in book form, it might be quite
a while before any new or updated information would be gathered
in order to print a revision of the book. The Internet has
changed all that. The goal is still to publish and books will
always be one of the mainstays of genealogical research. But
now some of the rules and expectations have changed, not to
mention the difference in expense and energy involved to publish
one’s work on the Internet.
Publishing a website is something that everyone has the opportunity
to do. Most people have web space available to them as part
of their monthly Internet connection fee. There are also many
facilities online which allow you to publish your family history
for free. Websites can be as simple as you like or as complex
as your imagination can make them. Begin with one simple web
page. Include contact information and a brief list of your
research efforts to date, including names, dates and places.
As you progress in your research, add more and more material
to the site. Include scanned images of records, documents
and photographs. Write articles and include them on the site
to share your own bit of expertise with the world. The limitations
of money and time are no longer an impediment to you being
able to share what you have done.
Because information can be shared so easily on the Internet,
everyone who participates in online research has become both
an author and a publisher. Many people aren’t aware
of that. Messages posted on a website with queries or message
boards are published material. E-mail messages to mailing
lists end up in archives on Internet servers around the globe.
These archives can be searched by anyone at any time from
that point forward. Now, all these people who are electronic
authors and publishers need to familiarize themselves with
the many aspects of this new facility.
All the same rules apply to online publishing that apply to
offline publishing. Copyright, source citation and privacy
are among the chief concerns that devoted genealogical researchers
have regarding online publications. The copyright that others
hold on published materials must be respected. Do not publish
copied information without the permission of the original
author. Citing your sources and documenting your research,
aids in responsible publication of your genealogical research.
Indicate in all your publications where you found a specific
piece of data, giving explicit references. If you have included
undocumented data in your electronic publication, clearly
indicate that the data is your ‘best guess” or
yet to be proven. Finally, in honoring your ancestors, make
sure you honor the privacy of your living family members.
In general, don’t publish any information about anyone
after about 1920.
• Cyndi’s Genealogy Home Page Construction Kit
(www.CyndisList.com/construc.htm)
• Transforming Your GEDCOM Files Into Web Pages (oz.net/~markhow/writing/gedcom.htm)
• Publishing Your Family History on the Internet (www.compuology.com/book2.htm)
• Adventures in Cyberspace (www.ancestry.com/columns/myra/Shaking_Family_Tree07-09-98.htm)
• U.S. Copyright Office (lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/)
• CIPO: Canadian Intellectual Property Office (cipo.gc.ca)
The Internet
is a powerful tool in a genealogist’s toolbox. It should
be viewed seriously, with respect for what it truly is and
what it can be. Now it is time for everyone to look at the
Internet and see what really is there, then learn how to use
what is there with efficiency, productivity and responsibility.
Cyndi
Howells owns and maintains Cyndi’s List, the consistently
top-rated website for genealogists (including Family Chronicle’s
own survey). She is the author of the best-selling books Netting
Your Ancestors and Cyndi’s List.
This
article originally appeared in the January/February 2000 issue
of Family Chronicle.
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