Focus on the Context Because Context Is Everything

I'm often approached at the end of a presentation at a meeting or conference and asked for advice for solving a research challenge. A person will launch in with something like, "I've been unable to find my 3x great-grandfather and he's a complete brick wall. Where should I look?"

I have to stop the person and ask, "Where do you think he lived? When do you think he was there? What are you trying to prove or disprove?" I need to understand the context first before I can even begin to offer any suggestions. It is imperative that I know the place and time period: that determines what geopolitical entity was in power, what records were being produced at the time, and makes me consider boundary changes and other events that might influence the research approach.

Sometimes the responses I get from a person make me wonder if he or she had really focused on the context of the ancestor's circumstances and/or developed a research plan. The research plan would need to concentrate on time, place, historical and personal events, records being produced, and later jurisdictional changes that influence where the records WERE produced and WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

It's easier these days, with the tsunami of new records being made available online all the time, to get pulled into a mode of reacting with rapid research. This can undermine the time we take to thoroughly analyze each record, and to relate it to others. That means we may miss apparent connections, we may not develop thoughtful hypotheses, and we probably don't prepare (or revise) a viable and potentially successful research plan. We may also rush to conclusions without considering the whole picture.

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely love talking to people at seminars and getting these questions. They make me think outside my own research box *and* to use my more than half-century of experience with thousands of research record types and content. And what I will always do is ask you to step back and ask yourself the questions that will help place your ancestor into temporal, geographical, and political context. I hope you will do that on a regular basis. Refer to Cyndi's List and to the FamilySearch Research Wiki for ideas and references to records and methodologies.

And take the time to read, analyze, and understand every record you encounter. Compare and relate it to other evidence you may have (or will) encountered. And develop a research plan, no matter how small, to focus yourself on success.

Online Library Reference Resources

Some libraries also have made their reference sheets about their collections, sometimes referred to as "pathfinders," available on the Internet. Others may have produced one or more brochures, such as the one for the Allen County Public Library's impressive Genealogy Center (see brochure here) to highlight their collection. Other libraries may simply provide an informative webpage such as the one for the Florida History and Genealogy Library's collection at the Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library.

Archives like the US Library of Congress showcase special collections as individual components of their website. Others, like the National Archives and Records Administration (a unit of the US federal government) provide an entire Resources for Genealogists webpage to help you use their vast collections. And FamilySearch, the venerable Family History Library of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Salt Lake City provides its helpful online resources in the form of the FamilySearch Research Wiki with more than 88,000 articles as of this writing.

All of these may include instructions for locating materials in the collection, bibliographies by document type, online images, special collections, and aids for items that may not have been added to the electronic catalog.

These informative resources be conveniently accessed on the Internet from your home computer 24/7. They also can help you learn in advance of a research visit what materials they hold in their collections so that you can prepare yourself for a more effective research trip. When visiting public and academic libraries' and archives' Web sites, don't forget to check on the availability of online, electronic materials.

Take some time to learn how to effectively use the facility's online catalog. And don't be shy about contacting and asking questions of the reference librarians.

Royalty free mage from Pik Wizard.

Record Dates and Places Consistently

It is important to record dates in your research in a consistent manner, whether on paper or in your genealogy database program. The accepted standard among genealogists is to use the European method of indicating Day Month Year. For example, my mother's birthdate of July 10, 1911, would be recorded as 11 July 1911. 

Sometimes the dates you are recording are only approximate and you want to indicate that they are not exact.  You might specify an approximate date as either 'about' (recorded as abt) or 'circa' (recorded as Ca. or ca.) or 'before' (recorded as bef) or after (recorded as aft).  

It is better to be approximate in this manner if you are not certain instead of indicating a specific date. It is also helpful to indicates in the fact notes for the event in your database what it is in the evidence you have examined or why you have indicated other than an exact date.

When you have no proof of a date, it is better to leave the date blank and add a note in your database fact notes if appropriate. This can remind you the next time you research on that person what evidence you have (or have not) examined and what your thought processes were at that time.

Place names should always be entered as they were at the time of the event. Boundaries and geopolitical jurisdictions changed over time. By doing so you will always be prompted to search for additional records from the same time period in the right place. Use histories and historical maps to help understand who was in control at the time. Here are some examples.

• John McKnitt Alexander was born 6 June 1733 in a specific place in New Munster in Cecil County Maryland. Since this pre-dated the American Revolution, Maryland was an English colony. You would record the place as:

New Munster, Cecil County, Maryland, British Colonial America

He died on 10 April 1917 in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. This was now a part of the United States. You could record the place as:

 Mecklenburg County, North Carolina   or

Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, United States of American   or

Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, USA 

• Thomas Beswick Sissons was born in Yorkshire, England, on 25 August 1880 and died on 22 June 1942 in New Zealand. In my RootsMagic genealogy database, I reflect a number of events/facts with dates and locations as precisely as I can so that I will be able to home in on them again as needed. (Source citations help me find the location of the actual evidence I examined and I may also have acquired an image (media) of the evidence.) Here is a portion of my database screen.

Record for Thomas Beswick Sissons from the
 author's RootsMagic database.
CLICK TO ENLARGE IMAGE

These entries may also have fact notes explaining my analysis, hypotheses, and conclusions.

One of my Morgan ancestors purchased a piece of property in what was Orange County, North Carolina, in 1755, and part of the property still remains in the family. Over the years, counties were formed and boundaries changed. For example:

Orange County NC was created out of parts of Bladen, Granville, and Johnston counties in 1752.

Caswell County was formed from Orange County on 8 April 1777.

Person County, formed from Caswell County in 1791 and effective 1 February 1792.

A second cousin owns a portion of the original land parcel, and it now lies in Person County. In the course of my research, I researched land, tax, and probate records for my ancestral line in Orange County, then Caswell County, and finally in Person County. The jurisdictional changes also caused me to look for marriage records and other documents for many family members in those other counties. By recording each event with the county name/jurisdiction, I have been able to return in my research again and again to the right county courthouse. I've also been able to share information with other researchers and direct them to the right place.

An excellent reference source for exact county formation and boundary change dates in addition to historical maps is the FamilySearch Research Wiki at https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Main_Page. Be sure to use this great resource in your research!