As family history researchers, we are usually fascinated by maps - at least I am. These visual interpretations help us understand our family's origins in other countries and provide information on how our immigrant ancestors traveled to ports to board their ships, in addition to understanding historical events.

Those maps can be found in gazetteers and online. There are also local maps that can help us locate relatives who lived in towns and cities. Some local maps are for tax purposes, and others were developed for fire insurance liability.

In the US, the Sanborn Company published more than 660,000 maps from 1867-1970. These maps were drawn to help insurance underwriters understand the risks of insuring buildings in cities and towns.

For more than a century, over 660,000 Sanborn maps have demonstrated the growth and development of more than 12,000 American towns and cities. New digitalization projects, such as the one at the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County (Ohio), preserve the original colors in the two volumes scanned so far. Volume 1 runs 1904-1917, while Volume 2 runs 1904-1930.

The originals were colored according to construction key and other details. Some libraries have microfilmed copies of the maps which are only in black and white, but digitization preserves the original colors (see below)

Let's take a look at what the Cincinnati maps hold for illustration purposes. At this library, there's a separate PDF document online for each index page and map sheet.

All the sheets are on a map index (see below). Each sheet shows about four to six blocks. The scale of 50:1 means that each inch of the map covers 50 feet, allowing for considerable detail. Major public buildings include houses of worship, companies, public schools and more.

Continue reading "Digitized Maps: Another source of family details" »

FamilyTreeDNA.com is now cooperating with the Center for African American Genealogy Research (CAAGRI) and the Public Records and Archives Administration of Ghana (PRAAD) by testing several hundred members of the Nzema, Ga, Fante, Ewe and Asante tribes.

The results of the DNA tests will be part of a genealogy workshop to be held Friday, October 30 in Accra, Ghana. Led by CAAGRI director Paula Royster, the workshop is aimed at highlighting the importance of recording oral traditions by showing people how to record it.

The program will include the use of online databases to search for ancestors and descendants, preservation of songs and photographs, transcriptions of stories passed from generation to generation and forensic genealogy.

Ghana's participation in this effort is important as their archives house more than 4 million records. Many of them relate to the trans-Atlantic slave trade, which affected people of African descent.

FamilyTreeDNA - founded in April 2000 - was the first company to develop the commercial application of DNA testing for genealogical purposes. Before then, it had only been available for academic and scientific research. The Houston, Texas-based company has a database with more than 265,000 individual records. This is the largest DNA database in genetic genealogy, and means that testing with FamilyTreeDNA and using its comparative database makes it a prime resource for anyone reseraching recent or distant family ties.

The non-profit Center for African American Genealogical Research provides genealogical resources and support at no cost to the community. It was established in 2004.

It is the only organization of its kind and offers unique on-site support services for the African-American researcher. Support includes research assistance, workshops and genealogy-mentor programs for low-income youth.

It has technical learning centers and continues to provde innovative ways to collect, preserve and interpret the past for the education and enjoyment of present and future generations.

For additional resources to help you to research your African American families:

-- Louisiana Division, New Orleans Public Library (Louisiana)

-- Afrigeneas.com

-- Genealogy.com - African American resources

-- African American Examiner

I'm interested in hearing your success stories and how these resources have helped. I look forward to reading your comments!

Have you thought about the fact that while genealogists are historians - it is an integral element of our quest for knowledge - historians may not be genealogists?

How do genealogists gain understanding and perspective when dealing with history? History to a genealogist is not the dry historical happenings of a distant past, but is often very personal history - events that our ancestors either lived through or died from as a result.

As I have written previously, I was usually bored by high school and college history classes, except for some very specific topics, such as Sephardic history. Who cared about all those other dates and places? What did those events have to do with me?

My interest in history changed dramatically once I began working on my family's history, and began following my ancestors back over the centuries in Iran, Spain, Russia, Belarus, Lithuania, Israel and the US.

Suddenly, those dry boring dates and dusty forgotten places became very important as I learned that my ancestors lived there or were eyewitnesses to or participants in those same historical events.

Genealogy is more than just lists of names and dates - it is about our ancestors as people. How did they live? Where did they go and why? How did circumstances and historical events impact their lives? History becames very personal if there is a tie to specific times and places where where our ancestors lived.

It was somewhat of a shock when I realized that if one of my direct ancestors had died - before producing children - as a result of an epidemic, a war or a sinking boat, then I would not be alive today. This realization hits every genealogist at some point, and it brings everything back to a very personal reality. When I taught genealogy to elementary and junior high students, I would discuss this very point and student reactions were interesting as they came to the same realization.

While researching an article on genealogy in New Mexico, I came across an article by Karen Stein Daniel, editor of the New Mexico Genealogist, published by the New Mexico Genealogical Society ADD URL.

Note that, if you have roots in New Mexico going back to the 16th century or at any time, this journal is filled with fascinating articles. Published for some 40 years, a CD is for sale containing all the issues. It is well worth it and I strongly recommend acquiring it. The society's website offers some articles and resources online.

In Stein Daniel's article, "Historiography for Genealogists: A Perspective in Understanding," she offers the Random House Dictionary of the English Language (1966 edition) definition of historiography:

"the body of literature dealing with historical matters; the body of techniques, theories, and principles of historical research and presentation, and methods of historical scholarship; the narrative presentation of history based on a critical examination, evaluation, and selection of material from primary and secondary sources and subject to scholarly criteria."

Stein Daniel writes that this sounds like the application and methods that genealogists should be adhering to in research and writing, regardless of whether or not it is for publication.

In 1934, famous historian Charles A. Beard wrote: "...historians recognize ... the obvious, long known ... that any written history inevitably reflects the thought of the author in his time and cultural setting .... Has it not been said for a century or more that each historian who writes a history is a product of his age."

Continue reading "History: Dry boring dates, dusty places?" »

Laurence Harris has always been interested in family history and genealogy, and he still has the very first family tree he drew when he was 19.

Laurence has now joined the MyHeritage.com team as the UK Family History Advisor, and I'm genuinely happy to introduce him to the community. We first met in London several years ago, and most recently at a genealogical conference in August.

A UK-based family historian with many years of experience, including more than five years as a professional genealogist, Laurence has researched two members of the House of Lords, and researches for the popular BBC series, "Who Do You Think You Are?"

He's also a satisfied user of MyHeritage's tools for both his personal family research and his professional (personal and corporate) clients. Thus, it seemed natural for him to join the MyHeritage team, on a part-time basis, as our UK Family History advisor.

"I am delighted to be joining MyHeritage," said Laurence. "I hope that I can use my knowledge and experience of the UK, its communities and family history research sources to ensure that the products and services continue to be developed in a way that provides even more functionality and benefits for us as users."

Why does Laurence like MyHeritage?

Continue reading "Laurence Harris: UK Family History Advisor" »

MyHeritage.com was happy to learn that the MyHeritage Genealogy Blog had been nominated for Family Tree Magazine's 40 Best Genealogy Blogs (Family Tree 40).

Some 130 blogs are listed in 10 categories; MyHeritage Genealogy Blog is in the Genealogy Company category.

Readers can vote for a clearly marked specific number of blogs in each category. Blog URLs are included on the voting form, so you can check out blogs. Voting is now open through November 5. You can vote more than once.

To learn about the voting process, click here to read the magazine's Genealogy Insider blog posting.

The 80 blogs receiving the most votes will make it to the finals, and the magazine's editorial staff will select the 40 winners, to be announced in the May 2010 Family Tree Magazine and in the Genealogy Insider e-mail newsletter.

The categories are:

All-around
These bloggers give you a little (or a lot) of everything: news, research advice, their own family stories, photos, opinions and more.

Genealogy Companies (MyHeritage Genealogy Blog is here)
Blogs in this category are written on behalf of a genealogy company, and contain helpful (but not overly advertising-oriented) information on the company’s products, as well as other resources.

Heritage
Here, blog content focuses on a particular heritage group, such as African-American, Jewish or Irish.

News/Resources
These blogs deliver a range of genealogy news and information about new resources.

Cemetery
These focus on cemetery research, gravestone photos, etc.

Photos/Heirlooms
Content here is primarily about sharing, researching and preserving family photos and/or heirlooms.

How-to
Blogs here offer instructional content on genealogical resources and methodology.

Genetic Genealogy
These are primarily about genetic genealogy (DNA) and family health history.

Local/Regional
Most posts in these blogs cover resources, genealogy events and history for a specific city, town, state or region.

Personal/Family
Blogs here cover primarily a blogger's own research and ancestors. Family historians write what they know and what’s important to them.

Follow contest updates from Family Tree Magazine on Twitter (hashtag #FT40).

Click here to get voting!

Happy 2560th birthday to famed Chinese philosopher Confucius, and his more than 2 million descendants. About 1,000 people attended the presentation this week of the latest revision of the family tree in his ancestral town of Qufu.

The family tree covers 43,000 pages in 80 volumes and, for the first time, women, minorities and foreigners have been included. The family genealogy has been maintained for some 2,000 years.

The Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee headed by Kong Deyong (who also heads the International Confucius Association), is supposed to revise the family tree every 60 years but political events precluded the last scheduled revision. The previously published edition was in 1937, when there were only some 600,000 descendants.

The association believes that this genealogy is a unique branch of Chinese traditional culture and that it has great value in research on anthropology, demographics, clan and genealogical studies.

Some 500 worldwide branches assisted the Hong Kong-based committe to gather information.

Also for the first time, descendants who converted to Islam are also included. They live in communities in the eastern Qinghai Province and converted in the Yuan Dynasty. During the project, branches in Shanxi and Henan provinces lost for more than 1,000 years were rediscovered.

On September 29, a 77th-generation descendant presented the family tree to the National Library of China, Taipei's National Central Library and Qufu municipal government. Qufu is the ancestral town of Confucius.

More than 40,000 overseas descendants were added; 34,000 of them from the Republic of Korea, who descend from a 54th-generation descendant who went there during the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368). Some 900 descendants were discovered in Taiwan, and there are also descendants in the US, UK and other countries.

This fifth revision project took 10 years to complete and cost the descendants about $1.5 million. Each new member paid an official registration fee of about 70 US cents, and their deceased members were added free. For the first time ever, the revision was funded by private donations.

The update, available in digital format, includes the name of the spouse, educational background and posts held by descendants. For female descendants, the names of their spouses will be written in smaller characters.

The inclusion of female descendants represents, says the committee, social progress and women's rights, and affected more than 200,000 Chinese women living today.

According to Confucius, individuals are a link in the chain of existence from the past to the future, and he believed that everyone should have descendants to continue the family tree. Not having children is considered inexcusable and male children were important to continue the family name.

Although this project greatly increased the numbers of descendants, others were still left out as they did not know the names of their grandfathers or present evidence to support their own family trees.

Many genealogists today will ask why DNA and genetic genealogy hasn't been used for those people. However, although the committee did accept women and minorities, it did not accept DNA evidence.

Blaine Bettinger's The Genetic Genealogist blog, included a quote from Seed Magazine's "Inheriting Confucius," indicating "Given the potential implications of genetic knowledge for long-presumed members of the family, they think it is better not to know."

However, the Beijing Institute of Genomics has a Confucius DNA Project, and descendants can submit a sample for analysis for $125.

More Resources:

Newspaper articles about the project:

http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90776/90882/6355646.html

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90782/90873/6767102.html

http://www.rmhb.com.cn/chpic/htdocs/english/200704/9-1.htm

http://china.org.cn/english/features/cw/182581.htm

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200702/05/eng20070205_347645.html

Learn more about Confucianism here.

Libraries are a major source of information for genealogists and family historians. In addition to nurturing the love of books in children and young people, they provide wide-ranging sources of information and community services for all library patrons and their neighborhoods.

In fact, 10 New York City Public Library branches in three boroughs (Bronx, Manhattan and Staten Island) have been open - since September 14 - for expanded hours from early morning through late night, for an average of 52.5 hours weekly. Some branches are open 8am-11pm, others from 10am-9pm. People who work during the day will now have an opportunity to access major free resources.

While New York's famed libraries - where I spent many hours from elementary school through college - are expanding hours, other libraries are either closing or - horror of horrors - giving away their books, such as this school in Massachusetts is getting rid of its books in favor of technology. Personally, I think it is short-sighted, given the fact that information recorded only a few years ago on such technology as 4-inch floppies cannot be read today, but a book printed five centuries ago can still be read. Do read the comments to this story; there were more than 500 the last time I checked.

However, for many US libraries, the economic situation has caused a major kick to the chest and reduced hours and service cuts are in the news for libraries across the United States.

Indeed, we were shocked to hear that the Free Library of Philadelphia's entire system might be closed as of October 2, 2009, unless Pennsylvania legislators reached a budget agreement.

The closure would have cancelled all programming for children and adults, InterLibrary Loan, circulation of materials, computer classes, afterschool programs and community meetings. This is serious business, not only for genealogists, but for all residents whose neighborhood libraries would close.

However, in Philadelphia, the outcome was a happy one. The Free Library's website reported on Thursday, September 17, that the Pennsylvania State Senate had passed the bill needed to avoid closings. State legislators received more than 2,000 letters (in addition to phone calls and emails) in support of the libraries.

Continue reading "Family history: Budget cut problems" »

Each search engine seems to produce different results. Google, Bing, Yahoo.

I tried a quick search recently using all three. The goal of my search was Vorotinschtina, a small agricultural colony established in the 1830s, adjacent to the hamlet of Zaverezhye, about 12 miles southwest of Mogilev, Belarus.

Vorotinshtina, Belarus
53' 50" N 30'03" E
101 mi E of Minsk
Vorotinshtina [Yid], Vorotinschtina, Worotyńszczyzna [Pol], Vorotinschtina-Zaverezhye

Zaverezh'ye, Belarus
53'50" N 30'03" E
101 mi E of Minsk
Zaverezh'ye [Rus], Zaverezhye

Results for each set of results pulled items from FamilyTreeDNA.com, JewishGen, blog posts from MyHeritage Genealogy Blog and Tracing the Tribe blog, YNetNews, Jerusalem Post.

Bing produced 14 results. and did not seem to pick up on many blog posts.

Google returned 102 hits, many were duplicates, leaving 28 "real" ones, and one in Spanish.

Yahoo offered 42.

As another simple test of all three, I decided to search for myself to see what numbers each would pick up. I used "schelly talalay dardashti" as the search parameter to limit it to myself and skip mentions of cousins in both families, etc.

Bing 4,520 (but could not click on results higher than 450).
Google 7,940
Yahoo: 7,340, including Facebook

Closer to home, decided to see where and how MyHeritage.com's new Family Tree Builder 4 fared. Here are the results for "MyHeritage.com Family Tree Builder 4.0" -

Bing: 1,970
Google: 66,400
Yahoo: 17,800

Results for "MyHeritage.com" without FTB 4.0:

Bing: 88,700
Google: 2,670,000
Yahoo: 75,800

There are some other sites coming down the road, such as Yebul/Yabul and Kosmix.

Continue reading "Search Engines: Comparing the new ones" »

Why do so many people get involved with tracing their family's ancestry and roots?

Genealogists and family historians will say that there are many reasons including:

- Unraveling history's mysteries
- Learning where, how and why and how our ancestors lived
- Discovering famous ancestors
- Digging up skeletons in our closets
- Leaving our legacy to future generations
- Tracking genetic traits along with genealogy

That last point will help future generations understand their family's health history. Certain genetic conditions run in various ethnic or religious groups.

What's in your family? High cholesterol or blood pressure, heart disease or cancer, Alzeimer's or diabetes? Do you know? Have you investigated death certificates and the causes of death?

Certain genetic conditions are found frequently in different groups such as sickle cell disorder in African Americans, Tay-Sachs in Ashkenazi Jews and Cajuns and a host of other conditions. Great strides have been made in genetic testing for a long list of conditions such as: Vietnamese, thalassemia; Finns, congenital nephrosis; and Northern Europeans, cystic fibrosis.

How can you collect this information? The best way is to talk to your family at lifecycle events or at holiday gatherings. Gather information on the family's ethnicity, race and origins, health history of each branch (was there diabetes, cancer, heart disease?) and lifestyle questions (smoking, medical care, etc.)

Listed below are various online resources you can use to help answer some of these questions. When you have collected this information, bring it to your doctor or other healthcare professional. You might be referred to a genetics specialist or your doctor might advise making changes to your lifestyle and diet. Share the information with your family so they will also know of the possibility of risks.

There is also a bioethics component to this area of genealogical research. Some important questions may be: Do you really want to know about your risk or a family trait? What should you share with your family? There is more information on this component in the resource list below.

How can you start working on this important aspect of your family's health history? Family Tree Magazine's "nine steps to a family health history" may help:

- Interview family
- Find death certificates
- Search for obituaries
- Examine cemetery and funeral records
- Check mortality schedules
- Look for insurance records
- Find military service and pension records
- Research hospital and other medical records
- Learn about previous genetic testing in your family

Here's a list of record types that can help you compile this information: Cemetery records, censuses, civil registers (vital records), funeral home records, hospital records, mental institution records, military records, newspaper notices and physicians’ accounts.

A source not usually listed are historic photographs that may contain hints of a medical condition. One could look for swollen hands or legs (that could indicate possible heart disease or arthritis or a number of other conditions), drooping eyelids, differences in right and left sides of a body (perhaps indicating a past stroke or other paralysis), If you have a photo of someone that may raise questions as to the subject's health, ask a doctor to look at it.

Your ancestors' journals and diaries may also contain health information, if you are fortunate enough to have some of these to look at.

What kinds of questions should you ask relatives during your interviews? An article by Barbara Krasner-Khait in Family Tree Magazine a few years ago covered just that:

- Are there any unusual traits?
- Were there miscarriages or stillbirths?
- Was anyone extremely obese or thin?
- Who suffered from major diseases?
- Did anyone have reconstructive surgery?
- Who was hospitalized, for what and how long?
- Did cousins marry cousins? (Common just a generation or two ago in some groups)
- Did anyone abuse alcohol or drugs?
- Did anyone suffer from recurring maladies, such as allergies (and to what), headaches and others?

A good time to ask these questions is when families gather at important civil and religious holidays, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, Passover, July 4th or others. For the past few years, the US Surgeon-General has asked the public to do this during the Thanksgiving Weekend (end of November) family gatherings.

Find the Surgeon General's "My Family Health Portrait" online to complete and print it out to show your doctor. The internet-based tool makes it easy to record your family health history. It assembles the information and makes a family tree you can download. Your information is not kept online, but the printout gives you a health history to share with your family or your doctor.

Continue reading "Family history, health history" »

When you have a genealogy problem, who are you going to call?

Ghostbusters won't help you with genealogy questions - unless they can make contact with your own long-departed ancestors who can answer your questions.

But there are experts out there who will help you solve your family history problem.

There are millions of genealogy blogs in cyberspace. A Google blog search query for "genealogy," showed 1,545,813. Many focus on the author's own research on his or her family. Some focus on a specific state, region, country or type of resource (ethnic, religious, photography, cemeteries, etc.).

How do you find a blog covering the topics in which you are interested?

The newest list of genealogy blogs is found at Geneabloggers.com, with some 600 blogs listed and growing. Major gen blogger Thomas MacEntee decided that there should be a place for all gen blogs and created the site. His blogs are categorized by subject, topic, specific locality or country.

One of the best is Chris Dunham's Blog Finder which categorizes a long list of some 1,400 blogs. They are categorized under personal research, locality specific, technology, single surname, documentary, photography, cemeteries, international, conferences, Jewish, Polish, French Canadian/Acadian, preservation, famous folks, genetic genealogy, podcasts, libraries, associations and societies, African-American, queries, professional genealogists, obituaries, communities, humor, Vlogs and corporate.

For example, there are 174 international blogs, focusing on Canada, Germany, Ireland, Latin America, France, England, Scotland, Sweden, Australia, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Ukraine, South Africa, Croatia, Mexico, Italy, Finland, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, Hungary, Caribbean islands and other countries.

Continue reading "Problem Solving: Genealogy Blogs" »