52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 36

Week 36: Check out the Family History Library catalog (http://www.familysearch.org/eng/Library/FHLC/frameset_fhlc.asp). In terms of its library collections, there are no rivals. From this web page, you can search by place, surname, keyword, title, film/fiche, author, subject, and call number. Try all of them. Don’t do actual research with this exercise. Instead just click links and see all the catalog has to offer. Many of these... items can be rented for a small fee and viewed at your local Family History Center (http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/library/FHC/frameset_FHC.asp). You do not have to be a member of the LDS Church to utilize this service.


This is a timely challenge for me.  Last week I got the call that my FHL microfilm was in!  After learning what parish my Baudermann's were from, Klepsau, Baden, Germany I went online to the Family History Library catalog to see what records are available on film.  I found two sets of film for the area and time frame I was looking for.  Using the place name search, I simply typed in Klepsau and found listings of film from the Catholic Church.

After printing out the film notes pages I used Google Translate to identify exactly what the films contained, which is:  baptism, confirmation, marriage and death records.  What more could I ask for???  Well I could ask for the film to be translated from Gothic German script into English, but that's a pie in the sky dream!

As I am close to the Midwest Genealogy Center, I requested that my film be sent there.  I had no idea how long my wait would be, luckily it was only two weeks.  I made a trip to the library the evening I received the call and started viewing.  Needless to say, I was shocked when I saw the records and my initial reaction was "no way I'm going to be able to figure any of this out", but I kept at it and eventually began to see patterns in the records and figured out how the index worked.

From this index I was able to find the baptism records for my Great Grandfather and two of his siblings!  I used my digital camera to take photos of the microfilm after many unsuccessful attempts to print a readable copy.  I then used Picasa to enhance the images for reading.  I have the film for 30 days and will be making many more trips to view and hopefully find all of the baptisms listed as well as some marriage records.

The Family History Library's collection can be brought directly to you, either to a library or Family History Center.  Take some time to review the catalog and see what they have available in your areas of research. 

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 26

52 Weeks To Better Genealogy – Challenge 26

Take a stroll through Google Books. Most of us have probably used Google Books in our genealogy research, but have you really taken the time to explore what’s there? Look at the magazines and featured books. Check out the subjects offered. By taking the focus off research for a bit, your mind is open to see other ways this tool can be used.

Google Books is in my Top 5 of must search sites when doing genealogy research.  I search for surnames, place names and events, and have had great success with the results.  I have been able to get a feel for some of my ancestors lives as I've found them listed in university yearbooks, fraternal organizations and professional association publications.  Those have provided clues about their occupations, interests and community involvement.  Of course, the full view book returns are the best and I have used up a lot of megabytes downloading a few of those books!

My best find to date was a publication by my Grandfather Baudermann's fraternity that had a section called "Our Brother's At The Boarder" with a list of names.  That cued me into looking for military records for my Grandfather during the Mexican Expedition.  Before finding that article, I had seen nothing that mentioned any type of military service for him.

This challenge is asking us to step back from our usual usage of Google Books and approach it with an open mind to see what's out there.   One of the first things I noticed is in the subject list there are no listings for History or Genealogy.  Yet, when you type "genealogy" in the search box, there are over 1million returns.  How many are needed for a subject listing Google?


I do love all of the magazines, but this is one of those areas that will get me off into a tangent that takes hold of me for hours!  I currently subscribe to six magazines, I love em!  Probably overkill because I can get backlogged a couple of months before reading my issues.  Google Books magazine collection could greatly expand my magazine exposure at a fabulous cost of nothing, in the way of dollars, but I don't think I can afford the time! 


The "interesting" category is just that, very interesting.  If you want to expose yourself to books you would never normally pick off the shelf, click through this category.  You may find only a preview of the book, you may get a snippet view with a few pages from throughout the book, or get lucky and hit a full view return.  If you do find something interesting with only a snippet or preview, just copy and paste the title into your library's card catalog search feature and see if you can get a copy at the local library or through inter library loan.


All in all, Google Books is a great resource for any subject, be sure you have it bookmarked and on your list of regular websites to use for research.

 

 

52 Weeks To Better Genealogy - Challenge 25

Write one good, solid comment on at least one genealogy blog every day for a week. Sometimes we get busy and the genealogy reading we should be doing just piles up. The same thing happens with blogs. This week, take some time to read genealogy blogs. Select at least one post a day and establish communication with the author. Offer a compliment, a question or genealogy information you may have. This challenge provides a little love to bloggers and some new perspectives for researchers. Authors of genealogy blogs can use this opportunity to comment on comments, so to speak.

Just finished the last of my blog reading for the week, my Google Reader count is down to 0.  But a few minutes have past so I am sure that 0 has been replaced!  Blog posts are like rabbits, they multiply like crazy!!  That is fine with me though as I never lack for something to read.

I did make a dedicated effort to read AND comment on more blog posts than I usually do this week.  There are so many informative and entertaining blogs out there on such a wide range of subjects.  Even though I've been reading blogs regularly for almost a year now, I am still surprised at the topics chosen and the volume of material there is on what I would have once considered obscure subjects.  Blog reading has certainly expanded my horizons!

52 Weeks To Better Genealogy - Challenge 23

Come up with a personal genealogy challenge of your own. Each person has different research goals and experiences. Use this week to come up with your own challenge, and then take the steps to accomplish it. Genealogy bloggers are encouraged to share their ideas and challenge their own readers.


When I first read the entry for Week 23, I thought "nooooooo, I don't need challenges to my challenges!"  But after thinking about it, I realized I was actually going to have a hard time deciding which of my challenges to blog about.

My challenge for this installment is to clean up my data in my genealogy database.  Initially, this sounded like a huge endeavor that would take weeks and weeks to complete not just one.  Not necessarily so if you are using a genealogy software that can create a Potential Problems Report for you.  Currently my genealogy data is housed in Legacy and I do have the option of generating just such a report.

When creating this report, you have the option of specifying what potential problems you want the program to look for.  You may only be interested in looking at potential problems with birth dates.  In that case, on the problems tab you would only select items that relate to birth dates.  The same goes for name standardization issues.  You may not care, at this point, that a middle name does not have a period after an initial.  Just uncheck that line on the standardization tab to turn off that check feature.

There are a total of four tabs with criteria you can select or unselect for review.  This can make your database clean up more manageable.  You could review all date type issues one week.  The next week you could review all standardization issues etc.  However you choose to run the reports, just be sure you do.  Having invalid dates and/or minor discrepancies in our data can create a lot of wasted hours of research.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 22

Spending some time at Find-A-Grave.com and seeing what it is all about is our challenge of the week. I have been visiting Find A Grave for a little over a year now. I am a contributor and a photo volunteer. My time as a photo volunteer is short, only a month. I think I chose the wrong month to start...requests by the twos and threes were coming in daily the week before and after Memorial Day!

To date I have been able to add 13 memorials, 23 photos and fulfill 10 photo requests. It has been an interesting experience and I had no idea how isolated some cemeteries are. I also am hoping some of my photo requests will be fulfilled soon by volunteers in other areas of the country.

I haven't been using Find A Grave to it's potential. The volume of memorials and photos continues to grow and I wasn't tapping into that resource. I had been at a stand still on my Allen and Gaines lines in Clark County Kentucky. Find A Grave has me moving again! Don't miss the opportunity to add to your family history research, visit Find A Grave soon.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 21

Week 21: Examine the website of your state or provincial archives. Take some time to push all the buttons and click all the links. What did you find? Bloggers can write about the site’s high points and share the information with their readers

I love this challenge as it gives me an excuse to spend more time on one of my favorite genealogy websites, The Missouri State Archives.

The Missouri State Archives is the official repository for state records of permanent and historical value. Its mission is to foster an appreciation of Missouri history and illuminate contemporary public issues by preserving and making available the state's permanent records to its citizens and their government.

The organization and operation of the Missouri State Archives falls under the office of the Missouri Secretary of State, Robin Carnahan. We are very fortunate to have such a person in charge of safeguarding our State's history. The archives provides a beautiful research facility in Jefferson City, valuable educational programs throughout the year as well as their online, digital initiatives. The Missouri State Archives website made the list for Family Tree Magazine's 101 Best websites in 2008 and 2009!

Among the many jewels this site has, the two crowning jewels are the Missouri Death Certificates and Missouri Digital Heritage. Online images of death certificates are available for 1910-1959...for free! You may look up by last name and county, find the person you are looking for and download the PDF directly to your computer. No fee, no copy cost, no mailing cost and best of all...no waiting!

It is easy to get lost for hours in the Missouri Digital Heritage project. There are online exhibits detailing various historical events in the state. You may search or browse historical maps, plat books and civil war letters. The Missouri Soldier's database covers the War of 1812 up to WWI, there is information on the culture, transportation and agricultural lives of those living in Missouri. The photograph and images collection is immense and should not be missed.

I have this site bookmarked on my toolbar and visit on a weekly basis if not more. As much time as I have already spent on this website (hours and hours) I still have not viewed all of the collections available. If you have any Missouri connections, you will definitely want to visit and save this site.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 20

Week 20: Play with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Government Land Office (GLO) Federal Land Records (http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/) web page. This is a great resource. Your task this week is to explore the land patents and land surveys sections. Input some search terms and see what pops up. Don’t be afraid to click links and see what happens. You’ll be surprised by what you find.

The BLM Land Office Records site, contains three data sets: Federal Land Patents, Federal Land Status Records, and Federal Survey Plats and Field Notes. Each set of records does not contain information from all of the same states and not all states are covered. More information is being added so don't forget to check back often. The FAQ's will cover most of your questions, be sure to review those first. You will want to spend more time on the Visitor's Center tab to get more detailed review of the data sets.

I was able to find a Land Patent record for one of my Greenstreet lines (my husband and I both have Greenstreets). I would really like to get hold of some of the Survey Plats, but was unable to find anything at this point. This site is a valuable resource to fill in some of the gaps you may have in your ancestor's time lines. I'm looking forward to visiting the site again after more records have been added to the collection.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 19

Examine the “Genealogy and Military Records” page on the National Archives page. (Non-U.S. folks: examine the military records information from your country’s national archives.) Click the links and read everything you can. If you’ve ordered a military file before, read this page again and refresh you memory so you can help others. Authors of genealogy blogs can write about records they’ve received, comment on the National Archives page, or ask questions of their readers via their blog.

I have written to the National Archives requesting military records in the past. I wrote about it in this post. I've also requested military documents for one of my Dad's brothers and did receive a reply but no medals. Medals are reissued to next-of-kin. My Uncle never married, had no children, his parents and both brothers are deceased. They would not recognize me as next-of-kin though.

I do need to spend more time on the site looking at the images and seeing what information I can find for the Mexican Expedition. My grandfather served in the Army during the Expedition but I have had little success finding information. What information I did find was from a book published by his fraternity that talked about "their brother's on the border".

I get lost very easily on the NARA site, but that's not a bad thing. The things I find while lost are always interesting! The volume of information is unimaginable and the thought of even a 1/4 of that information being digitized is a great dream!

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 18

This week's challenge is to "Dip your toe in the social networking pool" and blog about how the various sites are useful to our genealogical research.

No dipping was done here, I dove in head first! I knew about social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. I had read a few blogs and subscribed to news feeds, but my participation was one-sided as a receiver and very limited. I spent time searching for interesting and valuable genealogy news though Google, going site by site by site. I enjoyed the information and the stories but getting to them was tedious and I figured I was missing a lot.

In July of 2009 curiosity prompted me to check out Twitter. I set up my account and immediately put genealogy in the search box and was AMAZED at the number of Tweeters that said genealogy was a hobby for them. Once I started following a few people, the social networking pool went from being a backyard swimming pool to the ocean. I follow and regularly tweet with others across the United States as well as in England, and Australia.

Twitter was the medium that allowed me to broaden my level of friends on Facebook and increase the number of blogs I was reading. Each time a tweet came across with notification of a new blog post I clicked and followed. The same happened with Facebook, I would see the join me on Facebook tweets and I would join. The exposure to new and not so new technologies through Twitter has been impressive. I had no idea what a blog reader was, I was getting blogs through RSS feeds to my email. I didn't know about Tweetdeck or Hootsuite until I saw mentions of others using those applications also.

The beneficial part of these social network sites is the networking opportunities. There are comments floating out there (from the Snooty-Patooties) that Twitter and Facebook are silly and have no benefit to genealogy research. Wrong! The information posted from commercial sites is very valuable. I now know who has a conference coming up in my area, who is publishing or making available new research material immediately. And the information comes to ME, I don't have to go searching for it. How can receiving information in a timely manner be silly?  On Facebook my friends post comments and photos about research trips as well as family photos.  How can getting to know others that share your passion be silly?

There is NO END to the amount of information that can be gleaned through all of my "social" contacts now.  If I have a research problem, question or road block all it takes is a 140 character tweet and the offers for help come rolling in.  I see nothing but value to social networking in genealogy.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #17

Get out your family photos and label them. You’ve seen them a million tines because they’re YOUR photos, but what happens when they’re passed down to others? Will those people know the names of everyone in the pictures? Take some time and label your photos with pertinent information. If you’re working with old photos, take consideration with their age and condition. Devise an archival-friendly labeling system. For digital photos, you can use computer programs to tag the images with names or other identifying information. If that’s too confusing, you can at least save and/or re-name digital photos with details of your choosing. Don’t let another generation slip by without documenting your photos. Your ancestors will thank you.

Yet another week has gone by and another challenge from We Tree is underway.

From my first digital camera forward, say around 2002, I'm pretty happy with the state of my photos. As I downloaded photos, they were saved to a folder named for the event or place and dated. Not 100% of those photos have names associated with them, but I would say that 75% do.

Pre-digital camera days I can't claim I've done a very good job in the labeling category. Most packets that the photos are in, do have the event or place and date listed, but few photos have names actually on the photos. I have four copy paper sized boxes full of photo packets. The odds of me going through and labeling all of those is slim to none! Having said that, I do have photos from that time period that are in frames or scrapbooks and they are properly labeled.

As for the "old" photos, I had one box and two photo albums in my possession. Last fall I scanned in all of the photos, over 400 in all! I started by saving the scans into folders based on which family I thought they belonged to. A few of the photos had names, but most did not. I was able to recognize some in the photos and identify that way. For the most part, as far as the old photos go, less than 50% are labeled.

I've read about face recognition software for photographs. Maybe one day, this software will be common with all photo software and all photos will be identified automatically!

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 16

The challenge for Week 16 is to check out the online library catalog of a university. You may use one close to you, or one in the area of your research. Colleges and universities have wonderful archives, many of which are valuable to historical research. Browse around the library website and investigate the various archival collections. Make note of ones that may assist you in your own research.

I first accessed the resources of a university library in 2004. While searching the historical New York Times, through ProQuest Historical Newspapers available online, I found articles listing my grandfather as being on the track team for New York University around 1904-1906.

I began looking around the NYU website and the various libraries the university has. After finding this Collection: New York University Archives - This collection contains preservation copies of various New York University publications, primarily yearbooks, dating from the mid-1990s back to the first years of the University's history, I wrote to the reference desk asking for information on their yearbook collection.

One of the NYU librarians contacted me fairly quickly with news of photographs and other materials she had found. Sending in the required payment for copies and postage I awaited the arrival of my package. I received a copy of a yearbook page for the year of my grandfather's graduation as well as photos and information on the track team, eight pages in all.

My grandfather's bio is the bottom one on the page "Irish" Baudermann. Interesting as his mother and father were both born in Germany! I would also love to know more details on the girl who broke his heart!

This challenge has inspired me to go back to the NYU library and perform further research. As with other challenges in this series, a light bulb came on and I have a new avenue to explore!

52 Weeks To Better Genealogy - Challenge 15

Return to the lost art of letter writing, that is Challenge 15. We are asked to write a letter asking for information from an institution, library or a person. I have written letters requesting information in the past. About 10 years ago, when I started my research, not every site had a link to an electronic request form. I sent letters to a couple of libraries, universities and to people.

My Baudermann line is small and concentrated in the Newark, New Jersey area. Early on I had very little information on my Grandfather Baudermann. My father and his brothers had no contact with their father after 1930, leaving me with no relatives names to contact. I went to WhitePages.com, typed in Baudermann for Newark and got 11 matches. I sent letters to all 11. Just a short, one paragraph letter as I really had nothing to say other than I'm looking for the family of Joseph A.G. Baudermann. I received one reply saying she had no information on the family and good luck to me.

I slowly educated myself on research tactics and began making headway on my Grandfather. When searching family trees on Ancestry.com last year I found a tree with a Baudermann in it. Immediately I contacted the tree owner and started my wait for a reply. The reply came quickly and contained the name and address of a woman I should write to for possible information. My letter this time was two paragraphs as I did have a little more to back up my query.

Two weeks later I received a three page letter, an obituary for my Grandfather, a letter regarding the estate of my Grandfather's cousin and most importantly a photograph of Joseph A.G. Baudermann. The letter is from Joan, the Granddaughter of my Grandfather's half-sister, and she was a goldmine of information. She was such a sweet lady to provide all this information and she states in her letter that she is 78 and only does "snail-mail", how cute is that? I was thrilled to receive the information and I immediately picked up the phone and called her. I was able to fill in a few more details and I truly enjoyed our conversation.

The information Joan gave me, the stories she told of my Grandfather's life and the fact that she called him "Uncle Joe" really brought the family to life. But what absolutely floored me was the photograph. It was like looking at a photo of my Dad. I posted the photograph onto Facebook and asked "who is this"? My family members replied "Dad" or from my nieces "Grandpa". The resemblance is truly uncanny. To say they were surprised when I revealed his identity is putting it lightly.

Joan's letter is beautiful in the physical sense as well as with the imagery she used to tell my Grandfather's story. Would I have been happy to receive this via email? Of course I would, but now I have something that is much richer and means so much more to me.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 14

Week 14: Use a different search engine for your online genealogy research. Google is quite popular, but other search engines may provide different results. Try Yahoo! Search (http://search.yahoo.com/), Bing (http://www.bing.com/), Ask.com (http://www.ask.com/), Dogpile (http://www.dogpile.com/), and even Clusty (http://clusty.com/). Pick an unusual surname and search it in different engines. Make note of the top 10 page returns for each.

This challenge most definitely IS a challenge. I am a Google lover through and through! I use Google to search, for my email, for my blog, for my reader...I think you get the picture here. However, in the true spirit of a Geneablogger I will give the others *shudder* a try. The test will be as suggested, pick an unusual surname and search for it. My Dad's family is the Baudermanns and they are few and far between in the US as well as in Germany. I will see if any of these search engines can give me something new *come on Google, don't let me down now*. I will use Baudermann as my search phrase and view the first ten pages of results from each site.

1. Yahoo: Nothing new, a lot of sites in German, my blog showed up three times as well as some of my queries on message boards.

2. Bing: No new information, Bing did return more sites in German than Yahoo did. I did like the fact that Bing's translation service put the English and German versions side by site.

3. Ask: Sadly, no new information to report. Ask did return some Historical NY Times articles, which I already had, but Yahoo and Bing did not in the first ten pages.

4. Dogpile: Dogpile is the compilation of Goole, Bing, Yahoo and Ask but only returned three pages of results, none of which were new.

5. Clusty: Clusty is a new search engine to me, I've not used this before so I'm hoping for positive results. I like the fact that related search results come back clustered together, that's a new approach. Clusty is also the first to return some of my very own tweets containing the Baudermann name. While Clusty does not appear to have any new information for me, I did spend more time with it simply because it's arrangement of the information caught my attention. I must also admit, I looked past the first ten pages of results.

I liked this challenge, as designed, I traveled off the beaten path in search of information.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge 13

Week 13: Make an appointment with Cyndi’s List. All beginning genealogy publications include a link to Cyndi’s List because it is the ultimate guide for family history links. If you’ve never used Cyndi’s List, take the time to look around. If you’re familiar with the site, look again. Take the time to browse with detail. Don’t try to research your own family’s history, just move through the site and get a feel of all it has to offer. If you have a genealogy blog, share with your readers a new website you discovered through Cyndi’s List.

If you don't have Cyndi's List on your favorites list, you should. Where else can you find over 270,000 links to genealogy related websites in one place? Yes, some links may lead to dead ends because a site has been moved or is no longer functioning, but most links do work and you will love what you find.

Something else to keep in mind if you do run into a bad link, the site is "Cyndi's List" and it is Cyndi who takes care of things. So if a link is bad, or if you submit your link and it takes a little while to get it posted, remember that this is one person doing us all a HUGE service!

Cyndi's List will not only direct you to research data, you will also find research instruction, services and volunteers. There are links to help you with source citation, form analysis and descriptions. Don't think of the list as only a group of links to find data, there is so much more. Thanks Cyndi!

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #12

Week 12: Check out the web sites for the Society of American Archivists (http://www.archivists.org/), ARMA International (http://www.arma.org/), and the American Library Association (http://ala.org/). Genealogists can benefit from the educational opportunities and publications of other information-based organizations. You may not be an archivist, records manager or librarian, but you share the same interests. Look at the events these associations hold. Find the books they publish and see if you can request them through your library via Inter-Library Loan. You may also want to check out your state’s (or country’s) library association. If you’re a genealogy blogger, write about your impressions of one or more of these organizations.

This challenge brought me completely new exposure to the SAA and ARMA associations, I am familiar with the ALA. This challenge brought to the surface, again, my love/hate relationship with education in a genealogy related field.

I have always had a curiosity about the educational and experience background of people. It's always surprising how varied the backgrounds of are people that are in the same field. I have a Bachelors of Science in Business Administration and work in the marketing field. Not a big stretch, I took plenty of marketing classes during my education and now have 11 years in the marketing field. People in my field can pick just about any university (state or private) and receive a business degree. We are lucky to have a program that is so accessible, other degree seekers do not fair so well as this challenge points out.

The first site I visited was the Society of American Archivists. I immediately clicked on the Education and Events tab and looked at the Directory of Archival Education. There are only fourteen states listed that have university's that offer degrees relating to this field and my state isn't one of them.

I next visited ARMA, The Authority on Managing Records and Information. This organization is offering professional development and continuing education type of courses, most look to be available online. The online options make these programs easily accessible to all and generally I would not expect to find these courses offered at a university.

Finally, I visited the ALA, American Library Association site and selected the education tab. While their appears to be many options for education in librarianship, the options for an ALA accredited program are fewer. There are currently 62 ALA accredited master's degree programs across the United States with four options in my state! But there are several states with zero options. What does it take to offer this type of program? A library?

All three of these organizations hold an annual conference, which I am a big fan of. The ability to meet and network with others in your field is always a positive. These organizations appear to be very active and I hope they are working on expanding the educational opportunities to include all states.

52 Weeks To Better Genealogy - Challenge 11

This week's challenge has created a delima for me. I want to participate in all of the challenges, that's my goal. However, I want to keep my blog on a positive note and not give negative or bad reviews. On the other hand, my blog is my blog and I should feel free to say what I think about subjects. Are you curious now as to what the challenge is and why I'm making a big deal of this?

Week 11: Read the back posts from the Transitional Genealogists Forum (http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index/TRANSITIONAL-GENEALOGISTS-FORUM/). This is a message board for genealogists who are taking the steps needed to become professional genealogists. Even if you aren’t interested in that goal, you will benefit from the questions and answers provided on this excellent discussion list. If you have a genealogy blog, write about a question or subject from this board that was helpful for you.

I was a subscriber to the Transitional Genealogists Form (TGF) for several months. I was a "lurker" hoping to pick up on a few tips that would give my research a little more polish. I am not to the point that I am even considering becoming a professional...I just want to KNOW what the pros know!

First thing, the TGF is in the old-fashioned mailing list format. You can also sign up to receive the digest version, which is what I did. I received multiple posts to the mailing list in one email, rather than an email every time somebody posted. The digest is extremely cluttered and hard to follow sometimes. The subject lines do not always make sense, some leave the email they are replying to in their reply and I notice that a lot of listers do not sign their email. So, right off the bat I did not like the TGF due to this format.

Secondly, things were going along somewhat well on the list until a person voiced an opinion on genealogy education and certifications. You've heard the term "then all hell broke loose"? That quote describes my opinion of what followed. Emails became very opinionated, divisive and rude to the point of ridiculous. At that point I decided I would unsubscribe and look for information in other areas.

I understand that people have very deep opinions on education, certifications and accreditation in genealogy. I too have a very definite opinion on this subject, however, I'm not going to cut my nose off to spite my face. The genealogy community needs to get along and work together to promote all avenues of education in this subject. Getting on a soap box and preaching "my way or the highway" is not the way to do this.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #10

Investigate Family Search Pilot, which is part of FamilySearch.org. This is a wonderful collection of records which literally grows every day.

This is yet another great challenge presented on the Geneabloggers site.

I have used Family Search Pilot in the past although not as much lately. I tend to get into the habit of relying on Ancestry.com too much. With all the wonderful resources available online, both free and subscription sites, it pays to use them all. As each of these sites are continually updating images, adding new images and indexes, rechecking the information is a must.

At Family Search Pilot I particularly like the German records. The main line I focus so much of my research time on is Baudermann. This surname is rare in the United States as well as in Germany. I have a difficult time finding information on this family outside of church records. Family Search Pilot contains German baptism, marriage and burial records, some from the 1500's to the 1900's. While not all of these collections contain the images, some do have images you can browse through. I look forward to more indexes and images being added to this site.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #9

Week nine has been the most challenging of the challenges to date! Select five blogs and read them everyday. While the challenge suggests we get out of our comfort zone and select blogs that may be on topics other than genealogy, I chose not to. There are so many wonderful genealogy blogs that I never have time to read. If I am going to devote five days to reading, I definitely wanted them to be genealogy related. I randomly chose five blogs that I follow and they are:

Bits and Pieces

Everything's Relative

Georgia Black Crackers

Kinfolk News

Life From the Roots

I enjoyed catching up on these blogs this week. There was a wide range of topics and all were very interesting!

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #8

On to Week 8's Challenge...Discover online map collections. This could be a challenge for an entire month! The amount of online map collections available just keeps getting bigger, making genealogists so very happy! I love maps, as I think most people do. Maps remind us of places we have been, places we are going or places we can only dream of going. For genealogists maps help us to visualize our ancestors. We can document a migration trail and "see" the cities, towns, rivers and mountains that they saw along the way. I started this challenge with my library system's online resource databases to see what map collections they have available.

First stop is the Digital Sanborn Maps which were created as fire insurance maps beginning in 1867. While the entire collection is phenomenal, what i like best is the ability to click on a town or city map year by year. This gives you the ability to see how your ancestors town grew and changed over the years.

Next stop is with the Historic Map Works database. If you have access to this collection through your library you will not be sorry you took the time to review. Historic Map Works has a full-color digital collection with over 100,000 land ownership maps for the United States including suburban and rural areas. Currently being added to their collection are nearly 100,000 antiquarian maps...these are the maps that make you say "wow"! This site offers so much including search features, you will not want to miss what the collection has to offer!

The final database I will touch on is also available through my library system and is called Global Road Warrior The Ultimate Guide to the World. This collection is wonderful on so many levels. The best benefit may be for those lucky enough to be able to make a genealogical research trip to another state or country. Global Road Warrior provides access to maps, transportation options, points of interest and photo gallery's.

Hours, even entire days can be spent on just these three collections. The wealth of information we can gain in our research, from maps, is invaluable. There are so many options available to us right from our home, be sure to take advantage of them.

52 Weeks to Better Genealogy - Challenge #5

Getting to know WorldCat better is what this week's challenge is all about. On a side note, I haven't received the book I requested in last week's challenge. But I will be patient, it hasn't cost me a dime and I'm grateful the service is available.

I spent some time on WorldCat just plugging in surnames to see what I could find. I found nothing, a lot of books written by someone with my surnames but nothing pertaining to my genealogy.

Next, I began searching using geographic locations. This was very interesting and the amount of information was plentiful. I'm not talking about searching using words like Germany, New Jersey or Missouri. I used specific town names and was very surprised at what has been written about such places, especially for some of the small towns. I found that the small town I live in had three different newspapers in the past. We do not have a newspaper today and it has been ten years or more since the last paper closed. How times change.

Genealogy education was my next choice of search terms. I was expecting to get books such as how to do genealogy research online, using DNA to trace your ancestors etc. The first book returned was a popular book for online genealogy, those that followed were even better. There were books on schools in various parts of the country, city and rural schools, books of graduates and teachers and schools for specific groups of people. This was another reminder that key words used in searches really are key!

With my interest aroused I will spend more time on WorldCat experimenting with various key word phrases and see what I find.