Research Paths and Byways
Looking Backward, Looking Forward
by Patricia Law Hatcher, FASG

This last Ancestry Daily News of 2005 is a perfect time to look backward and forward at our genealogical and family history efforts.

Researching

Looking Backward. How many new ancestors did you find in 2005? It can be interesting to look back each year and think about whom you found--and how you found them. And how many former ancestors did you acquire in 2005? Yes, that's what I said, former ancestors. I remember a number of years ago an exchange of letters with a very highly respected genealogist in which we both admitted that we had reached a point in our research in which we were, as he put it, "pruning branches off the family tree," as we realized that some connections simply didn't hold up to critical scrutiny.

Looking Forward. To get a good start on 2006, identify one line with good potential for discoveries that you can focus on. Also review your pedigree chart for the weakest link. From experience, I can tell you that this is usually something that you acquired early in your research, that came from a compiled family history without footnotes, or that came from the undocumented online compilations. Commit to digging in and doing "real research" to confirm or refute the connection.

Sharing Research

Looking Backward. Where are the results of your 2005 research? Did you compile the information into a family history to share with others or into reports to yourself to aid in future research? Or is it buried in piles of paper and scattered throughout files on your hard drive? (I'm sure Juliana is nodding at this last point.)

[ADN Editor's Note to Pat: Have you been looking in my windows?]

Looking Forward. Are you a big-project person or a little-steps person? If you are a big-project person, take time now to think about the one big project that you would like to complete in 2006 and write a goal statement and a timetable to post near your computer. If you are a little-steps person, make a list of twelve ancestral couples and commit to completing the research and writing a narrative for each family group, one per month. Another idea is to pair up with a friend or genealogy cousin and agree to send an e-mail on the last day of each month describing your research results during the month.

Sharing the Past

Looking Backward. What have you done this year to share the family memorabilia that you have collected with others in your family?

Looking Forward. Consider creating a 2006 photo calendar with a picture of an ancestor or an item of memorabilia for each month. (It is especially nice if there is a related event in that month.) Most image-editing software has a text tool that will allow you to write the person's name and other information on top of the photograph or in an area added below the photograph.

Sharing the Present

Looking Backward. Have you preserved the events of this past year in your life for your descendants and family members? I write an annual Christmas letter that does this. Well, that's not true. I have established a tradition of Epiphany letters, which often get written in the quiet following the Christmas hoopla. (The greeting-card companies are missing a sure bet here. I'm certainly not the only procrastinator around, and there must be a huge market for Epiphany and Happy-End-of-Year cards.)

Looking Forward. If you aren't the kind of person to write letters, how about a chronology? Readers of this newsletter know that some of us are huge fans of chronologies as a research tool. This is a perfect time to create a personal chronology for 2005 and set one up for 2006. In addition to personal aspects such as vacations, moves, jobs, and (unfortunately for many of us) health problems, remember to include all events that meant something to you: births, marriages, deaths, and graduations of relatives and friends.

Saying Thank You

Looking Backward. Did you thank those who aided in your research, not only those distant cousins who provided you with information on your common ancestry, but also those who made information available in print or electronically? Several patrons of the Genealogy Section at the Dallas library brought holiday goodies for the staff to say thank you, including scrumptious homemade Armenian paklava.

Looking Forward. You needn't bake. Now is the perfect time to write thank-you notes to the staff and volunteers at the archives, genealogical societies, historical societies, libraries, and elsewhere to thank them for everything they have done to help others with their genealogical research.

Thank you Juliana and crew for everything you do to make Ancestry Daily News the helpful tool that it is for family historians and genealogists.

Patricia Law Hatcher, FASG, is an instructor, and professional genealogist. Her oft-migrating ancestors lived in all of the original colonies prior to 1800 and in seventeen other states, presenting her with highly varied research problems and forcing her to acquire techniques and tools that help solve tough problems. She is the author of Producing a Quality Family History.

Copyright 2005, MyFamily.com. All rights reserved.

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Ancestry Quick Tip
Life Stories
Margaret Wilkinson (nee Dickson)
Edinburgh, Scotland

While we are all searching for our ancestors, I have a thought for the future generations. I have held classes for over fifteen years for people writing their own stories, and often stories of other members of their family. So much is lost, as we all know, by people thinking their own lives are uninteresting. This is never the case. I urge all the readers of your newsletter to attend to their own stories as well and encourage their children to do the same at different times. This way our future generations won't have such a hard time as we're having!

Thanks to Margaret for today's Quick Tip! If you have a tip you would like to share with researchers, you can send it to: ADNeditor@ancestry.com

Quick Tips may be reprinted, with credit to the submitter, in other Ancestry publications, so if you do not want your tip included in a publication other than the Ancestry Daily News and Ancestry Weekly Digest, please state so clearly in your message.

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Clipping of the Day
New Year's Nativity and Old Year's Burial and the New Year's Birth
New York Herald (New York, New York), 01 January 1872, page 3:
. . . .

"The last day of the year!" said each belated reveler to himself--and their number was legion--as he returned home in the drizzle which made the "wee sma' hours" of yesterday morning so intensely disagreeable. Indeed, nearly all the gayety and social festivity that usually characterize the dying hours of the year were by respect for Sabbatarian traditions transferred to Saturday night--the drinking of toasts and harmless mirth and exuberant jollity with which all men of healthy tastes and genial habits celebrate the last moments of an annual visit of time--were discounted by the pressure of a pious necessity. People seemed unwilling to separate as assembled in friendly conclave round the family hearths. They chatted over the losses and the gains, the joys and the sorrows, the bereavements and the changes, the births and marriages of the twelvemonth that with flying feet was speeding forward through the last quarter-mile stretch of its appointed course to the goal of death and nothingness. Now the steaming cup passed gaily round, as recollections of joyous junketing parties and merry reunions were called up before the eye of memory; and, again, a mist of tender regret blurred the vision as there sprang to the lips, but halted on the threshold of speech and died away in a meaning silence, that sadly familiar wish:--
But O for the touch of a vanished hand
And the sound of a voice that is still.

But bachelors of a gay turn of mind by no means contented themselves with these domestic forms of New Year's Eve festivity. With quick, joyous step they threaded their way through the dismal mist until they reached their club or some other familiar haunt of friendly reunion. And in such temples of genial fellowship the fun indeed waxed fast and furious. Men's wits seemed sharpened by the inspiration of the time, and sparkling jests and gay stories and festive songs fell upon unsympathetic ears, and were received with rapturous thunders of applause or loud bursts of wholesome laughter. . . .

In its material aspects the day was a very disagreeable one. The air was damp and chilly, and the streets were greasy with mire. Overhead low, sullen clouds shrouded the sky and obscured the light of day. One could not help but thinking, indeed, that the sooner the Old Year were dead the better if he could not do something better for us in the way of climate. However, age is almost universally crabbed and disagreeable; and who could reasonably expect an Old Year to be jolly on his death bed! Besides to most of us, he was a good friend, and loaded us with benefits and gladness. It was but meet, therefore, that we should be indulgent to his last shortcoming, and should take leave of him without reproaches. But, perhaps, the best way to honor his memory is to give a rousing welcome to his child and heir, who, with youthful vigor, springs into his place with the early light of this happy New Year's morning.

Subscribers with access to the Historical Newspapers Collection can view this clipping.

Subscribe to the Historical Newspapers Collection at Ancestry.com.

Fast Fact
Fast Fact: Upcoming Online Genealogy Classes at MyFamily.com

• Four weeks of lessons and interaction with a genealogy expert.
• 30-day free access to applicable Ancestry.com collections. (For details on which collections will be available, see the individual class descriptions.)
• Tips and advice on how to find ancestors online.
• Lessons through site interaction and worksheets.
• Ability to create your family tree using Online Family Tree software and downloadable genealogy forms.
• Collaboration with other site members to grow your family tree over the course of a year.

To learn more about these classes, see George G. Morgan's article from the 11 July 2003 Ancestry Daily News.

Upcoming Classes

• Basic Slovak Genealogy Research Class
  05 January 2006 with Lisa Alzo
• United States Great Lakes Region Class
  05 January 2006 with Lisa Alzo
• Immigration and Naturalization Research Class
  05 January 2006 with George G. Morgan
• Basic Family Tree Maker 2006 Class
  05 January 2006 with Cindy Rowzee
• Scottish Research
  12 January 2006 with David W. Webster
• Basic German Genealogy Research
  12 January 2006 with Janelle Bair
• Basic Eastern Europe Research
  12 January 2006 with Lisa Alzo
• Irish Research
  19 January 2006 with Sherry Irvine, CGRS, FSA (Scot)
• World Census Records
  19 January 2006 with Cindy Rowzee
• Intermediate Genealogy Research
  19 January 2006 with George G. Morgan

More Classes:

• Lost Loves, Family, Friends, Military, 26 January 2006 ($199.95)
• Native American Research, 26 January 2006
• Intermediate German Research, 26 January 2006
• Basic Jewish Research, 02 February 2006
• English Research, 02 February 2006

Click here for the complete list of genealogy classes, or here for investigative courses.

Product Spotlights

		Producing a Quality Family History by Patricia Law Hatcher, FASG Normally, this book retails for $19.95, but today you can buy it in the Shops@Ancestry.com for $14.95.

Thought for Today
Vincent van Gogh

Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.