Organize Your Genealogy

Get Your Research in Order! Stop struggling to manage all your genealogy facts, files, and data--make a plan of attack to maximize your progress. Organize Your Genealogy will show you how to use tried-and-true methods and the latest tech tools and genealogy software to organize your research plan, workspace, and family-history finds. In this book, you'll learn how to organize your time and resources, including how to set goals and objectives, determine workable research questions, sort paper and digital documents, keep track of physical and online correspondence, prepare for a research trip, and follow a skill-building plan. With this comprehensive guide, you'll make the most of your research time and energy and put yourself on a road to genealogy success. Organize Your Genealogy features: • Secrets to developing organized habits that will maximize your research time and progress • Hints for setting up the right physical and online workspaces • Proven, useful systems for organizing paper and electronic documents • Tips for managing genealogy projects and goals • The best tools for organizing every aspect of your ancestry research • Easy-to-use checklists and worksheets to apply the book's strategies Whether you're a newbie seeking best practices to get started or a seasoned researcher looking for new and better ways of getting organized, this guide will help you manage every facet of your ancestry research.

Presents methods for tracing your family history with tips and sample charts to follow.

Genealogy research should go beyond finding documents and filling in charts. This book outlines a simple process that will aid your research and create pages of information that can be read and understood by all family members. Your research will become faster and more accurate and your family can enjoy the family history. We all have family stories that give insights into the lives our ancestors. Some are entertaining and others are more historical in nature. Many others are celebrations of our ethnic and cultural heritage. They all should be saved and repeated for our future generations. However, pieces of these stories are lost as families pass them down from generation to generation. Writing a family history will save them for many generations. Writing a family history can seem to be a very challenging project for many people. Hopefully, the methods discussed in this book will show the reader a simple format that will make this task much easier. You may be reluctant to write down these stories because you do not consider yourself a writer or you cannot see how your family history is important to save. However, it is important for you to understand that someone in your family should capture and save the oral histories, do the research to try to confirm what the accurate story is and do the research to increase the knowledge of your ancestor's lives. All of our immigrant ancestors contributed to America's history and their stories should be saved for our grandchildren. Our family histories should give clues of their roles and this will help us understand our roots. Your collection of family history, photos and documents are incomplete unless someone writes an explanation of how they are related. This creates your unique family history and is the core of why someone needs to write them down for the enjoyment of your children and grandchildren. If you feel you do not have the skills to do this, who in your family can? If you like to do the research, is there someone that can work with you to write it? If you are interested in telling your family stories, I hope that the materials in this book help you overcome your fears of writing and you will commit the oral traditions of your family to the written word. I show how getting started with brief biographical summaries can make writing easier and overcome your fears of writing, I cover simple methods for organizing your summaries that can stand alone and then later be combined into a larger document that becomes your family history. The book reviews a simple process that compiles oral history, family pictures, and genealogical documents and puts it together into a readable and interesting document that suddenly becomes your family history.

Record Your Family History! From the editors of Family Tree Magazine, this workbook makes it easy to record and organize your family history. Family Tree Memory Keeper helps you keep track of basic genealogy information and special family memories, including traditions, heirloom histories, family records, newsworthy moments, family migrations and immigrations, old recipes, important dates, and much more. This book features: • Dozens of fill-in pages to record all your essential family information. • Convenient paperback format for writing and photocopying pages. • Space for mounting photographs. • Maps to mark your family's migration routes. • Tips for researching your family history. • A comprehensive list of additional resources. Use Family Tree Memory Keeper to log your genealogy research. Bring it to family get-togethers to gather and share information. Create an invaluable record of your ancestry for future generations.

"Includes master forms for making unlimited photocopies"--Cover.

It can take hours to research family history and it is easy to become inundated with stuff - paper records, recordings, photographs, notes, artifacts, and more information than one would imagine could ever exist. The usefulness of the collection is in the organization - using computers, archival boxes, files, and forms to help you put your hands on what you need when you need it. Also included, in this book, are instructions on the best ways to store and preserve one-of-a-kind family relics. Fifth in the National Genealogical Society's Guide series, The Organized Family Historian will follow the same user-friendly format that makes the other books helpful at any level of genealogical experience. The NGS offers readers 100 years of research and experience.

Are you stuck in your genealogical research? Wondering how to make progress on your brick wall problems? Discover the process that a professional genealogist uses to solve difficult cases. Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist's Guide shares a step-by-step method using real world examples, easily understood by any level of genealogist; written for the researcher ready to take their skills to the next level.Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist's Guide will give you the tools to:- Form an objective focusing your research for an entire project.- Review your research with new eyes by creating your own timeline analysis.- Construct a locality guide to direct your research.- Create a plan to keep your research on track.- Style source citations, giving your work credibility.- Set up a research log to organize and track your searches.- Write a report detailing your findings and ideas for future research.Links to templates give you the tools you need to get started and work samples illustrate each step. You'll learn to execute a research project from start to finish, then start again with the new information discovered. Whether you are a newbie or experienced researcher, Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist's Guide will move the search for your ancestors forward. Start now to learn to Research Like a Pro.

A guide to conducting genealogical research, focusing on the role of electronic databases, computer programs, and Internet resources in revolutionizing the process of tracing family histories. Includes charts, forms, exercises, Web site addresses, and bibliographies.