Preparing for the Genealogy Trip
Did I call this a Trip? Gee, must be something to that.
Actually, there is. It's not only a trip, but a stumble and crash if you aren't careful, cautious, and prepared. I think the most dangerous thing a person can do while searching their heritage is to make assumptions without at least setting out to prove them right or wrong. I have been on too many web sites where people snatch a census or two, add a lot of assumptions, then make a tree for themselves, which of course isn't based on much fact at all. So, a word to the wise, take your time AND LET the puzzle pieces fit or get rid of them. Don't force anything, and don't get rid of anything, it might fit later onto another branch of your tree.
Step One: Decide if you are serious about tracking your family and settle for nothing less than as near to perfection as you can. Your heritage should be important to you.
Step Two: Get your body, mind and spirit ready for the research, and take time to look around your work area to figure out where you are going to put the volumes of data that you will end up printing. Or, take time to organize a space on your computer's hard drive where you will save documents, photos, et al. For example, I knew I was going to build a Clauson Tree, but I really wasn't thinking of the hundreds of branches to that Tree through marriages etc. It expands quite fast. Duh. I thought I would simply make a folder labeled Clauson and of course a folder for the photos (if any) or copies of census records, etc. I thought I would sign up for Ancestry.com, amass all the data I could, then unsubscribe from Ancestry.com and assemble everything at my own pace. What a fool I was for thinking that.
Instead, here's what happened... I subscribed to Ancestry.com, began amassing tons of material, tossed it on my hard drive, tossed it into several sub folders, didn't organize a thing, then headed right into amassing information for Dagney's family. It was a disaster, but I quickly realized it and was able to fix it (in a couple weeks). Besides, not always do the census documents copy well and you might get parsing failures...meaning they simply can't be used once you have saved them. And you certainly don't want to print them unless you own shares in the Black Ink Industry.
So, what you do is set aside a nice chunk of your hard drive and give it a name, like Dagney's Family. Under that make folders with known last names of families, like Bertram, Gahlau, Rushman, then under those folders, make files for individual families of that main family as they appear. I use Word Perfect, but you can use any word processing program, but the key is, that if you put everything straight into a Genealogy program, it is harder to see what you are missing and need to follow-up on. In Word Perfect, I can Yellow Highlite something that is missing and just scroll down through that family's census to see what else needs work. Once I get all I can, then and only then will I input the data into a Genealogy program. And as a norm I don't print anything but what I really need to have beside me to work on.
Step Three: DO NOT TRUST COPYING ANYTHING! Train yourself to glean all the information from a census record rather than hope it saves to the hard drive. This includes the date of the census, and perhaps the page and book number. Why spend your hours getting all that data if you can't prove that you got it? Also, while you have that census page open, take time to see who else lives near your target. You wouldn't believe how many other family members I have found as neighbors. Plus, several census years will give the number of years married, or married once or twice or so, and immigration and naturalization years. There's so much on a census record. When you open a census record you might need to enlarge it to see it better. Using the census pages, I think, is the most time consuming part of genealogy research, but it is 100% worth it.
Click HERE (1910 Teaching Tool) to see an excerpt of a census record with explanations of the info provided.
Along with census records you will find birth and death records, not to mention Draft Registrations. They are filled with valuable information, especially the Death Records. If they are available, definitely take time to use them. An example of this was when I was trying to find out if my John Doe was the right one. Believe me, there are a lot of duplicate names in our histories. Anyway, I found a Draft Card on one of them and used his address to verify it was the right guy....because.....on a census the address was the same. That was one of those great moments for a genealogist because it kept me from following the wrong fella. Not all census records have addresses, but when they do it's pay dirt sometimes.
No matter where you get your census data, I highly advise that you get and print copies of blank census forms. That way you can easily read what the columns are without having to ruin your eyes trying to read nearly illegible forms online.
Step Four: I don't know if this is for you or not, but what helped me the most was to lay a US map beside me on my desk. As I obtained information I actually plotted a family's movements. My Clauson's were pretty mobile folks way back when, and my not being terribly familiar with the United States was quite a drawback. To be totally honest, I traced the US map onto a large sheet of butcher paper and literally plotted important places and dates. First I used small post-it arrows I made from post-it notes. That lasted long enough to intrigue our cats and become another game to them which jeopardized my whole map project. There's nothing like finding a little yellow Post-It arrow near a cat food bowl and it says, "What the hell were they doing there?" And I couldn't remember who it was for. That forced me to remove the bright yellow arrows and resort to writing on my new map.
The important thing was that I saw a pattern emerging from my family's travels, each census period (every 10 years). Then they disappeared completely from the census records. But, based on my intuition and their direction, I KNEW they were on their way west. I finally found them in Rapid City, South Dakota. In fact, I will share an incredible story with you in hopes of helping you to not miss a thing when you are researching your own family.
My Kentucky Clauson's began as Clawson's. Then back around the Civil War one of the boys changed his name to Clauson. I naturally don't know why, but you have to key on everything in your research. I will expound more on this on the Clauson section of the site. But for now, I had originally found them in Kentucky, then they went to Illinois, then over to Nebraska, then most of the kids ended up in California (as adults). But early in my search I learned that my great grandfather Samuel L Clauson had been in the Civil War and there was an obituary on him in Florida, so I knew the family split somewhere between Nebraska and California. Since I hit a wall, I targeted the sons. Daughters are real hard to find because they marry and change their names.
Now here is another tidbit of great info. California death records cite the mother's maiden name. Bingo! I immediately jumped to California where the male Clauson kids had landed and obtained the mother's maiden names for their wives and targeted them, and that's when I found the Clauson's in South Dakota, using the maiden name of Losh. But Clauson was spelled Claxxon.
About now I should tell you about the illiteracy, incompetence, or apathy that abounds from the census records. I don't know if it is pure illiteracy or laziness or uncertainty or whatever, but you will find names spelled every which way, which can and will throw you off or cause you to completely lose a family. So when searching, make note of the many ways names are spelled and search for all of them. In fact, up to about 1920, depending on the area of search, I resorted to looking for first names in certain counties and towns. That can force you to search through anywhere from ten to several thousand records, but if your heritage is important to you, you will do about anything for the gold medal.
Continuing, not only did I find most of the Clauson aka Claxxon family in SD, I found another elusive ghost called Fonnie. (Finding Fonnie was what started this entire genealogy project.) But the name that led me to them was Losh, because there were two Losh kids with the Clauson family. I didn't have a clue who they belonged to but they were grand kids according to the census. So now I had to find the parents of the kids and keep an eye on Fonnie, because now I had written proof that he not only existed, but that he was definitely ours.
Here's the really interesting part of this...when I targeted the Losh's to find out who they were that's when I discovered another elusive ghost of the Clauson's. That was McClellan or Mack Clauson. He was married to a Losh from Iowa and they were living in Iowa. Sadly the kids weren't theirs.
I continued searching and found one of the Losh kids, two decades later, living with....are you ready for this????? She was living with a Clauson! Her mother, Jennie Clauson. So Jennie obviously had been married to a Losh. That's when I found a brother to Mack's wife who had been living just north of Rapid City..yes a Losh. I was forced to assume that Jennie left her husband and Sam and Nancy Clauson got her kids (for whatever reason) and took them back to Jennie on their way to Florida. Again it is a dangerous assumption, and one I will not put in the family tree until I have more proof. There are still more records available to search.
Here's another shock...I searched for marriage records for Jennie and Losh in South Dakota and to my sheer and utter delight I discovered that Fonnie had married Edna Seaman, in South Dakota. That was a shock because I was certain that I found Edna's maiden name as Losh, which is what started all this. But no, she was definitely a Seaman....and her family were neighbors of the Losh's in Iowa. I immediately retraced my steps and have NEVER found that death record for Edna Losh. It does not exist. Eerie isn't it, but it took me right where I needed to be to find my family in South Dakota. I have had several really strange happenings in this search for my heritage that are far beyond normal. Hopefully, you will have such good luck as well.
Step Five: Take advantage of the older folks in your family and pick their brains about the past. Get names of everyone, even friends they remember. It breaks my heart that my family are all gone now and I have only vague memories of who was who. I mentioned before in another article that my dad actually loved that I found out that he had been adopted. I wish he were still alive because I have found so much on his biological family that he would've done back-flips of joy. Many times when discovering yet another piece of the puzzle I find myself saying, "This is for you Dad." So leave nothing to wait for another time. Take an interest in your life! It's amazing how many things I've discovered that makes me wonder if there is some sort of genetic memory at work in me now. My mom used to say I looked French (contrary to my other siblings) and I have a natural talent for foreign languages, but now I think I know why. Not only am I Norwegian, Scottish, and Irish, but my great grandmother (Dad's biological grandmother) was French (Beaveau) and had immigrated to America in the late 1800's. More on that in another article.
Ok, I've talked enough, although I have more stories to tell, but for now I will end this article. By the way, the Steps outlined above are not written in concrete, they are simply meant to be a guide and helpful hints. Genealogy research is definitely fun and exciting, but can easily overwhelm a person or allow you to get so far off the beaten path that it can leave you wondering where in the world you started from. The key is to keep copious notes and don't do this research if you have distractions going on around you. It's too easy to get sidetracked or forget where you were going. And please, as mentioned before, don't throw information together and call it fact.
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