Genealogical Haphazardry

Royal Family Trees

2009-12-23T14:58:00.003-06:00

I spotted this amazing urn at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on a trip to New York.

Writing Your Family History

2009-08-25T20:33:00.004-05:00

I have been throwing around the idea of writing a book about my grandfathers. They were both trail-blazing Texas guys with enough stories on either side to fill a library.

Where to begin?? I know there are tons of books on the subject of How to Write About Your Family, etc..., I guess I could start there, but it feels more natural to just start pouring it all out on paper and fixing it up later.

Has anyone reading this ever attempted a written family history or biography of a family member? Care to share any insights?

Oh My, A Whole Summer with No Posts!

2009-08-25T20:27:00.003-05:00

The Summer just flew right by! Since I stopped my work at the San Antonio Public Library's Texana/Genealogy Dept., it seems my thoughts have not been turning to the past as much as they did before. I've got to do something about that!

Something I hope to do soon, that will definitely put me in that nostalgic frame of mind, is to visit my aunt in Austin, who's attic has become the holding ground for the entire family's history. She wants us to digitize everything so that we can 1) preserve it and 2) share it between the many branches of the family more easily.

SNL Timberlake Genealogy

2009-05-11T12:04:00.001-05:00

I adore this skit.

Video Recaps | Full Episodes | Webisodes

Genealogy TV Show!

2009-05-07T09:09:00.004-05:00

Maybe this is old news to everyone, but I was surprised to stumble upon this story about a TV series about celebrity genealogy. OK, this is combining 3 of my favorite things: family history, TV and celebrity gossip. I'm already hooked.

"Based on the award-winning British documentary series, "Who Do You Think You Are?" unearths the family trees of a variety of celebrities, tracing their ancestral histories along with the history of the United States. In addition to Lisa Kudrow, other participating celebrities include Susan Sarandon and Sarah Jessica Parker.

'This show personalizes history and turns it into a gripping narrative," says Kudrow in a network statement. "The most striking thing about the show is the realization of how connected we all are.' "

However, I was a little worried when I noted this:

"NBC has set an April 20 premiere date for "Who Do You Think You Are?," a new alternative series executive produced by Lisa Kudrow. The series will air in the 8 p.m. hour on Mondays"

I hope this doesn't mean the show's already dead in the water.....I guess just check your local listings on Monday nights and see if it ever pops up. Is it already on, has anyone seen it yet?

Here's the link for the BBC show:

http://www.cbc.ca/whodoyouthinkyouare/

And the link to the article:

http://www.hitfix.com/articles/2009-1-27-lisa-kudrow-returns-to-nbc

Repairing Adventures with the Keach Collection

2009-05-06T19:09:00.003-05:00

I got to the point in my work with the antique Keach Collection that I needed to repair some of the loose spines and brittle covers. This is an example of a common thing I ran across: scrap paper seemed to be used as reinforcement for most of the spines and covers of the cloth-bound books.

These random bits of printed clippings seemed secret and it was almost a shame to glue them back on. I was one of the only ones to see these hidden snippets - though now you are in on the secret too.

Exploring Footnote

2009-05-05T12:42:00.004-05:00

I finally took some time to explore the Footnote database. It is an addicting treasure-trove of historical information and the interactive aspect makes it especially fun.

By typing in my Grandpa's name in the search box, I received hundreds of results from newspapers, census records, social security records and much more. I limited the results by state and then found my Grover Simpson in the more-pared-down results.

The fun part is adding and approving the information on his page - what power! I was able to add his occupation and primary residence and approve (or "agree with" to use their terminology) his last residence and death date. In the image above you can see the green check marks that indicate I have "agreed with" the displayed information.

Then I looked up my recently-deceased and beloved aunt Sharon and connected her to Pa so that anyone looking at either of their Footnote pages can see that they are related. I was warned by the Texana staff members that anything you add their is accessible to anyone, but I have no problem with that. Sharing genealogical information is important and as the Simpsons are dwindling, it's time to record our family history before everyone who remembers it is gone.

I encourage you all to do the same and Footnote is so easy to use (there's also a Facebook app for it called I Remember), it really is more fun than work.

Astounding Trees from Flickr Commons

2009-04-22T21:37:00.001-05:00

I was looking for more Roots pictures to post and stumbled upon this one.

Perhaps this was a clever bit of trick photography, but it certainly is a striking picture.

Sifting through the Flickr Commons

2009-04-22T20:53:00.004-05:00

Any serious junk hound or antiques collector

will tell you there is no greater pleasure than sifting.

A box of old photos, 4 for $1, or a a big rack of good stuff at a thrift store - it's all about the hunt, the thrill of discovery or the satisfaction of knowing you looked through everything, even if you didn't find anything spectacular.

The Flickr Commons is the same to me when I'm looking for images for the blog. You have free range to use the images there for blogs......I'm pretty sure. I have found so many great photos that I have no reason to share other than they are neat. I think I'll do more of that.

I found this picture and used a "Hockneyizer" (in the style of the artist David Hockney) on it using this free image generating site:

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/hockney.php

I love how the little boy ended up framed in the middle - randomness is often so perfect.

19th Century New York City Coroner's Reports

2009-04-19T12:47:00.003-05:00

Coroners' reports, New York City, 1823-1842 by Kenneth Scott

My review

Stumbled upon this book in the Texana/Genealogy stacks. Talk about some lurid reading - just little one-sentence lines: name, age, gender, cause of death, murderer/site of accident/random extra info.

It's so weird and archaic and tragic and I just can't stop reading it when I'm supposed to be doing inventory of the genealogy collection. Unfortunately, this picture is not from the book, it is a silly bit of early trick photography from the Flickr Commons.

The weird thing is there were a lot of entries in Coroner's Reports noting the cause of death as "suicide by slitting the throat." I find that very strange and hard to believe. What a way to go - I wonder if it was really gangsters and the coroner's office was covering for them?

I think I've been watching too many cop shows.

Sorry the posts have been so gory lately, I'll have to lighten it up now!

Pa's Legacy

2009-04-17T22:12:00.006-05:00

http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/publications/pwdpubs/media/pwd_lf_k0700_0004.pdf

My Daddy's daddy was Grover Simpson, the Texas Game Warden who arrested L.B.J. for poaching back when he was just a State Senator. Well, he also wrote the guide to field-dressing a deer in 1963 that Parks and Wildlife still gives out to hunters and is available as a pdf from their website. Daddy thinks that his sister Sharon drew the illustrations.

This fills me with ridiculous pride. It's a piece of him and Sharon that is living on and I get a little thrill whenever I look at it.

Miss them both.

San Antonio Remembers

2009-03-17T20:36:00.007-05:00

http://www.sanantonioremembers.blogspot.com/

I wanted to alert everyone to an awesome new blog the San Antonio Public Library's Texana/Genealogy Department has just started. It's still a little bare, but stay tuned for great, little-known stories about San Antonio's past from the vault of the Texana Department.

The goal of the blog is not to just post San Antonio historical facts, but to elicit replies from the public, so that the Texana collection may grow through individuals sharing their personal stories about San Antonio's history. This idea is similar to Story Corps, the oral history-collecting project that travels the country.

Though there's not much there yet, follow the Texana blog for your chance to add your own stories to the collection.

http://www.sanantonioremembers.blogspot.com/

Consider "The Oyster"

2009-03-05T09:12:00.008-06:00

I fell in love with this little book as soon as I opened the slim volume and saw the goofy illustrations. It's very Alice in Wonderland. Below is one of the other news stories about the Keach collection. It presents him as a whimsical rich gentleman, showering random libraries with rare books wherever he goes. I love it. Enjoy.

From The San Antonio Light March 30, 1917:

....Presents Books to Carnegie Library:

J.R. Keach of Chicago Makes Gift of Several Hundred He Collected

"A valuable collection of several hundred books has been presented to the Carnegie Library by J. R. Keach of Chicago, who is stopping at the Traveler's Hotel. Mr. Keach explained that he collects books for the pleasure of collecting, and that when he assembles a large number, he presents them to some library. This is the second large gift of books that has been made by Mr. Keach to the Carnegie Library.

The present collection presents a varied assortment, philosophy, history, poetry, travel, biography, fairy stories and folk lore, essays, to say nothing of valuable editions of classics and rare and unusaul books in Italian, Latin, German, French and English. "The Oyster" is one of the curious books in the collection and one of the most beautifully bound. There is a beautiful edition of Don Quixote in four volumes, Shakespeare's sonnets in Roycroft binding, to say nothing of innumerable others. "The Rose Garden of Persia," a translation of early Persian poetry complied by Louisa Stuart Costello, is one of the most artistic and beautiful in the collection."

The J.R. Keach Mystery

2009-02-17T17:42:00.017-06:00

I finally finished the shelf list for the Keach collection. I had no idea how time-consuming transfering a long list organized by author name into one organized by Dewey Call Number would take. All together it took me about 6 hours of data entry alone, this was after the 12 hours of annotating the original shelf list with Dewey Call Numbers and damage notes. The other tedious part of this process was going back over my list and correcting any sequence mistakes I made. I was surprised by how often I had jumbled the Dewey sequence, when I thought I had been going very slow so as to avoid that very issue.

I've also been able to check in with Frank Faulkner, the head of the Texana department, and he shared with me the documents he had dug up relating to the original donations of the collection by Mr. J.R. Keach back in 1916 and 1917. He gave me 3 different copies of articles from the San Antonio Light and San Antonio Express News, along with a history of SAPL that was published in the Express in 1927 that mentions the Keach “mystery gift.”

These articles help flesh out the mystery (sort of, there are still a lot of unanswered questions) of who this J.R. Keach was and why he donated so many wonderful books to the Library in a city so far away from his home in Chicago. Frank has so far not been able to locate J.R. Keach in any of the census records either. The problematic thing is that in every article his name is spelled differently and his initials are even different in some! Clearly, this is a good mystery - I hope to investigate it further.

Here's the first article, San Antonio Light, 4/30/1916, p.4:

J.R. KEACH GIVES BOOKS TO LIBRARY

Collection Includes More Than 300 Volumes; Many Are Valuable

A collection of more than 300 assorted volumes, all of them worth and a great number of great value, has been presented to the Carnegie Library by J.R. Keach, who resides at the Traveler's Hotel. The gift has been estimated by the library staff to be worth approximately $500 [$300?].

The collection consists of fiction, travel, history, biography, essays and some are rare volumes. Many of the books are practically new and some in beautiful bindings. One of the interesting books in the collection is one published in 1609. It is "On Divorce" by John Reynolds and is called "a defence of the judgment of the reformed church that a man may lawfully put away his wife." Another interesting volume is a reprint of a translation of a medieval romance, "The Kisses," written by Johannes Secundes Nicolaios, who was born in 1511. There were only 800 of these reprints made.

Still another is a reproduction in facsimile of the first edition of Shakepeare's poems which were published in 1593. The binding of the edition in leather with the leather strings to tie it together is reproduced. The edition was editied by Sir Sidney Lee. There were only 1,000 of these books published and one is worth $35."

There are many wonderful things about this article, mostly the charming values assigned to the rare volumes. It's also neat to think that many of the volumes published in the 1910's were actually new at the time of this article's writing. The other interesting thing is that I do not remember either On Divorce or The Kisses, on the shelf or on the original shelf list...I wonder where they got that one from...or what became of them.

The other articles will be posted shortly...stay tuned!

Keach Collection Up Close

2009-02-16T18:04:00.006-06:00

Finally here are some images from the J.R. Keach Collection in the Texana/Genealogy department at SAPL that I have been working on for the past few weeks. I thought I'd post these to remind myself of how great the originals are, since I have been seeing them only as entries in the Excel spreadsheet for a while now. I spent 5 hours yesterday doing nothing but the data entry for the shelf list - I'm almost done though, then onto the archival storage of the damaged books.

Cross-Eyed

2009-02-14T10:12:00.006-06:00

I finally got through the inventory process for the Keach collection. I annoted the old shelf list organized by author's last name with Dewey call numbers so that I could start drawing up the new shelf list organized by Dewey number. That doesn't sound too hard, right?

Imagine a 15-page list where all the Dewey numbers are jumbled randomly. You have to go through every page looking of the next one in the sequence. Imagine you had bad handwriting and you have trouble deciphering your own notations. Imagine you are entering it all into an Excel spreadsheet that you have little experience using. Now you understand.

So, the fun part is over. The leisurely, quiet moments with dusty books that were held by many hands over several hundred years have passed. Now onto the real work with the dreaded spreadsheets. I'm about a third of the way done with the computer work, so hopefully I'll knock it all out in my next session.

In the meantime, here's an article about an archival donation to the University of Texas at San Antonio. I wish SAPL had gotten it, but I don't know where we would have put it - we're already full to the brim

"(Feb. 12, 2009)--UTSA officials announced Feb. 11 the donation of documents from the 1830s to the UTSA Library Archives and Special Collections at UTSA's Institute of Texan Cultures. The gift comes from the family of Aline Carter, poet laureate of Texas and former curator of the Alamo. Additionally, the family will establish an endowment to support and maintain the UTSA archives and collections.

UTSA Vice Provost David R. Johnson (left) and David Carter,representative of family donating collection to archive(Photo by Mark McClendon)

Among the items in the Carter family's donation:

Aline Carter's manuscript, "Light Beyond the Hills," a recounting of the life of her great-grandmother, Elizabeth Canterbury, one of the first five female settlers in San Antonio.

"The Perote Papers," written by Canterbury's husband, Wilson Riddle, they are his plea to a British minister for the release from a dungeon of him, his brother and other prisoners

"Indian Depredations Reports," which describe massacres, conflicts and cruelty inflicted by Indians on whites. In the 19th century, the term "depredations" was used universally to describe these actions. San Antonian George Brackenridge reported on "depredations" committed by Indians on the Texas frontier. He was appointed by the secretary of the interior to head an investigative committee

A telegram from Clara Driscoll, known as "Savior of the Alamo," who in 1903 provided funds to prevent the sale of the Alamo to a hotel firm

"We hope this collection serves as a great resource for public education," said family spokesperson Paul Carter. "If anyone is interested in doing a documentary on San Antonio or pursuing historical research on a class project, they would now have these resources available to provide accurate and first-hand accounts. We are grateful that the UTSA archives exist and want to spread the word about the many worthwhile endeavors UTSA is pursuing, which we will support with our donations."
Because such materials enhance the understanding and knowledge of early San Antonio, Carter said that his family hopes their donation spurs other local families to search through older photographs and papers and determine if they could be pertinent additions to the UTSA archives.
"We are pleased that the UTSA Archives and Special Collections will be the repository for this important San Antonio family collection," said David R. Johnson, UTSA vice provost for academic and faculty support and former interim dean of the library. "There is no doubt the collection will be a tremendous resource for historians and students researching 19th and 20th century San Antonio as it was experienced and described by the Carter family. Covering the family's activities for more than a century, the collection provides great insight into the fabric of life in the city and region."
UTSA Archives and Special Collections holds more than 300 items, ranging from Mexican manuscripts from the 1500s to original Fiesta San Antonio Commission photos of the 1920s. The archive also serves as the repository for the university's primary source of materials on San Antonio regarding women and gender, authors and political activities of the San Antonio Mexican-American community since World War II.
Access to the UTSA Archives and Special Collections is free and open to all. For more information, call (210) 458-2381 or visit the UTSA Archives and Special Collections Web site."

UTSA Today

The University of Texas at San Antonio
>> Read a San Antonio Express-News story (2/12/09) aboutthe Carter family gift to UTSAUTSA Library receives historic 1830s documents

By Kris RodriguezPublic Affairs Specialist

Lazy Sunday with Antique Books

2009-02-01T14:14:00.007-06:00

Today I almost got through the whole Keach collection, and I realized my 600 volumes estimate was way off, it’s more like 300. Most of the books today were in the 800’s – literature, for those non-librarians out there. Lots of Shakespeare sonnets, some Dante, Spencer and Donne. Most of them were published in the 1700’s.

The neat thing I encountered today was that several of the books had WorldCat records tucked inside that show that the only other libraries that own the books were Princeton, Yale and Johns Hopkins, in one case. These books must be exceedingly rare and it was an honor to get to handle them.

I've gotten the rhythm down of processing these old books: wipe top of pages, blow off remaining dust, set down gently, open to the title page, confirm publication info against master list, record Dewey number and any damage, and put back on shelf. It's going a lot faster now.

Best title of the day: Silent Gods and Sun-Steeped Lands
Best book: A Lecture on Heads. I wish I had time to copy down some passage from it, it was a hilariously-serious satire of phrenology.

EEK! Just one more Thing!

2009-01-31T19:20:00.004-06:00

After discussing the glamorous prizes associated with the 23 Things program tonight with colleagues, I realized that I have technically not completed all 23 Things! And the deadline is midnight tonight!

The Thing I skipped was actually Thing #2: discuss the habits of lifelong learners that are easiest and hardest for me.

After watching the sleepy little podcast (that woman's voice was like a sedative), I realized that the easiest lifelong learning habit for me is to accept responsibility for my own learning. I have never been afraid to ask for help and have sought out training opportunities whenever I felt they would be helpful. The hardest is definitely "viewing challenges as learning opportunities." Rarely, when faced with "one of life's curveballs," do I say to myself, "Oh goodie, an opportunity to learn!" Instead, I freak out and learn whatever new task I need to learn to get through the crisis in a state of nervous agitation. Not great for learning.....

OK, it's now officially, official - I've completed the 23 Things!~ On with the prizes!!!!!!

Historical Archive Work Begins

2009-01-30T19:22:00.008-06:00

I've finally started my most-looked-forward-to project in Library School - working in a historical archive. I will complete 120 hours of various tasks and desk hours at the San Antonio Public Library Texana/Genealogy dept. I have to keep a journal of the expereince for school, so I thought I'd blog about it at the same time. So, here's how my first 4 hours on the job turned out:

My project involves producing a shelf list for the archival collection of antique books donated to the library in the 1920’s by Mr. Keach – I’ll have to find out more about this man who amassed such an interesting collection. As most of the books are from the 1700’s and 1800’s, they are not available to the public except through request. The collection is kept in The Vault, the cryptic name for the climate-controlled room behind the desk where the delicate material is kept. Consisting of around 600 volumes (that's a random guess), the Keach collection runs the gamut from anthropological studies of ancient cultures to a manual for conducting Anglican church services, from art studies to Indian fairy tales and curiously contains a sizeable Chaucer section.

I started with a copy of the existing list someone had typed out on a typewriter who-knows-how-long-ago that was organized by the authors’ last names. The department needed a shelf list organized by Dewey call number (of course the existing list didn’t have call numbers on it). So starting with the very first book on the very top shelf, I recorded its call number (thankfully written on a catalog card tucked into each book – at least I don’t have to assign Dewey numbers!), checked the publication info. against the list, wiped the black smear of dust of the top of the pages, and checked it for damage. Repeat 150 times with many breaks to wash hands and cough your head off.
I’ll go back to later and create archival boxes for the damaged books to be kept in.

I had a ball! Here are the highlights of the day:

· Oldest book: 1616
· Neatest inscription: Sam W. Pennypacker, Mar 19, 1877. What a name!
· Best series title: Library of Old Authors. I’m not making it up!
· Best book title: Phallicism: Celestial and Terrestrial
· Neatest book: The Oyster: Where, How and When to Find, Breed, Cook and EAT IT! It was a little tiny blue book from the 1800’s (forgot to write down the date) with goofy illustrations of oysters with womanly legs.

Roots.

2009-01-17T15:12:00.002-06:00

Featured Family Saga

2009-01-17T11:28:00.002-06:00

Mapping The Farm: The Chronicle of a Family

This looks interesting, a guy researches the history of his wife's family's farm in Minnesota over 4 generations. No reviews yet on Goodreads, you could be the first!

Featured Family Saga

2009-01-14T08:32:00.004-06:00

Things I've Been Silent About Follow this link to Goodreads.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/books/review/Sciolino-t.html?_r=1

Follow this link for the New York Times Book Review. Here's an excerpt from that review:

"Now she has written a second memoir, much more intimate than the first, a dissection of her often difficult family life, recounted against the dramatic sweep and turbulence of recent Iranian history. The idea for the book sprang from a list that she began compiling in her diary sometime after the 1979 Islamic revolution, entitled “Things I Have Been Silent About.” It draws on other sources as well, including diaries her father, a former mayor of Tehran, started when she was 4, and addressed to her; his sanitized published memoirs and his unvarnished unpublished version; and family photographs, some of which she said she took from her mother and which appear in the book. Much of the time she relies on memory, a powerful tool that can distort as well as enlighten. "

More "Psychic Roots"

2009-01-13T12:32:00.003-06:00

My Mom had a good psychic roots story for me:

My great-aunt Scotti took Mom to a DAR research center to help her find a particularly elusive ancestor connection and within 30 minutes my Mom had found the marriage record she needed!On their way out, they got to talking to an older lady there also doing research. My Mom was still so excited about her discovery that she mentioned it to the woman. Well, wouldn't you know it, but that woman had been looking for years and years for that same marriage record to piece together a distant part of her own family tree. So my Mom stumbled upon her own distant cousin and solved both of their genealogical puzzles at the same time. Talk about serendipity.

Wow.

2009-01-09T13:09:00.003-06:00

Psychic Roots:Serendipity and Intuition in Genealogy

I stumbled upon this book today during a search for genealogy books on Goodreads. I can't wait to read it. I wonder if anyone reading this has had any paranormally-coincidental genealogy moments to share?

Roots.

2009-01-06T15:27:00.000-06:00

Thing 23: Summary of 23 Things Experience

2009-01-02T11:40:00.020-06:00

This blog was originally created as a library school assignment. I then re-purposed it to facilitate the 23 Things Library 2.0 training here at work. Now it's taken on a life of its own and gotten some modest notice within the genealogy field.

Though I've been looking at this Library 2.0 training through the lens of genealogical research, I've really learned a lot about online resources in general. Things I didn't even know existed before this experience are Delicious (I refuse to put in all those ridiculous periods), Technorati, Rollyo, Animoto, image generators, Flickr Commons, and the MyHeritage site. Skills I've mastered since starting the 23 Things program are embedding videos and other html codes, setting up RSS feeds, creating Goodreads widgets (I can't stop making shelf widgets!), posting to a pbwiki, and following blogs (it's easy, but I'd never done it before).

Now that the 23 Things program is over, I can use these new skills and resources to continue to develop this blog (but not on work time anymore...sigh...). I look forward to blogging about my upcoming stint volunteering at a historical archive as well, so stay tuned!

Thing 21: Podcasts

2009-01-02T11:40:00.012-06:00

Check out the sidebar for the Genealogy Guys Podcast feed. I have heard of these guys for a while, and finally got around to checking them out.

Thing 22: Downloadable Audiobooks

2009-01-02T11:40:00.007-06:00

I found Overdrive to be easy to use and their media console very easy to install. I still think the digital file disappearing from your computer at the end of the loan period is magical. How do they do that?!

Thing 20: YouTube: Hours of Fun

2009-01-02T11:39:00.013-06:00

"Awareness Test"

This short video's message is definitely applicable to genealogical research. Pay close attention!

Thing 19: Web 2.0 Awards List: MyHeritage

2009-01-02T11:39:00.008-06:00

http://www.myheritage.com/

MyHeritage won the Genealogy Web 2.0 award, so I joined up for free and spent some time studying the site. Well, it turns out that it works much the same as the PBWiki collaborative system I discussed in an earlier post. By signing up with MyHeritage, you automatically create your own, private family site that you can then invite family members to join. There you can all post photos, fill in the family tree, and even post Facebook-style status updates. The clean look of the site is much better than the ugly and baffling PBWiki set-up, so maybe MyHeritage is the way to go.

Thing 13: Social Bookmarking: I Just Don't Get It

2009-01-02T11:38:00.005-06:00

I checked out Delicious, the premiere social bookmarking site and I just didn't see what all the fuss was about. I searched for sites that people had tagged with "genealogy" and got a list of 10 sites - and they were all the big ones - Ancestry, Geni, FamilySearch. That doesn't help me much...I did like that you are shown related tags to explore, like "family," "history," and "research," but when you look at "research" for example, you get a much broader range of any type of research site, scientific ones too...

So I didn't find Delicious to be that helpful for a novice genealogist except as a means of organizing your own favorite websites - it doesn't seem to be the place to discover new resources.

Roots.

2008-12-09T19:49:00.002-06:00

Thing 17: PBWiki: Great Genealogical Possibilities

2008-12-09T19:24:00.005-06:00

Why is it that in most families there's only one person who does the genealogy and everyone consults them about whether or not we really are related to the Mavericks or what was great-grandma's birthday again? It's just not fair. No one person should be doing all the work.

What if one were to start up a personal pbwiki account (the pricing gets better the more people involved) and invite others in the family with genealogical tendencies to collaborate on the family tracing? We saw a large-scale example of this in Familypedia, the genealogy wiki I stumbled across, but I think this type of sharing tool may work best for smaller groups, where you know who's adding the information and whether or not to take it with a grain of salt.

Now, if I can only get my genealogically-minded relatives to become technologically-minded, then I might just be on to something.....

Thing 18: Google Docs...A Place to Keep Your Stuff

2008-12-09T17:06:00.004-06:00

I recently checked in with Google Docs, the word processing arm of The Google Empire, and was surprised to find some old bits of term papers I had started working on last year still there, ready to go! I had started up a Google Docs account so I could work on my school work at work or home, but always felt iffy about the security of such a system - what if Google ate my homework?! I suppose now I can rest assured, now that this accidental, year-long experiment has proved the worth of Google Docs as an internet word processing and storage system.

Thing 16: Genealogy Wikis: Working Together

2008-12-05T13:22:00.010-06:00

I did a Google search for 'genealogy wiki' and came across this great resource:

http://genealogy.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

Familypedia: The Genealogy Wiki, contains roughly 25,000 articles, devoted to distinct surnames, places or individuals. I looked up my own surname and was surprised there wasn't a page devoted to it. There we pages for famous people with my last name, but I was not one of them.

Here's a nugget from their main page: "The focus of this site is on capturing the details of the lives of our ancestors, both those historically significant people and the everyday people usually not listed in encyclopaedias, histories, or even "people's histories". Along the way, it is our hope that the site will also provide information about the historical and social context that our ancestors found themselves within. Finally, this site aspires to be truly global, with active contributors and information from multiple cultures and all four Hemispheres."

(photo above from the Library of Congress Collection at Flickr Commons)

Roots.

2008-12-01T14:07:00.002-06:00

Think 15: LibraryThing Genealogy Group

2008-12-01T10:27:00.008-06:00

LibraryThing is a site similar to Goodreads, in that you can collect, recommend, and search for books, but it has less of the social networking angle that Goodreads has. LibraryThing's main claim to fame is the social tagging feature, much like Flickr.
OK, the truth of the matter is that I am procrastinating a little paper about social tagging that's due by the end of the day, and rather than work on it, I'll blog about it!

On to business.

Just like on Goodreads, there's a Genealogy Group on LibraryThing and this group is much more active than the former. In fact, the member library contains 164,806 books! This group describes itself as:

"Group for any and all interested in genealogical research. This group is for beginners and for professionals. It's for those who like to research and compile data and those who like to paint a cultural and historical picture of individual lives. It's for everyone in between.Share book lists, recommendations, triumphs and trials..."

The most common book among all the group member's libraries is Evidence: Citation and Analysis for the Family Historian by Elizabeth Shown Mills.

Crockery Heirlooms

2008-11-28T11:03:00.007-06:00

The old, worn crockery bowl in the middle was my great-grandmother's and we use it every year to make Mom's famous pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving. My mom happened upon a similar bowl at an antique store and of course, snapped it right up. This year, as we got all the pie fixings out, she showed me how she labeled each bowl so that future generations will know the genealogy of their crockery heirlooms.

Roots.

2008-11-28T11:00:00.000-06:00

Goodreads Widget

2008-11-26T11:29:00.008-06:00

It took me a while to figure out that I could make a Goodreads widget for one of my bookshelves. I spent a few minutes populating a Family Saga shelf on my Goodreads account; I tried to pick a balance of Fiction and Non-Fiction titles that looked interesting (the Sweet & Lo family saga is supposed to be especially juicy). Making the widget was super-easy: simply select a widget from Goodreads, select the shelf you want to use, and copy the html code that spits out. Then go to the Blogger Layout screen and add the gadget called "Html/javascript" and copy in the Goodreads html. Save and voila! You now have a Goodreads shelf widget!

Thing 6: Animoto: Spirit Photo Montage: Creepiest Thing Ever

2008-11-22T22:15:00.003-06:00

Those cheesy spirit photos from the National Media Museum Collection are rendered utterly bone-chilling when "animotoed" with Moonlight Sonata. Spooky!!!

Roots.

2008-11-22T14:41:00.000-06:00

Footnote Database: The Coolest Thing I've Ever Seen

2008-11-22T13:51:00.004-06:00

The San Antonio Public Library just subscribed to the Footnote database, and it provides a wealth of easily-searchable and pleasingly-laid out documents, some of which have never beofre been made available electronically. I tried searching for my great-grandmother's death certificate within Footnotes' Texas Death Certificates Collection. Lo and behold, there she was, with her very own "Footnote Person Page." I've included the screen captures in order to give you an idea of how amazing it is to see your ancestor's life mapped out along with major historical events (top screen) and her vital stats nicely charted. There are also functions that allow you to "approve" of the information displayed, and to add additional information of your own, though I haven't tried to do so. Genealogy has certainly come a long way.

Non-Genealogical Spookiness

2008-11-22T13:22:00.005-06:00

Thank you, National Media Museum, for putting this amazing collection of "spirit photographs" in the Flickr Commons collection. These came from the National Media Museum's photostream, available here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationalmediamuseum/. Between this and the Library of Congress' American Memory Project, I am in old-photo heaven! I decided to make a mosaic because they are fun and I couldn't post just one of these very silly and yet very spooky photos....

Roots.

2008-11-21T12:22:00.000-06:00

Thing 14: Technorati: Claiming Haphazardry

2008-11-20T11:18:00.005-06:00

I registered with Technorati and claimed this blog. I also added a ton of tags for my blog so that the odds of someone stumbling upon it will increase. Maybe I'll get some "fave"s using this little widget above. Now, if I can only figure out how to embed it in the sidebar or something...Oh, I just did!
I'm excited and intimidated to really put myself and this little web creation out there in the blogosphere. We'll see what happens!

Thing 12: Rollyo: Genealogy Blogs Search Roll

2008-11-20T10:27:00.003-06:00

I created this search tool on the Rollyo site. It was so easy, and I didn't have to sign up or register to do it. I added Genealogy Blog Finder, the Cyndi's List page of genealogy blogs, and a couple of other sites that list genealogy blogs. Therefore, this search tool is limited genealogy blogs only. I was surprised that Rollyo rejected the Google genealogy blog search page for inclusion in my search roll. There are other "looks" you can choose for your Rollyo search roll, but the red is the snazziest.

Roots.

2008-11-18T15:25:00.001-06:00

Haphazardry Makes It to the Big Time!

2008-11-18T13:05:00.004-06:00

Well, you may remember my post about Genealogy Blog Finder, the mother load of genealogical blogs listings, each blog having RSS feeds of their own, and organized by type (Humor, Technology, Preservation, Photography, Conferences, etc...).

I made it on the list! You can now find Genealogical Haphazadry on page 8 in the "Tips, Resources and Reviews" section of Genealogy Blog Finder. Pretty exciting! I better whip this blog into shape!

Thing 11: Goodreads | Genealogy

2008-11-14T15:21:00.003-06:00

Goodreads Genealogy

I have been a Goodreads-er for a while now and have been absolutely hooked. I recently discovered a genealogy group on Goodreads (see the link to their page above). There are several genealogical discussions taking place there, and the group's bookshelf is diverse, but small. I was hoping to link into all these great genealogy books through this group, but it looks like they haven't been as "add-to-your-shelves-happy" as I have been. Though I love Goodreads to death, I am continually frustrated by the impossibility of browsing by subject. Maybe I don't know what I'm doing and it is, in fact, quite easy to find all the highest rating genealogy books, and if so, I hope someone will set me straight. Perhaps I'll join this genealogy group and try to get them to add some more titles to their shelves so that we may all benefit from their reading experiences.

Roots.

2008-11-14T13:47:00.002-06:00

Thing 7: Technology and Genealogy: A Mixed Bag

2008-11-13T12:11:00.008-06:00

Online genealogical resources have changed the nature of family history research. Many genealogists can do the majority of their work through online databases. This is great! It opens the playing field to folks who don't live near a library.

At the same time, easy-to-use online genealogical resources can lead the novice astray. Searching strategies, different name spellings, and database retrieval processes all come into play when using electronic genealogical resources. Those not aware of Boolean searching or database functions run the risk of assuming that if the database didn't find the ancestor, then he/she is untraceable. Doing your research in a library gives you the back-up of personal assistance; you can consult a librarian if you get stuck. If you choose to stay on your couch and hunt for the past online, you are literally on your own. That's not always a good thing.

The blog trend that is sweeping the nation has swept up genealogists as well, as evident through the amount of genealogical blogs covered by the Genealogy Blog Finder mentioned in previous posts (http://blogfinder.genealogue.com/). The blogs and social network sites that discuss genealogy can make up for (sort of) the lack of guiding professional staff found at libraries. Feedback and advice available throughout the online community provides a wealth of valuable information...as well as a wealth of misleading information.

So, novice genealogists, be forewarned. The internet is no replacement for a nice, musty library archive.

Roots.

2008-11-10T19:29:00.003-06:00

Panoramic Photographs from The American Memory Project

2008-11-10T18:46:00.006-06:00

The Library of Congress' American Memory Project never gets old. Ha! Bad pun.

Anyway, I just discovered the cache of Panoramic Photographs that are, for the most part, restriction-free. I found this great, wistful dirt road landscape to use as the backdrop for my blog title. Here's the link:

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/panoramic_photo/index.html

They are not all landscape or city panoramas, as you might expect, in fact I found what may be the weirdest one and thought I'd share it with all of you:

This is an alligator farm in Florida in 1910. Can you see them all down there? I was reminded of the legendary alligator farm at the Witte Museum in San Antonio, but from what I heard it was never this extensive.

The Panoramic Collection also has a whole section of group portrait panoramas, so if you squint real hard you may be able to pick out an ancestor from the group. Good Luck!

Thing 10: Image Generator: Genealogy is a Puzzle

2008-11-08T15:18:00.008-06:00

I used the copyright-free image of 1840's era Philadelphia I found on the awesome American Memory site (see 2 posts down) to create this jigsaw puzzle.

I used the online image generator found on this equally awesome site:

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/

I love this puzzle generator, and what a great metaphor for genealogical work.

Things 4, 8 & 9: RSS Feeds: Genealogical Mother Load!

2008-11-08T14:39:00.007-06:00

In trying to catch up on the 23 Things lessons, I did a Google search for "genealogical blog." Yes, I was looking for other great genealogical blogs, but really I was trying to see whether my own blog would appear in the results list. It didn't, not even in the first 3 pages of results! I think that's a good thing, though....

The genealogical mother load I referred to was the 1st hit in the result list and was really the end of my search! It's called Genealogy Blog Finder, here's the link:

http://blogfinder.genealogue.com/

This awesome site groups genealogical blogs by focus: personal research, technology, cemeteries, preservation, libraries, etc... Within each grouping there are many blogs listed, each with their own summary. According to the site, it has "1,132 blogs now categorized." Again, you could lose yourself for hours looking into each amazingly-specific blog.
Wow.

American Memory Project: Library of Congress

2008-11-08T12:28:00.008-06:00

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html

A treasure trove for any History aficionado and or Genealogy buff, the American Memory Project is described on its "About" page thusly:

"American Memory provides free and open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience.It is a digital record of American history and creativity. These materials, from the collections of the Library of Congress and other institutions, chronicle historical events, people, places, and ideas that continue to shape America, serving the public as a resource for education and lifelong learning."

This multimedia resource can eat up hours of your time and you'll never see all of it. Many of the images, films and sound recordings are not copyrighted, but quite a few are, so it is important to check the "Rights and Reproductions" link for each piece before you use it.

Here's the statement from the site:

"As a publicly supported institution, the Library generally does not own rights in its collections. Therefore, it does not charge permission fees for use of such material and generally does not grant or deny permission to publish or otherwise distribute material in its collections. Permission and possible fees may be required from the copyright owner independently of the Library. It is the researcher's obligation to determine and satisfy copyright or other use restrictions when publishing or otherwise distributing materials found in the Library's collections."

As an example, I found this image of Second Street in Philadelphia, PA taken between 1842-1845. The Rights and Reproduction link for the image opens this message: "The Library of Congress is not aware of any restrictions on these photographs." Sounds good!

San Antonio Public Library Free Genealogy Class

2008-11-05T16:30:00.003-06:00

The next free genealogy instructional session offered by SAPL's Texana/Genealogy Department is coming up!

Beginning Genealogy: The Internet as a Source

Tues. November 18
2pm-3pm

Seating is limited, so call 207 -2500 (ask for Texana) to register for a spot.

In this class you will learn how to:

-evaluate genealogy websites
-download blank research forms
-understand major sites and how they can help you.

El Dia de los Muertos: The Genealogical Holiday

2008-11-01T18:19:00.009-05:00

Today is the Day of the Dead, time to light the candles on your ofrenda and put out a bit of your ancestor's favorite food and drink.

No other holiday honors the family lineage as much as this one, for Thanksgiving is devoted to appreciating one's present family, and Christmas is all about presents and cookies, let's not kid ourselves.

But today, on this ghostly holiday, we pause and look back to those family members that have passed or perhaps we never knew. Genealogists the world over should observe this special holiday.

By the way, the San Antonio Public Library has a permanent Dia de los Muertos ofrenda in the form of a mural near the Central Library's auditorium, pictured below. Images from Flickr.

Thing 5: Creative Family Trees From Flickr

2008-10-30T09:42:00.008-05:00

This photograph family tree is very stylish. Make your family history into fabulous interior design!

Now this is for only your most dedicated of genealogists - what if you had traced the wrong ancestor? That would be one painful correction! I do love this idea though, perhaps just mapping one's close extended family, rather than going way back. I've always wanted a tattoo but could never make up my mind on an image or phrase I could live with for the rest of my life - but since family is the one constant in our lives - why not ink the ancestors? I love it.

Genealogy Not Just for People....

2008-10-30T09:35:00.004-05:00

I found this on Flickr in a search for "family tree" images. It's a little hard to read, but you can get the general idea: companies' connections are often as convoluted and hard to trace as family ties.

Genealogy Classes at SAPL

2008-10-29T16:20:00.004-05:00

The Texana/Genealogy department of the Central San Antonio Public Library offers several FREE genealogy classes throughout the year. The next one coming up is:

Using Census Records in Family History Research

Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008
2:00pm-3:30pm

Register for this free class by calling the library at 207-2500 (ask for Texana).

I attended this class last year ( ...or was it just earlier this year?) and really learned a lot. This is a very informal class, and would be beneficial to both novice genealogists and public library staff unsure of how to instruct patrons in using Census Records.

Things 5 &6: Flickr Mosaic: Not Very Genealogical...Maybe a little.

2008-10-24T10:40:00.004-05:00

I experimented with a Flickr mosaic and it was a blast. I think this montage actually reflects my character and interests very well.

National Archives' "Getting Started" Page Is Super Cool

2008-10-18T14:38:00.001-05:00

http://www.archives.gov/genealogy/faqs/

I've decided to give all my blog posts cheesy, newspaper-type headlines.

Anyway, for novice genealogists (like me!), the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) website can be a great place to start (AFTER you've been to your library's Genealogy Dept., which is the real place to start!).

NARA's FAQ page is seemingly endless, covering nearly every kind of genealogical quandary. What I particularly like is the way they have broken down what kind of genealogical info can and cannot be found on the site so that you don't waste time searching for something that isn't there.
The National Archives is really the mother load; you have access to Census, Military, Immigration, Naturalization and Land records all on one site. Their FAQ's make note of the important fact that these same records are available through subscription services like Ancestry.com, but can be found here for free. However, not all National Archive records are online, some you have to request copies of, so don't get too excited, thinking you can sit down and fill out your whole pedigree chart in one night on the NARA site!

http://www.archives.gov/genealogy/faqs/

Enjoy!

Thing 3: Library School Blog becomes 23 Things Blog

2008-10-09T16:42:00.001-05:00

If any of you are thinking of doing the Library School thing or are already signed up with the Foundation for the Mejor Futuro Scholarship, you may want to check out this blog I made for my Information Storage and Retrieval class last year.

This blog project was very much in line with the 23 Things program: you will find an RSS feed, photos, and podcasts, much like the weekly 23 Things.

So, now I am re-purposing this blog to follow the 23 Things steps, though I would like to keep the genealogy/Texana focus.

#9: INTERNET: CYNDI'S LIST

2007-11-19T17:58:00.001-06:00

Cyndi's List.com

http://www.cyndislist.com/

This website is a wonderful resource for genealogists and librarians because of its comprehensive indexing of other genealogy websites. As stated in the website's description, Cyndi's List is:

"*A categorized & cross-referenced index to genealogical resources on the Internet.
*A list of links that point you to genealogical research sites online.
*A free jumping-off point for you to use in your online research.
*A "card catalog" to the genealogical collection in the immense library that is the Internet.
*Your genealogical research portal onto the Internet. "

Although we have to take her word for it, Cyndi's list does appear to be very extensive and may come close to "cataloging the genealogy collection in the immense library that is the Internet." Because of its scope and usability, I selected Cyndi's List as the best free genealogy website on the internet. I have used it many times for my own research and in answering reference questions and have found it easy to use and well indexed.

A simple Google search for "genealogy" pulled up Cyndi's List as #7 in the results list.

#8: MULTI-MEDIA: AMERICAN MEMORY PROJECT

2007-11-17T18:07:00.000-06:00

Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA-OWI Collection,
LC-USF34-030792-D DLC

The American Memory Project is a fascinating Library of Congress database that holds thousands of image, sound and text files from numerous sources. This image of a family tree is from the FSW-OWI Collection, taken by photographers working for the government, and such work is generally not copyrighted.

I chose this image for display on this blog because of its historical look. It also demonstrates the fact that mapping family trees through genealogy is a time-honored tradition, and the fact that this family tree was framed and displayed prominently in the home illustrates the pride in their heritage that so many genealogists exhibit.

http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ammemrr.pl?title=%3ca%20href%3d%22%2fammem%2ffsowhome.html%22%3eAmerica%20from%20the%20Great%20Depression%20to%20World%20War%20II%3a%20Photographs%20from%20the%20FSA-OWI,%201935-1945%3c%2fa%3e&coll=fsaall&div=&agg=fsa&default=ammem&dir=ammem

#7: SOCIAL NETWORKING: MYSPACE

2007-11-16T22:21:00.000-06:00

MySpace Genealogy Group

This is MySpace's most popular Genealogy group, boasting 3, 082 members and operating since 2003. Because of the length of time it has been active and amount of members it has (the next most popular genealogy group had only 300 members), this group presents the most resources and opportunities for social networking about genealogy issues.

Members post the family names that appear on their family tree in hopes for finding others with the same surnames in their background. They have organized these types of postings as topic threads such as, "Surnames A-D, Surnames E-H, etc...," making it easier for one to track down their own family names within the postings.

There are other useful topic threads such as, "Good Genealogy Sites??" in which members post family history research websites and explain why they like them. There is also quite a bit of discussion about the benefits and disadvantages of Ancestry.com, providing some valuable first-hand advice from current members of this subscription service that has come to dominate the genealogy research industry.

Another interesting thread, "Ever Have Relatives Refuse to Give You Information?" offers fascinating examples from members who have dealt with relatives who are reluctant to provide family photos or documents, discusses their possible motives, and provides advice for how to proceed in this delicate matter.

Finally, the "Famous Relatives" thread offers a forum for members to post their claims to fame, and there are many listings of famous great-great aunts or distant cousins. Though not especially useful, this thread is very entertaining and if someone out there does have a famous relative, here's your chance to make it known!

http://groups.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=groups.groupProfile&groupID=100002420&categoryID=0&Mytoken=1E3EABB7-34B1-4924-912E5B4CB5AC0D6D3680008

#6: D: DATABASE SEARCHING: BROWSING

2007-11-16T22:06:00.000-06:00

BROWSING: Library Literature

Since Browsing requires a lot of hunting and following threads through many different subject areas, I chose to browse within the Library Literature database since I would be limiting the subject area to the LIS field. If I chose a broader-focused database such as LexisNexis or WorldCat, I could be hunting for a while before I narrowed my browsing to the library field, since genealogy as a library service is the primary focus of this blog.

After selecting the "Browse" option within LibLit, I searched for "genealogy" within the subject field. 20 subject headings were displayed, the first 13 relating to genealogy. The exceptional list of genealogical subjects, complete with tallies of documents for each one, was a great way to start a search for information for this blog topic. However, as is often the case with browsing, it was difficult to focus on one subject area - they all looked so appealing! In particular, Genealogical research, Genealogy Databases, Genealogy/Information Services, and Genealogy/Internet Resources were most tempting.

I chose to focus on Genealogy/Internet Resources, as that subject heading was most in line with this blog and it contained 25 documents - a good compromise between the 100 listed for Genealogical research and the 4 documents with the Genealogy/Information Services heading.

The first 2 of the 25 articles displayed for Genealogy/Internet Resources dealt with genealogical issues specific to Ireland, so I looked to the rest of the list for more relevant results. Clearly, many of these articles are useful in this blog focus: Doors Opening Wider: Library and Archival Services to Family History, Finding Your Story: Genealogical Resources on the Net, Family Trees On the Web, Using the Internet for Genealogical Research: A Brief Selection of Web Sites, among others. Of the 25, 15 of the titles were spot-on topic.

Browsing within LibLit for articles about genealogical resources was an educational experience, for rather than being limited to the search results from targeted searches, this allowed me to view the entirety of available documents on a general topic and navigate my search accordingly.

#6: C: DATABASE SEARCHING: SPECIFIC FACET FIRST

2007-11-08T12:26:00.000-06:00

Specific Facet First

Since the three facets of my searches for documents about my blog topic have generally been "genealogy," "public libraries," and "resources," the most specific facet is "genealogy." I chose LexisNexis as the database in which to use this search strategy because of the large pool of items it contains - I was sure to find quite a bit of information about this specific focus of my blog.

I chose to limit the search to within the past 5 years, thereby filtering out-dated information from the search results. I also limited the search to "Major U.S. and World Publications," rather than focus on Web Publications or Blogs, since examples of these types of material have been provided elsewhere in this blog.

Using these limiters and "genealogy" as my only search term, the search retrieved 997 hits. When sorted by relevance by the system, the first 4 hits seemed quite useful:

1) Allen, D. (2003, July 24). Genealogy council is a boon to local rooters. St. Petersburg Times. P. 2D.

2) Tapping into the roots. (2007, April 3). Chinadaily.com.cn.

3) Unearthing family roots. (2007, August 14). Chinadaily.com.cn.

4) Getting back to your roots. (2004, March 25). New Media Age. P.21.

Interestingly enough, the search did pull up items from Web Publications, perhaps that is one of the reasons why the number of hits was so large. Though this search pulled up many useful documents, I would proceed to narrow the results list to a more manageable size through the use of stricter date and publication limiters and the addition of more search terms to narrow the subject focus.

#6: B: DATABASE SEARCHING: CITATION PEARL GROWING

2007-11-05T19:37:00.000-06:00

Citation Pearl Growing

A keyword search for "genealogy public library" was first conducted in the Books in Print database. This is the beginning of the "pearl growing" process in which you start with a list of relevant items, select the most promising, and use it's subject headings or keywords as inspiration for further searches.

The Keyword search retrieved 30 hits and were sorted by date. When I sorted them by relevance, the first few hits seemed less relevant to my purpose than the first few listed by date! The result list from this search is pictured above, with the search terms at the top.

Most of these 30 results were very specific, regional titles such as, Public Cemeteries of Sumter County, Alabama 1834-1972: A Genealogical Listing, and Index to Births as Reported in the Marshfield News and Marshfield Times Prior to 1908. However, the first few titles were more appropriate to my concerns of broader genealogical resources: Tracing Your ancestors in the National Archives, The Digital Age and Local Studies, and My Confederate Kinfolk: A Twenty-First Century Freed-Woman Discovers Her Roots.

Of these I chose to focus on the Digital Age and Local Studies by Peter H. Reid in order to explore the electronic resources available to genealogists (this book appears at the bottom of the first screen capture).

The subjects listed for this title were Genealogy; Libraries and Readers; Local History; and Public Libraries. Interestingly enough, none of these subject headings mentioned the internet or electronic resources. So I looked to the synopsis for terms I could use in another search, thereby adding yet another layer to my search pearl. After several bouts of trial and error with various search terms form the synopsis, I hit on a good combination:

"genealogy and web"

This search pulled up 2 hits, the first one being Genealogy Via the Internet: Trace Your Family Roots Quickly and Easily Using the World Wide Web by Ralph Roberts. Though this was a great resource, I wanted more. So, in adding yet another layer to my pearl, I used the subject heading from Genealogy Via the Internet,

"Genealogy Computer Network Resources,"

to retrieve a list of 76 extremely relevant titles, the first being of that quintessential brand of guidebook, Genealogy Online For Dummies. The results list is pictured in the second screen capture above, with a tiny line at the top demonstrating the subject search.

Though 76 titles is quite a bit to sift through, I think it is preferable to the previous list of 30, wherein many titles were too obscure to be useful to most librarians or patrons, and to the short list of 2 hits pulled up from the second layer of searching. Though the items in the final result list do not refer to genealogy in public libraries, they do provide a wealth of resources for the public librarian and patron to expand their genealogical expertise outside the realm of print indexes and microfilm.

#6: A: DATABASE SEARCHING: BUILDING BLOCK

2007-11-05T17:41:00.000-06:00

Building Block

Dialog is an excellent database in which to use the Building Block searching strategy because that is the search system it is built for. Having access to many different databases within this meta-search engine could result in information overload, but since this course limits us to search only within ERIC, Library and Information Science, Gale Magazines, and Dissertation Abstracts, the field can be considerably narrowed. In order to further narrow my search (since Dialog charges by the minute, I did not want to retrieve a ton of unnecessary results that would require a lot of sifting) I chose to search within the Library and Information Science database only. This choice effectively limits my search to the LIS field and eliminated the need for "library" to appear as a search term.

The structure of Dialog allows for quality Building Block searches. By submitting one search facet at a time, one can build an intelligent search string based on the number of results listed for each element of each facet. The choice of which search term to use when creating the final Building Block search string is informed by the amount of hits noted for each term by the database.

Following the submission of the terms "genealogy OR family history," I was able to eliminate "family history" since it promised no results. Facet 2, "resource OR service," pulled tens of thousands of results, so I knew either of those were good search terms. Finally I tried "public or layman" to see if these were viable choices for Facet 3. "Public" far out-weighed "layman," so it was a natural choice to represent Facet 3. Then I combined the best-looking (in terms of possibility of relevant results) search terms to create the following building block search: "genealogy and resources and public." However, this search string retrieved only 2 hits. In order to increase recall I chose to change Facet 2 to "service" since it was represented much more in the database than "resource." I also expanded Facet 3 to include both "public and layman." The final search string looked like this:

"genealogy and service and (public or layman)"

This time 5 hits were retrieved, and all seemed relevant to this blog topic. In fact, the first hit was exactly what I was looking for: How Public Librarians Can Provide Basic Genealogy Instruction. Even though this search retrieved some excellent results, 5 is not really enough and I could play with the search terms even more to try to broaden the retrieval amount while still maintaining high relevance. If Dialog were a free database, I would refine my search quite a bit more, but when under the gun and every second counts (literally!), this search with its 5 relevant hits is perfectly satisfactory.

# 6: DATABASES SEARCHING

2007-11-04T10:01:00.000-06:00

Database Searching Introduction

The following series of posts explores the successes of various searching strategies concerning this blog's subject, genealogy resources for public librarians and patrons, within 4 major databases: LibLit, Books in Print, LexisNexis and DIALOG.

The four search strategies used are Building Block, Citation Pearl Growing, Specific Facet First, and Browsing, used in DIALOG, Books In Print, LexisNexis and Library Literature, respectively.

I will discuss of the rationale behind my choice of search terms and browsing paths and evaluation of the results retrieved for their usefulness in regard to this blog's focus.

This exercise in database searching might inspire and educate others attempting a similar foray into the vast realm of database resources; for I certainly learned a lot about natural vs. controlled language (see Citation Pearl Growing), the importance of choosing the correct search terms (see Building Block) and of staying on course while browsing.

#5: TAGGING: LIBRARY THING

2007-09-28T12:19:00.000-05:00

Library Thing

"LibraryThing is a full-powered cataloging application, searching the Library of Congress, all five national Amazon sites, and more than 80 world libraries. You can edit your information, search and sort it, "tag" books with your own subjects, or use the Library of Congress and Dewey systems to organize your collection."

All the tags users place on a given title are accumulated into "tagging clouds" which help give an impression of the book's main features. When searching for a genealogy book, I came across The Hidden Half of the Family: A Sourcebook for Women's Genealogy by Christina K. Schaefer. I used its tagging cloud to decide whether it could be a useful resource for genealogists:

Christina K. - author(1) etc.(2) female ancestors(2) female ancestors U. S.(1) genealogy(16) general research aid(2) I don't own this book yet...(1) manual(3) methodology(4) Reference(3) reference genealogy women(2) Research(1) Research Methods(2) researching women(2) Schaefer(1) sourcebook(1) U.S. - genealogy - handbooks(1) w-80(1) Women(7) women - U.S. - genealogy - han(1) women genealogy(2) women's history(2) Women's Research(1)
http://www.librarything.com/work/799530

The numbers after each tag denote the frequency of the tag, or how many users assigned that same tag to this book. Clearly "genealogy," "reference" and "methodology" stand out as popular terms as well as various "women"-related phrases. These common tags lead me to assume this could be a good resource for genealogists struggling with research of female ancestors.

#4: RSS FEED: RSSGenealogy.com

2007-09-20T16:22:00.000-05:00

RSSGenealogy.com RSS feed has been added to the sidebar!

This fantastic "meta-feed" collects the feeds of all the major genealogy websites and blogs in one place. By subscribing to RSSGenealogy's feed, one gets all the updates from such genealogy website heavy-hitters as Cindi's List, Everton Publishing's blog (linked in my blog as well), Genealogy.com, U.S. Census, and many, many others. The convenience of this collection of feeds cannot be understated when there are so many technological and organizational changes happening in library science in general, and in genealogical research in particular. This feed is an important addition to this blog that aims to make staying abreast of genealogical resources, new and old, a one-stop experience.

Check the sidebar, under my profile, often for the latest updates from RSSGenealogy.

Discovering RSSGenealogy's feed was a happy accident in conducting a Google search for "genealogy" and "RSS feeds." I had no idea such a "meta-feed" existed, as I was searching for any relevant genealogical feed and was so glad that this was the first hit in my search.

#3: PODCAST: GENEALOGY GUYS

2007-09-16T09:45:00.000-05:00

The Genealogy Guys Podcast

http://genealogyguys.com/index.php?post_id=252867

"George G. Morgan and Drew Smith discuss genealogy! Their podcast is the longest-running, continuous genealogy podcast in the world," according to the site.

While each podcast if full of genealogical updates, the podcast from Sept. 4, 2007 mentions new ancestry databases available but more interestingly, addresses some common genealogical "myths" such as:

"My ancestors' names were changed at Ellis Island."
"Everyone with the same surname is related."
"Naming patterns will solve all your brick walls."

This podcast was selected for posting here because genealogical resource tips and updates are presented in a fun, entertaining manner and offer valuable information for all levels of genealogical expertise. Perhaps this podcast can provide a much-needed break for genealogy enthusiasts' long hours at the dizzying microfilm screen!

This website was the first hit in a Google search for Genealogy Podcasts.

#2: BLOG POST: U.S. GENEALOGY

2007-09-10T13:48:00.000-05:00

Genealogy Roots Blog

http://genrootsblog.blogspot.com/

This blog is described by its author as providing help "for finding online genealogy databases, records and resources. The focus is on vital records (birth, marriage, divorce & death records), obituaries, census records, naturalization records, military records and ship passenger lists. The Genealogy Roots Blog is based in the USA, but online European, Canadian, and other records sources are sometimes included. Mixed in with all this you will occasionally find a fun post, a book review or genealogy news."

This blog serves as a more specialized resource for people seeking their family history within the United States, as opposed to the Genealogy Blog of Everton Press which has world-wide resources.

This blog was the second hit in a Google search of genealogy blogs.

#1: BLOG LINK: GENEALOGY BLOG

2007-09-05T11:17:00.000-05:00

Everton Publishing's Blog

http://www.genealogyblog.com/

This blog was created by Everton Publishing which describes the company's development thusly:

"By listening to you, learning as much as possible about the field of genealogy and teaching people to connect with the history of families, the company became widely recognized by professional genealogists and hobbyists alike as the industry leader in continuing education, research, and publishing."

Their blog is devoted to posting updates in every conceivable area of genealogical research throughout the world. One week's posts include such varied topics as new voter registration records available at Saline Co. Library, Kansas to DNA testing resources to Barack Obama's family tree. This rich resource will be of value to the casual researcher as a means to broaden their horizons and to the seasoned genealogist as a source of perhaps obscure new developments in the field.

This was the first hit from a Google search for genealogy blogs.