How Social Media Can Help Your Family Tree Research

Social media can help you in your family tree research  in a number of ways. 

1. Keeping You Up-To-Date

Genealogy sites such as Kin Tree, Ancestry and Find My Past have Facebook and Twitter pages along with blogs where you can keep abreast of all the latests news.  Even if you don't use them for anything else, it's worth checking these out and connecting with their pages t make sure that you don't miss out.

2.Tracking Down Living Relations

If you have an idea of where an unknown relative is based then a search on social media can be very fruitful. It also has the advantage of allowing them to check you out and to see you are a genuine person and not a scammer.

3. Surname Groups

Social media is full of groups who share the same surname.  This can be helpful in a number of ways.  Firstly, you can find out about the surname and where people are located in the world. Secondly, you may find a family connection. Lastly, other people researching the same surname may be able to give you pointers or have information on the family name that is useful to you.

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4. Historical and Geographical Groups

There are many social media pages out there who are interested in events or places with which your ancestors were connected.  most are friendly and helpful and can fill you in on details that you may not have found anywhere else.

5. Answering questions

Try putting in a search on Twitter for example, for something for which you have questions. In this example (below) the phrase "Seaforth Highlanders" was used and below gives you a flavour of the results.  You can select to look for people called "Seaforth Highlanders", where the phrase is used (as we did) or to look for images.

Bonnie Saunders ‏@Glasstreasures21 Sep

Here is today's feature for you. This is The Seaforth Highlanders Badge Plate. I hope you all enjoy and... http://fb.me/2s3HTQSFK 

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•  Reply 
•  Retweet 
•  Favorite 

We Are The Dead ‏@WeAreTheDead20 Sep

Pte. Eric Oswald Cleugh (Seaforth Highlanders of Canada). Dec. 27, 1942.

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Valour and Gallantry ‏@VC_GC3 Sep

VC: Lance Corporal Robert McBeath (Seaforth Highlanders) First World War http://bit.ly/Xy46jh  #VC

Retweeted by ScotsMilitaryHistory

6. Ask A Community

There are many social media communities out there or a variety of topics where you can simply ask a question.  People are generous with their help and will be glad to help you find information or point you in the right direction.

At Kin Tree, we are experts in the use of social media so please don't hesitate to contact us for more information.

Contact us at:

kintree@ymail.com

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Tracking Down That Elusive Ancestor

Anyone tracing their family tree will have come across that problem where you know that you should be able to find an ancestor in a particular index but they don't seem to be there. Census records are a common area where ancestors seem to "disappear" for example.

How can we find these elusive ancestors and why might they disappear off the records?

The are common reasons why our ancestors might disappear.

• Spelling - Names were normally written down by the person who was officially recording an event. Different people might use different spelling variations.  There could be a mistake simply because the person recording information misheard a name.

• AKA - Often people were not known by their birth name, The name on the birth certificate may say, for example, Jane Mary Paterson. On records such as the census on some occasions she may have been recorded as Jane however if she was known as Mary, it could have been this that is recorded or many people called Jane were known as Jean, Jeannie or Janet.  She may also appear with a completely different first name because although she was registered as Jane, she gets called Anne, for example.

• Transcription errors - Old handwriting may not be clear so it is easy for errors to be made with transcriptions.  People are not perfect and transcriptions are often done by volunteers who are giving their best efforts. Sometimes people simply make a mistake.

• Indexes - Sites use different methods of indexing for the same information so how you might extract the information in one will not work on another or would bring  forward some results that are the same and some that are different.

So how might we find them?

• Using wildcards, soundex and all the other search tools can help widen the search but can also bring different results depending on what site that you use. Sites will often give you variations on the spelling of a name but try the same search on different sites and you will come up with a different set of results according to which names they think match closely enough to your original enquiry. 

• Finding out information about your ancestor from other sources may shed some light on where they were or the name by which they were known.

• Sometimes it is a case of sitting down and going through pages of information page by page.

• It's important to check a number of sites to find an elusive ancestor or to cross reference your results where the name varies from what you were expecting. This can be expensive of course as most websites cost money to access and time consuming if you are unaware of the best strategies.

How do you cut down on costs and use the best strategies?

At Kin Tree, we subscribe and use a number of websites so paying for an hour or two of our time will cost a lot less than subscribing to all the sites yourself.  Also, being expert researchers we know the best strategies to get results. Contact us for a no obligation chat or further information at:

kintree@ymail.com

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Bringing Your Family History To Life

Tracing your family tree is an absorbing past time. Often it starts with a desire to find out how far back you can trace your family but along the way you will also start to root out other interesting information about your ancestors. You soon realise that they are more than a date in history.

There comes a point when you will want to gather all the information together and write it down.  However, then thoughts generally turn into how to make it more interesting than simply a set of dates.

Look at this example of a fictitious person called William MacDonald.

We could have an entry that said simply -

William MacDONALD was born on 7 November 1897 at 23 Example Street, Govan. He was the son of James MacDONALD and Mary RANKIN.  He married Janet FRASER on 22 June 1922 in Parish Kirk, Glasgow. He died on 17 August 1971 at the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow.  His home address then was 154 Sample Street, Glasgow.

However by adding in more detail on these bare details, we can build up the picture of William's life. 

We could write about his birth - 

William was the fifth of seven children born to James MacDONALD and Mary RANKIN.  He was born at the family home, 23 Example Street, Govan on 7 November 1897. 

Then by adding in some more details that we have from poor relief records, we can add in -

William was the fifth of seven children born to James MacDONALD and Mary RANKIN. He was born at the family home, 23 Example Street, Govan on 7 November 1897. The family lived in a tenement flat and were on the second floor in the left hand side flat.  

So we now have facts about William from his birth certificate, the 1901 census and poor relief records (from a later date) which described their flat. The next step that we can take is to add details about his life through putting the family into the historical context of the time. This can be done in a number of ways, for example by researching the area in which William lived and the wider social context of the times.

Mixing all these elements together we have -

William was the fifth of seven children born to James MacDONALD and Mary RANKIN. He was born at the family home, 23 Example Street, Govan on 7 November 1897. The family lived in a tenement flat and were on the second floor in the left hand side flat. 

For William and the rest of his family, the kitchen was the centre of activity in old tenement flats. William's family had two rooms. Beds, sink, coal bunker, cupboards, pulley, fireplace and cooking range would all be crammed into them. The cast iron kitchen range was standard in tenement buildings used both as a heating and a cooking tool. 

A large cast iron kettle normally stood on the hob keeping the water warm. Every effort was made to keep the fire alight over night, especially in winter. This was done by saving old tea-leaves and potato peelings, mixed with dross (coal dust) and cinders and placing them on the fire before going to bed.

Outside toilets were a common feature of Govan tenements until the late 19th century. Subsequently tenements were built with a toilet or renovated to include a shared water closet on each stair landing. Often too, the only running water was an outside tap that was used by all the residents.

By adding in these details, we are already bring William's world to life.  We can imagine how it would be to live in his home.  It can be quite daunting to build up these details however they do make the difference between a simple list of facts and an exciting and interesting book about our ancestors' lives.  

At Kin Tree we are not only experienced and qualified in genealogy but also in history so we have a wide knowledge base to build a picture of your family's past.  We have the experience and knowledge to draw together the genealogical facts and present them in a way that brings your family's story to life.  We are also experienced at printing family history books so we can present your book to a professional standard.

 If you have any questions on bring your family's story to life or on printing a family history book then please get in touch for a no obligation chat at:

kintree@ymail.com

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Great Digital Image Resource For Scotland

If you are looking for digital images relating to your Scottish family history then your first stop should be Scran

The Scran Trust hosts around 370,000 images, movies and sounds which come from archives, museums, galleries and the media on its website.  It's funded through the Scottish Government, subscriptions and sales of services.

The site is easy to navigate.  For the family historian there are lots of images available of local towns and cities.  Similarly, there are images of subjects such as occupations, migration and historic maps.  There are many other sections too or you can simply put in a straight forward search into their search engine.

This is only a very small glimpse of what is available on the site.  The best way to find out what is there is to go and look for yourself. Access can be gain in a number of ways. It's free to browse thumbnails of the images but to gain full access there are a number of was in which this can be done.

• If you are a school pupil or student in Scotland, there is a good chance that you will have free access to the whole site. Check with your school, college or university librarian.
• Local libraries often have accesses. This might be within the library itself and many have remote access from home.  Check with your local librarian for details of access.
• Subscription - It is inexpensive to join Scran either for 6 months or a year.
• Buy individual images.

The site has a wealth of material on Scottish life so it is of interest to not only family historians but to anyone with an interest in Scotland.  Why not give it a browse and if your local library does not give you access then why not ask them to subscribe to the site.

For more information on using online sites, please contact us for a free no obligation chat at:

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