Looking for a Needle in a Haystack? GAME CHANGER at FamilySearch

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Generated with Bing ImageCreator (AI), March 13, 2024


Where is YOUR Needle, Your Missing Record?


Genealogical Proof Standard

When we use the GPS (Genealogical Proof Standard) as our guide, we all know that "exhaustive research" can be both tedious and exhausting. Is life long enough to search page by page through all the counties where all the members of a family might have lived, paid taxes, bought, leased or sold property, made a will or died intestate?

It is possible that the new Full Text Search at FamilySearch will eventually allow us to do just that. It has been estimated that 75% or more of the records at FamilySearch were browsable but not searchable; the only indexes those found in the records themselves. Those records are certainly attainable by using those indexes and browsing to the record of interest, but the process is tedious, often frustrating, and slow. And once found, the record must be read and transcribed to be useful. This new Full Text Search tackles all of these obstacles, and promises to make all of FamilySearch records searchable. Read on!

In this post, some RootsTech sessions will be linked; few of us have had time to sample even half of what is offered. We welcome comments here about talks you found helpful. We may showcase some of them in the future. Among many other announcements, the creamiest of creamy changes has risen to the top: full text search.

The portal to this game-changer is right on the main page: 


Click  VIEW EXPERIMENTS and be presented with a number of new initiatives. The one featured here is "Expand your search with Full Text."

For now, there are only two record sets included; this new power is still being refined. The developers ask for criticism and suggestions; please offer your feedback and make it better! "'US Land and Probate Records' and 'Mexico Notary Records' are currently the only available collections to browse" as I'm writing this post. I think no readers have already exhausted what the "US Land and Probate Records" have to offer! Unnamed in the description but in there are the US Plantation Records, according to some diligent researchers.

On the landing page is a 4 1/2 minute introduction video, which is worth watching. If you want to dive in this minute, the direct link to the search is https://www.familysearch.org/search/full-text. 


Needle in Haystack, courtesy of commons.wikimedia.org/


Toughest Research Cases - Solved

What inspired me to write this post was Andre Kerns' presentation, "Finding Milly: Tracing enslaved ancestors using Experimental Search [now Full Text Search]." Kerns' talk covers one of the most difficult realms of genealogical research, finding and documenting enslaved people. Whether or not you have enslaved or enslaver people in your tree, this talk is worth watching, and then watching again. Kearns applies the GPS in his research and demonstrates using full text search.

Kearns' talk: "Researching hard-to-find ancestors in old wills and deeds records can be daunting. Learn how AI-powered Experimental Search [now Full Text Search] by FamilySearch revolutionizes the process, making research easier, faster, and more confident. Join me as I share firsthand experiences and insights into unraveling the life of my enslaved ancestor, Milly, demonstrating the power of innovative search techniques in genealogy." Be sure to download the syllabus too.

Finding Milly: Tracing enslaved ancestors using Experimental Search

Full Text search was introduced in the opening Tech Forum at RootsTech. From minute ~22-30 and after minute 36 you can listen to the details; the entire presentation is worth your hour to hear what's ahead for FamilySearch. One takeaway from this session: 100 million records are now fully searchable; their goal eventually is ALL their digitized records to be fully searchable. They will evaluate the order in which the record sets will be AI-transcribed by value to researchers.


Final note: to get the citation, click "View image group metadata" on your found record. I certainly hope that they rename this! See a screenshot on Randy Seaver's blog about Full Text Search. 

For more about creating complete citations for these records, see: https://mytrailsintothepast.blogspot.com/2024/03/data-for-source-citations-for-records.html


Have YOU tried out the new Full Text Search and found your needle in the haystack of millions of records? Please share your story with us here in the comments or send to m.strickland@skcgs.org





Valorie Zimmerman


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