Healing the Rift of a Century A cousin reached out to me last week on FindAGrave.com , because I had posted pictures to her grandfather's memorial.  Find a Grave, database and images ( https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/38737708/rolland_stewart-wade : accessed August 23, 2024), memorial page for Rolland Stewart Wade (14 Jun 1898–3 Dec 1962), {{FindAGrave|38737708}}, citing Blue Mountain Memorial Gardens, College Place, Walla Walla County, Washington, USA; Maintained by Blue Mountain Memorial Gardens (contributor 47135041). She had never known her grandfather or anyone from his side of the family, for reasons her father had never wanted to discuss. But now that her parents have passed on, she felt that she was missing a piece of her history, and decided to go looking for some answers. Rolland Wade Her grandfather, Rolland Wade (1898-1962), was an older brother of my great-grandmother, Olive Wade Swenson, whom I was fortunate enough to know as a child. I told her what I knew of Roll

  Tree of Life by lilipilyspirit.deviantart.com Not All Stories Need Words Art can speak to us in photos, plays, poems, skits, dioramas, quilts, songs, photographs, even maps and diagrams.  Family trees are stories, too . When you view a timeline of an ancestor's life, does a story spring to mind? Those who think they can't write, can record their story on their phones, or computers. Both Word and Google Docs have voice transcription power.   Tell Your Own Story The magic moment is when a person realizes that they have a story to tell. Is it one of walking hand in hand down a dusty road with great-grandmother? Whether or nit she told her story, your memory is yours; tell it! Sometimes it is the little moments, such as after the ghost story is told around the campfire, when all the kids suddenly feel the urge to get back to the cabin and out of the dark night. Or the feeling after catching your first fish, proudly walking past the crowd to clean it so you can eat your catch. S

Have you been spoiled by good fortune? Consider Joining Our New Study Group! Courtesy andreas_fischler; Creative Commons 2.0 Sometimes it is really easy to find records on the big genealogy sites, the hints make sense, and we begin to think that research is easy. So easy, that we may forget what to do when the ripe fruit isn't hanging easily in reach. That's when a study group would come in handy ,  to remind us of basic principles of research. Or for beginners on the family history journey to learn those habits and practices from the very best, right at the start. Recent Example I had given up with Seth Willis of Harrison County, Missouri, an ancestor of one of my McBee uncle's DNA matches, until I thought about what to focus on for the new Research Study Group, beginning Wednesday, 14 August . Seth was born early enough that there are no records of parentage, and his probable father's obituary does not mention him. So I created a timeline of facts and sources to se

Generated by Bing Image Creator 2 August 2024 This post is for all of you who do not want to use AI .  If you're hesitant about using AI, you're not alone. Many people are wary of handing their privacy over to a machine. However, AI can be a powerful tool for genealogists, and you may find it more helpful than you first thought. You may have felt the same about spreadsheets and calculators, yet now they are tools in your daily life.  Just as calculators and spreadsheets revolutionized how we handle numbers and budgets, AI chatbots and large language models (LLMs) are transforming our interaction with language and information. So you may eventually use AI to help you do your work in research, document transcription and analysis, writing, research reports, timelines , DNA analysis, emails and other record-keeping. Some can analyze photos and other images or to pull out family connections from a will, and draw a family tree. Of course, you must check the work, as you do your incom