A timeline gets you where you want to go! We've discussed timelines many times here on the blog. Here is one 2-year-old example: The Timeline: Your Guide Through the Twists and Turns of Research . In the latest SKCGS Study Group, working our way through "Research Like A Pro," by Diana Elder, AG with Nicole Dyer. The second chapter is all about how to use a timeline to analyze sources and likely evidence found in those sources.   But how exactly do you create one? And is one way better than another? Elder advocates for a spreadsheet or relational database. While most of us have not yet tried Airtable , the relational database she uses now, I tried creating the spreadsheet from the information I had been collecting in a timeline using Google Sheets. While it was useful as a place to collect the direct links to record images and a good prompt to create source citations, I didn't find it useful to reason out what was happening behind the records.  Here is a snippet of tha

October Is Family History Month Please share some of your stories here. Send us a sentence or paragraph and pictures: m.strickland@skcgs.org SeattleBGRG.org Telling Our Stories I heard a wonderful radio show this morning about story telling, which followed a great Black Genealogy Research Group of Seattle (BGRG) meeting yesterday about telling our stories. The focus of both the radio show and the BGRG meeting was not just telling our stories aloud, but in getting them OUT -- to our families, to our friends, to legislators or whoever needs to hear and remember them. The radio show is available for listening here:  Three comedians share their thoughts...  (31 minutes),  ...discover the power of sadness   (22 minutes),  both highly recommended.  In genealogy we tell stories about all sorts of things - some technical, such as how to use various record types or sets, how to locate repositories and find what we need, and most important, who our ancestors were and what they did and even stori

At one point in my life I did post-graduate work at the University of Montana in Missoula. I decided to do a research project on the History of Music in Missoula, 1865-1890. I spent one summer reading microfilm of Montana newspapers to find not only the occasions that mentioned music, but also to determine what was being performed and by whom. After the Civil War, there was an influx of southern men to Montana Territory looking for gold. Mining camps sprang up all along the rivers that flowed out of the Rocky Mountains and these migrants brought with them the culture of their Appalachian heritage. An article in the newspaper, whether from Virginia City, Missoula or Anaconda, might read, "We were entertained on Saturday last by music performed by the sheriff, the barber and other members of our community, playing on their fiddles, banjo and mandolins. Community inhabitants filled the saloon and expressed their delight." A few inches down the page, there might be another articl

Why?  Google Drive is free, and available on all of your devices. And you probably already have a Drive and don't know it! I use mine constantly. Why should you use it? For saving from anywhere, and sharing with anyone. Share source images you've found with cousins, share your own documents with others for feedback, and share things with yourself on other devices. You can do this no matter where images or documents come from or what software created them. If you prefer Word to Google Docs but want to be able to get inline comments, just import them to your Drive. Do the same for Excel, or any other software. You can even save to and share from your Drive from your phone or tablet. Don't worry, you can edit and then download in Word or Excel format. Where's My Google Drive? First, how do you find your Drive? Go to Google.com and look up to the right. If you are logged in and have uploaded an image you will see it right next to the matrix of stacked dots. Top right of th

 It has come to my attention that people serving in their community are often involved with more than one organization.  It is also becoming very evident that organizations are collaborating with each other for the benefit of the general public.   SKCGS & KCLS For several years, South King County Genealogical Society has provided genealogical help at branches of the King County Library System.  As the Auburn Library Branch has re-opened after Covid closure, SKCGS volunteers are providing genealogical help once a month.  (We could do it  more often if we had more volunteers. Write to outreach@skcgs.org to volunteer.) SKCGS & GSMD and DAR Many of our society members are also involved with other heritage organizations such as  General Society of Mayflower Descendants , and  Daughters of the American Revolution .     "MFS is the Black Diamond 2022 Community Service Group Award recipient!!  The award ceremony will start at 12:00 p.m. on Sunday, September 4 th .  Please join us

Developing Foresight and Creativity I'm reading a thought-provoking book called The Rise of the Creative Class: Revisited by Richard Florida [1]. How does this relate to genealogy and family history? Think of how much our field has changed in the past few years, and even more in our lifetimes. These immense changes, from microfilm and copy machines to online records and virtual meetings, are the result of creativity in action.  When I attended the NGS (National Genealogical Society) Conference in Sacramento last spring, genealogy society delegates met in person for the first time, and spent a morning discussing and learning how to practice foresight . Not predicting the future, but instead, thinking with the future, to better prepare our selves and our societies for the changes that are coming. Did any of us, on New Year's Day 2020 see what was coming and how it would change all our lives?   Many public health experts all around the world had been worried even before Covid-19

New Mexico Wildfire- -Silver City Sun-News Devon Noel Lee is back! The Family History Fanatics team had to flee their home to escape the terrible forest fires in New Mexico, and have recently been able to resume their informative, useful videos. Devon's first loves in genealogy are first, research, and then writing about family.  Write a Timeline Recently I watched one of her short writing videos called " Write a Family History Story in Chronological Order | FIRST DRAFT ONLY " which seems so logical! Notice the "first draft only" part of the title. Writing out a timeline can sort your thoughts and yield insights about what happened in the family, such as births happening during travel, deaths of family members close together, when and where the land purchases took place, all of which might otherwise not be noticed. You may notice holes in your research as you write, which will pause the writing while you chase down those records and complete finding context and