Sunday, November 1, 2009

Best of the Genea-Blogs - October 25-31, 2009

Several hundred genealogy and family history bloggers write thousands of posts every week about their research, their families, and their interests. I appreciate each one of them and their efforts.

My criteria for "Best of ..." are pretty simple - I pick posts that advance knowledge about genealogy and family history, address current genealogy issues, provide personal family history, are funny or are poignant. I don't list posts destined for the genealogy carnivals, or other meme submissions (but I do include summaries of them), or my own posts.

Here are my picks for great reads from the genealogy blogs for this past week:

* A Bar Room Brawl, A Tripple Play and Interview with Forgotten Bookmarks by Thomas MacEntee on the Destination: Austin Family blog. Thomas finishes his series on using Twitter to solve genealogy research problems, and then interviews Michael, the fellow he helped. Excellent research and interview!

* FamilySearch Community Trees by the author of The Ancestry Insider blog. Mr. AI did a nice job of summarizing the family trees currently on the LDS FamilySearch Community Trees site, and some of the problems with the site.

* What (Genealogy) Startups Are Really Like by Dean Richardson on the Genlighten Blog - Genealogy Documented blog. Dean provides an inside scoop on what the process of starting a genealogy business is really like - the joys, the frustrations, the problems, the rewards.

* Federal Land States by Donna M. Moughty on Donna's Genealogy Blog. This post explains the federal land system of principal meridians and baselines, ranges, townships, sections, and aliquot parts very well, with a link to the BLM Map showing the states, meridians and baselines. A keeper!

* Wexford County Deeds, Part 2, Land Records, what next?, What Does the Deed Tell Me?, Locating Property and Landmarks in Michigan., and Granny’s Land Record Transcriptions by Pam Warren on the Granny's Genealogy blog. Pam's series of posts deal with actually finding land records in county archives, along with her description of the land records she worked with. Lots of good detail here, and very helpful.

* …and then the fire alarm went off! by Arlene Eakle on the Arlene H. Eakle's Genealogy Blog. Arlene recounts her experience at the Huntington Library when the unexpected happened. Some excellent suggestions her for researchers on the road.

* History: Dry boring dates, dusty places? by Schelly Talalay Dardashti on the MyHeritage Genealogy Blog. Schelly has some "food for thought" about how genealogists relate to history, and historians can relate to genealogy.

* Truths Behind History-Inspired Halloween Costumes by Diane Haddad on The Genealogy Insider blog. Diane uncovers the true stories about certain costumes.

* What a Group Sheet Tells Me About My Grandpa by Becky Jamison on the Grace and Glory blog. Becky checked off the events in her grandfather's life and then tried to understand his outlook on life through the lens of the events.

* Three Generation Road Trip by Janet Hovorka on The Chart Chick blog. Janet shares her talks with her grandmother and her daughter's talks with Janet's mother...very nice work.

* A Festival Of Postcards (5th Ed.) – Quadrupeds by Evelyn Yvonne Therriault on the A Canadian Family blog. Evelyn hosted this postcard carnival of blog posts about Quadrupeds - some interesting postcards and stories here.

* Halloween fun from Ancestry.ca by John D. Reid on the Anglo-Celtic Connections blog. John shares an Ancestry.ca press release with Hallowe'en-oriented names and occupations form the Canadian census records.

* In the Beginning… Resources for Beginning Genealogists by Carolyn L. Barkley on the GenealogyandFamilyHistory.com blog. Carolyn lists six must-read books for beginners - they work for seasoned researchers too!

* Here's My Plan, Stan by Caroline M. Pointer on the Family Stories blog. This is the second post in Caroline's series to investigate suspicious family deaths decades after they occurred. Genealogy and Cold Case are a match! The "to-do" list applies to many genealogy research problems.

* Resources For Backing Up Your Data by Thomas MacEntee on the Geneabloggers blog. This is an updated list of ways and places to backup your precious genealogy and family history data (and everything else too!).

* Halloween Census Whacking by Craig Manson on the Geneablogie blog. The title speaks for itself! Great work, Craig!

I encourage you to go to the blogs listed above and read their articles, and add their blog to your Favorites, Bloglines, reader, feed or email if you like what you read. Please make a comment to them also - all bloggers appreciate feedback on what they write.

Did I miss a great genealogy blog post? Tell me! I am currently reading posts from over 530 genealogy bloggers using Bloglines, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

UPDATED 9 p.m.: Added Craig's post since I missed it this morning somehow. Definitely fits into last week!

3 comments:

GrannyPam said...

Thanks for the mention, Randy. I am honored!

Janet Hovorka said...

Thanks Randy. I'm glad you enjoyed the post. And thanks for the pointers to all the other great posts. Appreciate you!

Thomas MacEntee said...

Randy

Thanks so much for the multiple mentions:

- the Marjorie Pauline Frost series was fun to work on and to write. I'd love to see more of this documented CSI-type sleuthing from other genealogy bloggers.

- the backup resources are sorely needed and I hope we can get everyone to at least think of what would happen if all their research were wiped out.