Sunday, September 12, 2010

Best of the Genea-Blogs - 5-11 September 2010

Hundreds of 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:

* Mailbox Monday: Future of the NFS Tree and Killer Cool! Wow!!! by the writer of The Ancestry Insider blog. More "under the hood" information about new FamilySearch and the potential of a reference page for each person in it.

* Recycling Family Histories by Tom Fiske on Leland Meitzler's GenealogyBlog. Tom has an interesting story about helping his future wife, and telling family stories to his older brother, who just died.

* Bonnie's New Family by Colleen Fitzpatrick on the Identifinders Blog. Here is an amazing research story about an adoptee being reunited with her father and sister.

* Open Thread: Should Genealogy Volunteers Be Paid? by Lynn Palermo on The Armchair Genealogist blog. Lynn has some observations and some questions, and would like your comments too.

* Genealogy Rule #326: Watch What You Say and How You Say It by Cyndi Howells on the Cyndi's List blog. Cyndi had comments on her Facebook page denigrating "the LDS site" for its lineage-linked databases. She sets them straight.

* Ancestry, Genealogy Programs and Online Trees by Carol Yates Wilkinson on the iPentimento: Genealogy and History blog. Carol answered a question about "which is best...?" saying, well, go read it.

* You Can Think That if You Want but It's Wrong by Lorine McGinnis Schulze on the Olive Tree Genealogy Blog. Lorine nicely explains how to deal with other researchers who insist that their interpretation of data is correct.

* A beloved uncle, a war, and a Dobro by Jean Wilcox Hibben on the Circlemending blog. There are several wonderful stories in this post from Jean - a beautiful tribute to to young soldier and his instrument, which Jean now plays in her presentations.

* Using a blog for research note-taking by Pat Richley on DearMYRTLE's Genealogy Blog. Ol' Myrt describes Birdie Holsclaw's method of using a private blog to create and update research on specific persons or families. The benefit is that it's always available online.

Other "Best of..." weekly pick posts are here:

* Follow Friday: 10 September 2010 by Greta Koehl on Greta's Genealogy Bog. Greta picks her faves too, and they are all good.

* Weekly Genealogy Picks by John Newmark on the TransylvanianDutch blog. John highlights blog posts, carnivals, press releases and more, plus he links to several other weekly pick posts.

I encourage you to go to the blogs listed above and read their articles, and add their blog to your Favorites, Google Reader, RSS 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 670 genealogy bloggers using Google Reader, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

2 comments:

JL said...

Randy, you're missing a ton of them! GeneaBloggers list is up to 1,267.

DearMYRTLE said...

Randy -- thanks for the shout out! Birdie continues to guide and teach us, even though she has passed away. How I wish she could find my elusive Dolly Yockey.