Sunday, October 3, 2010

Best of the Genea-Blogs - 26 September to 2 October 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:

Where does genealogy end and history begin? by Marian Pierre-Louis on the Roots and Rambles blog.  Definitions, comparisons, questions - Marian gets some help from readers too.
 
When is large, too large? Another look at Ancestry.com by James Tanner on the Genealogy's Star blog.   James has an interesting comment from a reader, and discusses the issue further.
 
Israel: 'One Family, Many Faces Festival,' Day 1, Tel Aviv: Family Festival - Day 2 and Tel Aviv: Family Festival, Day 3  by Schelly Talalay Dardashti on Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog.  Schelly shares stories and pictures about the festival in Tel Aviv.  The best line by a parent was "We just want them to know their history."  Amen!
 
The Best Genealogy Advice I Ever Got Was by Leah on The Internet Genealogist blog.  Leah shared her best advice in three categories, have you provided yours yet?
 
Six reasons why postcard collecting is like family history research by John Gasson on The Wandering Genealogist blog.  These six reasons are excellent for family history...I don't know much about postcard collecting!
 
Sharing Genealogy: Part 2 by JL on the JLog blog.  JL has great ideas for getting relatives to listen...you have to be sneaky sometimes!
 
Relative Finder, Ancestry.com Style by the writer of The Ancestry Insider blog.  Mr. AI finds GIGO almost every family tree he climbs...at least he can hear the crickets.
 
Genealogy Research Bag - a Lifesaver!  by Lorine McGinnis Schulze on The Olive Tree Genealogy Blog.  Lorine has wonderful ideas about getting everything you need in one place to go off to the library or cemetery at a moment's notice. Her readers provide many more ideas in comments.
 
Stepping away by the writer of the Nolichucky Roots blog.  I think we all understand this problem with genealogy software... but I'm not brave or patient enough to do this!
 
Connecting with Long Lost Relatives by Tessa on The Keough Corner blog.  An issue we all deal with - Tessa has some excellent ideas about the subject (yes, I know it was the week before, but it was worthy!).
 
The Top 10 Places to Find Old Photos of Your House  by Marian Pierre-Louis on The New England House Historian blog.  Outstanding ideas for finding historical home pictures. 
 
Genealogy Software Must Change! and Genealogy Software Must Change! PT2 by George Geder on the Geder Genealogy blog.  George has some good ideas, as do his readers, about adding diversity and other features to genealogy software.
 
Building a Genealogical House: The Internet and Genealogy by Chris Staats on the Staats Place blog.  Chris uses a great analogy to characterize the role of the Internet in pursuing genealogy research.
 
12 Step Program for Genealogists by Laura on the It's All Relative blog.  Funniest post of the week, and great ideas for passing it on to the next generation.  Yeas, verily, I too am a geneaholic!  [Yes, I know it was posted today, but I didn't want to wait a week to share it!]

Other weekly "Best of..." genealogy blog posts include:

* Follow Friday: 1 October 2010 by Greta Koehl on the Greta's Genealogy Bog blog. Greta's weekly reader picks are often different from mine and John's.

* 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 680 genealogy bloggers using Google Reader, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

3 comments:

Schelly Talalay Dardashti said...

Thanks, Randy, for the pointers to Tracing the Tribe's series on the family festival. This event would have warmed the cockles of every geneablogger's heart!

best wishes, as always
Schelly Talalay Dardashti
Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog
http://tracingthetribe.blogspot.com

Unknown said...

As always a great list to review each week. The list helps me each week to find new blogs and focus on great posts, I might have missed. I also appreciate your mix of post, some educational, some family history, and of course you often steer us to the humorous. We need a sense of humor to do genealogy!!!

Susan Clark said...

I was about to thank you for the mention, when I started reading the other blogs you mention. Now I'm really flattered! I'll be thinking of Chris Staats' construction analogy as I work on my scaled down genealogy.

And thank you.