Sunday, January 30, 2011

Best of the Genea-Blogs - 23-29 January 2011

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:
 
From Deed to Map by the writer of The Shy Genealogist blog. As promised last week, TSG has produced an excellent road map for researchers to turn their ancestor's land deed into a map of the property.

Aaron Rodgers - Green Bay Packers Quarterback and His Connection to the Chicago Bears & Pittsburgh Steelers by Nick Gombash on Nick Gombash's Genealogy Blog.  Nick posted this right after the football game last Sunday - he did quite a bit of online targeted research to determine this.  Well done!

New FamilySearch, a view from the British Isles Part Three by Audrey Collins on The Family Recorder blog.  Audrey keeps finding things not to like for British Isles researchers on the revamped FamilySearch site.

What's a Professional Researcher to Do without Expert Connect? by Marian Pierre-Louis on the Roots and Rambles blog.  Marian has advice for those researchers that were working with Ancestry.com's Expert Connect service.

How to set your “Favorites” on the NEHGS search site  by Heather Wilkinson Rojo on the Nutfield Genealogy blog.  Heather provides helpful directions to do this task on http://www.americanancestors.org/.  It works! 

Expert Disconnect – What’s Ancestry.com’s Next Move by Thomas MacEntee on the High-Definition Genealogy blog.  Thomas speculates about Ancestry.com's future - I love blogs like this!

Transcript For Genealogy Transcriptions by Lee Drew on the FamHist blog.  Lee gives Transcript software a whirl, and likes what he sees.  I do too.  It's free.

Now For My More Rational Side  by Kim on the Ancestors of Mine from Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Beyond blog.  Kim was affected by the Expert Connect cancellation, and she discusses it from all sides.  Well done.

The 50 Best Life Story Questions.by Dan Curtis on the Dan Curtis - Professional Personal Historian blog.  Nice list, Dan!  A keeper.

What I'd Like From Ancestry.com  by Michael John Neill on the Rootdig.com blog.  Good suggestions from a great researcher - Ancestry, are you listening?

We Want Tech: Highlight Flagrantly Erroneous Pedigrees by the writer of The Ancestry Insider blog.  I agree wholeheartedly!    Read the comments too.

Manuscripts – Don’t Ignore Such Valuable Resources by Carolyn L. Barkley on the GenealogyandFamilyHistory.com blog.  This is a great article about seldom remembered genealogical resources.

Email about Starting Genealogy Research by Ruth Himan on the Genealogy Is Ruthless Without Me blog.  Ruth responds to an emailer in her own inimitable, knowledgeable and funny way.  More to come?

Approaching your Genealogy Problems Creatively by the writer of the relatively curious about genealogy blog.  I had heard of mind-mapping - here are some websites that might help you brainstorm your research problems.

The future of subscription websites for genealogy by James Tanner on the Genealogy's Star blog.  James ponders Ancestry.com's fate, and that of other subscription websites.  Good thinking.

Miscellaneous Serendipity! by Paula Stuart-Warren on the Paula's Genealogical Eclectica blog.  Paula has words of wisdom here - do you check the "miscellaneous papers" at a repository?

Several other genea-bloggers wrote weekly pick posts this week, including:

Friday Newsletter and Follow News: 28 January 2011 by Greta Koehl on Greta's Genealogy Bog blog.

Follow Friday: Around the Blogosphere - January 28 by Susan Petersen on the Long Lost Relatives.net blog.

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

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

1 comment:

Heather Wilkinson Rojo said...

Thanks for including my post in this list. I hope everyone stops complaining about the "new" NEHGS site and begins finding some treasures there. You listed some blogs that are new to me here. I'm looking forward to exploring them tonight.