Saturday, July 13, 2013

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (SNGF) - The Date Your Father Was Born

Hey genea-folks, 
it's Saturday Night again, 

 time for more Genealogy Fun!



Your mission this week, should you decide to accept it, is to:


1)  
What day of the week was your Father born? Tell us how you found out.

2) What has happened in recorded history on your Father's birth date (day and month)? Tell us how you found out, and list five events.


3)  What famous people have been born on your Father's birth date?  Tell us how you found out, and list five of them.

4)  Put your responses in your own blog post, in a comment on this blog post, or in a status or comment on Facebook.


Here's mine (without the "how you found out" parts):

1)  My father, Frederick Walton Seaver, was born  on 15 October 1911, in Fitchburg, Worcester County, Massachusetts.

That date was a Sunday.  

2)  These significant world events have occurred on 15 October throughout history:

*  1582  Pope Gregory XIII implements the Gregorian calendar. In Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Spain, October 4 of this year is followed directly by October 15.

*  1815  Napoleon I of France begins his exile on Saint Helena in the Atlantic Ocean.

*  1917  World War I: At Vincennes outside of Paris, Dutch dancer Mata Hari is executed by firing squad for spying for the German Empire.

*  1951 – The first episode of I Love Lucy, an American television sitcom starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley, airs on the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS).

*  1956  Fortran, the first modern computer language, is shared with the coding community for the first time.

3)  These famous persons were born on my father's birth date:

*  1844  Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher (died 1900)

*  1908 – John Kenneth Galbraith, Canadian-American economist (died 2006)

*  1924 – Lee Iacocca, American businessman and author

*  1945 – Jim Palmer, American baseball player


Those are pretty mundane - no real heavy hitters here, and none listed for 1911 (his birth year).

4)  Done.  My own blog.  Twitter, Favebook, Google+.


Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Surname Saturday - DAVIS (England to colonial Massachusetts)

It's Surname Saturday, and I'm "counting down" my Ancestral Name List each week.  


I am in the 7th great-grandmothers, I'm up to Ancestor #631, who is Sarah DAVIS (1676-1754) 
[Note: the earlier great-grandmothers and 7th great-grandfathers have been covered in earlier posts].

My ancestral line back through three American generations of this DAVIS family line is:

1.  Randall J. Seaver (1943-living)

2. Frederick Walton Seaver (1911-1983)
3. Betty Virginia Carringer (1919-2002)

4. Frederick Walton Seaver (1876-1942)
5. Alma Bessie Richmond (1882-1962)

8. Frank Walton Seaver (1852-1922)
9. Hattie Louise Hildreth (1857-1920)


18.  Edward Hildreth (1831-1899)
19.  Sophia Newton (1834-1923)


38.  Thomas J. Newton (ca 1800 - ????)
39.  Sophia Buck (1797-1882)

78.  Isaac Buck (1757-1847)
79.  Martha Phillips (1757-????)

156.  Isaac Buck (1732-????)
157.  Mary Richards (1733-????)


314:  Joseph Richards (1703-1748)
315.  Mary Bowden (1705-????)

630.  Michael Bowden, born 1673 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States; died before 12 October 1741 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  He was the son of 1260. Michael Bowden and 1261. Sarah Nurse.  He married 20 November 1697 in Danvers, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.
631.  Sarah Davis, born 01 February 1675/76 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States; died 01 September 1754 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  

Children of Michael Bowden and Sarah Davis are:
*  Susanna Bowden (1699-1709)
*  Francis Bowden (1701-1737), married 1735 Elizabeth Webster (1710-????)
*  Sarah Bowden (1702-????), married 1724 John Riddan (1695-1756)
*  Mary Bowden (1705-????), married 1726 John Richards (1703-1748)
*  Martha Bowden (1705-1719)
*  Hannah Bowden (1707-1753)
*  John Bowden (1709-????)
*  Lydia Bowden (1712-????), married 1731 Samuel Kelley (1706-????)
*  Michael Bowden (1714-1761), married 1735 Hannah Hendley (1712-????)
*  Ebenezer Bowden (1716-????)
*  Susanna Bowden (1717-1799), married 1740 Moses Newhall (1718-1774)
*  Benjamin Bowden (1721-1741).

1262.  John Davis, born about 1640 in England.  He married 05 October 1664 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.
1263.  Sarah Kirtland, born 27 September 1646 in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  She was the daughter of 2526. Phillip Kirtland and 2527. Alice.

Children of John Davis and Sarah Kirtland are:
*  Sarah Davis (1665-1665)
*  Sarah Davis (1667-1667)
*  Mary Davis (1668-????)
*  Joseph Davis (1672-1673)
*  John Davis (1674-1754), married 1700 Ann Lewis (1676-????)
*  Sarah Davis (1676-1754), married 1697 Michael Bowden (1673-1741)
*  Ebenezer Davis (1678-????)
*  Benjamin Davis (1681-????)
*  Joseph Davis (1686-????)

2524.  Jenkin Davis, born about 1614 in England; died 1661, probably in Lynn, Essex, Massachusetts.  He married before 1640 in England.
2525.  Sarah, born about 1616 in England.

Child of Jenkin Davis and Sarah is:

*  John Davis (1640-????), married 1664 Sarah Kirtland (1646-????).

The only information I have about the Jenkin Davis family is from:

Alonzo Lewis and James Robinson Newhall, The History of Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts, Including the Town of Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscott & Nahant (Boston, Mass. : John L. Shorey, 1865).

The book  has a short sketch of Jenkin Davis on page 151, which is not very complimentary.  

Information about the family of John Davis was gleaned from the Lynn, Massachusetts Vital Records book, online at Archive.org and other websites.

The URL for this post is:

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Friday, July 12, 2013

Fold3 "Save to Ancestry" Features Works For Me Now

I complained yesterday that the new "Save to Ancestry" features on Fold3 did not work for me, so I waited a day, and now they do work.  Here's my process:

1)  In the Martin Carringer Revolutionary War Pension File on www.fold3.com, I clicked on the green "Save to Ancestry" button:


In the popup window, I chose my "Seaver-Leland Family" tree, and started typing Martin Carringer's name.  Two names were presented, including the one I wanted, so I selected that.  There are more names on the list but you have to scroll down to see them.

2)  After selecting "Martin Carringer 1758-1835," I clicked the orange "Save" button and saw:


That was easy.  I wanted to see how it was listed in my Ancestry Member Tree, so I clicked on the  link to "View Martin Carringer's profile on Ancestry.com."

3)  The link took me to Martin Carringer's profile - here's the top of the page:


After scrolling down to the bottom of the "sources" list, the "Revolutionary War Pensions at Fold3" link shows on the list:


Clicking the link for the record takes me back to the record image on Fold3.

Before I took the above screen shot, I saved several other records for Martin Carringer to my Ancestry Member Tree using the "Save to Ancestry" button on Fold3, including;

*  The memorial page for Martin Carringer (1758-1835)
*  A numbered record book at Fold3

So the "Save to Ancestry" feature on Fold3 now works for me, and I'm happy that it's fixed, and I look forward to using it quite a bit in the coming weeks.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/07/fold3-save-to-ancestry-features-works.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Follow-up Friday - Helpful and Useful Reader Comments - Week Ending 12 July 2013

This Follow-Up Friday post highlights helpful and useful reader comments on Genea-Musings posts received the past week or so.

1)  On Finding Martin Carringer's Revolutionary War Rolls on Ancestry.com - Difficult! (posted 11 April 2013):

*  Jennifer Leible asked:  "So glad to come across your post and know I'm not the only one having a problem! So you said you finally found it on page 283/4. How did you finally come to those pages? I've been looking and looking through my document with no luck yet...please help elaborate on how you found it! Thanks!!"

My comment was:  I used determination and knowledge gleaned before - I checked my Notes in my database, and found that Martin Carringer was a member of Colonel Carnahan's Company in the 8th Pennsylvania Regiment of Foot in the Pennsylvania. I found (finally) the 8th Regiment on this microfilm stream. 

That's it....prior information that I was lucky enough to be able to find before wasting three hours going page by page hoping i'd be able to recognize the name when it appeared on a page.



*  Geolover noted:  "You said, "8) A user can edit any source citation in the FamilySearch Family Tree"

"Not so, if the citation was added to Source Box by clicking on the FS-HistoricalRecords extract-page citation. It can only be edited if one first makes a copy to add to the Source Box. The copy can then be edited to show such niceties as identity of the actual record (such as X County, Ohio, Probate Court Marriage Licenses Vol. XX p. yy).

"You noted that repository data was not transferred by RM6 into the source citation in FS-FT. FS-FT does not have a field for "Repository" and is not set up to establish a source hierarchy such as exists in full-feature home genealogy programs. For such things as each member of an 1880 US Census household, FS-FT wants you to have 8 separate citations derived from the index/extract page for each individual.

"On the other hand, there is no present plan to completely index complex documents, such as an application for estate administration that lists 20-odd heirs of different sorts. There is no 'tagging' system in FS-FT for a person's being "grandchild of" or "niece of".

"So the organization's stated intention to have all the uploaded documents attached to an indexed individual is quite limited in scope."


My comment:  You're right about not being able to edit a citation added to my source Box from FamilySearch collections.  It appears that you can "Add" a comment or note to a "Source Box" citation (which might include information about a census NARA film and roll, for instance).  You can "Edit" a source citation created by TreeConnect and added to our Source Box.  All of this is good to know.


*  Anonymous offered:  "I agree that the links are messy on Ancestry. A few tips to obtain a cleaner web link:

"1. You can save the record to your Shoebox. The link created for the record in the Shoebox is much shorter: http://www.ancestry.com/rd/viewrecord.aspx?dbname=&dbid=2101&rpid=2907628

"The two key pieces of data to get back to a record are the DBID or DBName and the pID (record ID) within that database.

"2. You can modify the longer URL from the record to its most basic parameters:
http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?indiv=1&db=MADeathRecords&h=2907628


"In this case the "indiv" parameter indicates the record page. The other parameters store the search terms and other data to help keep the links to return to results, etc...

"It does not provide a long-term solution to user-friendly URLs directly available from the record page, but it is a workaround."


My comment:  Thanks for the two suggestions.   I think I'm not going to add Ancestry.com web links to my database for fear that they are not permanent.


*  John said:  "I would find the phonetic option for surnames very helpful if I could turn off Soundex and implement one of their other Phonetic Algorithms in its place.

"But when they do implement the other algorithms, it's in addition to Soundex, and I sometimes have to scroll through thousands of names that aren't really phonetic matches for the surnames I'm searching for, and are only listed due to Soundex's limitations.

"It also bothers me that checking the phonetic box only means that it provides Ancestry the option to use these alternate algorithms if Ancestry has determined the algorithm is appropriate for a particular database. The researcher isn't allowed to determine if an algorithm is appropriate or not. If the algorithm is encoded into Ancestry's software it ought to be useable in any database at the discretion of the user."


My comment:  It sounds like you want to be able to select from the specific phonetic algorithms for a certain database.  As you noted, Ancestry lets you select "Exact matches" plus "Phonetic matches" but you don't know which algorithms are available.  

The "About these settings" link on the "Last Name" filter dropdown menu says:

"There are other name matching algorithms that we can use to help identify records to consider for your results. If you choose phonetic, we will identify appropriate algorithms that apply to specific data collections and if a record has one of those names, we will use it as a possible record for your results set. For example, if you are prioritizing Jewish Collections first, we would choose the Daitch-Mokotoff phonetic algorithm."

5)  Thank you to all of my readers for their comments.  I did not include the comments on the Ancestry Help I don't Need blog post, because they were confirmatory in nature.


Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Fold3.com Has NEW "Save to Ancestry" Feature - FAIL!

I received this in an email from Fold3 about their new feature - you can save a record to a person in your Ancestry Member Tree by clicking a link.

==========================

When you discover an ancestor's record on Fold3, have you ever wished you could link it to a family tree on Ancestry.com? Well, your wish has come true!
Whenever you see a green "Save to Ancestry" button above a document or on a Fold3 memorial page, you can link that document or page directly to someone's profile on Ancestry. The lure is hard to resist with this eye-catching green button.

The process is effortless and intuitive. When you find a document you want to attach to someone you've already recorded in a family tree, simply click the "Save to Ancestry" button and follow the instructions.
You'll be asked to log into your Ancestry.com account, and then you'll see a drop-down list of your trees. Locate the tree you wish to save the document to, begin typing the name of the person to whom the record should be attached, choose the correct name from the list that appears, and then press save. Yes, it's that easy.
You'll then be given a choice of closing the window and continuing your search on Fold3, or viewing the profile of the person you attached the record to on Ancestry. If you choose the latter, you'll be taken to the profile page of the person you were just linking to where you can view the record link. It will appear under  "Source Information" on the right-hand side of the page as a citation link to Fold3. The document image is not added to your ancestor's profile, but the link is. If you click that link, you'll return to Fold3 where the image appears immediately in the Fold3 viewer.
You will also find a list of all Fold3 document links you've attached to someone's profile under "Source Citations" within the Facts and Sources tab on the tree. If you also want to see the actual document image, download it from Fold3 and then upload it through "Add Media" on the profile page.
If you've created a memorial page on Fold3, you can also add it to your ancestor's profile page on Ancestry.com simply by clicking the "Save to Ancestry" button at the top of the page. Never has it been so easy to bring all your sources together in one place.

Watch the "Save to Ancestry" tutorial, along with other helpful video tutorials, in the Fold3 Training Center and learn more ways to make the most of your discoveries on Fold3.
=======================
That sounds really easy and useful. I watched the "Save to Ancestry" tutorial just to make sure I couldn't foul it up.
I went to Fold3.com, and searched for Martin Carringer in the Revolutionary War Pension Files.  Here is the screen in Fold3 for the first page of his Pension File:

There's the big green "Save to Ancestry" button above the image, over to the right.  I clicked on it, and a popup window opened showing my Ancestry.com user name.  I selected one of my trees, which contains Martin Carringer, from the dropdown list, and started typing the name:


The video said that it would show me candidate persons to pick as I typed.  It didn't.  I got to the end of the name, and waited.  I waited for 15 minutes.  Nothing.
I tried it again.  I tried other pages.  Nothing.  I signed out of Ancestry.com and signed back in.  Tried it again.  Nothing.  Waiting.  Still.  It's been 45 minutes of waiting now (I did go do other, more useful, things while I was waiting).  
I'll try again another day.  Maybe they're overloaded.  Maybe they've flagged my account so that i'll complain about it.  Maybe users have to be allowed to use it.  I have no clue.  I expect that a feature like this will work when I try it out after a public announcement.  Frustration!
Here's a screen shot from my Ancestry Member Tree containing Martin Carringer (1758-1835):

I had really high hopes for this - these records are golden.  Maybe it will be ready to use the next time I try. 
Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Creating a Source Citation for an Online Newspaper Image in Family Tree Maker 2012 - UPDATED!

This post is about creating a source citation for an online newspaper page image using the source templates in Family Tree Maker 2012.  I have already crafted source citations for this record type in RootsMagic 6 and Legacy Family Tree 7.5 - see Creating a Source Citation for an Online Newspaper Collection in Legacy Family Tree 7.5 - UPDATED.

For this study, I chose an obituary for my grandfather, Frederick W. Seaver, from Ancestry.com which was found on a newspaper page image.

UPDATED 12 July 2013:  I erred on the "Citaton Detail" in the original post by omitting the date on the newspaper.  FTM 2012 does not provide a field for information to include in a "Citation Detail."  I just overlooked this small, important, detail!  Thank you to reader Geolover for gently pointing it out in comments.


1)  Here is the page image found by an Ancestry.com search:




The obituary is from the Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel newspaper, dated 13 March 1942, on page 9, in the "Deaths" section, and headed "Frederick W. Seaver."

2)  In Family Tree Maker 2012, in the "People" Workspace and the "Family" View, I clicked on Frederick Walton Seaver (1876-1942) to bring up his "Individual & Shared Facts" screen, then clicked on the "Death" Fact, and then on the "Sources" Tab, and the "New" button and selected the "Add a New Source" item.  This opened the "Add Source Citation " screen.  I clicked on the "New" button (so that I could select a source template) and then the "More" button to open the "Select source Template" menu:



 On the "Select Source template" menu, the "Publications: Periodicals, Broadcasts, and Web Miscellanea" seemed the most appropriate "source group," and in the dropdown list for "Category" I selected "Periodicals."  In the dropdown list for "Template," I chose "Newspaper Article - Online Archive (by Newspaper name" item.

3)  The "Edit Source" screen opened so that I could add information to the data fields:



I named the "Source template," then entered data for the other fields consistent with the information provided by Ancestry.com.  There was no field to indicate the "Online Archive" name (i./e., Ancestry.com), so I put it in the "Item format" field.

4)  After adding the content on the screen above, I clicked on the "OK" button, and the "Add Source citation" screen opened (updated):




I added information to the "Citation detail" field, including the article title, the type of article, the page number, the column number and the access date.

5)  After completing the screen above, and going back and forth editing fields to make it as accurate as I could, I clicked on the "OK" button.

Here is the "Reference Note" tab on the "Add Source" screen (updated):



After editing, the source citation ("Reference Note") in Family Tree Maker 2012 looks like this (updated 12 July 2013):

"Deaths: Frederick W. Seaver," obituary, 13 March 1942, page 9, column 2 (accessed 6 November 2006), Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, Fitchburg, Massachusetts, digital image, ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com).

For some reason, the FTM 2012 source template puts the "Citation Detail" ahead of the source title.

6)  For comparison purposes, the source citation crafted using the RootsMagic 6 source template was:

"Deaths: Frederick W. Seaver," obituary, Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, 13 March 1942, page 9, column 2; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 17 November 2006).

And for the same obituary source citation crafted using the Legacy Family Tree 7.5 source template:

"Deaths: Frederick W. Seaver," Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, obituary, 13 March 1942, p. 9, col. 2; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 10 July 2013). 


My judgment is that the RootsMagic 6 and Legacy Family Tree 7.5 source citations are very close to Evidence! Explained formats, but that Family Tree Maker 2012 falls a bit short on format.  Perhaps Family Tree Maker 2014 will improve the source citations to be closer to the EE standards.

7)  Now I'm ready to see how these source citations crafted by the source templates in the three programs will transfer to the FamilySearch Family Tree (assuming that Legacy Family Tree and family Tree Maker enable that to happen).

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/07/creating-source-citation-for-online_11.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Treasure Chest Thursday - 1845 Marriage Record for James Richman and Hannah Rich

It's Treasure Chest Thursday - time to look in my digital image files to see what treasures I can find for my family history and genealogy musings.

The treasure today is the 1845 marriage record for James Richman and Hannah Rich in Hilperton, Wiltshire, England.





The transcription of this marriage record is (handwritten portions in italics, form blanks underlined):

18 45.  Marriages solemnized by Banns in the Parish of Hilperton in the County of Wilts.

No. 69
When Married:                     Sept. 7th
Name and surname:              James Richman
                                           Hannah Rich
Age:                                    Full age
                                           20
Condition:                           Bachelor
                                         Spinster
Rank or Profession:            Labourer
                                         Weaver
Residence at Time of Marriage:  Hilperton
                                               Hilperton
Father's Name and surname:  John Richman
                                           John Rich
Rank or Profession of Father:  Labourer
                                             Weaver

Married in the Parish Church according to the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church of England by me 
                                                                   Wm Talman

This marriage was       }         [signed] James Richman       in the presence }  James Carpenter
solemnized between us}         [signed] Hannah Rich           of us                }  Ann Richman

The source citation for this entry in the Hilperton Parish Register is:

Church of England, Parish Church of Hilperton (Wiltshire, England), Bishop's Transcripts, 1622-1880, "Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1837-1880," FHL BRITISH Microfilm 1,279,404, Item 15, Marriages, Page 35, No. 69, James Richman and Hannah Rich entry.

James Richman and Hannah Rich are my second great-grandparents, and emigrated from England to the United States in 1855 and 1856, respectively.  Their son, Thomas Richman, is my great-grandfather.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/07/treasure-chest-thursday-marriage-record.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Creating a Source Citation for an Online Newspaper Collection in Legacy Family Tree 7.5 - UPDATED

By popular demand (well, Michele Lewis asked for it in a comment to Creating a Source Citation for an Online Newspaper Collection in RootsMagic 6), posted 9 July 2013), I tried creating a source citation in Legacy Family Tree 7.5 for an image from an online newspaper collection.  

This post is about creating a source citation using the source templates in Legacy Family Tree 7.5.  
For this study, I chose an obituary for my grandfather, Frederick W. Seaver, from Ancestry.com which was found on a newspaper page image.

UPDATED (11 July):  I made a significant error in the original post, and readers Doug Williams and Monique Riley saw it and commented.  I thank them for pointing out my oversight...I have corrected the post so that it reflects the true capabilities of the Legacy source template.

1)  Here is the page image found by an Ancestry.com search:



The obituary is from the Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel newspaper, dated 13 March 1942, on page 9, in the "Deaths" section, and headed "Frederick W. Seaver."

2)  In Legacy Family Tree 7.5, I clicked on Frederick Walton Seaver (1876-1942) to bring up his "Individual Information" page, then clicked on the "Sources" icon which brought up the "Assigned surces" screen, and then on the "Death" Event, and then on the "Add a New Source" button:



On the "Add a New Master Source" screen, I scrolled down the left-hand list of the types of sources and chose "Newspapers," which opened the "Select a medium" section, and I chose "Online images (issued by unrelated content provider)" because that was appropriate for the source material.

3)  After clicking on the "Go to Step 2" button on the screen above, the "Fill in the fields below" screen opened:



I entered information into the "Source Info" Tab, which has "Source List Name," "Location (state)," "Location (City)," "title," and "Format" fields as shown above.

/There are other Tabs on the screen above for  "Text/Comments," "Repository," "Multimedia" and "Overrides."

4)  After clicking on the "Save" button (upper right) on the screen above, I saw the "Edit the Source Detail" screen and entered data there also:


The fields for data entry (the "Detail Information" tab) include "Author Last Name," "Author Given Name(s)," "Author Suffix," "Article," "Issue Date," "Page," and the Optional fields of "Surety Level," "Recorded Date, and "File ID."

There was no data field to enter the website and URL for the online content provider, so I added that information to the "Format" field in the Master Source screen.

Updated: The upper portion of the "Detail Information" screen above has a scroll bar (and that's what I missed seeing in the initial issue of this post).  Moving the scroll bar down reveals more fields for "Column," "Website title," "URL," "Date Accessed," and "Collection."  I added content to these fields.

There are other Tabs on the screen above for "Text/Comments," "Multimedia," and Overrides."

After a bit of editing, the source citation (called "Footnote/Endnote Citation") in Legacy Family Tree 7.5 looks like this:

"Deaths: Frederick W. Seaver," Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, obituary, 13 March 1942, p. 9, col. 2; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 10 July 2013). 

That looks pretty good, I can use that citation to find the specific page and article again, assuming Ancestry.com is still extant and still has the newspaper collection.  Or, I can use it to find the specific page at a Fitchburg library or historical society.

I did have to add the word "obituary" to the date field, and added "ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com)" to the "Format" field because there was no field for it in the source template.  The "Ancestry.com" term should be italicized.  The "Page" field puts an automatic "p." in the citation, so I started with the page number in that field. There was no field for the access date, either.  If I put the access date in the parenthesis with the URL, then it would have made the Master Source unique for this specific citation.  I could have put the website name, URL and access date in the "Page" field, I guess.

5)  The Ancestry.com source citation provided by Ancestry.com looks like this:

Ancestry.com. Fitchburg Sentinel (Fitchburg, Massachusetts) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2005.

This source citation, like all Ancestry citations, is very non-specific, and it would be impossible to use it without searching on Ancestry.com for the person again.

6)  For comparison purposes, I created the same obituary in RootsMagic 6, and it is:

"Deaths: Frederick W. Seaver," obituary, Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, 13 March 1942, page 9, column 2; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 17 November 2006).

This is the same as the Legacy Family Tree source citation (with small differences).

7)  I will do the same source citation in Family Tree Maker in a future post.  I want to compare the process across the three programs I use - RootsMagic, Legacy Family Tree, and family Tree Maker.

One of the reasons I did this exercise in the three programs was to see how well source citations created by proprietary source templates transfer into the FamilySearch Family Tree.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/07/creating-source-citation-for-online_10.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

Ancestry.com Presentations at SDGS Meeting on Saturday, 13 July

The July program meeting of the San Diego Genealogical Society (SDGS) is Saturday, July 13th, at St. Andrew's Lutheran Church (8350 Lake Murray Blvd, just south of Jackson Drive) from 10 a.m.until 12:30 p.m.  This is the Annual Ice Cream Social meeting.

The speaker this month is Randy Seaver with two presentations:

1)  Searching Ancestry.com Effectively

Ancestry.com has many wonderful features, a lavish buffet where it is hard to choose what to use and how to use it.  In the Searching talk, Randy will discuss the effective use of such "New Search" features as basic or advanced search forms, exact or ranked matches, full names or wild cards, name and locality filter options, specific or all databases, restricted or whole collections, and website navigation.


2)  Growing Your Ancestry Member Tree

There are over 46 million Ancestry Member Trees with over 4 billion person profiles.  They are useful as an online backup for your tree, for finding records for your ancestor, as cousin bait, and to enable you to find matches with AncestryDNA.  In this talk, Randy will describe how to create a FREE Ancestry Member Tree, how to find pertinent records, add stories and media, sync with Family Tree Maker 2012, create a coffee table book, and more.

Randy is a native San Diegan, well known for his nationally recognized blog, Genea-Musings, which provides genealogy research tips and techniques, news items and commentary, humor, San Diego society news, and his own family history research and some family history stories.  Randy started pursuing genealogy research in 1988 because he wanted a new avocation, and it quickly turned into an addiction.  He uses RootsMagic, Legacy Family Tree and FamilyTreeMaker.  His research has resulted in a database of over 41,000 persons.  Randy is a frequent speaker throughout the Southern California area.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/07/ancestrycom-presentations-at-sdgs.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver