Sunday, November 21, 2010

Best of the Genea-Blogs - Week of 14-20 November 2010

Best of the Genea-Blogs returns after three weeks - did you miss it?  Grandfather duties, vacations, computer problems, Charger football, real life - they may cause BOGB breakdowns again in the future.

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:

Saving Compiled Genealogies for Future Generatrions by Pat Richley on DearMYRTLE's Genealogy Blog.  Ol'MYRT is one of the most modern and up-to-date genealogists I know, and she shares her thoughts on genealogy software, databases, collaboration, kinship and more. 

Nominate a Genealogy Blog for the 2011 Family Tree 40 by Diane Haddad on The Genealogy Insider blog.  Please do!  I am honored to be on the Family Tree 40 panel with Lisa, Pat and Thomas.

Saftey Rule #2 for the Genealogy Internet Playground and Saftey Rule #3 for the Genealogy Internet Playground by Janet Hovorka on The Chart Chick blog.  Janet has great advice for working on genealogy on the Internet.  For reference, here's Rule #1 from last week.

I Am Thankful for - 17 November 2010 by A.C. Ivory on the Find My Ancestor blog.  A.C. has his own living history resource - his grandparents.  I loved this post!

*  Indexing Errors: Test, Check the Boxes by the write of The Ancestry Insider blog.  Mr. AI comments about Indexing Errors and provides a fun test.  His post Answers to Indexing Illustration provides the test answers.  I had guessed them all once I knew the context.  Read the comments for both posts.

Saturday Evening Post: Interviewing Family During Holidays by Susan Kitchens on the Family Oral History Using Digital Tools blog.  Susan is quoted in the magazine, and she has observations about asking "why" in interviews.


Atlanta Family History Expo Recap by Amy coffin on the Family History Expos blog.  Amy provides a list of the bloggers and their blog posts from last weekends conference. 

* Research Challenge: Join in a quick group consultation/research plan exercise by Marian Pierre-Louis on the Roots and Rambles blog.  Marian posted an intriguing and baffling research problem from a friend - can you help solve this puzzle?

News Flash! 1852 New Year's Resolutions Solve Genealogical Mysteries! by Dee Burris on the Shakin' the Family Tree blog.   I bet you've always wondered why some families are elusive - here's some of the answers!

Ten Commandments of Genealogy by Dick Eastman on the Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter blog.  Dick's observations ring true (although his terminology is a bit outdated).  Some commenters have ideas of their own.

Review: The Women Who Came in the Mayflower by Susan Petersen on the Long Lost Relatives.net blog.  Here's a free genealogy eBook for your Kindle.  I wish it was on Scribd or another online site too.

My First FHL Film -- Score! by Tonia Kendrick on the Tonia's Roots blog.  I love it when researchers discover a useful resource!  Tonia discovered the joy of finding information on FHL microfilms, and will order more!

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

* Follow Friday: Around the Blogosphere - November 19 by Susan Petersen on the Long Lost Relatives.net blog.

* Best Bytes for the Week of November 19th by Elizabeth O'Neal on the Little Bytes of Life blog.

* Friday Newsletter and Follow News: 19 November 2010 by Great Koehl on Greta's Genealogy Bog blog.

Genealogy News Corral: Nov. 15-19 by Diane Haddad on The Genealogy Insider 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 700 genealogy bloggers using Google Reader, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

5 comments:

Susan Petersen said...

Thanks for the shout-out, Randy! I appreciate it!

Tonia said...

Thanks for the shout-out, Randy! Most appreciated.

Janet Hovorka said...

Thanks Randy. Honored as usual. Thanks for everything. So appreciate you.

A.C. Ivory said...

Thanks Randy! I truly feel blessed to have my grandparents still around. I thoroughly enjoy spending time with them!

DearMYRTLE said...

Thanks for the shout-out Randy. I always recommend your blog, and in fact spotlight it whenever I do a class on blogging.

Thanks for the tremendous influence you have on the genealogy community.