Saturday, January 3, 2015

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (SNGF) -- Best Find of 2014, and Research Challenge for 2015

It's Saturday Night - 
time for more Genealogy Fun! 



Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible! music) is to:


1)  What was your best research achievement in 2014?  Tell us - show us a document, or tell us a story, or display a photograph.  Brag a bit!  You've earned it!

2)  We all have elusive ancestors.  What research problem do you want to work on in 2015?  Tell us where you want to research and what you hope to find.

3)  Put the answers in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, or in a Facebook or Google+ post.  

Here's mine:

1)  I think my best research achievement was tracking down the Elizabeth Dill birth record in the Eastham, Massachusetts town records.  This was a challenge, because it wasn't where the finding aid (the IGI Batch number) told me it was.  I blogged about the records and the problem in Searching for Elizabeth Dill's Birth Record in Eastham, Massachusetts Records (3 November 2014) and about the solution in Crowd-Sourcing Works Again! Finding Elizabeth Dill's Birth Record in Eastham, Massachusetts Records ((4 November 2014).

Here is the record I found (with help from my readers):


2)  In 2015, I want to work more on the Thomas J. Newton research challenge I have.  He was probably born in Maine, married Sophia (Buck) Brigham in eastern Massachusetts, fathered two children who say they were born in Vermont.  I have ONE record with his name on it - a town paupers list in 1832 in the Westborough, Mass. town records.  There must be another record somewhere in New England!!  You can read my "biography" of Thomas J. Newton in 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 31: #38 Thomas J. Newton (ca 1800 - ????) (1 August 2014).

I need to do more research in Massachusetts probate, land records and town records, focusing on Worcester and Middlesex Counties.  I also need to focus on Lamoille County, Vermont, where the two children of Thomas J. Newton were probably born - again, probate, land and town records may hold some answers.  

This is important to me - he may be my 3rd great-grandfather, and he might not be.  I need to find proof of the father of my second great grandmother, Sophia (Newton) Hildreth (1834?-1923), and then flesh out his ancestry.  This is one of the biggest "blank spots" in my family tree.  It's not the only one in the 4th great-grandparents generation.  

The URL for this post is:

Copyright (c) 2015, Randall J. Seaver




Surname Saturday - BARR (England to colonial Massachusetts)

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


I am in the 8th great-grandmothers and I'm up to Ancestor #1075 who is Frances BARR (!669-????) 
[Note: the earlier great-grandmothers and 8th great-grandfathers have been covered in earlier posts].

My ancestral line back through two generations in this BARR family line is:


1. Randall J. Seaver

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)

16. Isaac Seaver (1823-1901)
17. Lucretia Townsend Smith (1827-1884)

32. Benjamin Seaver (1791-1825)
33. Abigail Gates (1797-1869)


66.  Nathan Gates (1767-1830)
67.  Abigail Knowlton (1774-1855)

134.  Jeremiah Knowlton (1745-1785)
135.  Abigail Pierce (1750-1776)

268.  Jeremiah Knowlton (1713-1752)
269.  Sarah Allen (1717-1796)

536.  Nathaniel Knowlton (1683-1760)
537.  Mary Bennett (1686-1717)


1074.  Henry Bennett, born 1664 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States; died 1739 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  He was the son of 2148. Henry Bennett and 2149. Lydia Perkins.  He married 20 May 1685 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.
1075.  Frances Barr, born about 1669 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  

Children of Henry Bennett and Frances Barr are:
*  Mary Bennett (1686-1717), married 1703 Nathaniel Knowlton (1683-1760).
*  Frances Bennett (1694-????).
*  Margaret Bennett (1698-????)
*  Joanna Bennett (1701-????)
*  Lucy Bennett (1703-????).

All girls!

2150. John Barr, born about 1630 in England; died 22 April 1673 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  He married before 1665 in probably Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.
2151.  Mary Smith, born about 1632 in Shropham, Norfolk, England; died 12 January 1708 in Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts, United States.  She was the daughter of 4302. Richard Smith and 4303. Joanna.

Children of John Barr and Mary Smith are:
*  Jonathan Barr (1665-????).
*  Elizabeth Barr (1667-????).
*  Frances Barr (1669-????), married 1685 Henry Bennett (1664-1739).
*  Jeremiah Barr (1670-????).
*  Abigail Barr (1672-????)

Mary (Smith) (Call ) Barr married Henry Bennett (1629-1707), the father of Henry Bennett (1664-1739) in 1685.

The only information about this Barr (or Burr) family is from the town records, and town histories.

The URL for this post is:

copyright (c) 2015, Randall J. Seaver


Friday, January 2, 2015

Top 10 Genealogy News Items From 2014 - My Take

There were hundreds of genealogy news announcements in 2014.  Some of them were outstanding - advanced technology, advanced genealogy research, added new record collections, etc.

The ones that I think are the most significant for my own research are (referring to my own blog posts):

1)  FindMyPast Acquires Mocavo, Mocavo Provides Free U.S. Census Indexes (23 June 2014).  This was a significant acquisition of Mocavo's databases and technologies by FindMyPast.  Subsequently, Mocavo stopped adding new databases, which is unfortunate.

2)  BIG News from Ancestry.com - Announcing Retirement of Several Features and Websites (5 June 2014).  Mundia, Y-DNA and Mitochondrial DNA Test Data, MyCanvas, MyFamily, and Genealogy.com products were retired.  MyCanvas found a new home later and is still usable.  

3)  Record Hints are Now Available on FamilySearch Family Tree (17 June 2014), and Information From FamilySearch about FamilySearch Family Tree Record Hints (20 June 2014).  FamilySearch added Record Hinting to the FamilySearch Family Tree.

4)  First Look at Improved AncestryDNA Matches and AncestryDNA Improvements Description - UPDATED (19 November 2014).  AncestryDNA claimed that the improved matches would be more reliable, and the new DNA Circles would be useful.  

5)  FindMyPast Introduces Hints in Family Trees - UPDATED (17 December 2014).  This brings FindMyPast to the same record hinting capability with Ancestry, MyHeritage, and FamilySearch.

6)  RootsMagic Adds MyHeritage Matching Technologies for Powerful Automatic Research Capabilities and RootsMagic 7 is Now Available - with WebHints (FamilySearch and MyHeritage) (25 November 2014).  I use RootsMagic 7, and this is helpful.  The WebHints seem to slow down the software though.

7)  MyHeritage Introduces Instant Discoveries Feature (10 December 2014).  This new capability may bring rank beginners into the genealogy world...I'm not sure that is good!

8)  Breaking News - Ancestry Expands Groundbreaking Collaboration with Family Search (21 January 2014).  Collaboration of FamilySearch with Ancestry, MyHeritage and FindMyPast spread FamilySearch legacy databases to the other providers, and useful technology and data sharing to FamilySearch.

9)  Middlesex County, Massachusetts Probate Records, 1648-1871, Now Available on AmericanAncestors.org (13 August 2014) and Mining the Essex County, Massachusetts Probate Records on AmericanAncestors.org (2 September 2014).  This was really important for me - these are two of my major ancestral counties in Massachusetts.

10)  CreateFan.com Has More Beautiful Multi-Generation Charts (4 April 2014); Find Relatives on the BYU-EDU Relative Finder Website (23 July 2014); Using Find-A-Record to Add Information to Your FamilySearch Family Tree (1 July 2014); Kinpoint Can Be Used To Find Research Opportunities (27 October 2014).  FamilySearch affiliates continue to invent new tools to search in and display information from the FamilySearch Family Tree.  

What other product or resource announcements were significant for you during 2014?  Tell me in Comments to this post.

The URL for this post is:  
http://www.geneamusings.com/2015/01/top-10-genealogy-news-items-from-2014.html

Copyright (c) 2015, Randall J. Seaver


52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 53: #60, Abraham Kemp (1795-after 1881)

Amy Johnson Crow suggested a weekly blog theme of "52 Ancestors" in her blog post Challenge:  52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks on the No Story Too Small blog.  I am extending this theme in 2015 to 104 Ancestors in 104 Weeks. Here is my ancestor biography for week #53:

Abraham James Kemp (1795-1881) is #60 on my Ahnentafel list, my third great-grandfather. He married in 1818  to #61 Sarah Sephrona Fletcher (1802-????).



I am descended through:

*  their son, 
#30 James Abraham Kemp (1831-1902), who married #31, Mary Jane Sovereen (1841-1874), in 1861.
*  their daughter #15 Georgianna Kemp (1868-1952), who married #14 Charles Auble (1849-1916) in 1898.
*  their daughter, #7 Emily Kemp Auble (1899-1977) married, #6 Lyle Lawrence Carringer (1891-1976)in 1918. 
* their daughter, #3 Betty Virginia Carringer (1919-2002), who married Frederick Walton Seaver (1911-1983) in 1942.
*  their son, #1 Randall J. Seaver (1943-....)

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

1)  PERSON (with source citations as indicated in brackets):

 *  Name:                           Abraham Kemp[1-2]
*  Alternate Name:            Abram Kemp[3–5]  
*  Sex:                               Male   

*  Father:                           John Kemp (1768-1861)    
*  Mother:                         Mary Dafoe (1776-1851)   
  
2)  INDIVIDUAL EVENTS (with source citations as indicated in brackets):   

*  Birth:                            4 November 1795, Fredericksburgh, Lennox and Addington, Ontario, Canada[1]
*  Baptism:                       27 December 1795 (age 0), Fredericksburgh, Lennox and Addington, Ontario, Canada[1,3]
*  Census:                         1 April 1851 (age 55), Ameliasburg, Prince Edward, Ontario, Canada[4]
*  Census:                         1 April 1861 (age 65), Huntingdon, Hastings, Ontario, Canada[2]
*  Census:                         1 April 1881 (age 85), Windham, Norfolk, Ontario, Canada[5]
3)  MARRIAGES AND CHILDREN (with source citations as indicated in brackets):
  
*  Spouse 1:                     Sarah Sephrona Fletcher (1802-????)    
*  Marriage 1:                  16 April 1818 (age 22) probably Prince Edward, Ontario, Canada[1]
*  Child 1:                       Waity Catherine Kemp (1820-1899)   
*  Child 2:                       Mary Ann Kemp (1823-1903)   
*  Child 3:                       Stephen J. Kemp (1826-1880)   
*  Child 4:                       William H. Kemp (1829-1886)   
*  Child 5:                       James Abraham Kemp (1831-1902)   
*  Child 6:                       John L. Kemp (1834-1920)   
*  Child 7:                       Peter Evans Kemp (1837-1921)   
*  Child 8:                       Andrew Hait Kemp (1840-1915)   
*  Child 9:                       Sarah Jane Kemp (1843-1891)   
*  Child 10:                     Charles W. Kemp (1845-    )   
*  Child 11:                     Wesley Kemp (1847-1891)   
  
4)  NOTES (with source citations as indicated in brackets):   

 The book by William Briggs, Ontario Historical Society Papers and Records (Toronto, Canada : Ontario Historical Society, 1899)[3] lists the baptism of Abram Kemp, son of John and Mary Kemp, on 27 December 1795 in Fredericksburgh.

A Kemp family Bible was in the possession of a descendant of Abram Kemp (1795- after 1881) of Norfolk County, Ontario. The Bible was printed by A.J. Holman Company of Philadelphia, 1877. [1] This Bible was given to Daisy Rader by John Evans Kemp, who died in 1956.  A transcript of the Bible was typed at some unknown time and a copy of the transcript was donated to the Orange County (CA) Genealogical Society and placed in the Huntington Beach (CA) Public Library in Orange County, California, where Randy Seaver found it in the stacks in the early 1990s. 

The second page includes these notes:

Abraham Kemp was married to Sarah Fletcher on 16th April 1818.

BIRTHS

Ab'm Kemp 4 Nov 1795 (4 Dec 1795)
Sarah Kemp 7 July 1802 (about 1807)
Waty C. Kemp 23 Sept 1821 (23 Dec 1820)
Mary Ann Kemp 20 July 1824 (20 Feb 1823)
Stephen G. Kemp 7 Feb 1826
W.H. Kemp 4 March 1829
Ab'm J. Kemp 22 May 1831
John L. Kemp 28 Apr 1834 (about 1835)
Peter E. Kemp 28 Feb 1837
Andrew Kemp 6 Nov 1840 (6 Nov 1839)
Sarah J. Kemp 2 June 1843 (about 1841)
Chas. W. Kemp 14 Sept 184-
Wesley Kemp 16 Nov 1847 (16 Feb 1849)

In the 1851 Canada Census for Canada West (Ontario), the Abram Kemp family resided in Ameliasburg, Prince Edward County, Ontario.[4]  The household included:

*  Abram Kemp - a farmer, born in U.S., W. Methodist, age 55, male.
*  Sephrona Kemp - spinster, born in France, Catholic, age 44, female
*  Abram Kemp Jr. - labourer, born in Canada, W. Methodist, age 21, male.
*  John Kemp -  labourer, born in Canada, W. Methodist, age 17, male.
*  Peter E. Kemp -  labourer, born in Canada, W. Methodist, age 14, male.
*  Wesley Kemp -  born in Canada, W. Methodist, age 4, male.

In the 1861 Census for Canada West, the Abraham Kemp family resided in Huntington township, Hastings County, Ontario.[2]  The household included:

*  Abraham Kemp - born C.W. (Canada West), Wesleyan religion, age 65, male, married, member of family
*  Ann Kemp - born C.W. (Canada West), Wesleyan religion, age 55, female, married, member of family
*  Wesley Kemp - born C.W. (Canada West), Wesleyan religion, age 13, male, not married, member of family.

Abraham Kemp may have had more than one wife, since the first known wife, Sarah (Sephrona?)  was born in 1802 (according to the Kemp Bible), and was age 44 in the 1851 census (an error of five years), born in France (French Canada?) and religion Catholic.  Abraham and Sarah's first child was born in 1821. However, the marriage records for their children list Abraham's wife as Sarah, except for one son's record which says Sephrona.  

In the 1861 Census, Abraham's wife's name is listed as Ann, age 55, and she is listed as born in Ontario and religion Wesleyan.  Ann may or may not be Sarah. 

Abraham Kemp was not found in the 1871 Census of Canada in Ontario.  

In the 1881 Census of Canada, Abraham Kemp resided with his son Peter Evans Kemp in Windham township, Norfolk County, Ontario.[5]  The household included:

*  Peter E. Kemp - male, age 44, born O[ntario], religion C. M[ethodist], origin English, occupation F[armer], M[arried]
*  Catherine Kemp - female, age 36, born O[ntario], religion C. M[ethodist] , origin German, no occupation, M[arried]
*  Jannet Kemp - female, age 14, born O[ntario], religion C. M[ethodist] , origin German, attends school
*  Sarah E. Kemp - female, age 3, born O[ntario], religion C. M[ethodist] , origin German
*  Mary Kemp -female, age 4/12 (born Dec[embe]r, born O[ntario], religion C. M[ethodist], origin German
*  Abram Kemp - male, age 85, religion C. M[ethodist] , origin English, occupation F[armer], W[idowed]

The last record on hand for Abraham James Kemp is the 1881 Canada Census record.  He did not appear in the 1891 Canada Census.  He probably died between 1881 and 1891 in Norfolk County, Ontario.  No death record or gravestone has been found to date.

Cheryl Kemp Taber's family tree on Rootsweb WorldConnect  (http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=cdn-kemp) lists several more records, including crown land records, a Norfolk County deed, War of 1812 militia records, etc. 

5)  SOURCES
 
1. Unknown, John Evans Kemp Family Bible transcript (Transcript at Huntington Beach CA Public Library).

2. Census of Canada, 1861, Hastings County, Ontario, District 138, Subdistrict 1, Huntingdon township, Page 14, lines 46-48, Abraham Kemp household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 9 May 2008), citing Library and Archives Canada Microfilm C-1033.

3. William Briggs, Ontario Historical Society Papers and Records (Toronto, Canada : Ontario Historical Society, 1899), page 42, Abram Kemp baptism entry.

4. Census of 1851, Prince Edward County, Ontario, A, District 32, Prince Edward County, Subdistrict 304, Ameliasburgh township, Page 42 (penned), Lines 14 to 19, Abram Kemp household; digital image, Library and Archives Canada (http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/ : accessed 10 March 2013); Library and Archives Canada Microfilm C-11750.

5. Census of Canada, 1881, Norfolk County, Ontario, Windham township, population schedule, District 158 (Norfolk North), subdistrict Windham, Division 1, page 30, Dwelling #157, Family #157, Peter E. Kemp household; digital image, Library and Archives Canada (www.collectionscanada.ca : accessed 5 March 2013); citing Library and Archives of Canada Microfilm C-13263.

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


Copyright (c) 2015, Randall J. Seaver


GenSoftReviews Announces its Users Choice Awards for 2014

I received this press release via email from Louis Kessler today:

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

GenSoftReviews.com is the site users go to rate and review their genealogy software and to find out about other genealogy software to try. The site lists more than 850 programs, and users have contributed over 2,600 ratings and reviews.

cid:image002.png@01D02621.184FE5D0

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The 6th annual Users Choice Awards have been announced at the GenSoftReviews website.
26 programs were eligible having a minimum of 10 reviews and at least one review in 2014. Of those, 16 programs achieved a user-assigned average score of at least 4.00 out of 5, and were awarded a 2014 GenSoftReviews Top Rated Genealogy Software award.
The Winners include:
  • 9 Windows programs: Ahnenblatt, Clooz, Family Historian, Ancestral Quest, Brother's Keeper, Family Tree Builder, Behold, RootsMagic and Genbox Family History,
  • 1 Mac program: Reunion
  • 5 Online programs: The Next Generation, Famberry, My Great Big Family, MyHeritage and Family Echo
  • 1 Handheld program: Heredis for iOS

The top program for 2014 was Ahnenblatt, a free full featured Windows program by Dirk Böttcher. Ahnenblatt ended the year with a user rating of 4.90 out of 5 based on 152 reviews. Ancestral Quest dropped from first in 2013 to seventh in 2014 but still retained an excellent score of 4.54 out of 5. The Next Generation, a program that manages and displays your family tree on your website, moved up from fourth in 2013 to second in 2014 with a score of 4.78 out of 5.

New to the list of winners for 2014 were My Heritage for their online Family Tree system, and Behold, a genealogy data viewer.

Programs that dropped off the list from 2013 include iFamily for Leopard and Heredis for Mac, both of which did not receive at least one rating in 2014, as well as Gramps that fell from a rating of 4.15 in 2013 to 3.41 in 2014.

A new rule added in 2014 is that unsupported programs no longer qualify for Users Choice Awards, but they are still listed at GenSoftReviews so they can be rated and reviewed. As a result, Personal Ancestral File was not awarded a Users Choice Award despite still being well liked with a score of 4.51 out of 5.

GenSoftReviews uses a time-weighted average score. The weight of every user rating goes down 50% every year, so newer opinions will be better reflected in the average score.

Congratulations go to all the 2014 winners. They are producing a product that their users like. GenSoftReviews hopes all genealogy software developers will use the feedback these reviews provide to improve their programs for their users.

For more information and a complete listing of current and past winners, see the Users Choice Awards page.

###

About Louis Kessler

Louis Kessler has been a genealogist and a programmer for over 35 years. He developed and maintains the GenSoftReviews site. He is also the author of his own genealogy program known as Behold that can be found atwww.beholdgenealogy.com

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

I guess I'm missing out on some great software.  The only software on thel ist that I use regularly is RootsMagic, and I use the MyHeritage online trees.



Thursday, January 1, 2015

Genealogy Industry Benchmark Numbers for 1 January 2015

I'm still a "numbers guy" and like to try to keep track of various numbers in the genealogy world. So this is a list of genealogy numbers as of 1 January 2015 (see the last three year's numbers at Genealogy Industry Benchmark Numbers for 1 January 2014; 1 January 2013 Benchmark Numbers and 1 January 2012 Benchmark Numbers):

1) http://www.Ancestry.com (various, $$)

*  about 2.125 million paying subscribers (2014: 2.175 million; 2013: about 2.0 million; 2012: about 1.7 million)
* 32,529 Databases in the Card Catalog (2014: 31,477; 2013: 31,322; 2012: 30,482; 2011: 30,006)
*  about 60 million family trees with over 6 billion profiles (2014:  55 million trees, over 5 billion profiles; 2013: 29 million trees, over 3 billion profiles)
* 2,147,483,647 persons in Public Member Trees (2014; same as 2013; 2013: 2,147,483,647; 2012: 1,838,295,985; 2011: 
1,263,587,509)
* 1,060,127,515 persons in Private Member Trees (2014:  824,470,052; 2013: 619,560,089; 2012: 448,817,254; 2011: 308,674,051)

Note:  The Public Member Trees number has not been updated since 2013.

2) www.FamilySearch.org (various, free)

* 1,871 Historical Record Collections online (2014: 1699; 2013: 1,413; 2012: 1,000; 2011: 519)
* 80,630 Research Wiki articles (2014: 75,809; 2013: 70,171; 2012: 65,815; 2011: 46,002)
* 529 Research Courses (by skill level) (2014: 450; 2013: 432; 2012: 252; 2011: 109)
* 99 Community Trees (2014: 97; 2013: 91; 2012: 67; 2011: 64)

*  1,263,791,848 FamilySearch Indexing records completed (2014:  960,171,033)
*  160,185,712 indexed records added in 2014
*  1.03 billion digital images online *  170 million digital images of records added in 2014 (2013: 170 million)
*  about 240 million names in FamilySearch Genealogies (2014: 240 million)
*  about 1.1 billion profiles in FamilySearch Family Tree. (2014: 1.0 billion)
*  12 million profiles added in 2014 to FamilySearch Family Tree (2013:  12 million)
*  4.9 million family photos in FamilySearch Family Tree (2013: 1.8 million)

Note:  FamilySearch does not provide public information about some numbers.

3) http://www.Fold3.com (records, $$)

*   445 titles of original documents (counted) (2014:  434)
*   437,779,797 total records (2014: 426,351,717)

4) www.WorldVitalRecords.com (records, $$)

*  about 22,820 collections (2014: 23,210; 2013: 22,336; 2012: 28,700)
*  more than 4.2 billion names (2014: over 4.2 billion; 2013: over 4.2 billion; 2012: 4.2 billion)
* over 158 million record images (2014: over 158 million; 2013: over 158 million; 2012: 158 million)
*  over 100 million newspaper pages (2014: over 100 million; 2013: over 100 million; 2012: 100 million)


5) http://www.Archives.com/ (records, $$)

* 508  databases (2014: 456; 2013: 321; 2012: 268; 2011: 140)
* over 4 billion  records (2014: 2.6 billion; 2013: over 2.5 billion; 2012: over 1.5 billion; 2011: 1,158,738,805)


6) http://www.AmericanAncestors.org (records, $$)

* almost 400 online collections
*  more than 247 million records

7) www.Rootsweb.Ancestry.com (free)

* 751,736012 persons in WorldConnect family trees (2014:  723,773,068; 2013: 698,798,164; 2012: 667,438,708; 2011: 630,984,813 )
* 442,391 WorldConnect databases (2014: 440,417; 2013: 437,989; 2012: 434,729; 2011: 430,030)
* 309,88,224 records in FreeBMD database (2014: 297,879,501; 2013: 282,193,587; 2012: 266,785,174; 2011: 195,536,463)


8) www.FindMyPast.com (records, $$)

* over 2.0 billion family history records (2014: 1.6 billion; 2013: about 750 million; 2012: about 750 million)
*  581 United Kingdom databases (2014: 450)
*  269 Australasia databases (2014: 276)

*  558 U.S.A. databases (2014: 45)

9)  www.Mocavo.com (records, $$)

*  423,803 Databases (2014: about 175,000)

10) www.CyndisList.com (links, free)

* 295,359 genealogy links (2014:  329,378; 2013: 325,819; 2012: 309,467; 2011: 291,330)


11) www.Linkpendium.com (links, free) 

*  10,377,437 genealogy links (2014: 10,212,253; 2013: 10,049,723; 2012: 9,948,990; 2011: 9,239,987)

12)  www.FindAGrave.com (records, free):

*  over 121 million grave records (2014:  over 110 million; 2013:  over 91 million; 2012: over 73 million)

13)  www.BillionGraves.com (records, free):

*  over 10.3 million grave records (2014: over 5.3 million)

14) www.GenealogyBank.com (records, $$)

* over 6,500 newspapers (2014: over 6,500; 2013:  over 6,400; 2012: 5,800; 2011: 4,600)
* over 1.727 billion records (2014: over 1.528 billion; 2013: over 1.365 billion; 2012: over 1 billion; 2011: 700 million)

 215 million obituaries (2014: 215 million)

15)  http://ChroniclingAmerica.loc.gov/ (records, free):

*  8,831,604 newspaper pages available (2014: 6,673,511; 2013: 5,206,652; 2012: 4,540,417)

16)  http://www.Newspapers.com (records, $$)

*  Over 3,400 US newspapers (2014: over 200)
*  856,422,889 pages (2014: 56,873,402)

17)  www.NewspaperARCHIVE.com (records, $$):

*  Over 6,200 newspapers (2014: over 5,000)
*  Over 155 million newspaper pages (2014: over 120 million)

18) www.MyHeritage.com (separate trees, $$)

*   64,803,737 million registered Members (2014: 75 million; 2013: 72 million; 2012: 61,626,012)
*  16,109,153 Family Sites (2014: NN; 2013: 27 million; 2012: 20,920,031; 2011: 16,306,687)
*   1,411,945,076 billion individuals in family trees (2014: over 1.5 billion; 2013: 1.5 billion; 2012: 906,702,547; 2011: 645,780,280)


19) www.Geni.com (shared tree, $$)

*  almost 7 million users (2014: almost 7 million; 2013: almost 7 million; 2012: almost 6 million)
* 144,067,016 million profiles in family trees (2014: NNN million; 2013: over 100 million; 2012: over 100 million)
*  83,158,103 profiles in Geni's World Family Tree (2014: over 70 million; 2013: over 65 million; 2012: 60,629,166)


20) www.WeRelate.org wiki (shared tree, free)

* over 2.655 million persons in family tree (2014: over 2.3 million; 2013: over 2.3 million; 2012: over 2 million)

21)  www.WikiTree.com wiki (shared tree, free)

*  233,297 WikiTreers (2014:  ocver 80,000; 2013: 57,000; 2012: 43,000)
*  8,835,233 profiles (2014:  over 5.3 million; 2013: 4.2 million; 2012: 2.9 million)


22)  www.GeneaNet.com (separate trees, $$)

*  2 million members (2014:  2 million)
*  Over 1.9 billion profiles in online family trees (2014: over 650 million)

23)  www.OneGreatFamily.com (shared tree, $$)

*  Over 190 million entries

24)  www.FamilyTreeDNA.com (DNA, $$):

*  707,017 DNA test results (2014: 663,523; 2013: 401,057)

25)  www.23andme.com (DNA, $$):

*   over 750,000 genotyped customers (2014: about 500,000)

I obtained those numbers from publicly available information on the websites.  Several sites have not updated their numbers, or have hidden the numbers.

There are many free and subscription websites that do not publish easily findable numbers.

What other websites and what other numbers should I be benchmarking? Are some of the numbers wrong? Please tell me in Comments and I will edit the list above!

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2015/01/genealogy-industry-benchmark-numbers.html

Copyright (c) 2014, Randall J. Seaver