Tag: young genealogists

Faces of NextGen: Meet Cindy Medina

May 2, 2016

What five words would you use to describe yourself? Perpetual learner, seeker, adventurer, researcher, and writer.

Why genealogy? Genealogy was instilled in me at a young age. My father would always talk about his grandparents and great-grandparents very fondly. Every chance he had he would talk about them. Fortunately, I also have a baby picture at the age of one, with five generations of women, including myself, aunt (in lieu of my dad), grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great grandmother.

On my mother’s side, an aunt and uncle would talk about my great-grandfather, James Gallardo, working for the Alton, Illinois railroad. My grandfather and his siblings were born in Alton. With all this, I knew how important it was to remember who you are.

I was always the kid or teenager that asked my friends questions about their family. If they had vintage pictures, I would run to go see them. I always connected with my friends by pictures and stories they told me about their family, always was inquisitive, and at that age I didn’t realize I was already practicing GENEALOGY. Throughout the years, I have asked my living grandmothers (maternal and paternal) questions and inquired about their life stories. They have always been open and I am thankful for that! I always kept a mental note or jotted down any name they mentioned. Uncles, aunts, cousins, first, second, third, etc. They all matter! And due to that information I have been able to knock down many brick walls. There is no doubt I have Native American and Spanish heritage. I can’t claim a tribe, because Mexico has been mixing for five hundred years and all their birth certificates till 1750 so far state “Mestizo” which means of mixed heritage. I am definitely of Spanish Colonial heritage of the 1700s, not sooner. It is my aim and goal to find out my “Missing Spanish Link” and find out who was the first Spanish ancestor to arrive in “New Spain” a.k.a Mexico.

What’s the coolest discovery you’ve made? I found two months ago my sixth great grandmother, Roberta Baylon, and my sixth great-grandfather, Jose Gutierrez, married in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico in 1793, then “New Spain.” The certificate shows their parents’ names, my seventh great-grandparents. I was so excited to see this!

What are you working on this week? I am working on organizing all newfound research of the past months, which has been vast, on all lineages, maternal and paternal. Once I am ready to continue to do more research I will continue with Roberta Baylon and Jose Gutierrez.

What’s the number one secret to your success in genealogy? PERSISTENCE! It never fails. I can take a break, but once I am ready, BOOM, I find something awesome! As a genealogist, you can take a break, but don’t let too much time pass by. It should be something continuous, something you do for a minute every day or weekly. When the minutes add up, it is a bank of knowledge and research! Last, if one website doesn’t give you anything, always try other routes and get more information, then try again and you will find something!

What are we most likely to find you doing when you’re not researching family history? I knit! My Facebook Page is “A Knitting Journey.” That is another passion of mine. I come from a line of “crochet ladies” on my dad’s side (five generations) and I took the road for knitting with two needles. I can crochet, I can definitely hold my own, but knitting is my FORTE!

Anything else you’d like to share? I have researched my own family, helped friends with “brick walls,” and I have also met great people in the genealogy industry in the states and abroad. I look forward to growing my network more. I would like to support others and be supported. What we do is not easy. We do it because we have a passion for it and we know the value of it. It is nice when you have other passionate people in your circle that share the same genealogy dreams and struggles. I look forward to connecting with many!

The NextGen Genealogy Network is made up of young genealogists with diverse backgrounds, interests, and experiences. Faces of NextGen showcases a different member of our community each month. If you would like to be considered for an upcoming feature, simply complete our questionnaire and submit a selfie.

Faces of NextGen: Meet Jessica Taylor

April 4, 2016

Jessica Taylor, 36, Utah

What five words would you use to describe yourself? Curious, careful, personable, busy, learning.

Why genealogy? When I was at BYU shopping for a major I knew I liked history and I liked ancestors so putting them together would be fun! Genealogy is great “hands-on” history.

What’s the coolest discovery you’ve made? That the genealogy industry is a really exciting place to work right now.

What are you working on this week? I run a genealogy firm, so I get to work on the “inner gears” running the genealogy train, if that makes sense. So this week I’ve been coordinating improvements to our site’s SEO, helping onboard new affiliates, getting us set up to participate in radio over at Extreme Genes, and finalizing a change to our Worker’s Comp Insurance. Lots of variety!

What’s the number one secret to your success in genealogy? Working with incredible people.

What superpower would you want to help you uncover your family history? Direct communication with ancestors, of course! That would speed up a lot of our tapping at brick walls! Besides that, not needing to sleep would be really useful.

What are we most likely to find you doing when you’re not researching family history? Playing with my three little girls, walking our Shih Tzu, or running.

Anything else you’d like to share? I admire NextGen because I spent about ten years in this industry hiding my young age because I felt intimidated. So I’m glad you’re getting the young ‘uns out there and involved!

Faces of NextGen: Meet Eric Wells

March 7, 2016

Eric Wells, 38, Missouri

What five words would you use to describe yourself? Three instead: Just plain awesome.

Why genealogy? Genealogy was the unintended result of trying to assemble a photo book for my grandmother. She wanted to pass on hundreds of old original photographs to her five children, but ran into a problem when one or more photos needed to be given to more than one of her children. I had no idea this was a big desire for her, nor did I know she had been stuck for decades with this roadblock. At the time I had no idea that taking on this project would inevitably lead me to make connections between the people in the photographs. Diving headlong into my own family’s genealogy was enough to make me love the work.

What’s the coolest discovery you’ve made? On my wife’s side of the family, I discovered the parents of her great grandfather. It took hours upon hours browsing through early twentieth century records from Alabama and Georgia to build up enough circumstantial evidence to create a plausible theory. It took locating her distant relatives and running DNA tests to confirm the connections, the result of which deepened her family tree back to the early nineteenth century as well as widened it by discovering that her great grandfather actually had a half brother and a half sister.

What are you working on this week? I am researching a client’s family tree in an effort to produce heritage books and family tree posters for an upcoming family reunion.

What’s the number one secret to your success in genealogy? Thinking outside the box. Following the trail of census and vital records is the backbone of the research, but the real fun starts when those sources don’t have the info one needs to solve the problem. Thinking outside the box has helped solve more problems than I can count. It often requires having to take the time to learn and understand the time period, culture and geographical area to discover new resources and records which are not normally used.

What superpower would you want to help you uncover your family history? Easy, time travel (with a camera and spare batteries). Burned counties could be saved, ancestors could be seen for the first time, and thanks could be given to those who prevailed through the tough times. I’d like to get to know the deadbeats and the black sheep to understand why they did what they did. Unfortunately I am not (yet) endowed with that superpower, so I’ll just have to live with my own impressions and use my imagination to re-animate our ancestors.

What are we most likely to find you doing when you’re not researching family history? Fixing and remodeling houses (especially my own), some social activism, listening to podcasts, catching up on the latest discoveries in science and archeology, and working my way through a list of the top one hundred greatest books.

Anything else you’d like to share? This is may be a bit macabre, but genealogy is a way to bring people back from the dead. Not in the Frankenstein way, but instead it brings the people back to life within the memory and the minds of those exposed to the work I do. One of my favorite quotes is a recent one from the artist Bansky. He said. “…they say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.” As odd as it may sound, genealogy is currently the best shot at immortality.

Exploring the Obsolete: The Need for Adaptation in Genealogy

February 16, 2016

To be a young and savvy genealogist means to embrace change. These are the stories that motivate and excite us in our own histories: the exact moments when new paths begin, when the ships set sail, when boots touch down on soil for the first time. Because we try to become catalysts for our own possibilities in our personal and professional lives, these are the stories we most want to discover in our families.

Adaptation—fearlessness in the face of change—is inseparable to who we are as the rising generation of family historians, researchers, and archivists. It’s the commodity our generation has to offer in abundance, an asset that is frequently underutilized and unappreciated. And at no point is that more apparent than when something in the genealogical community goes obsolete.

So in order to help all of us in our journey to discovery, I want to talk about what it means for something to be obsolete, and how we can recognize and embrace these changes when they come.

What makes something in genealogy obsolete?
As I’ve reflected on my own experiences in adaptation, these are some examples that come to mind as a working definition:

When the number of users of a product, project, or service has demonstrably been in decline for a prolonged period of time. Especially true when the majority of its users no longer use the service.
The product, project, or service in question has been replaced by one of equal or superior functionality, or one that is free or reduces costs to the user.
The product, project, or service is no longer financially sustainable without significant reduction or expansion to its implementation.
The technology on which the product, project, or service depends is obsolete. Especially true when more effort must be exerted in adapting the old systems to new technology than would be exerted in replacing it.
The needs of new/current users are not being met by the current design of a product, project, or service.

Obsolescence: The Death of PAF
When I first began getting serious about genealogy early in my teenage years, I used Personal Ancestral File, or PAF. At the time, I didn’t understand the importance of citing sources or collaboration with other researchers. I wasn’t trying to wrestle with DNA related questions, or categorize a large collection of photos or original documents. For me, research was using as many free resources as possible—no matter how poor or questionably accurate they may have been. For my lack of experience, I didn’t know any better. For my needs at the time, PAF was ideal because it was free and easy to use.

If you’ve never heard of PAF or seen it in action, that’s because it’s obsolete now. All support for it was discontinued several years ago, for many of the reasons listed above. PAF software has been replaced—twice—in favor of websites superior in functionality. With the significant advances in technology and digitization, the needs of users had expanded to such a degree that PAF could no longer keep up. As computer operating systems continued to progress beyond Windows XP, the program could only be run in compatibility mode by those who insisted upon using it. With the introduction of Windows 8, compatibility mode for many programs disappeared. The problem was compounded further with Windows 8.1, and the technology on which PAF was based was gone.

How do we cope with the obsolete?
Why was PAF’s disappearance not the end of my world? Because I had long since outgrown the software. I moved on to RootsMagic Essentials 4 and 5, and embraced all of the features they had to offer. Many of the features they provided, including one of the earliest alliances with FamilySearch, made their software invaluable to me.

As I learned what it meant to do quality research with source citations, and became increasingly transient as a college student, my needs changed again. For someone like me who has lived in five states and gone through six computers (and at least as many phones) in the past ten years, anything less than seamless cross-platform synchronization does not meet my needs. As a result, I’ve since done away with desktop genealogy software altogether, in favor of the website/app combination provided by Ancestry.

Reaching a place where obsolete technologies no longer affect me has been an exercise of continual experimentation. Rather than being dragged into a new experience, I am willing try most of the tools available on the market. I develop a keen sense of what I require, and use anything and everything to accomplish the task. When something no longer functions according to my needs, I dump it without hesitation or sentimentality. I live under the assumption that there is always something better coming, or may already exist, that will ultimately make what I do easier and more enjoyable.

The Best is Yet to Come
I don’t think I’m alone in feeling that some of the best work that has ever happened in the genealogical community is happening right now. Digitization and greater records access demand to make better researchers of us all. DNA analysis presents us with unprecedented answers to burning questions—not to mention more honest connections with family members than we’ve ever had before, at a time when those connections are more important than ever.

But we cannot fully take advantage of these opportunities without adapting to changing online presences, redefinitions of organizational goals, an increased need and reliance on volunteerism, and the disposal of obsolete technologies.

To refuse to adapt, to give up on outgrowing our current approaches, is to sacrifice our own potential for the sake of comfort. And what we stand to lose, now and going forward, is of too great a value to pass up.

Heather Collins scribbled her first pedigree chart in the back of her journal at fourteen. Her research has since taken her deep into the American South, Canada, and the Caribbean. She blogs at Of Trees & Ink, and is a founder/contributor at Young & Savvy Genealogists. A native of Maryland, she now lives in Idaho with her husband and very spoiled cat.