Footnotes and Source Citations

I recently read a post on one of the history blogs that I follow which talks about the importance of footnotes in historical work. The author is very passionate about using footnotes and having footnotes in the works that he chooses to read. You can read that post here; For Love of the Footnote at the Journal of the American Revolution.

I completely agree with the author. I have also put down books where footnotes or endnotes were not included. Reading this got me thinking that maybe my blog posts should contain more footnotes and source identification. That goes against what I felt in the past.

When I started blogging I thought about using footnotes mainly for source citations but opted against it to try and keep posts shorter and maybe a little less technical or academic. I wanted to keep my posts and the blog clean and uncluttered, at least as much as possible. I thought that if someone wants to know where I got my information, they can just ask. I would be happy to provide the information.

However, I think I may be changing my mind, at least a little. There are two sides to this, at least when it comes to my blogging goals and expectations.

1. I want to keep posts fairly short as not to overwhelm readers or potential readers with gobs of information. Let's face it, if you look at a blog post and it keeps going on-and-on, don't you skip over it and move on to the next one. I know I do. One of my main purposes for the blog is to present findings to family and maybe attract some family that I don't know about yet. Keeping the posts short and to-the-point of what I found is probably what most family want, the meaty stuff.
2. As a researcher, I want to make sure that what I put out there is credible. I want readers to know where I got my information so they can go look for themselves. If they can do that, maybe they'll see something that I didn't or interpret the information differently. I also want to show all the evidence that I use to make my conclusions, which, I hope, adds more credibility to my content.

I think I'm going to try a few things different in future posts so I can include both my conclusions (the meaty stuff) and also how I reached those conclusions (the proof or technical, academic stuff).

I am going to do two different posts for each record or piece of evidence. The first will be the meaty and to-the-point post which focuses just on what the record is and what it tells me about my family. This, I believe, will be more appealing to family who just want to know about our history.

I'll make a second post which will cover my analysis of the information and how I came to the conclusions I made. This will be a format more in-line with the Genealogy Proof Standard. This will include the footnotes and citations of all the information I used to reach my conclusion. This is the more academic approach and allows readers to dive deeper into what I researched, if they choose.

I am going to be playing with format for these two posts over the next several weeks or even months. I need to see what works best so there will probably be a lot of tweaking. My hope is that I can come to a happy medium between providing the basic down-and-dirty information that some want and also the academic technical analysis that proper research requires.

What do you think of my idea or how do you think we should approach source citations in our blogs?

Thanks for reading and please keep diggin' for that family.

Chris

Old Country Church Records–Reading them.

Yesterday, I posted about the birth/baptism record of my great grandfather, John Pakledinaz, and how I have concluded that it is, indeed, the correct record. Today is a follow-up to that post because I wanted to give a more detailed evaluation of the record collection and also give some tips on how I deciphered the contents.

The record collection where I found my great grandfather is the Croatia, Church Books, 1516-1994, specifically the Roman Catholic, Sotin, Births, Marriages, Deaths 1857-1885, filmed and then digitized by the LDS. This particular collection consists of 399 images and I have combed through about 180 of them so far (all of the Baptisms). The records are in great overall condition considering the originals were over 100 years old when they were filmed. I would say that 90% of the pages in the images are very legible. The digitized version is far superior, in my opinion, to the microfilm version. They are clear and I can zoom in and out without loss of legibility and I can view them at home on my home computer, much better than viewing on a film reader.

The main difficulty with these old church records, obviously, is that they are not in English. This particular collection is in Latin and Croatian. They are in a spreadsheet type record form with headings. The headings start out in Latin and then half way through they turned into Croatian. This isn’t so bad because the English translation stayed the same; Nomen (Name – Latin) is the same as ime (Name – Croatian).

However, the entries do the same thing, they started in Latin and then, all of a sudden, whoever was doing the recording starting writing everything in Croatian. I don’t speak Latin or Croatian, so I was pretty confused several times during my search. See the examples on the left. The top record of Jacobus is from 1857. This is written in Latin – Maji (May), Legit. (Legitimate Child), and colonus (could be farmer).  The bottom record is from 1885. This is is Croatian – Ožujak (March), Zakonit (Legitimate), Zak, supr (Legal or legitimate marriage).

To make things worse, as with all handwritten records like these, the same person did not record every entry. Some entries were very neat and clear and some are just downright scribble. But, with the help of a couple different websites, I can pretty much decipher most of what is written.

The first website I went to and used much through the entire process was www.Croatia-in-English.com. They have great explanations of the church records with word and name lists that I used to make my way through the harder parts of the records. Along with that site, I also used Google translate A LOT! I never used just one site to make sure I was getting a word correct; I always used at least those two sites. I also used the Family History Research Wiki from www.FamilySearch.org just to verify some of the harder words.

Lastly, when I just could not figure anything out or at least wanted to verify what I have found, I went to the Ancestry.com message boards (for this record, the Croatian board). I did not jump to the message boards first because I feel that I need to do everything in my power to try and decipher these records on my own. The more I can do on my own, the better I’ll be doing further research in records just like these. Anyway, I just could not figure out this word that was under my Great Grandfathers Fathers name. I was almost sure it was his occupation or something like that, but I could not decipher it completely. So I posted to the board. I received two answers within hours of posting and my suspicions were confirmed, the word means farmer or peasant farmer (in Croatian).

There will always be portions of these records that you may never decipher. In the observations column of my great grandfathers record there is some writing with what is probably dates: Ex Offo?? 2/12 1905 ??? 14/11 9?9 I believe the first date is something to do with his emigration date, as it is very close to the date I found him on a ship’s manifest at Ellis Island (Aug 1905), but it doesn’t match for sure, so I will probably never know.

 
Another part of these records that threw me for a moment was there were some dates and a + sign by some of the Baptism names. I have German Genealogy also so I have reviewed many of their village books and I remembered that the + sign in those records meant death. So, do these annotations mean the same thing? I quickly picked an example and then started searching the death records of this collection and there it was, the annotation on the baptism matched a death record of the same person. However, my example almost through me off with the language again – the Baptism was written in Latin so the name was Johannes and the Death was written in Croatian, so the name was Ivan – Ivan is Croatian, Johannes is Latin, and they both can become John in English, just like in my Great Grandfather’s case.

This is enough for one post but I will continue to post about these records because I have found a lot of hope-to-be ancestors. Over the next couple months, I’ll be continuing my search into these records, making some conclusions from what I find and then I’ll post my findings.  

Do you have any suggestions on reading these old church records? If so, please leave a comment and tell everyone about it. 

Thanks for reading and keep diggin’ for that family.

Chris

Where Did This Come From? Hinterhauser Bible?

I can add to the string of mistakes I’ve made when I was a very young and inexperienced genealogist. The document to the right is a scan out of a Hinterhauser family bible (transcription below). At least that is what I remember. See, although I have the scan saved on my computer I have nothing that tells me when I got it or from whom I got it.

I do remember that it was very early in my family history journey, probably about 2002. I know that it was the first big break-through of my search for Hinterhausers. Since I was in Germany at the time, I asked a co-worker to look at it and they explained the words to me and also that it looked to come from a Familienbuch or Ortssippenbuch. They helped me research a little which led me to finding these families in German records from the Batschka region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and even back to the original German villages of our Hinterhauser line and also the most distant relatives I have found, my 6th Great Grandparents – Josef and Magdalena (Schwahl) Morlock. These are the parents of Katharina Morlock who are not listed on the bible page.

This is where this page fits into our family:

No 1841 marriage is Augustine Hinterhauser to Rosalia Csihas – these are my 2nd Great Grandparents. Their son, listed underneath them, Augustine is the brother of my Great Grandmother, Anna Maria (Hinterhauser) Pakledinaz. I have written about her in a couple different posts: Ancestor Appreciation and also on the Hinterhauser Page/Post.

This mystery page was very critical to my early search but due to my poor record keeping and just plain inexperience, I do not know exactly where it came from. 

My goal in sharing this is to 1) find out if I can locate some cousins who may even have the bible where this was written and 2) give a bit of advice to anyone just starting out – Document…Document…Document everything about everything you receive in your journey.

So, do I have any cousins out there that may have seen this page before? Maybe you have this mystery bible in your possession? Please leave a comment if you have any relation to these lines.

Thanks for stopping by and keep diggin’ for that family.

Chris

Here is the transcription and translation of that document:

Page 326

No. 1833 Hinterhauser Martin Son of H(interhauser). Martin & Anna Marie Scheuer 1

Katharina Morlock

____________

Son Of

No. 1834 Hinterhauser Martin & Katharina Morlock 2

Hinterhauser Josef & Frau Anna Teppert daughter of Andreas Tep. Susan Krembacher

Son of

No. 1835 Hinterhauser Josef & Anna Teppert 3

Hinterhauser Philippe Frau Madgalena Kehl daughter Andreas Keho Eva Umlau

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­_____________

Page 327 Son of

No 1837 Hintehauser Philipp & frau Magdalena Kehl 4

Hinterhauser Augustine Frau Rosalia Csihas daughter Josef C(sihas). Anna Maria Piller

______________

Son of

No 1841 Hinterhauser Augustine & Frau Rosalia Csihas 5

Hinterhauser Augustine Frau Elisabeth Stoos daughter Johann Stoos ?

Son of

Hinterhauser Augustine & Elizabeth Stohr

No 6 Josef Hinterhauser 6

Ipad For Genealogy–Pt 3–Password Overload!

This is the 3rd installment of a series I’m doing on how I use the iStuff (iPhone/iPad) for genealogy and general research. You can read the first posts here: Part 1 - Calendars and Part 2 - Free Cloud Storage.

How many different internet sites or apps do you have password protected? If you are like our family, there are countless numbers from bank accounts, emails, kids internet sites, school internet sites, etc... As family historians, we only add to the number of passwords with the internet and database sites that we may subscribe to. We have to keep track of those passwords and keep them close by when we need them while also keeping them protected. We started using one of those solutions about a year ago, it is called Cozi Password Vault.

There are lots of password vault apps out there and all pretty much do the same thing, they are the keeper of your passwords and other sign-in information that you need on a daily basis but just can't always remember. What separated Cozi Vault for me was the ability for it to sync between devices. I wanted to use it on my iPhone and iPad and also my wife's iPhone, and it works great.

In order for it to sync between devices, it is ultimately setup in the cloud so that may be scary for some. It is not that scary for me because I read reviews of things like this and also look at their security issues, I was impressed with what people had to say so we started using it and have not looked back.

Here is a list of things that we like about it:

1. Syncs between all our iStuff so I add/change a password for our bank account on my phone or iPad, it updates on my wife's phone automatically. This syncing does not have to take place on Wi-Fi, Cozi will use cellular service to keep everything in sync.
2. Not just for passwords, you can customize menus and data so you can store login information or just about anything that you want to remember for a site.
3. The database has places for the url for the site so you can access your password and then open up the site right from within cozy
4. It has a password generator - I have some accounts where I have to change passwords every 30 or 60 days and I cannot use a password that I used before so this generator comes in very handy.
5. With on click, your password is copied to your clipboard so you can paste it right into the site when needed.

This is not a free app, I think it costs $1.99, not much when you think about the hassle it saves trying to remember all those passwords and login information.

I know there are plenty of these apps out there; which one are you using and why? Let us know in the comments.

Thanks for reading and keep diggin' for that family.

Technorati Tags: Ipad,Iphone,passwords,password vault

Documenting the Present?

Are you documenting your kid’s life as you go? I thought about this the other day during my boy’s cub scout meeting. I was a cub scout when I was about their age, but all I really remember is going to the meetings and wearing the little blue uniform. I don’t remember what rewards, badges, or accomplishments I earned during that time. I kind of wish I remembered that or had something that told me.  I don’t want my kids, 30 or 40 years from now wondering the same thing. But how should I go about doing this?

We are already keeping some of the patches, belt loops, and certificates in a box, but what if this box gets damaged or lost? I think we need a backup plan. A scrapbook would work, but those are time consuming and have the same possibility of getting lost or damaged as the box. Then it hit me! My genealogy software would work great for that. It has an event process to enter awards, honors, memberships, etc… and I’ve used these for my ancestors but have not been very good at using them for documenting the present.

The boys cub scout and our daughters girl scout advancements and awards fit nicely within this program. I can add pictures of the events and electronic versions of their certificates. This is the perfect backup plan and something I should have been doing all along.

I think we get so caught up in finding out about our ancestors that we forget to think that our descendants are going to want to know about our life. I need to get better in documenting the present accomplishments of our family to help out our future generations who may want to know what we were up to. Remember, the past of the future is the present.

What present moments are you making sure you document? Have there been some that you’ve missed?

Thanks for reading and keep diggin’ for that family.

Chris

Ipad For Genealogy–Part 2 FREE Stuff

I started off with Part 1 talking about calendars and you can read that here.

For this post I am going to talk about FREE stuff when it comes to online or cloud storage.
Everyone likes free stuff.

I have been a longtime user of Dropbox and just not for my genealogy stuff; I use it for everything that I want to access across my digital platforms. However, the Dropbox free account only offers 2GB of storage (with referrals you can get more) and I have been pushing that limit. So, I have recently been exploring other options to add to my free cloud storage because I just don’t want to pay for it. So, here is what I am doing and how I now have 32GB of free cloud storage.

1. Dropbox (2GB). This is my goto storage just because I have been using it for so long and am comfortable with it and it plays very nicely with everything. However, like I mentioned, it only comes with 2GB for the free account. I am pushing that limit.
2. Google Drive (15GB). Since I use Google, I have free storage with them called Google Drive. I have not really used this too much in the past and I really don’t know why. However, I‘ve linked my storage to all my devices and will now play with it. My initial thoughts is this is where I will store word processing and excel spreadsheets that I need to update on a fairly routine nature. Research logs, biographical sketches, research notes, etc… Google drive is the the goto place so you don’t have to buy Microsoft Office. I’m beginning to like it a lot.
3. SkyDrive (7GB) by Microsoft. I’ve had this for awhile but did not like it in the past because it seemed glitchy and didn’t seem to play nice with others. The primary purpose of this was to sync Microsoft product specific information and I didn’t use Microsoft stuff for portability, I have Apple stuff for that. However, Microsoft has updated something and it is working a lot better and more like the other cloud storage products. After linking my account and downloading the app it seems to be a great place to store things that you want to have access to but may not update – static pages of information. I am a den leader for one of my boys Cub Scout dens so I am using this for all that information. Seems to be working great so far.
4. SugarSync (5GB)– this is the newest to my cloud storage apps. It seems to be very comparable to Dropbox, just a very different interface but not too difficult to work around. I am using it the same that I use Dropbox just with different stuff; I put all my schoolwork and military history research sources in here. The hardest part of SugarSync was actually getting the free storage, it isn’t obvious on their website. You have to first download the desktop application and then create an account from there. You then get the option to accept their free account – although it keeps defaulting to try and get you to opt for the paid version. But, 5GB of storage is perfect for what I need it for.

So, there you have it – I went from 2GB of free storage with Dropbox to 32GB of cloud storage in just a couple of days. It may seem inconvenient because stuff is located in different folders or apps, but it only took me a day or so to get used to where I put stuff – I don’t even have to think about it now.

Do you use free cloud storage? Did I miss a good one? Let us know by leaving a comment.

Thanks for reading and keep diggin’ for that family.

Chris

P.S. I will be making periodic updates to this post to let everyone know how each is working out.

Technorati Tags: Ipad,Cloud Storage,Genealogy,Family History

Rookie Mistake–Source Documentation

I am working on my genealogical documentation, as stated in my previous posts: A New Start and also Slow and Easy. I have run into yet another snag in my previous research and documentation, that if done correctly the first time, would have saved much time now.

The current problem is within the marriage of John and Anna Pakledinaz (my great grandparents). It is not that I do not know when or where they were married, I am confident I know this information. They were married on 15 January 1910 in Youngstown, Mahoning County, Ohio. The problem is with my documentation of this information. Here is a list of my sources/information:

1. Back in 2000, I wrote to the Youngstown Diocese to find out about St. Joseph Church and the marriage record of John and Anna. The Chancellor wrote back that same day saying the church does not exist anymore but she has the records in her office. She gave me the information I requested, here is exactly what she wrote: "There is a marriage record for Pakledinaz/Hinterhauser. Although the record is difficult to read, as it was written in cursive Latin and fountain pen, it looks like the name is Joannes(John) Hinterhausen and Annam (Ann or Anna) Pakledinaz. The witnesses were Adam Willie and P_____ (unreadable) Flagger. January 15, 1910: married by Rev. J. W. Klute. The parents' names are not listed.” NOTE: The last names are reversed for John and Anna?  
2. The day after that email traffic, the Chancellor typed and certified a Certificate of Marriage with the seal of the Chancellery and sent it to me. (I only have the certificate, I did not keep the envelop or anything else she may have sent with it). (Again the last names are reversed for John and Anna).
3. I also have another Marriage Certificate in my possession, although this is a copy. This is a certificate obtained May 7, 1951. This lists the same information but does not reverse the last names and does list the name of John and Anna's parents (Score). It also says on the lower left corner, "Vol 1 Page 133.

What I have is pretty good evidence to prove the marriage of John and Anna on 15 January 1910 in Youngstown. However, here are the questions I have when trying to put these sources into my database and my rookie mistakes when I got these sources.

For #2, I do not know if any other information came with the certificate since I did not keep the envelope. I also do not know which type of source was used to compile the information although it sounds like the church book as was mentioned in #1 above. I would much rather have a photo or copy of the original church book, then I can evaluate what was written for myself and see if the names were actually reversed in the book or was it a mistake of the Chancellor who gave me the information.

For #3, where did this information come from, where did it originate? Where did I get it from? This was obtained in 1951 and it is singed by a Reverend, so I'm guessing that it came from church records. But if this did come from the church records then why did it contain the parents names and #2 did not? I'm guessing that the vol 1 page 133 is showing the book it came from, but who has that book? If the Chancellor does then why does it not have the parents name again? Maybe this record is from the official court records for the marriage and the vol 1 page 133 refers to their documentation at the courts?

All these questions frustrate me because most could be answered if I would have kept better record of my sources. This is what I am learning:

1. It is not enough to document your source information, you must also know where that source came from. Ask the questions! I could have asked the chancellor’s office in the email chain about #1 and 2 but I did not.
2. When you receive a copy of a source from someone else, whether it be in the mail or in email or in person, keep everything that accompanied that source - the envelope , the original email and all accompanied emails. Then make a note of everything that came with it and from whom you received it so you do not question yourself later, as I am doing now.

One of the reasons that I started this project, which I call my restart, is to find instances just as I am describing. I've learned a lot over the last several years about research and documentation, stuff that I wish I knew back in 2000 when I made these mistakes. But, I was a rookie way back then and I'm sure I'm going to find a lot more just like this.

What kind of rookie mistakes have you found in your own research? Have you fixed them? Leave a comment and tell us about them so we can all learn from each others mistakes.

I hope that someone can learn from my mistake here and not repeat it. Thanks for reading and keep diggin' for that family.

Chris

Note: I have written of John and Anna a couple other times, you can read them in these posts: Surname Saturday - Paklendinaz - Pakledinac and Pakledinac- Irish? and also Ancestor Appreciation Day: My Immigrant Ancestors.

iPad/iPhone for Genealogy and Research - Pt. 1

I am assuming that I am not alone when I confess that the search for technology which will make my life easier is an addiction for me. I'm convinced that there is some form of new technology that will improve every part of my life and my workflow. I can spend hours researching different technology which will improve my workflow and make me a better researcher, more organized, a better time-manager, etc... you get the picture.

So, I figured I would try and pass on some of the apps and other technology stuff that I use in this digital research age.

The first thing to talk about is the general stuff everyone gets with the iPad/iPhone - the synchronization of your calendar and emails.

I have an iPad (obviously, or I probably wouldn't be writing about using it for research and genealogy) and I also have an iPhone as does my wife. We use gmail as our main email provider and have a family email address in which we also use the calendar. Before we got our istuff we did not use the shared google calendar very much since we had to be on a computer to look or add anything - it just wasn't very convenient. Once we both got our iPhones the convenience was there so I synced our gmail accounts and we were able to share a calendar real-time. I can update from my iphone while at work and within a minute or so my wife sees the update to our calendar. But, it is more than a real-time sharable calendar.

Probably like most, I have more than one email. I have the family email but I also have a personal email and also one for my genealogy. These are all gmail based and all attached to my istuff so I can review and respond to emails anytime. I also use the calendars associated with these different gmail accounts. I use one for my blogging editorial calendar (I'll talk about this in another post) and I also use another calendar for my day job. Using my istuff to link all these together, all my emails and all my calendars are with me whenever and wherever I go - very convenient and very portable.

If you are using some of this istuff and you do not have your calendars and emails synced up, I would highly recommend it and it is really easy - any google search will bring up instructions on how to do it.

Like I said, I use google for mail and calendars and find it really easy - if you use some other calendar and email provider with your istuff let me know how it works in the comments.

Thanks for reading and stay tuned for another post about how I'm using the iPad and iPhone for my research. Keep diggin' for that family.

Chris

Posted with Blogsy