Category: Family File Hijinks

I have the same “problem” as Randy Seaver.

Posted on by Kathleen

Since it is so hard to communicate through blog comments when you are trying to get your point across, I’m putting this post up to show what I get when I try to import a GEDCOM file into my copy of Family Tree Maker 2012. I’m just trying to help the information process, so that everyone involved can get a better picture of what is happening. Poor Russ Worthington is trying to help, but is probably more frustrated then anyone involved.

I didn’t even realize I had this issue, until I was reading my blog reader this morning and stumbled across Randy Seaver’s ongoing “adventures”. This is basically me saying, “ME TOO!”

Here is my process, to show my re-creation:

Step 1

This shows that my 3rd Great Grandfather, William H Moore, has a census image attached to his birth citation. There are other images attached to him that you can see in the middle media column of the fact page on the right. However, we only need to see that there is actually media present in the file. Also please excuse the really crazy address citations there. I’ve since condensed them into a better looking format.

Step 2

Next I exported a selective file. I chose only my direct ancestral line and I made sure to “Include media files”.

Step 3

I have done this step with both ANSI and UTF-8 character sets. The same result both times.

Step 4

Next I did Russ’ recommended step of searching the gedcom for jpg links. Nothing there, so I knew there would be no links when I imported. For the sake of documentation I’ll carry on.

Step 5

I imported the gedcom file into a new Family Tree Maker file. You can see that there are no multimedia links present.

Step 6

Here is William H Moore’s new fact page in the new Family Tree Maker file. Notice how the media column is all zeros. This tells us there are no links to any present or missing media.

Step 7

Here is my lonely, empty Media section.

Like I told Russ in his post, I merely tried to re-create Randy’s problem out of curiosity. I often do this when I see people are having some sort of issue in software. I’m not a computer programmer, I’m not a particulary smart person. I’ve just always loved messing with things and getting them to work. So this started as an experiment (I do many) to see if I could re-create Randy’s exact problem. Sometimes I might notice where someone missed a step or set something wrong and can even help, (not often, I ain’t no genius, that’s my brother, HA).

So here’s a second example of the problem Randy is experiencing. In a normal import, there should be something in the media section showing that there are missing media files, not the images themselves, but links. I always understood that. I was just flabbergasted that my file had none of those links! I’ve had those in previous versions of Family Tree Maker, so I know them when I see them.

Am I completely a geek when I say that this was a very fun way to spend an afternoon for me? Even if I did have to do laundry and make pudding too.

When Good Things Go Bad

Posted on by Kathleen
click for bigger view

My intentions were good today. I’ve gotten a lot done and I’ve even watched my football team fail miserably. I was making progress in my huge project of a more organized family file, when I came across the image above. This isn’t the first time this has happened to me. Just the first time it was so blatant. For example, on certain censuses, the whole last 5 lines of Elliott County, Kentucky are missing. I’m not talking on the last page. I’m talking the the last five lines on each page of a whole enumeration district.

The real question is this, if the image looks like that, How did they index it? Oliver Quesenberry and his wife Mahala are in the index, but obviously not on the image above.

If they are using something else, is there any way for someone to get their grubby hands on it. Since this isn’t an isolated problem, I was just wondering the work around. I know the most obvious is to go to my local historical society or library and check out the microfilm. However, my library doesn’t carry the census or microfilm that I’m aware of, and I’m not in Kentucky. I’m in Maryland… which isn’t anywhere near Kentucky. Well, closer then California is to Maryland but you get my point. The historical society would be an option but I doubt they carry the Kentucky districts but I’m not opposed to trying.

When I came across the missing lines in Elliott County, I checked on FamilySearch, and they were also missing the lines. I just assumed that they were all using the same images of the census. Am I right in thinking this? I was going to look through on FamilySearch this time, but I am unable to view the images. This isn’t vital to my research obviously because research doesn’t hinge on the census. My thoughts are just to turn this into a learning experience for myself.

So that’s how my Sunday has gone and I wouldn’t trade it for the world!

Margaret Slusher, you might have been found!

Posted on by Kathleen

As anyone who researches their genealogy knows, the women can be hard to track down once they leave the house. It gets doubly hard in very rural areas where records might not have been kept. I run into this problem a lot in my Kentucky/Ohio research. One of my more recent “brick walls” is Margaret Slusher. I say “brick wall” because technically it isn’t. I know who her parents are and I know who her husband is. I even know the year she married. However, in 1860, she’s not living with her new husband or her parents. I’m a stickler for the details, so it bugs me when I can’t find people in certain censuses. Sometimes it’s unavoidable, but most times it’s just you’re not looking in the right place. The key to the problem is Margaret’s marriage to James Mays happened in September of 1860.

What a lot of people forget is that most censuses take a few months to complete, however, the enumerator is supposed to record the data as it reflects the household on a certain day. In 1860, that day was June 1, 1860.

I was transcribing the surrounding households of Joseph and Nancy Slusher, Margaret’s parents, when I came across William Jenkins household. At the very end, it shows a 20 year old Margaret Slusher. Since I don’t know my Margaret’s exact birth date yet, this one definitely fits with her estimated birth. The birthplace of Virginia fits. It’s the little tick that the blue arrow points to that interests me now. That tick is to show that the person was married within the year. I’d say this is my Margaret. I got very lucky that she didn’t get missed in the census all together since her marriage fell at such an awkward time of the year for the census. 🙂 I also got lucky that the Jenkins household gave Margaret’s maiden name. If they hadn’t I might have just had to live with not locating Margaret on the census.

Robert Love, You’ve been Verified!

Posted on by Kathleen

A few months back, my long lost cousin Grace sent me a copy of her Love family outline. In it, I found Martha Love and Robert Love, who were not in my records of the Love family. Martha was quite easy to track down with the Walker family. I didn’t find any evidence on Robert though. I’m being very discriminatory about who I put in my family file, so Robert wasn’t put in yet, but he was in my notations. Until last night.

I was sitting around last night, feeling sorry for myself because my family file got corrupted. It was no major deal because I did have backups. The only problem is my most recent backups were also corrupted. So I ended up using the gedcom backups I have as a secondary backup. Have I said backup enough for you?

Back on subject, I decided I might as well spend a tiny bit of money and buy some credits from Scotlands People. I’ve seen a lot about the site but I’ve never actually used it because of the credits issue. Well, I didn’t let that hold me back last night!

I found Andrew Love and his family in the 1841 Scotland census! As far as I know, this is the first and only census record that Robert Love appears with the family. Granted, the census does not say he is Andrew and Agnes’s son, but I don’t need them too. I am just trying to verify old family lore. Therefore, now I know there should be a birth/baptismal record for Robert and I finally have a year to look in!

Welcome to the family file Robert Love! The water is nice and freshly un-corrupted!

In slightly related news, I had a major genealogy moment while watching the Robin Gibb episode of Who Do You Think You Are. Not only did he visit Paisley, Scotland, the homeland of the Loves, I also spotted John Love, teacher in the book about the school he was researching! I haven’t connected John to my tree yet, but I think he’s Andrew’s brother. They lived down the street from each other for many years. I probably should have saved some of my credits to look up John. Oh well, there’s always next time!

A Dilemma, but Not Really

Posted on by Kathleen

Now that I’ve come to the top of my Mays Family information, I’ve run into a dilemma. Except it’s not really a dilemma. I’m determined not to clutter up my new family file with sourceless information. The only problem is I don’t think most of my Mays family information is sourced. I’m starting to believe what I have is second hand information. So the dilemma is what to do about all those Mays children that I’m unsure of.

The obvious choice is don’t put any of them in. It’s the right thing to do. The problem is, there’s a lot of people I’d be leaving out.

OLD Family File

As you can see from the graphic above, in my old file there were seven children for William and Frances Mays. In my new file, there are only two. Hopefully I can find documentation for the others. Part of the problem is that I have census and vital records for a lot of them, but they don’t lead back to William and Frances currently. So I have to find a way to link them back before I add them.

West Liberty, Morgan County, Kentucky. 1860 Census.

I just wish they didn’t make it so tempting! Look at all them just sitting there! How much more obvious can you get. The Mays family was always right next door to each other.