Out On a Limb: FamilySearch blog offers many useful tips

Having trouble finding those female ancestors?

Well, that’s been a problem for genealogists over many generations. Particularly when we are dealing with centuries past, the women are just not as likely as the men to turn up in the key documents.

But FamilySearch offers some helpful tips this week in its blog. For instance, military and other pension records often list the wives and widows, even though you had to look them up by the name of the husband. There are more.

I mention this topic today less to unravel the problem of discovering female ancestors than to acquaint you with this highly useful blog by one of the world’s great genealogical organizations. I suggest that all genealogists become familiar with it.

FamilySearch is the immense repository of free information compiled and maintained by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The blog offers new material numerous times a month. Access it at www.familysearch.org/blog/en.

Recent editions have covered such disparate genealogical topics as finding Russian and German military records from World War II, mining the 1920 U.S. Census, locating obituaries and using a circular family tree that can be color coded for nationality. There are hundreds of topics on the site’s blog library, and many look promising for breaking the logjams that genealogists run into from time to time.

Speaking of FamilySearch, that organization now urges people to record their experiences during the pandemic for future generations. (See the Nanticoke brief below.) When you set up an account, which is free, you will be able to download an app that will enable you to store audio and video recordings with FamilySearch.

The organization has more than 8 billion pieces of information and is constantly adding new material, prepared by an army of volunteer indexers. If you would like to help your fellow genealogists by joining the FamilySearch indexing effort, go to www.familysearch.org/indexing for information.

Resources: The National Archives of Britain is closed indefinitely but to ease the strain on genealogists has made much of its material available for free download. To check out this large site, go to discover.nationalarchives.gov.uk.

Local Groups: The Nanticoke Historical Society has joined the ranks of local groups urging people to contribute to a data base about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the community. Stories of personal and family experience in the Nanticoke area may be emailed to history@nanticokehistoryonline.org or postal mailed to the society at the Samantha Mill House, 495 East Main St., Nanticoke, Pa. 18634.

Census News: Latest reports show that 62 million responses for the 2020 U.S. Census so far have been online. But that’s just the latest wrinkle.

Said the census office in a recent release, “Through the centuries, the decennial count progressed from in-person collections of handwritten answers to mass mailings of paper questionnaires in 1970. Among other changes along the way: creation of an electrical punch card tabulator for the 1890 Census and the first use by a government agency of the world’s first modern computer – IBM’s UNIVAC 1 – for the 1950 Census.”

News Notes: Congratulations to the Kingston Historical Society on its “Hometown Heroes” banner program. With the help of the municipality of Kingston, the group has placed on poles 85 banners bearing photos of the borough’s service people over the years. Many more are planned. For information on sponsoring a banner marking a family member’s service, go to the Kingston Historical Society Facebook page. Heading the project are Judi Nunemacher and Sandra Tuow.