Twenty first century genealogy in action

Beyondthedate is proud to announce a new partnership with the online academic website Udemy.com the number one provider of online education.  The online education market is booming with many topics.  From the educators that I have talked to this is the direction that education is going by users taking online specific courses to grow their skill set.

What does this have to do with genealogy?
Among the courses that Udemy offers are a few but growing number of courses about genealogy.  There are courses from experts about tracing your family tree and other courses will be added as time goes by.  I also know that for many genealogist, genealogy is not there only hobby and Udemy many be a resource they were unaware of that could help develop those hobbies as well, whether they be anything from photography to yoga to computer programming.

While the genealogy course selection are small now I know they will be growing as the Udemy platforms continues to grow.  Full disclosure I am currently in the mist of creating my own genealogy related online course through Udemy that will hopefully be done in the Spring.

For now the best genealogy courses are Everything Olde is New Again! Genealogy Clan Management which can help beginners climb their family tree and understand their records. Another great genealogy related course is Develop YOUR Customized Genealogy Family Tree Board Game which is a detailed course on creating your won genealogy board game. But feel free to browse their extensive collection of courses and topics that may interest you. 

As this partnership goes on I may mention from time to time any courses of genealogical interest(especially my own)  and place a permalinks on he right hand side but I will continue to blogging about topics of interest and how to get beyond the date to get your family story both past and present.

The two online courses mentioned in this article

Everything Olde is New Again! Genealogy Clan Management

Develop YOUR Customized Genealogy Family Tree Board Game

 

Knowing your milestones...the genealogist historian

My grandfather tells the story that in his father's lifetime the Wright brothers flew the first airplane and the first man landed on the Moon.  In my own lifetime there has not been a man on the moon but there has been unmanned landing on Mars and the Internet as we know it was invented.  Where my great grandfather grew up in a age of transpiration advances, I am growing older in an age of technological advances.

Being aware of the greater world and how it is changing adds depth to your genealogy.  These things have a place in the narrative of your genealogy so the future generation can know what you experience. In a narrative in my grandfathers genealogy he writes a story of how his father remembers the streetlights being lit by hand every night in the city.  As someone born after prevalence of home electricity and indoor plumbing, stories about how my relatives lived in before these things and found it normal, is fascinating.  It makes me stop and appreciate the modern conveniences that I take for granted.

Your personal milestones only become apparent in hindsight.  Technology develops over time.  If my great grandfather heard about the Wright brothers first flight, he might have thought they did something interesting, but there is no way he could have possibly conceived that it would lead to modern air travel let alone a trip to the Moon.  But all of those things happened as time passed.

Keep track of the modern world and how it is changing and note it in narratives in your genealogy so that future generations can look back and wonder how you ever survived without a flying car or your teleportation device to get to work in seconds.     

Telegraph, Telephone, Tell Aunt Ethel

Genealogy is a two way street.  Most of the time we are going backwards looking for ancestors from the past but we must also continue to document current history as well.  People are having babies all the time and as the generations get further apart is becomes more difficult to keep up with the new arrivals.  So as a genealogist you need to have systems in place to keep tabs on distant families note worth news.   

Closeness matters
In an ideal world you would receive a announcement or a least a Christmas card from every living family in your genealogy program with an update on an wedding, graduation or births that have occurred in the recent years.  But we don't have an ideal world and when you start to get to 2nd and 3rd cousins it is not practical or affordable to send out those thing to people you hardly know.  It is easy to get information from local relative or close relatives that you see throughout the year but what about the rest.

Relying on the relations to of others
Though you may not be close to the distant relatives perhaps you are close to someone who is close to them.  A personal example is that my Uncle was closer to some of the my fathers cousins than my father.  My Uncle saw them more frequently so to get genealogy information on who was having a baby or getting married in that family who I only saw at the occasional funeral or the once in a while family reunion, I would get the information from my Uncle who what happy to share the information he received when he saw them last.

When lines break
The problem with the "relative of a relative" situation is that communication lines can break.  In my own example my uncle died.  So the news out of the cousins family ceased.  Luckily my father has a cousin on that side of the family that he sees more than I do so, he is able to get births and marriages more frequently than next funeral but not as frequely as my uncle used to deliver.  But sometimes you have to take what you can get.

"Aunt Ethel"
Many families have a central figure that always seems to have the news on everyone.  The person usually is older and has ties to multiple families.  It may be a grandmother, or a Aunt but they are the one everyone sends the an obligatory birth and wedding announcement too, as well as the most recent school picture of the kids.  As the family genealogist, you need to make it a point to call or visit "Aunt Ethel" first to see how she is doing and secondly to be able to get a hold of her treasure trove  of genealogy information both past and present. 

Facebook
As I have posted before Facebook can be a genealogical resource for distant relatives.  But Facebook also has its limitation.  People generally only friend people they know.  So if you friend your 20 year old great niece, you may be the only one of her "friends" over 40 which could have some awkward things coming through your news feed if she even accepts your request.  But friending relatives that you know and are you own age could also get you genealogy information when they post about new grandchildren.

So when trying to get names down the tree rather than up, it is good to have strategic placed relatives that can give you all of the news of distant families that are also descendants of your relatives.  As the generations continue the names that you put in as babies will be having babies of their own and you need to be ready to document them as best as you can.