Did you make a New Year’s Resolution for 2021? Have you kept that resolution? What about genealogy goals for 2021? Did you make any?
Since retiring, I have been trying to make (and achieve) genealogy goals each year. Even though I’ve made progress with my genealogy, I don’t think I’ve been very successful in achieving those goals in past years. However, this year, I am making progress on those goals!
My first goal was to create (and post) a narrative report for each of my second great-grandparents. Since I had already posted reports for my Crawford and Hammond lines, my 2021 goal only included the following:
- Hiram M. Currey
- Angelina Jane Burke
- Albert Hutchinson
- Julia Harding
- Noah Briles
- Sarah Thompson
- James Ricketts
- Rachel Christy
- George Mentzer
- Emeline Minnick
- Thurston Kennedy Wells
- Salome Crandall
My second goal was to do descendancy research for my 3rd grandparents and post a report. To avoid posting about living individuals, I am limiting the report to 3 generations of descendants.
- Nelson Crawford / Martha Smith
- Zebulon Foster / Caroline Ostrander
- Horatio Hammond Louisa Fisk
- James Barr Ralston / Nancy McCormick
- Hiram Currey / Rachel Harris
- Henry Burke / Elizabeth Bland
- Aaron Hutchinson / Sarah Merry
- William Harding / Elizabeth Fowler
- Alexander Briles / Sarah Rush
- William Thompson / Polly Evans
- John Ricketts / Orilda Reed
- Samuel Christy / Lyda Gallmore
- Phillip Mentzer / Orinda Miles
- John Minnick / Elizabeth Jones
- Ozias Well / Mary Kennedy
- Lewis Crandall / Almira Nafus
Even though I already had all of these ancestors in my tree, working on these tasks allows me to do the following:
- Clean up sentences associated with each fact (My genealogy software uses these sentences to build the narrative reports.)
- Verify sources and update to my current templates
- Transcribe the deeds, obituaries and other records into my genealogy software
- Identify ‘holes’ in my research and try to find additional information to fill in those holes
- Review family connections to make sure I have sourcing to support those relationships.
A third goal for 2021 was to be more consistent with publishing blog posts. To help me stay on track with this goal, I try to do the following:
- Share family pictures in a ‘Throwback Thursday’ post
- Use the Amy Johnson Crow’s#52 ancestors prompts as a topic for a Saturday post
- Use Randy Seavers’ ‘Saturday Night Genealogy Fun‘ prompt as the topic for a Sunday post. (Prompts are posted on Saturday afternoons.)
- For the other four days of the week, I try to share transcribed records, narrative reports, descendancy reports and any interesting finds I have made while researching for my first two goals.
So, am I on track with these goals? Looking at my goal to publish the narrative reports, I feel that I will easily accomplish this goal in 2021. When it comes to researching the descendants, one would likely conclude that I am not on track. Since this descendancy research involves adding new people to my file and the documentation to support them, it is much more time consuming. Thus, I likely won’t accomplish this goal during 2021 – but I am satisfied with my progress.
In terms of my blog, I am happy to report that my research goals have made it easy to consistently post on my blog.
Thus, I am pleased with my progress on my 2021 genealogy goals. How about you? Are you satisfied with your progress on your 2021 genealogy goals?
One of my goals is a genealogy do-over. I’m going through one ancestor or relative at a time. I started a new tree on RootsMagic which I don’t sync with Ancestry. I go over each source, try to write it up correctly, update Ancestry, FamilySearch, WikiTree, Findmypast, and MyHeritage. I’m not making the kind of progress I’d like, but it’s fun. I’m not going as fast as I’d like with my NGS courses as I’d like. I also wanted to read more NGSQ articles but I am getting some done. I have other goals, too, although I overextend myself a lot. My blog has been neglected so one goal is to rectify that. Whew! Plus, we can get out now, and it’s car show season.
I started a ‘go-over’ when I retired. I didn’t want to do a do-over because I knew I had researched a lot of other lines that may (or may not) connect to my tree. I didn’t want to lose that research. My source citations are all over the map. Thus, I’ve been working my way thru my ancestors to review the data I have for them, update the citations and create a narrative report. Working on these narrative reports has actually improved my go-over process. At times, I switch to descendancy research, which also helps me with the ‘clean-up’ process.
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