Family history is thoroughly corrupted

[nickgc]

I print out hard copy of everything as well because in the longer term it is arguably more permanent.

I haven't even owned a printer for the last 10 years and haven't missed it.  The last time I needed a printout was when a 95 year old cousin without a computer wanted to see the tree and going to the version I keep on the web wasn't feasible for him.  It took me a couple of hours to export the relevant portion for him, pull it into Word, clean it up, and send it to the local UPS store for printing and mailing:  total cost was $7.00.

He now has a 30 page, professional looking document that has all his ancestors and their siblings back to the early 1800s:  and all the documenting notes I have made on them over the past 20 years.

The worry about not being able to transfer your hard wrought computer files from one platform to another is no longer relevant.   The internet has done away with that problem:  if you can get it on the web you can literally port it to any other system.

Nick

[LizzieW]

I don't really care that people have the wrong info on their trees, that's up to them.  However, it does seem a bit perverse to be interested in family history but not check properly. 

I am in touch with a 4th cousin in Tasmania, he has done a lot of research verified with certificates etc. but for some unknown reason decided to take some info he'd found on an Ancestry tree as correct.  He then bought the "wrong" marriage certificate.  He asked me about it and I said I had a different husband for our mutual ancestor.  I hadn't yet bought the marriage cert,  but having looked at FreeBMD and found two possible men on the same page, I then checked on the census after the date of the marriage to see which of the men's surnames had become hers.  Easy to do and very effective.  It turned out I was correct and my 4th cousin having now bought the correct marriage certificate agrees with me.

What didn't make any sense was to order a marriage certificate using what may or may not (and in this case not) be the correct husband.  Why not order the certificate using the known name of the ancestor.

Lizzie

[Siamese Girl]

I don't really care that people have the wrong info on their trees, that's up to them.  However, it does seem a bit perverse to be interested in family history but not check properly. 


Lizzie

I have noticed some very odd things on people's trees on Ancestry - including some folk married long before they were born 

I admit I am in no way infallible - but I think it's sensible to make sure you have at least typed the date correctly - and when you see the same mistake repeated on someone else's tree .........  well

Carole

[Bhoy]

I'm in the awkward position of having to break bad news to someone.  Thanks to this person's previous efforts I was able to get past one of my blockages.  The problem is that I've now been able to determine that there's a mistake in the research & my benefactor isn't in fact connected to the tree concerned (although I am).

Don't imagine that the news is going to go down well . . .

I have noticed some very odd things on people's trees on Ancestry - including some folk married long before they were born 

Yes, I think that the overwhelming desire to make connections blinds people to the bits that don't quite fit.  Cognitive dissonance?

[Lesanne]

      Blimey Bhoy, if you know, tell them. 

I wish someone had known I was barking up the wrong tree, before I had got to page 19 of a thread........ countless trip's to Oxford, which is quite a journey for me.
        But, someone has got, all the connections of wills etc to confirm........ 

I've mailed everyone that I know has copied it. Now I'm off, up another tree........
                                                 only time will tell.......

[kerryb]

I'm sure it has happened to us all.  I spent months of hard research on a line that I thought was mine and through blood, sweat and tears got 3 generations in the 1700s. 

Then a contact emailed me and pointed out that the census return of my great x 4 grandfather that I had pinned my research on was the wrong one.  There were in fact 2 boys born round the same time with the same name in the same village but what I had failed to see was that the death certificate of mine definitely put him as the census return I had not seen rather than the one I had (if that makes sense).

I was grateful she pointed it out to me and eventually started on the right trail but a bit peeved that I had just paid West Sussex CC for some parish registers entries for the wrong family 

I'm sure Bhoy that your contact will be grateful eventually 

Kerry

[lesleyhannah]

~~~~~~~~
I have a couple of well researched lines in my tree that when I started and knew no better I just copied and pasted to my tree

I think a lot of us have done that! When I first started looking for my Scottish ancestors I found scotlandspeople very expensive, and eagerly copied a tree that later turned out to have been built on guesswork. I learnt the hard way what everyone is saying here about backing up your data.

However, don't knock large trees.  I have expanded my tree sideways, taking in cousins and inlaws etc, because my interest is not just getting my direct line back as far as possible. I'm far more interested in the lives these ancestors lived.  It fascinates me that in one small town or village I can find dozens of families with the same surname as my ancestor. Their relationship may be a bit convoluted, but I love the challenge of finding the link. I reckon these 'cousins' probably knew each other and shared each other's lives - and documents such as removals orders and death certificates often verify that there was contact between the different branches.

So large trees don't necessarily indicate a mindless 'name collecting'. Some of my most interesting family history stories relate to the extended family - and have taught me more about history than I ever learnt in school!

[mike175]

The worry about not being able to transfer your hard wrought computer files from one platform to another is no longer relevant.   The internet has done away with that problem:  if you can get it on the web you can literally port it to any other system.

I'm as much an enthusiast for the Internet as you'll find anywhere, but I do remember that all those uploaded files are still stored on a server somewhere . . . ok, maybe on several servers, with multiple reduncancy, and all manner of safeguards, but it's certainly not under my control.

Furthermore, when I want to access the data I need special equipment to translate the digital coding into the English language and reproduce it on an electronic screen, so I also need to have an electric power supply. No doubt our brains will be eventually hard-wired into the "system" at birth thus avoiding such inconveniences, but until then I'll settle for printing it out in a form I, or anyone, can read unaided . . . except, as I say, for the reading glasses 

Mike.

[angelfish58]

I have noticed some very odd things on people's trees on Ancestry - including some folk married long before they were born 
Carole

Occaisionally Ancestry goes a bit giddy and displays wrong dates even when the correct ones have been entered. I was embarrased to find I had my great grandma christened before she was born, but when I went to edit it I had put the right dates. (Although someone has my dad dying 30 years before he actually did)