Keeping focussed

[Hazel17]

My time to do FH is pretty limited to when I am on holiday but a few years ago before I graduated I had plenty of time so I did all of my basic tree and got certs for lots of ancestors and haphazardly did whichever branch took my fancy until I realised I had lots of printouts and files of information but no one ancestor was 'complete'  i.e. with birth, baptism, marriage, death, burial, full set of census, and d.o.b of all their children etc. So now I am doing one great-grandparent's tree in depth and am ignoring all tempation to look at any links relating to the other 3 great-grandparents. Sometimes I see a really interesting new set of information that comes out linking to one of the other great-grandparents and I take a quick wander but I am trying to be strict with myself and keep to the branch I am untangling. I started re-doing my tree in Feb 09 and I have one great-great grandmother's tree fairly sorted and half way with her husband's... Only 14 and a half ancestors to go....  And then in about 20 years or so (at the rate I am going) I can go back to the great-grandparent I started on and see what new information has come out on the net... which will be quite a lot I suspect!!!

Of course no ancestor will ever be 'complete' but at least I know one part of my tree is as researched as much I think it can be from the net and I have visited archives that  I can reach (which is not many as my roots are very spread out across England). So doing this slowly will hopefully untangle the large mass of loose ends and masses of notes I have on all my great-grandparents trees.

It depends how organised you want to be - how about setting out to find out one key piece of information e.g place of residence in 1871 census - and if you see any tempting links to click make a note on paper to come back to them but don't click on them and continue on lookign for your key piece of info. Of course though in FH often the sidetracking leads you to key info that helps put the puzzle together. Sometimes of  am too tried to reseach prerly (so most of then time  ) then I just wander around the net happily sidetracking and being nosy instead if collecting key info.

[pinefamily]

You want to try and research from Australia then. No chance of any archival visits. I have to say though I have yet to find an unhelpful archivist. If you keep your e-mail enquiry simple, quite often they are happy to provide the info you are looking for. I have had several recent experiences with the archivists of 2 different London Companies (Goldsmiths and Clothworkers), and they both went above and beyond in my opinion.
Regarding internet searching and sidetrack links, I recently started googling ancestors with less common names; you would be surprised what you will find from such a simple exercise.

[Hazel17]

I have tried that too and have generally found helpful people. The archivist at the Bank of England was helpful - sadly my ancestor wasn't listed in their records though. If I had more time and money I would visit more archives in other bits of England.

[pinefamily]

Just like the google exercise, I have found that thinking outside the square, or using resources not normally associated with genealogy, has been very rewarding for me.

[Pejic]

I think I have found a way to improve. 

My original family researchhabits were acquired when I had to go to the church to find the register, and that was an incentive to grab everything that looked remotely relevant, to save a re-visit.

With the internet of course the same constraint doesn't apply, so now I just go to find one particular piece of information, record it it, log off and then select something else to research, I may not collect so much, but it is much more productive (usefully recorded and assessed).

[asgaard]

I had  this the other day was mooching round the IGI, looking for Hemsworths, then I spotted Guernsey Records and I just had to look for my Harpers :-)

[Pejic]

So in 3 months using this new approach, I've progressed enormously.  I now have a separate file for each "end" of my tree and take them in turn, keeping on until further research seems fruitless for the time being and moving on to the next one. 

It is only rarely that I have 2 files open at the same time (normally a husband and wife) when something crops up of interest to my search for both of them.

What this means though is that instead of my quinquennial sweep for odd additional information, I seem to have made it a full time job with 230 (and growing) ends and about 50 websites as well as google searches which are becoming increasingly productive.

[LizzieW]

I know someone who does something similar Pejic, but he keeps his records on Excel on a chart he's made.  However, he only researches people with his surname, which means, basically, he's only researching the male line.

That doesn't work for females, do we just follow our surname which leads through the male line and ignores our mother, grandmother etc. or do we follow our mother's surname, then where do we go after that, just follow her male ancestors?

That's why, I think women move around much more when researching ancestors, we like to know what they all were doing, not just the males.

[Pejic]

I keep my tree on FAP, having eventually, in no small part due to advice here, converted from my old software (Family tree - which has much better presentation but no compatibility with current Gedcom).

As you might guess from the number of ends I have, there is no discrimination with me - I follow male and female as available.  At one time learning of the rate of discrepancy between "official" fathers and children I tried a female only tree - but it was only a stunted bush.  Some of my most interesting lines have come from following maternal lines, and there is a much better chance that the recorded mother actually has some connection with the child.

My individual files are in word and I can pick them up and deal with them whenever I get an opportunity - I've recently adopted a standard format, and often I do not even know which branch of my ancestors I'm pursuing - which is a good control on my earlier tendency to wander around.

One new problem which I am having to fight against is where disparate branches of the same surname are getting into close geographic proximity and I have to fight the urge to discover the 7th or 8th cousin relationships, rather than just following where the results lead me.