Genealogy is not just copying names

 

In some parts of the world, particularly for people who descend from ancestors from Western Europe, genealogy is not a particularly new innovation or pursuit. In my 43 years of doing genealogical research, I spent the first 15 or so years copying genealogical information from my ancestors. This information was found in books and a huge number of family group sheets located in the Salt Lake City Family History Library. The information that I found was sometimes incomplete and inaccurate. For example, I found this book in my father's personal library. 

Tanner, George S. John Tanner and His Family: A History-Biography of John Tanner of Lake George, New York, Born August 15, 1778, Hopkinton, Rhode Island, Died April 13, 1850, at South Cottonwood, Utah. Salt Lake City: John Tanner Family Association., 1974.

This book contained a short section about John Tanner's ancestors going back to one William Tanner from the Rhode Island colony in the 1700s. Because it appeared that all the information was available in this book, it seemed that all I needed to do was copy the information out into my own genealogy computer program. (My use of computers for doing genealogy started at about the same time.) The problem was that the information about "William Tanner" was both partial and inaccurate. Many, many years later, after beginning actual research, learning a lot more about genealogical research, and looking at original source records from Rhode Island, I boiled down most of the inaccuracies to the simple fact that no one had yet identified William Tanner and had certainly not traced his origin to England. 

Now, what is happening with the online family trees and William Tanner? A huge number of William Tanner's supposed descendants are still copying the inaccurate and incomplete information out of the John Tanner book cited above. The reality is that I have found as many as ten men living in the Rhode Island Colony during the same late 1600s to 1700s with the same name: William Tanner. The results are evident from the constant ignorant changes and additions being made to the FamilySearch.org Family Tree entry for an entry many consider to be the person from the book. Here is a screenshot of the entries you can find with people who may or may not be THE William Tanner who is the ancestor of John Tanner from the book. 

What is known about the true William Tanner has been documented with deeds, wills, and other contemporary documents. 

Copying is not research.  

Why is Genealogy or Family History so challenging?

 

There are always obstacles and challenges to doing genealogical research. But, time and learning can over come most, if not all these challenges. The main issues deal with the difficulty of getting started and continuing to learn in order to adapt to rapidly changing technology. 

First a note about terminology. Genealogy and Family History are merely two different terms for exactly the same pursuit. The term "genealogy" is used more frequently in the United States and the term "family history" is more common in the United Kingdom. The only major university in the United States with a degree in genealogy, Brigham Young University, consistently uses the term "family history." But see also the Family History Portal where the term "Center for Family History and Genealoogy" is used. I use the terms interchangeably. 

Here are a three of the major challenges of pursuing an interest in genealogy or if you prefer, family history. 

Finding the motivation to begin learning the basics of genealogical research. 

Depending on your own background and perhaps, religious affiliation, you may have heard more or less about searching for your ancestors. There is a constant, low-level background of mostly online discussion about involving new people, mainly youth, in genealogy or family history. Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the LDA Church) are frequently reminded that searching out their ancestors is part of being a member. See Family History. There are major websites dedicated to help "youth" become involved. See, for example, Youth, Connect with Your Ancestors. Those who are not members of the LDS Church who make up the vast majority of those are involved in genealogy become fascinated by learning about their ancestral heritage apart from any religious motivation. 

So a religious motivation alone is not usually the reason why someone would go through the effort of learning what is usually an involved and difficult pursuit.  For example, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has promoted family history for over a hundred years and it is well known that the percentage of members of the church actively doing genealogical research is less the 5% of the total membership. However, 5% of over 17 million people is a lot of people interested in genealogy. See How the FamilySearch tool Ordinances Ready is hastening and simplifying temple and family history work for an example. Additionally, the in-person attendance at the annual RootsTech conference has been well above 20,000. It is my opinion that motivation must come from a personal interest in doing research and finding ancestral lines. That motivation could come from a family member, but that was not my own experience. Additionally, to be involved at anything like the level demonstrated by many of my associates, requires more than an interest, it requires years of effort dedicated to learning and practicing a high level of stubborn pursuit. 

Beginning the process of doing genealogical research.

Genealogical research is more than a hobby, it is an avocation and can become a full-time obsession. Genealogy involves historical research. There is nothing about genealogy that is easy to do. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) estimates around 3,400 historians out of a population of over 300 million, were employed in 2023. See Occupational Outlook Handbook. Interesting, an Ipsos poll from June 2021 found that 7 in 10 Americans think it's important to know their family's history. See Majority of Americans think knowing their ancestry is important. There is a general confusion over an interest in family history and actually doing genealogical/historical research. Also, taking a DNA test or actually doing research into original historical records is the dividing factor in the vastly different perspectives. 

Accepting the standards of carefully researched genealogy.

Even among those who are involved in "researching" their family lines, there is a significant percentage (not readily measurable) of those who lack the historical research skills to produce accurate and supported genealogical data. I must admit that this is a subjective conclusion on my part but it is based on well over 43 years of active genealogical experience. Many would-be genealogists give up when they learn that genealogical/historical research has standards. See Ethics and Standards. The fact that there are university level degrees in genealogy and family history should indicate that genealogy is a lot more than a part-time hobby. 

So, to summarize, genealogy is not a restful, Sunday afternoon, past-time for older people. It is a serious and difficult part of a historical research. The numbers of active participants, after subtracting those who do not have the skills necessary to actually do genealogical research, indicate that it is a highly specialized pursuit. I would say occupation but the number of people who make enough money to live from doing genealogical research is an insignificant number of the small number of people who do historical record supported research. 

FamilySearch's Struggle with Duplication

 

I recently discovered the second installment in the history of FamilySearch.org (aka The Genealogical Society of Utah or GSU). I have written about the first book in the past but it is still required reading for anyone interested in understanding the monumental task faced by FamilySearch to eliminate duplication of entries submitted to the temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Presently, with the FamilySearch.org Family Tree, the historical problem is still abundantly present. 

The concern over duplication was one of the main motivating factors for the establishment of the GSU. Here are the two books that explain, in great detail, the challenges faced by the GSU and its trade name FamilySearch. 

Allen, James B, Jessie L Embry, and Kahlile B Mehr. Hearts Turned to the Fathers: A History of the Genealogical Society of Utah, 1894-1994. Provo, Utah: BYU Studies, Brigham Young University, 1995.

Kahlile Bliss Mehr. Dawning Of The Digital Age: The Family History Department, 1995-2011, 2014. http://archive.org/details/MehrDawningOfTheDigitalAge.

Before you start wringing your hands or bemoaning the issues with the FamilySearch.org Family Tree especially about duplicate entries, you must read both books from cover to cover. The Hearts Turned to the Fathers book is still available from Amazon and Deseret Book. The second book is available to read on Archive.org. You can find an ebook edition of the first book from Barnes & Noble. 

From what I have read, the main issue confronting the GSU (FamilySearch) all along has been the technological challenges of attempting to create a tree for all mankind. So far, the FamilySearch.org Family Tree is the best that we have. I can also say that recent developments in the Family Tree are heading in the right direction and the issue of duplicate entries is still in the forefront of the development. But from my standpoint, if you come to me an complain about duplicates, changing entries, or any of the other issues with the Family Tree, I will simply say, wait and see what happens. Technology is changing rapidly and the Family Tree is changing as rapidly as the new technology is available and can be adapted to the development of the Family Tree. 

How about thanking FamilySearch for its efforts and praising them for trying to invent and use technology that was not available until the last few weeks before this post was written. 

How up to date is the FamilySearch Research Wiki?

 

https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/England_Genealogy

The FamilySearch.org Research Wiki is one of the most valuable genealogical resources currently available. With more than 100,000 articles, it covers more information than can easily be comprehended. It was designed as a "wiki" for the purpose of allowing users to create and edit information. However, it has been a long time since the days when any interested contributor was allowed to edit information. In July 2024, all the remaining long-time editors were blocked from further edits. I speculate that FamilySearch is working on adding an AI search capability to the wiki and need to "freeze" the wiki while that development goes on. Meanwhile, the articles are aging rapidly. Of course, not all the wiki is affected by the passage of time. But some of the major articles about specific countries are basically become out of date due to both historical and technological changes. Here is an example from the article on England and the subsequent articles linked to the main England page. See link above.

There is a page in the wiki that explains much of what is outlined below but the page has very few useful links and cannot easily be found. See https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/England_Jurisdictions 

There are 40 counties in this list. Currently, there are 48 counties in England. The statement in the text before the county list states that "The England counties listed below are based on historic boundaries pre-1974." Some of these counties no longer exist. As of 2025, there are 48 administrative counties in England. Some of these as listed above are purely traditional and do not appear in the current list. These missing counties include Cumberland, Huntingdonshire, London, Middlesex, Sussex, Westmorland, and Yorkshire.

These current counties are not separate articles or in the list above from the Research Wiki: Bristol, City of London, Cumbria, East Riding of Yorkshire, East Sussex, Greater London, Greater Manchester, Isle of Wight, Merseyside, North Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, Tyne and Wear, West Midlands, West Sussex, and West Yorkshire. 

In 1851, England had 40 counties for the purposes of census reporting, which were known as "registration counties". From 1851 to 1911, the "registration counties" were used for census reporting and administrative purposes. It's important to note that there are different definitions of "county" in England today: there are ceremonial counties (48), metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties for local government (84), and historic counties (39). The England 1851 map shown above is based on the 40 registration counties. 

Now the issue with these differing lists is that each of current 48 counties has its own archives and family history resources. Some of the administrative counties, such as the Isle of Wight, have been a county since 1890. See https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Isle_of_Wight,_England_Genealogy But some of the other counties do not have separate pages. 

This is just one example of the difficulty of administering and maintaining a collection of over 100,000 articles without the help of a willing and able community. For whatever reason, the editing of the Research Wiki has been limited to those inside FamilySearch. I might mention that most of the information about the Canadian Provinces is also out of date. 

Some of the countries of the world, such as Chechnya, are almost completely missing from the Research Wiki. 

I realize that traditionally, genealogists record events and sources with the places as they were at the time of the events in an ancestor's life. When changes occur, the name of the place changes. This means that without moving some of my ancestors' places entries change. The main challenge illustrated with my example above about England is locating the present jurisdiction so that a search can be made in the historical jurisdiction. The best example of this challenge is Yorkshire County, England, which is now North Yorkshire, South Yorkshire and East Riding of Yorkshire. 

It will be a great loss to the genealogical community of the Research Wiki continues to go further out of date. 

Origins going back 10,000 years from MyHeritage

 https://blog.myheritage.com/2025/02/introducing-ancient-origins-trace-your-origins-back-10000-years/

If you obtain enough DNA information from enough people, it is possible to draw conclusions about ancient origins. Here is the promotional video for the MyHeritage.com new Ancient Origins.

https://youtu.be/LlRKBp_YUp4?si=n4jjD7d8X2FaGyFM

Here is a link to the blog announcing the new DNA feature. https://blog.myheritage.com/2025/02/introducing-ancient-origins-trace-your-origins-back-10000-years/

I have had both my MyHeritage.com and Ancestry.com DNA on MyHeritage.com for some time. I currently have 18, 502 matches. My matches span the globe. 

If you think that projecting DNA matches back 10,000 years is a gimmick or imaginary, you don't know what is going on in the world-wide DNA community. Here are some links to articles explaining other long DNA projections. 

https://www.templeton.org/news/revising-human-history-through-ancient-dna

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43586-020-00011-0 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096098222100436X

There are probably hundreds more articles along the same lines. 

Now what about my own ancient DNA? There is a lot to explore on MyHeritage.com.

Each of the areas have futher analysis (I think I look just like the person used as an example except for the hair)

You can continue to explore more with the links given to support the conclusions. Here is one link.

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487 

Have fun learning about this new extension to your DNA origins. Of course, you have to have a family tree and a DNA test on MyHeritage to get the full results.

Google Gemini's Deep Research does genealogical research like a pro

 

RootsTech 2025 is only back one week when AI to a larger than life leap in its ability to do "real" research. This screenshot shows the product of Gemini Deep Research prompt to tell me about my great-grandfather Henry Martin Tanner. This lengthy bio is supported by more than a hundred relevant and accurate source citations. The whole process took about ten minutes. 

I am still in the process of learning about the options and any problems with using this new tool, but initially it looks like a major advancement. Here is the link to the Google explanation about this new AI development. https://gemini.google/overview/deep-research/?hl=en

I will be doing a online presentation about using AI to do Family History Research on 30 March 2025 for the BYU Library Family History Center. This will include some of my observations about using Deep Research from Google Gemini. See https://familyhistory.lib.byu.edu/learning for the link to our Virtual Family History Classes. After the class has been presented, the video will be uploaded to the BYU Library Family History ¥ouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/@BYULibraryFamilyHistory

More later.

23andMe files for Bankruptcy two weeks after RootsTech appearance

 https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/24/23andme-files-for-bankruptcy-anne-wojcicki-steps-down-as-ceo.html

For sometime now the news about 23andMe.com has not been good. Because I read the news, I was surprised to see their booth at RootsTech.org this year. 23andMe.com was a Gold Sponsor. 

Quick Google search indicates that customers of 23andMe.com can download their raw DNA data. Here is link to Accessing Your Raw Genetic Data from the webiste. 

What can you do with your raw DNA data for free? There are several options: FamilyTreeDNA.com, and MyHeritage.com are two examples. Just ask the question about uploading your raw DNA data in a Google search.