The limits of genealogical research -- Part Two

I never seem to run out of genealogical research tasks, but as I pointed out in the first post in this series, there are practical and real limits to extending research indefinitely. OK, now I want all you genealogists out there to fess up. How many of you show a line back to Charlemagne? Does your family group record for him list his wives and concubines and all twenty of his children? Now, back to the discussion. Since there are no European records in Arizona prior to about 1700 or so, we can safely conclude that to extend the line of anyone in Arizona, we would have to look elsewhere once we reached 1700. In fact, that conclusion would be mostly false. There are likely very few ancestral lines that can even be traced back to the 1700s, so the main question is whether or not your ancestors spoke Spanish. To illustrate that fact, I looked at the Family History Library catalog for Arizona. In going through the entries, I find almost no records dating back into the early 1800s, much less back into the 1700s. There are notable exceptions, such as Vigil's Index, 1681-1846, a general index of all the documents from the time of the Spanish and Mexican governments until the year 1846.

But what are your chances of finding an ancestor in the Spanish/Mexican land records? Could you go back further than that? Here is another source of information, Archivo General de Indias. Índice de documentos de Nueva España existentes en el Archivo de Indias de Sevilla. México: [Imprenta de la Secretaria de Relaciones Exteriores], 1928. http://books.google.com

So what is in the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain? Estimates range from 32,000,000 to 64,000,000 documents for an aggregate range of 80,000,000 pages of manuscript. Even if you had access to these records, they date back only to the 1500s. So you would run out of the records for Mexico in the 1500s. Why do I give Mexico and Spain as examples? Because the records in those countries pre-date most of those elsewhere in Europe and all of those available in the U.S. and Canada. Remember the first European settlements in North America date from the Columbus expedition in 1492. Those are some of the absolute limits of European records in North or South America. You could, of course, claim the Norse settlements in Greenland and Newfoundland in the 11th Century. But there appear to be no verifiable genealogical records from the settlements in Newfoundland. Otherwise, the oldest European inhabited spot in the Americas is Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, established in 1498.

The point is this, as you go back in time, the number of useful genealogical records begins to diminish. I realize that is a far less than surprising conclusion, but one that seems to escape a great many genealogists. Please remember, I am definitely not talking about trying to find your great-grandfather in the Midwest in the 1800s. I am talking about absolute limits to the information available. 80,000,000 pages may seem a very large limit, but it is a limit none-the-less. I am not ignoring the Indians who lived in North America. Actually, the Spanish Records are very helpful in doing research for Indians in the Spanish speaking world, but there are virtually no records helpful to genealogy before the Spanish conquest.

Back to the United States. The first settlements of what is now the U.S. were in Florida in the 16th Century, Pensacola was founded in 1559 but shortly destroyed and not re-established until 1698, meanwhile Saint Augustine was founded in 1565.  St. John's, Newfoundland was established in 1583. So once again, even if you were able to trace one or more of your ancestral lines back to an original immigrant from Europe, that immigrant could not have arrived before 1492.

What about records in Europe? Once again I will go to Spain. Why? Because Spanish historical documents contain a wealth of genealogical information. So how far back do the records go in Spain? Some of the earliest records we have date to the early 16th Century. Church records of individuals go back to approximately 1500. There are records from Switzerland from the late 1300s. English records go back to the 1400s is some limited areas.

Reality check. How many of you who have a line going back to the 1500s have done the original research in the old records? Or did you just copy the line from someone else? Have you ever tried to read a Church record from the 1400s?  Here is an example of the England, Norfolk Parish Register from 1589:

So, why do people claim lines further back? That is the question of the next post in this series.

The limits of genealogical research -- Part One

A number of events have gotten me thinking the past few days about the theoretical and practical limits of genealogical research. I published my spoof about researching "back to Adam" but the real question is how far can you go? This is a question I think can be answered for any given jurisdiction with fair accuracy. But the question also involves a lot of other factors, such as record retention, record loss, record availability and so forth. Why is this a question that needs to be asked and answered? Mainly, I feel, so that folklore does not supplant history and genealogy. It is so entirely impossible to construct a pedigree "back to Adam" you would think the whole idea would be preposterous, but there are a significant number of people who not only belief that it is possible, but have that as their avowed goal.

The whole idea of an endlessly extending genealogy may be either discouraging or challenging. Can you ever consider your research to be done if there are no limits?

Before getting into the nitty-gritty of records and documents, I need to identify what it is we are talking about. Genealogy expands both in the temporal sense and in the details. I may know all there is to know about my grandfather's date, birth, marriage, death etc. but I may still lack important facts about his life, work, hobbies, beliefs, etc. I can do research to fill in the gaps in the history and tell the stories. Although there may be practical limits with respect to documents, this is an area that never seems to end. I recently found 16 feet of documents about my Great-grandfather, his family and others who lived in the same small town in the Northern Arizona University Special Collections library. I am certain that very, very few of the family members were aware of this collection of documents. How long do you think it will take me (or someone else) to go through this collection and extract all of the pertinent family information? So, I am not talking about the historical context.

In this post and any subsequent ones on this subject, I am looking at what you or anyone else can reasonably expect to find in the way of documentation about a particular lineage. Where do the records end and the folklore begins?

Let me start with a relatively simple example. I live in Arizona. What kinds of records are available and how far back do they go? How do I make this determination? First, there are some readily available references. I suggest these two:

Eichholz, Alice. Red Book: American State, County and Town Sources. Provo, Utah: Ancestry, 2004.

Everton, George B., and Louise Mathews Everton. The Handy Book for Genealogists: United States of America. Logan, Utah (P.O. Box 368, Logan 84321): Everton Publishers, 1991. 

Yes, good old paper books. However, both are available in electronic format online. Each of these sources give a specific date for the availability of types of records for each state and county in the entire United States. They do not cover all kinds of records. They mainly deal with vital records, but you can get a good idea of the limits for any jurisdiction from these two books.

Back to Arizona, the state began statewide recording of births and deaths in 1909. The first U.S. Census records date from the 1860 Census. Arizona became a territory on 24 February 1863, before that it was part of New Mexico Territory. In 1863 the U.S. Federal District Land Office opened. So if you are not of Mexican or Indian descent then there is a limit in Arizona. You have to look elsewhere for records before about 1860. But let's go a little further. The first European contact with Arizona was in 1528 probably by Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca. So you can comfortably stop looking for European ancestry in Arizona before that date. But the first European settlements of what became Arizona did not occur until Eusebio Kino in about 1700. So here are two practical, non-theoretical, limits to research. If your ancestors did not speak Spanish, then you can stop looking for records in about 1860. If they spoke Spanish, you have to move on to some other part of the world sometime before 1700. If your ancestors were Indians, then you probably run out of records about the time the Catholic Church records end.

Let's look at one more source. How early do the microfilms in the Family History Library go back for Arizona? Hmm. There is a Mexican Census of Pimeria Alta in 1801. There are some records of letters sent in 1854. There is this book on microfilm:


Dobyns, Richard and Cara E., Archivo histórico de Sonora, Museo del Estado de Sonora indice de lo que contiene un legajo de este archivo, como ejemplo de los muchos documentos tocante de la historia del actual estado de Arizona que ya existe en él, Manuscript FHL INTL Film 1162420 Item 7.

I think you get the idea. You have to move on to some other jurisdiction, no matter what you believe or think either in the mid-1800s or in 1700 depending on your ancestry.

Where am I going next? I will move south and east. How far back can I reasonably expect to find records in Mexico? Where did the European settlers come from and how far back can I find records?

What's new with 52,865 articles and still climbing?

The FamilySearch Research Wiki is what's new. In the past three weeks the number of new pages has almost equaled 1000 a week. Here is a sample of the topics or countries in the past day or so of new pages:

‎Havasupai Indian Reservation, Arizona (Tribe)
Citing Online Sources
Lewes Poor Law Union, Sussex
‎Gila River Indian Community, Arizona (Tribe)
‎Wigmore Schools, Walsall and West Bromwich, Staffordshire
‎Walsall Poor Law Union, Staffordshire
‎Eucharist Sulpician Cemetery, Baltimore County, Maryland
‎Salem Cemetery, Catonsville, Baltimore County, Maryland
‎Rhode Island 1905 State Census (FamilySearch Historical Records)

The list goes on and on. The number of pages of information is truly amazing and the daily growth is also amazing.  If you need a place to start, go to Help:Basic Searches. That should get you going on finding just about anything you can think of and a lot you would never have thought of. Remember, anyone may search for articles in the FamilySearch Research Wiki. You only need to be registered to edit an article.

How a Computer Virus Attack Works

My son wrote a post on his Blog, Quantumleap42, that needs more exposure than just the physics guys. It is called "What does a computer virus look like?" He attached the following short video, but you should also read his commentary. It is a very good explanation of one way your computer might become infected with a virus. Here is the video:



If you are reading this post, you need to know about computer viruses.

Who reads all these genealogy Blogs anyway?

Some Bloggers are likely frustrated journalists seeking fame and fortune through the unlikely outlet of writing blog posts. On the other hand, most journalists, at least those who went to some sort of school to become one, would look down their collective noses at what they would consider to be the amateurish efforts of the unschooled masses online. Having read a few thousands of blog posts in the past years along with a lot of newspapers, magazines, books and other publications, I figure I have a pretty fair idea of what I think is good writing and what is decidedly not. In my opinion, genealogy Bloggers, on the whole, come out way above average for writing and story telling ability. I also think that the possibly unschooled masses are on the way to ultimately replacing the professional journalist in some venues. Bloggers will then become the de facto professional journalists. As a matter of fact, some of the Bloggers are already professional journalists.  Although, I might add, professional in the proficiency sense not necessarily in the area of compensation. I don't think "genealogist" and "rich" go in the same sentence together very well.

So, if we assume that there are a significant number of genealogy Bloggers out there writing at a professional level, who are they writing to? I mean, who is the audience. Do I know who my audience is? Do I care? Would I write if I didn't have an audience? In my own case, the answer is simple, I write compulsively. But would it be nice to know who, if anyone, reads my stuff? Hmm, I guess. Sure, why not?

As a matter of fact, the genealogy Blogger all have a pretty good idea about the identity of their audience. The word "genealogy" alone gives us an idea and that idea can be confirmed by looking at reader's demographics. There are, of course, a lot of ways to tell your blogs demographics. For example, there is Google Analytics, Alexa and Quantcast, all of which give you a detailed look at who reads your blog posts.

Google Analytics has reports on the number of visits, pageviews, and pages per visit as well as traffic sources and content analysis by post. I can learn that my blog is read in 55 different countries. I have quite a following in the UK, Canada and Australia.

Quantcast.com goes a little bit further into the analysis, I can see trends for the past week, month, quarter, half year and year. The program also gives me an idea of the demographics. My readers are 58% Female, 55% over 50 and 92% Caucasian. 90% of my readers have no children under the age of 17. How do they know this? I have no idea. But it appears that they compare the traffic to my site with all of the other sites visited and deduce the demographics from the traffic comparisons. They also come up with a whole lot more information.

Alexa.com is another source of demographics. You might be interested to know that Google, Facebook and YouTube are the top three sites in that order according to Alexa.com. Also people are eating a lot of Life Cereal and using a lot of Q-tips. This is a really interesting site. According to Alexa.com my blog is rated 256,246 in the U.S. Wow, what does that mean?

OK, so you can get a whole lot of information that you don't need or care about, but you might just get some ideas about promoting your blog, if that is what you want to do, and if that is why you are writing.

When I'm Sixty-four

When Paul McCartney wrote the words to the song, When I'm Sixty-Four, he was just sixteen years old. I am sure he thought sixty-four was unimaginably in the future. McCartney probably has a different perspective now that he is 68 years old. Unfortunately, many of us put off things in life, until we are older and have time. Genealogy is one of those things that seems to get put off "until we are older." When I look around me at genealogy conferences I realize that genealogy does not really have many younger adherents.

One of the biggest problems of waiting until later in life to begin an interest in genealogy, is that most of the people who can fill in the blanks in the pedigree and family group records have already passed on. When I was newly married, I still had regular contact with one of my great-grandmothers. She would certainly be an assistance now 40 years later in answering several questions.

I see genealogy's association with age as one of the biggest challenges to its greater acceptance as a serious pursuit. Presently, with the exception of Brigham Young University, there are no other major universities that offer a degree in genealogy. There is a four year college in Salt Lake City, Utah, Heritage Genealogical College, that offers a course in "Professional Genealogy." But you can scan the catalogs of any other universities in vain for any mention of genealogy as degree.

From time to time, I have discussed the need for certification for genealogists, but certification, by itself, will not move genealogy from the realm of hobby and avocation into the academic world. Part of the rejection of genealogy as a "serious" academic study comes from its checkered past and even more checkered present. What is more, I see absolutely no movement at all towards increased acceptance of genealogy as an academic discipline.

The first question is whether or not genealogy should be an academic discipline? Secondly, what would have to change to make genealogy a subject that would even be considered for addition to college catalogs?

Who decides which subjects are taught in the universities? Partially, the decision is made based on popularity. When I was at the University of Utah, several of the professors wanted to form a Linguistics Department. There was no undergraduate degree and no graduate degree. However, through the Anthropology Department, the professors were able to get a graduate degree established and offered a Masters Degree in Linguistics. At the time, the new department had three or four professors, who mostly worked for the Anthropology Department and about six students. They were able to get some support from the school's English for Speakers of Other Languages program (ESL now known as TESOL or Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages). Now, the University of Utah has an established Linguistics Department with both a complete undergraduate and graduate program and offers a PhD in Linguistics. The Department now lists 26 professors and instructors.

Linguistics is a highly specialized and esoteric subject. Those outside the discipline have no idea what the subject is all about. You may hear the subject mentioned, but you will not find any prime time television shows about celebrities and their search for their linguistic roots. So why would linguistics become an academic discipline and not genealogy?

A search of the University of Utah website shows that the term "genealogy" is not used for the purpose of discussing family history, but relates to everything from medicine to molecular biology. Likewise, the term "family history" has a lot to do with medicine but not history. The word "genealogy" is not even mentioned in conjunction with degrees in history.

Even though there is a history of certification in genealogy, the certification programs are directed more towards form rather than historical methodology. The requirements for certification in genealogy are more like the tests for contractors or air conditioning repairmen than the requirements for an academic study. When I took the three day State Bar Examination for Arizona, I was not graded on the form of my citations, but whether or not I could think like a lawyer.

The issue is not job demand. One reason why I mention Linguistics is that there is almost no demand for linguistics graduates outside of the academic world. You don't get a degree in Linguistics because you want a high paying job.

This post will be continued with a look at why historians have such an antipathy towards the idea of genealogy.

Mesa Man Documents Genealogy "Back to Adam"

I thought my readers would enjoy this news article from the Mesa Gazette:

1 April 2011-- At a press conference today, Mesa resident, James Tanner, 97 announced the completion of a lifetime goal; documenting his ancestry back to Adam. Tanner, who is a resident of the Happy Acres Care Center on East Broadway, showed off his document and files that take up most of his single room apartment. "I have been working on this project for over 60 years," Tanner indicated, "only recent advances in archeology and online digitized records from Google made all this possible."

Tanner indicated that the breakthrough in his research came when an anonymous benefactor enabled him to get a high speed Internet connection. Previously, all of his research had been on dial-up and he was afraid that he wouldn't live long enough to complete the project. He said translating the older records was also a challenge but several of the caregivers who were from Eastern European countries and South America helped him with the languages. Tanner said he works on the project most of the day, stopping only for dinner and an occasional Bingo game in the common room of the Care Center.

When questioned about how he could find enough records to complete such a project, he stated that many of his friends claimed to have their genealogy back to Adam and he thought it just might be possible to document the entire line. With the completion of his 4,359,232nd Family Group Record, Tanner said the job was essentially complete. Once he discovered Adam's will and probate record, the rest was pretty easy, he said. Adam's will, which Tanner states, has over 250 pages of descendants and is very difficult to read, was found in a recent set of documents added to Google's Book digitization project. Tanner also commented on the difficulty of reconstructing the records lost in the Flood. "Although, it is difficult to find some of the records," he relates, "after I found the land records for the Tower of Babel that pretty well solidified my research."

In his further comments, Tanner stated that he was waiting for FamilySearch, a large genealogical repository to "fix the problems with its New FamilySearch program" so he can upload his file. When asked his biggest challenges, he stated that finding enough floppy disks to back up my file was his biggest problem. "My new Pentium Four computer works just fine, but floppy disks are getting harder and harder to find and I am still having a hard time getting used to the new Windows 95 operating system." He stated that he was still comfortable with DOS and didn't see much need for Windows.