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Sometimes, you've just got to take your research offline

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By SHARON TATE MOODY

Tribune correspondent

Published: July 26, 2009

It's interesting to eavesdrop on fellow travelers at genealogy conferences. Whether riding in elevators or waiting in line, listeners can learn the best places to eat and the best lectures to attend. They can even share in the thrill of someone else's "aha" moment from a conference experience.

"Did you know there are real places to research? You don't have to count just on Ancestry," I overheard a man remark after a lecture at the recent National Genealogical Society conference in North Carolina.

He was talking about the Web site Ancestry.com. Unfortunately the genealogical sphere is filled with individuals who think all records are on Ancestry or some other online resource. That isn't true, though it does play an important role in research.

It is a tool and its value is in knowing how to use it. The Internet, supplied by commercial entities like Ancestry.com and records digitized from archives, libraries and academic institutions, contains a wealth of historical documents. As a researcher whose adventures in genealogy began pre-Internet, I appreciate the ease with which it allows us to track down clues and evidence.

The dangers lie in not knowing how to use what's on the Internet and failing to recognize that not everything can be found online.

Ancestry.com says it has 4 billion records used by 950,000 subscribers. I don't doubt their figures. The records range from the popular U.S. Census to the more obscure "War Papers Read Before the Commandery of the State of Michigan Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, 1886-1898," Vols. 1-2.

The site's records are divided into four broad categories: Historical Records, Family Trees, Stories and Publications, and Maps and Photographs.

Approach and use the family trees with caution. Seldom do submitters give sources for their work. Verifying their accuracy, therefore, is impossible. It's fine to use the material as lead information, but it should never be entered into family files as fact.

The real value of Ancestry is in the historical records. Again, it's important to scrutinize the materials and their sources. Databases can vary from abstracts to digital images of the original records.

Determine whether the record is a digitized version of the original or an abstract from the original. Digitized records are pictures of the originals and therefore are good substitutes. Abstracts, on the other hand, are written by people who are copying information from the originals. Abstracts can be filled with error such as names copied incorrectly and omission of blocks of information.

For example, one of the databases is North Carolina Death Certificates, 1909-1975. I found Florence Amadora Moore's 1954 death certificate. After studying the digitized record and copying it into my personal research files, I recorded the source information that Ancestry provided. It was the North Carolina State Board of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, North Carolina Death Certificates microfilm S.123.

I could write to North Carolina and pay $10 to get a copy of this certificate, but having the digitized version from Ancestry is just as good.

In another database, I found Abstract of Book 2 & Book A, probate court 1791-1826, Hamilton County Ohio. Pay attention to the source of the database: This one was published by the Hamilton County Chapter of the Ohio Genealogical Society.

To compile a book of abstracts, the society members would have pulled out (or abstracted) information from the original records that would be of interest to other genealogists.

Books of abstracts are good for finding people but looking at them is just one step in the process. Explore the publication to see exactly what records were abstracted. In this case, the foreword in the books tells where the original books are located. The next research step is to find those original records and get a copy of the pertinent document.

A subscription to Ancestry.com costs $155.40 a year for access to the U.S. collection and $299.40 for the World collection. The Ancestry Library Collection, available at the Hillsborough Public Library, gives access to the United States and the United Kingdom records.

Having a subscription allows a researcher to take his time and explore the many nooks and crannies of the Ancestry site at home. For example, when I found Florence Amadora Moore's death certificate and looked at the Source Information and Description of the database, I found a section on the "Cautions about Death Certificates" and "Where To Go From Here." I had the luxury of time to read through that educational material, an opportunity every researcher should take advantage of.

Ancestry.com has a valid place in every genealogist's kit bag. Used correctly it can lead you to the places where the real records are awaiting discovery.

Sharon Tate Moody is a board-certified genealogist. Send your genealogy questions and event announcements to her in care of Getaway, The Tampa Tribune, 200 S. Parker St., Tampa, FL 33606 or stmoody0720@mac.com. She regrets that she is unable to assist wit

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