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Build a Better GEDCOM wiki

Several bloggers put up posts about a new website called Build a Better GEDCOM Wiki. The current goals of the site include the following:
Based upon information provided on this page and others, we will attempt to build a set of goals here for the current project ofreplacing/updating GEDCOM. This new standard will be referred to as BG(Better GEDCOM) in this discussion.

  1. BG should remain a file format technology capable of serving as a data archival repository
  2. BG should be XML-based using Unicode cha
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A new paradigm for genealogical investigation

In a FamilySearch Wiki article from a presentation at the NGS 2010 Conference entitled "Blazing Digital Trails at FamilySearch"Bill Mangum, of Product Management explains the process of recordacquisition used by FamilySearch to augment its already huge collectionof documents. In addition to giving some interesting insights into theFamilySearch record acquisition process, the process outlined in thearticle can serve as a paradigm for gathering personal genealogicalinformation and as an adjunct to
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The challenge of moving beyond PAF

Personal Ancestral File (PAF) is probably the most influential lineagelinked database program in the world. To quote BradJackman on LDSTech back in 2008," However, I think most genealogists will agree that PAF still holds amajor position in the field, and it's ease of use, simple GUI, and hugeuser base make it a force to be reckoned with, not some littlefreeware experiment to be swept under the rug." PAF has been considereda "freeware" program since about 2000 and was never very expensive evenbe
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Lane Family Tombstone

Lane Family Tombstone

Pine Grove Cemetery, Winnacunnet Road, Hampton, New Hampshire.

William Lane, junior. and his wife Sarah Webster were my 8x Great Grandparents. Their names are on a 1681 list of the members of the 2nd Church in Boston, and sometime after that they removed to Hampton, New Hampshire. Sarah was William’s first cousin. They lived near Sarah’s father, Thomas Webster, near where Hampton Academy now stands. William Lane was a tailor. Deacon Joshua Lane was his son. I descend through

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Calling Bagot researchers

In the past few weeks I've had quite a lot of correspondence with people researching the Bagot family, and we've had a fruitful exchange of information.

As a result of this, and to facilitate further exchanges, we've set up a Bagot family forumon YahooGroups, and invite other Bagot researchers to join us there.The forum is intended mainly for people who are interested in ordescended from Bagot families in north Lancashire and surroundingareas. In addition to the usual exchange of messages informi
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Interesting things you find out with DNA testing - Hollinger, Hullinger

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Our tests confirmed out Swiss paternal heritage.

But it also showed that our paternal ancestor came originally from the fertile crescent.




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In my recent post about statistics for FamilySearch, a comment by Randy Seaver of Genea-Musingsgot me thinking about the statistics and terminology used online by allof those huge records collections, everybody from FamilySearch toAncestry.com to the Library of Congress. One of the most influentialbooks I have ever read is a small 144 page treatise written in 1954entitled "How to lie with Statistics." Here is the completebibliographical information:

Huff, Darrell, and Irving Geis. How to Lie with
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MARY COLE "HEROINE OF THE REVOLUTION" WHY?

The following article appeared in the Newberry County, S.C. newspaper dated Nov. 13, 1838.:

Today at the historic Bush River Baptist Church was unveiled a marker erected by the D.A.R. at the grave of Mary Cole, "THE HEROINE OF THE REVOLUTION". She was nee Mary Golden, widow of Lochlin Lenard who was killed by the Tories in 1781. She married Rev. John Cole in 1783.

I am a direct decendant of Rev. John Cole. He was minister of the Bush Baptist Church in Newberry County, S.C. from 1783 until his deat

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In a recent FamilySearch Blog post on 25 October 2010, DiltsGD offered a list of the top ten genealogical repositories.There is no doubt that the libraries on the list offer hugegenealogical resources, but the most important question for researchersis how accessible are the collections? What access is there to the vaststored material? How much of what the library contains is originalsource documentation and how much is just copies of what is availablefrom other libraries? None of these questions
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James Wilson was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire on March 15, 1765. His father was a farmer, and James was an apprentice to a blacksmith. He had little formal education. In 1796 he removed to Bradford, Vermont and taught himself cartography. To make up for a lack of education, he bought a copy of the Encyclopedia Britannica. At Dartmouth College he saw a pair of English globes, and became interested in producing his own. He began by turning solid blocks of wood, and covering them with maps. H

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Upcoming RootsTech Conference in February, 2011

Early sponsors of the upcoming FamilySearch RootsTech Conferencein Salt Lake City, Utah on February 10th through the 12th, 2011 includeBrigham Young University, the New England Historic GenealogicalSociety, Ancestry.com, the National Genealogical Society and theFederation of Genealogical Societies. The conference with bring togetherthe resources of three other conferences, the Conference onComputerized Family History, the Technology Workshop and theFamilySearch Developers Conference. Quoting fro
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The Country House

I was born and raised in the City, so I'm a city-girl at heart, but I will always remember mygrandparents' weekend place we called "The Country House."

When I was small, I remember feeling like it took forever to driveout of the city, chugging along the four-lane highway crowded with carsmoving no faster than 30 miles an hour. After what was an interminabletime to a youngster, we finally reached Pacific, a truly small town,where we would take a different road.

My grandfather, or Grampy as we ca

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As soon as I got back from Utah and my visit to FamilySearch, I taughttwo classes at the Fall Genealogy Workshop of the Family History Societyof Arizona. The conference seemed very well attended but being at agenealogy conference raises some issues, including whether or notattending a genealogy class is more entertainment than education. Theclasses I taught were on specific software products and it wasinteresting that more than a few of the attendees had purchased thesoftware at a previous conve
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Social Networking For Genealogists

I'm working on a program for our local genealogical society on how people use Social Networking sites for genealogical research.

Does anyone have a success story they would like to share on how GenealogyWise, Facebook, Twitter, or any other Social Networking site have helped you in your genealogical research? I'd love to hear them!

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New Blog Posts recently

I have made a number of new Blog posts recently while I am here in Utah for the first ever FamilySearch Bloggers Day. Here are a few of the newer ones:

More to Salt Lake than Family History Library
Feedback and Community Support on the Beta FamilySearch.org
Updated version of FamilySearch Indexing

and a few others

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Casino in Gettysburg

Once again the powers to be are trying to get the ok to build a casino in or near Gettysburg.
How could anyone think something like this is the right thing to do.
This is one of our nations most treasured national parks.
Please go online and sign the petition to stop this from happening at http://nocasinogettysburg.org/
Check out what others are saying about this threat to our national treasure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nubs99Vz_yg
I am not against casinos,but I am against building one at or ne
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A very selective New FamilySearch Beta test?

We had an interesting occurrence this past week or so. On October 5, Ireceived an E-mail from the New FamilySearch.org Beta Test Team, asfollows:
Dear Member, We are looking for individuals who can participate in evaluating new.familysearch.org before each quarterlyupdate.
We need individuals with different levels of computer skills, family history backgrounds, languages, andnew.familysearch.org experience.
We try to evaluate this system and the new features every few months for about 2 weeks.
Your
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