{"id":432,"date":"2012-11-28T08:45:00","date_gmt":"2012-11-28T14:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/the-path-of-a-beginner-genealogist\/"},"modified":"2013-07-22T18:07:44","modified_gmt":"2013-07-22T23:07:44","slug":"the-path-of-a-beginner-genealogist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/the-path-of-a-beginner-genealogist\/","title":{"rendered":"The Path of a Beginner Genealogist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" title=\"path\" alt=\"path\" src=\"http:\/\/lh6.ggpht.com\/-gvDKhcL_3LM\/ULXdTT9LZFI\/AAAAAAAAHAQ\/0KJjJXaoN34\/path4.jpg?imgmax=800\" width=\"196\" height=\"244\" align=\"right\" border=\"0\" \/>Last week, I read Amy Coffin&#8217;s post <a href=\"http:\/\/wetree.blogspot.com\/2012\/11\/time-to-pop-cap-in-term-drive-by.html\" target=\"_blank\">Time to Pop a Cap in the Term &#8216;Drive-by Genealogist,&#8221;<\/a> which discussed her opinion about an <a href=\"http:\/\/www2.tbo.com\/lifestyles\/life\/2012\/nov\/18\/banewso8-drive-by-genealogists-should-learn-a-few-ar-567094\/\" target=\"_blank\">article<\/a> written by Sharon Tate Moody.\u00a0 Apparently Amy wasn&#8217;t the only one with an opinion, as I later saw several messages on the <a href=\"http:\/\/archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com\/th\/index\/TRANSITIONAL-GENEALOGISTS-FORUM\" target=\"_blank\">Transitional Genealogists<\/a> mailing list while catching up over the weekend.\u00a0 On Sunday, I began to draft my own post, but I had so many thoughts swirling through my brain, I couldn&#8217;t figure out how to present it in a manner that wasn&#8217;t offensive or emotional.\u00a0 So I&#8217;ve sat on it until now and split my original draft into two parts, this one being the less offensive and emotional.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Before I get into this post, I want to mention that by Monday, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.geneamusings.com\/2012\/11\/how-can-we-communicate-right-way.html\" target=\"_blank\">Randy Seaver had also posted a response<\/a> and included links to some other blog posts.\u00a0 The two below are ones I had not seen because I was unaware of their blogs, but they both illustrate some good points so I&#8217;d like to share them.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/whohunter.com\/in-defense-of-beginners\/\" target=\"_blank\">In Defense of Beginners<\/a>, Rorey Cathcart<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/mmgenealogy.blogspot.com\/2012\/11\/grand-theft-genealogy.html\" target=\"_blank\">Grand Theft Genealogy<\/a>, Debbie Mascot<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Now that I got all that out of the way, here is my post.<\/p>\n<p>The gist of Sharon&#8217;s article was the there is too much misinformation published by &#8220;drive-by genealogists,&#8221; who &#8220;believe the television ads about how easy it is to click on a few links and find your entire family.&#8221;\u00a0 In other words, the newbies don&#8217;t know what they&#8217;re doing and publish a bunch of junk.\u00a0 While I certainly agree there is a bunch of garbage out there, I don&#8217;t really agree that it&#8217;s perpetuated by these so-called drive-by genealogists.\u00a0 I think it happens at a different phase of the beginners&#8217; path, as I will demonstrate.<\/p>\n<p>People dip their toe into the genealogy pool for many reasons.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>To fulfill a desire to learn where they came from.<\/li>\n<li>To record their family&#8217;s health history.<\/li>\n<li>To preserve their memories.<\/li>\n<li>To learn more about their ancestor&#8217;s and share the stories with their family.<\/li>\n<li>To explore their curiosity after stumbling upon family papers.<\/li>\n<li>To discover whether a family legend is true.<\/li>\n<li>To join a lineage society.<\/li>\n<li>To find birth parents or a child given up for adoption.<\/li>\n<li>To see if it is really as simple as clicking on a little leaf.<\/li>\n<li>Just for the heck of it!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These, and other reasons, are completely valid in my opinion.\u00a0 Those of us who have been around for awhile (yes, that includes me and my whole five years!) and are passionate about genealogy love to hear that other people are starting to explore their own families, no matter the reason.\u00a0 The fact that they&#8217;re interested makes us smile.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;ve all been there.\u00a0 We likely started out for one of the reasons above.\u00a0 So in other words, <em>we were all beginners at some point<\/em>.\u00a0 We started for different reasons, had different goals, and our paths took different forks in the road.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s how I see <em>The Path of a Beginner Genealogist<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Phase 1<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The quest is on.\u00a0 Whether there is a specific goal in mind or not, these beginners start to explore their family history.\u00a0 Chances are, they&#8217;ve heard of or stumbled upon that big genealogy website and signed up for the free trial.\u00a0 If they had a specific goal in mind, they may have even sought out some guidance from a book or a local society.<\/p>\n<p>It is during this phase that they are either bitten by the Genealogy Bug or not.\u00a0 I suspect that many times, the aforementioned free trial and the vast array of information on said website becomes too overwhelming for most people; they don&#8217;t know where to start, let alone how to proceed, and give up quickly.\u00a0 These people may also quit because they lose interest, don&#8217;t have any time, have no clue what they&#8217;re doing, realize it&#8217;s too expensive, or find that it&#8217;s not as easy is clicking on the little leafs.<\/p>\n<p>Others stick it out, usually because they have some sort of goal in mind.\u00a0 If their goal was relatively simple, and they are able to achieve it quickly, they may quit when finished.\u00a0 Some may have achieved their goal, but found an interest in learning more about their family and proceed to Phase 2.\u00a0 Sometimes their goal is more challenging; some will give up while others will realize they need some help and proceed to Phase 2.\u00a0 In some cases, those that didn&#8217;t start with a specific goal have enjoyed the thrill of the hunt and proceed to Phase 2.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" title=\"\" alt=\"Path\" src=\"http:\/\/lh6.ggpht.com\/-2fBX7wtgq-A\/ULXdUMHQcGI\/AAAAAAAAHAY\/gbGiGmooXs4\/Visio-The%252520Path%252520of%252520a%252520Beginner%252520Genealogist%25255B6%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800\" width=\"482\" height=\"446\" border=\"0\" \/><\/p>\n<p>I believe that people in Phase 1 are less likely to publish any information, probably because they give up too quickly (I&#8217;m willing to bet that at least half of the beginners fall into this scenario).\u00a0 For those that achieved a simple goal, say, learning more about a few ancestors, likely in their first few generations, publishing anything, especially outside the family, is probably scarce.\u00a0 Now, for those who are inclined to proceed to Phase 2, they might have posted a tree somewhere or started a blog or website in Phase 1, but this might be pretty rare\u2014during Phase 1, that is.<\/p>\n<p>If the Genealogy Bug has taken a bite of these Phase 1 folks, they proceed to Phase 2.\u00a0 Otherwise, they quit.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Phase 2<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>For those who enter Phase 2, they continue their pursuit, but are less likely to follow genealogy research standards.\u00a0 I believe the reason for this has to do with a lack of knowledge that standards exist, or, for those who are aware, they feel it takes the fun out of their newfound hobby.<\/p>\n<p>In some cases, it&#8217;s probably okay that standards are not being followed\u2014and yes, this is coming from a methodical researcher (including research outside of genealogy), who also has a background in policy and procedure development, and an affinity for education and training.\u00a0 But here&#8217;s why I say it&#8217;s okay in some cases.\u00a0 When someone is taking the initiative to preserve their memories and the memories of family members, they don&#8217;t want to be bothered by <em>having<\/em> to back up the claims.\u00a0 Right or wrong, this is what was passed down or how someone remembers it, and that&#8217;s all they&#8217;re concerned with.\u00a0 There may come a time when they want to &#8220;publish&#8221; something, but it&#8217;s likely that it would be something kept within the family.\u00a0 I don&#8217;t see anything wrong with this approach.<\/p>\n<p>Using the same scenario, some people will become interested in substantiating the claims and uncovering the truth and may decide to do more thorough research.\u00a0 Some of these people will learn about standards by virtue of their research, while others will seek out the information on their own.\u00a0 Either way, some will begin to see the reasoning behind the standards and will want to incorporate them into their research process, thus proceeding onto Phase 3.\u00a0 Others will remain in Phase 2 with complete disregard of the standards of genealogy research, again because they are unaware or they simply don&#8217;t care.\u00a0 And this is where it gets messy.<\/p>\n<p>As I said early, there are some cases where it&#8217;s okay not to follow the standards.\u00a0 But I feel like there are other times when we should follow them (to an extent) or perhaps we shouldn&#8217;t be plastering our &#8220;research&#8221; where the rest of the world can see it.\u00a0 There, I said it.\u00a0 Now is that realistic?\u00a0 Of course not.\u00a0 People publish erroneous and unsubstantiated information all the time, both on and offline.\u00a0 Case in point, I&#8217;ll admit that I&#8217;ve done it.\u00a0 A few years ago, I thought I found that I was the descendant of Mayflower passenger Stephen Hopkins and in the haste of my excitement, I posted such a claim on Facebook.\u00a0 Turns out, <em>my<\/em> Stephen Hopkins is not <em>the<\/em> Stephen Hopkins and there appears to be much debate over whether <em>my<\/em> Stephen is the grandson of <em>the<\/em> Stephen or not.\u00a0 I later <a title=\"Friday Finds \u2013 07\/17\/09\" href=\"http:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/friday-finds-071709\/\" target=\"_blank\">posted about my error<\/a> on this blog.\u00a0 So yes, mistakes can, do, and will continue to happen, and, might I add, the &#8220;professionals&#8221; are not immune.<\/p>\n<p>The people that remain in Phase 2 indefinitely, are a combination of people who can research and do it well, but aren&#8217;t concerned with the integrity of their research, and people who aren&#8217;t really cut out for research but are giving it the old college try.\u00a0 Both of these groups are the ones who will likely publish erroneous information (unintentionally) or may not provide a solid foundation for their research.\u00a0 Does that mean they shouldn&#8217;t be <em>allowed<\/em> to publish their information in a public manner?\u00a0 No; remember, <em>everyone<\/em> makes mistakes.\u00a0 We should give them credit for trying (while secretly gritting our teeth in frustration).<\/p>\n<p>Some of these &#8220;indefinites&#8221; will eventually quit, leaving a trail of garbage behind them, while others will learn the errs of their ways, proceed to Phase 3, and begin to clean up their mess.\u00a0 The rest?\u00a0 Well, they just stay in Phase 2 and continue to clutter the universe with misinformation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Phase 3<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The last stop on the path of beginners, if they make it this far, is Phase 3.\u00a0 It is during Phase 2, whether early on or much later, that these people realize the importance of genealogy research standards and want to improve their methods by applying these standards to their research.<\/p>\n<p>The people who make it to this phase are in it for the long-haul.\u00a0 They enter Phase 3, still a beginner, but with a desire to learn more and perfect their craft.\u00a0 Once they begin to learn these methods, standards, how to use advanced record types, etc. and learn to apply these concepts to their research, they lose the title of beginner and move onto the intermediate stage and beyond, continuing to learn along the way.\u00a0 Some of these people will go on to become professionals, with or without &#8220;credentials.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>It is the people in this phase and beyond who are the most likely to publish their work, whether online, in print, or both.\u00a0 Their materials are typically well-presented, substantiated by solid research, and properly cited.\u00a0 Could their information be erroneous?\u00a0 Absolutely!\u00a0 Did I forget to mention that <em>everyone<\/em> makes mistakes?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Again, I agree with Sharon that there is a lot of crap out there.\u00a0 I even started a blog post on the topic about a year ago and I may be revisiting that draft in the near future.\u00a0 But, based on my vision of the beginners&#8217; path, I feel that the drive-by genealogist would fall into Phase 1, and I believe that the culprits of erroneous information are more likely to be found in Phase 2, made up of those who are more serious, yet completely ignore genealogy research standards.<\/p>\n<p>And while that may strike a chord with some people, before you send me that hate mail, let me tell you how may path played out.<\/p>\n<p>I started on my genealogy journey over five years ago, for a combination of reasons that include finding a family tree narrative for my dad&#8217;s family (which had been in my possession since I was a kid) and a desire to know if the family lore was true, that we were related to Noah Webster (yes, the dictionary guy).<\/p>\n<p>At the beginning, I had no idea what to do or where to start.\u00a0 I knew Noah wasn&#8217;t mentioned anywhere in this narrative, but soon realized that it appeared to only show our direct ancestors.\u00a0 I then Googled &#8220;genealogy,&#8221; which I probably spelled wrong (admit it, you have too!) and was introduced to Ancestry (a.k.a., the aforementioned big genealogy website).\u00a0 Oddly enough, when I went to sign up for the free trial, I had apparently already created an account since my email address was &#8220;already in use.&#8221;\u00a0 I barely recalled this short-lived adventure that I had taken a few years prior.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, I was completely overwhelmed, had no idea what I was doing or what I should be doing, where to start, etc., and keep in mind I was a researcher and analyst by profession!\u00a0 Eventually I found several member trees and following the trail I could see that I was indeed somehow related to Noah Webster, I just wasn&#8217;t sure how (yes, I took these member tree as Gospel).\u00a0 Somewhere along the line, I downloaded PAF to put the pieces together so I could figure out the exact relationship.\u00a0 It was the visual that PAF provided me that helped me make sense of everything.\u00a0 (Sidenote:\u00a0 Although my sources were primarily these member trees, after I learned the errs of my ways, and did the proper research, yes, I confirmed I really am related to Noah Webster.)\u00a0 Then I started to wonder about who these other people were as well as my mom&#8217;s side of the family.<\/p>\n<p>After talking to my mom one day, she informed me that I had all of the family paperwork in my possession.\u00a0 It was in a box she had sent me nearly six years earlier, that I never opened\u2026I had forgotten all about it.\u00a0 It was a treasure trove of information for both sides of my family.\u00a0 I started going through all the papers (vital records, newspaper clippings, funeral cards, etc.) and entered the information into my PAF database.\u00a0 Did I cite any of my sources?\u00a0 Heck no, I barely knew what I was doing at the time and I really didn&#8217;t think I would get hooked the way I did.\u00a0 I really just wanted to see how all these people fit together\u2026some of them I knew, others had long since passed and I never knew them\u2026half of them I had never even heard of.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, I got genealogy fever.\u00a0 In my day job, I belonged to two professional organizations and wondered if anything similar existed for the genealogy world.\u00a0 Googling once again, I found several societies and joined a few.\u00a0 I then sought out reference material, purchasing several books on Amazon and reading up on genealogy research.\u00a0 That, coupled with the society publications I started to receive, were enough to steer me on the right course.<\/p>\n<p>By 2008, I decided to start a blog about my genealogical journey and encountered the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.geneabloggers.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">GeneaBloggers<\/a>, which also helped to put me on the right track.\u00a0 Not too long after finding the GeneaBloggers, I purchased Legacy Family Tree and started my database over, this time citing my sources, albeit perhaps not in the best manner at first.<\/p>\n<p>Somewhere along the line I became a name collector and am now stuck with a database full of people I don&#8217;t know, nor am I sure I care to know (but I just hate to remove them).\u00a0 In 2009, I decided to post my tree to Ancestry, but I kept it private because I knew it wasn&#8217;t up to par (not very well sourced, not to mention all the unsubstantiated crap I collected along the way).\u00a0 But I felt that something needed to be out there and it did lead to new cousins (as has my blog).\u00a0 So yes, I&#8217;m one of those Phase 2 people who posted a tree, but in my defense, I did make it private.<\/p>\n<p>Eventually, I learned the right way to cite my sources (I found that &#8220;US Census&#8221; as a master source with no detail wasn&#8217;t really helpful) and to this day I am STILL cleaning up my mess.\u00a0 But, as much as it sucks (and it really is a serious pain in the butt), it&#8217;s made me a better researcher.\u00a0 It was a hard lesson to learn, but I was fortunate to have learned it sooner than many others I&#8217;ve talked with.\u00a0 I only had a few years of research to clean up, while many others have decades to clean up!<\/p>\n<p>In just a few short years, I&#8217;m doing client work, I&#8217;ve found the birth mother of an adopted friend (which resulted in a VERY successful reunion), have written educational materials on genealogy subjects, and I continue to explore my own family history\u2026more importantly, I continue to learn new things everyday.\u00a0 I went through all the phases, and this is where my path led me.<\/p>\n<p>This journey is also why I am passionate about genealogy education.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve learned a lot from my mistakes and I want to help steer people in the right direction from the very beginning so they don&#8217;t have to go through what I (and many others before me) went through.\u00a0 And if it helps keep the universe free from junk information, well that&#8217;s just a bonus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last week, I read Amy Coffin&#8217;s post Time to Pop a Cap in the Term &#8216;Drive-by Genealogist,&#8221; which discussed her opinion about an article written by Sharon Tate Moody.\u00a0 Apparently Amy wasn&#8217;t the only one with an opinion, as I later saw several messages on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genblog","cat-25-id"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3HcLI-6Y","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=432"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2958,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions\/2958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}