Genealogy Reviews Online

Hellotree - A Quick Look

I was browsing through Miriam's AnceStories blog and found a post about a new family tree social networking site.  It's called Hellotree and is one of the many sites popping up around the net designed to be kind of a Facebook for people interested in family history.  Facebook, MySpace and others are designed for relatively young people to keep in touch with old friends and to make new ones.  The genealogy version appears similar, except they are designed for families to keep in touch with each other.

I can't say anything bad about Hellotree...it's OK.  I built a small family tree and discovered the functionality is almost exactly like Geni.com.  When you put the two trees side by side there really is no difference.  Like Geni, you can send email invitations to family members and work on the tree collaboratively.  Has anyone ever done this on any of these genealogy social networking sites??  I haven't and really wonder how it works.  Hellotree appears to me as a slimmed down version of Geni, but it has very similar features like tree building, user profile, a family index, and a photo section.  Geni has a few more bells and whistles within each area, but it's mostly the same.

Most of the bigwigs in genealogy say social networking is the next big thing in family history, but I wonder if this means the next big money maker, or big in terms of an important new tool for researchers.  I've never used any of these sites for collaborative research and don't know anyone who has...so who's using these things?

Like I said, there is nothing bad to say about Hellotree.  I like the Web 2.0 tree builder, but I'm just not into the whole concept. I kind of feel bad because it doesn't appear I'm giving Hellotree a balanced look.  I would really like to hear from someone who is into this kind of collaborative genealogy, and if they want to write a review I will gladly post their opinions in a guest article.   Maybe I'm just out of touch and someday I will come around, but right now this kind of site just doesn't do anything for me. 

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

History and Genealogy Jobs with the Federal Government

I read in Dick Eastman's blog about a genealogy job with the federal government.  Well, I found the companion historian position also being advertised.  Both of these jobs caught my attention because I'm already a Federal Employee (Dept of the Army Civilian), am interested in both genealogy and history, and I live in the Washington DC area.  Some commenters on Eastman's blog thought they wouldn't qualify because the job summary says they are looking for a "professional genealogist."  If you look deeper into the qualifications, there is no mention of "professional genealogist" anywhere.  You don't need one of those certifications to be selected for this job despite what the summary says.  The key criterion for these jobs, or any other federal job, is how applicants are evaluated.  Veterans get first shot at government jobs - as it should be in my opinion; then those in a federal government agency whose positions were downsized for whatever reason; then there's the Indian preference.  There are other unwritten complications, but these exist in any organization looking to hire people.

The pay seems high to those outside of the DC area, but the reality is the higher end of the salary scale is probably a hair above average.  The average cost of a single family house in the area is about $500,000 - if you want to have a decent commute.  There's cheaper housing further out, but the commute time increases and this can be problematic.  We do have a pretty efficient Metro system (subway) in the area, but I used it for 2 years prior to retiring from the Army and really got tired of it.

I think these are pretty cool sounding jobs, and if I didn't already have a decent job with a 10 minute commute, I'd probably apply.

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

FBI FOIA Electronic Electronic Reading Room

I took the day off from work Wednesday, and while exploring the internet looking for entertaining sites, I stumbled upon the FBI's Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room.  My fading memory tells me another blogger wrote about this site at some point in the past, but I just can't remember who to credit with the idea.  My original plan was to blog about all of the interesting announcements I saw on Randy Seaver's Gena-Musings blog that was coming out of the big genealogy conference in Kansas City, but then I found the FBI's site.  Four hours later, the day was gone and didn't even have enough time to write this post before all of the evening family activities started.

I think because of my line of work I'm just an information freak, so when I started reading the FBI case files I just couldn't stop.   I was really surprised at the amount of information in this electronic reading room.  Browsing the site is great fun and these 6 categories are the best place to start:

Espionage, Famous Persons, Ganster Era, Historical Interest, Unusual Phenomena, Violent Crime

Some of the files have been redacted (blacked out), and it does get a little annoying, but overall doesn't change the focus of the documents.  Probably the most fascinating file I read was on Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.  This was a controversial case, but the most interesting aspect to me is to read the language of the cold war, and the fear the USSR inspired during the 1950s.  It sounds ridicules today, but at the time this fear was very real.  Out of the bunch I looked at on Wednesday, this one was my favorite. 

Unlike genealogy sites, you can't do an indexed search of these documents.  While there's probably not much of genealogical value here, it sure is interesting historical reading from primary sources.   

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Genealogy Blogger Forces Newspaper to Change Article

Well maybe I'm exaggerating just a little bit...I didn't exactly force the Denver Post to change an article...I sort of just suggested it in the comments section of a story about energy.  I was reading this article called Big Oil Now Seeing Green and towards the end the reporter improperly used the word "descendants."  I wrote a comment telling them they should have used the word "Ancestor" because what they had just didn't make any sense.  Every now and then I see these two words used incorrectly in newspapers, and felt it was my duty to point out the error of their ways.  The original paragraph read as follows:

"Exxon Mobil, the company formed after the 1999 merger between Exxon and Mobil, was publicly challenged recently by the Rockefeller family to boost its renewable-energy research. Descendants of the Rockefellers founded the company that became Exxon Mobil."

When I checked it out this morning I saw the article was changed to reflect the proper word.  I rarely comment on news stories, but I just couldn't let thing one go by - I was surprised they actually made the change.  My comment is the first one on the list, and surprisingly it was the only one concerned about this important error...the rest were about trivial economic and environmental issues.

Nitpicking to keep the world safe for genealogy!

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Happy Mother's Day - Mary J. Zaring (Dec 24, 1920-May 13, 1971)

I found some cool photo's of my mother as a child up through her young adult years and thought it would be a good tribute to her life.  What I like about these photos is they show how vital and active she was.  By the time I was born she became a typical parent trying to balance work and a family with two small boys.  Now that I'm the same age as she was when she died, and we have 11 year old twins, I realize she was just tired like most parents.

The first photo is probably one of the earliest I have of her.  She's standing with her arm around her little brother (Franklin E. Zaring Jr.).  I don't know the exact date of the picture, but she appears about 6 or 7 years old so the year was approximately 1926-1927.  It's probably somewhere in the Denver area because of the flat paved road on the left and the cement sidewalk on the right.   I love the car in the background.

The second photo appears to be my mother's high school graduation day in 1937 - she's the young woman on the right.  I have a lot of photos of my mother during her high school years at Saint Francis De Sales - this was a Catholic school.  Some of these photos will be highlighted in upcoming "Who Are These People?" posts - many of are of unidentified boys.  I love this photo because the smile you see here is the one I remember when I was growing up - she was a very warm and affectionate woman and I think this photo shows it. 

The next two pictures of her skiing are cool.  I love the group photo on a ski slope with her friends.  My mother is the short one who's the 5th person from the left.  With the exception of the clothes and hairstyle, she looks like the typical ski bum you see in the Colorado mountains today.  For some reason, she stopped skiing after my brother and I were born.  I don't know if she got hurt when she was younger, but she still encouraged my brother and I to ski and we started at a young age.  An interesting note on the skis she is using in both photos...we still have those skis and poles.  I remember playing with them when I was a kid and my brother has them mounted on a wall in his house.

This last photo is one of my mother either shortly before she married my father or shortly after - meaning me and my brother are only a few years away.  She's standing at the gate of the Kenosha Trout Club up in the mountains in Park County, Colorado.  This was a members only club where the well-to-do had cabins and an big private lake to fish in.  My grandparents were the caretakers of this club and were given a place to live - the stone building behind my mother was their house.  I spent many fun summers and Christmas vacations at this place.

I have many other photos of my mother and letters from her scrapbook that I will eventually process and post, but I love these because they show her as a young, attractive, and very active woman.  I've actually learned more about my mother after she died (I was 14 at the time), through my genealogy efforts, than I learned when she was alive.  You know what?  The more I learn about her the more proud I am of her being my mother - Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Geni.com - Timeline Feature

A few weeks ago I got an email from Geni.com about their new time-line feature and thought I'd try it out.  Timelines are a key tool I use in my genealogy research.  What I try to do for each of my ancestors is place them at least once in every decade of their lives using some kind of official documentation.  Timelines really help me identify knowledge gaps where I can zero in on the parts of a person's life where I need to dig.  For those relatives who lived in the 19th and 20th centuries, I've been fairly successful, but I'm happy with whatever I get for those who lived earlier.  I started off using Microsoft Word when I built these things, but now I just use a spreadsheet like Excel. 

The Geni.com timeline works pretty well, but it took me awhile to figure it out because I don't really use the site very much.  The way it's set up is you enter all of the details on each family member and in the end you will get a consolidated timeline for your whole family.  I was only looking to develop one for my grandfather (Franklin E. Zaring) as a test, but got a little confused and after about 20 minutes of entering his data, I discovered I was entering his information under my profile.  I almost gave up after making this stupid mistake, but pushed ahead and got it done. 

The result you see in the image is a pretty good timeline.  It's got all of the basic info on my grandfather, the revision history including all of the info I added today, and below is the timeline itself.  The image doesn't show his whole life, but it gives you an idea of how the whole thing works.  I was a little disappointed that the timeline wasn't as cool as the Web 2.0 style family tree function.  I was also hoping I could export it somehow and have a stand alone timeline I could store in my electronic files, but I don't think this is possible.

I'll probably just stick to my Excel spreadsheets because of all the work I would have to go through inputting all of the data into Geni, but overall I'm pretty impress with Geni's timeline function.

(click on the image to get the full size image)   

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Origins of Mother's Day

I found an interesting article in the Washington Post today about a woman's quest for the origins of Mother's day.  Apparently Anna Jarvis, from West Virginia, is credited with starting a movement to create the holiday a couple of years after her mother's death.  Anna succeded and the special day for mothers was created in 1914.  The interesting part of the Washington Post story says "Her's the sad thing about Anna Jarvis: Mother's Day was her only baby.  And in the end, she was so put off by its success (i.e. commercialization) that she started a petition to rescind it and was promptly popped into an institution, where she died, alone, in 1948."  What a sad story...it almost makes me feel guilty for celebrating it.  Here's Anna Jarvis' obituary from the New York Times.

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Ancestry.com - New Military Records

Ancestry.com is really pushing out military records lately.  There are three new sets of records loaded with info on Army and Navy personnel.  Randy Seaver and Craig Manson both wrote in detail about the US Army Enlistment Records 1798-1914, but there are two more sets to dig into.

Returns from Regular Army Regiments, 1821-1916.  This collection is not yet searchable, but you can browse each regiment.  These basically are monthly reports commanders had to send to their higher headquarters.  Included are names of officers and enlisted men and reasons for their loss or gain; names of officers and enlisted who are absent; but the most interesting part is some contain details of engagements these units took part in.  For example I found the entry in the 7th Cavalry Returns on the Battle of Little Big Horn.  Frame 63 out of 216 provides a little bit of narrative on the battle and discusses Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer's command of the regiment.  At the end of the report, it says "Causalities:  Loss: 13 officers and 237 enlisted men."  From an historical perspective, this is one of the more interesting collections I've found at Ancestry.

US Navy Cruise Books, 1950-1988.  These books are searchable by name and contain photos of the crew and information about the ship.  As the database description states, these books served as a yearbook of sorts for the particular ship.  Currently there are only 10 ships listed and hopefully there will be more. 

You must have a subscription to view both of these collections.  I've linked to the description page, but if you click any other links to see the data, Ancestry will ask you to sign-up.  I'm not an affiliate of Ancestry...they won't have me...I just like these two sets of data.

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Another Civil War Causality

One hundred forty years ago Civil War Sailors, as part of a gun crew, loaded and armed a 9 inch 75 pound projectile into a cannon and fired it at a target.  They probably did this scores of times, but this one seemingly was a dud - it didn't explode.  I'm sure in the heat of battle this crew didn't even notice because they were concentrating on loading the next cannonball.  Flash forward 140 years and we find a Civil War relic hunter named Sam White trying to disarm it in his driveway when it explodes - killing him and destroying his property.

I know this is a tragedy for the man, his family and friends, but I started thinking about this Navy gun crew and wonder if, in their wildest imagination, they could ever conceive that a weapon they armed and fired in the 1860s would end up killing someone in February of 2008.  Should Sam White be counted as a Civil War causality?

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online

Civil Records of Selected Italian Communes

A commenter on my post about Ancestry.com beginning to add Calabria civil records gave us all a link to an incredible resource.  I clicked on the link to the site called Transcribed Records of Italian Towns and was amazed at the number towns listed.  This is another one of those wonderful sites where volunteers transcribe documents for us all to use - and the best thing is they are free.  Some of the links are to indexes and some actually have scans of the original documents.  For those towns not having transcriptions there are occasionally links to people who will do look ups upon request.  I've only browsed some of the towns listed, but plan on digging deeper soon.   

First the Ancestry.com development and now this - I'm pretty excited.  I would be more excited if the towns my grandparents came from were available, but at least I know some day it will happen.      

Click here to subscribe to Genealogy Reviews Online