Issue 35.13
Part 1
While presenting classes on the Family Tree found at https://familysearch.org/ and explaining that Family Tree is an online pedigree free for anyone to use and how we can add pictures, stories and sources, I have found that not a lot of people are familiar with this wonderful update to FamilySearch. With that in mind, I would like you to try this experiment and see what your family looks like in the Family Tree. (And don’t try to tell me all of your work is accurate and complete because in my years of experience the number of people I have seen with all of their work actually done is zero!)
On the Internet, go to https://familysearch.org/ sign in with your LDS Account if you have one, if not, you will need to register. Anyone can use this system, LDS or not. LDS people will just find that their pedigree is probably already available to them as it is linked to their membership record. Maybe your pedigree is already in the Family Tree or not but remember you type in the living and search for the deceased. Not every deceased person is in the system yet, so you may need to add them as well. It has built in privacy settings so only you will see the living you type in. If your pedigree is blank a tool will help you create your tree.
At https://familysearch.org/ to get to the tree, you click on Family Tree. Photos is where you add the pictures, Search is where you search the census records, parish records, church records, marriage records, etc., that we have already indexed with FamilySearch Indexing. This is why indexing is so important! All of this is free. Once you are viewing your tree you can look at a fan chart and a pedigree. Find a deceased person on your pedigree and click on their name in blue on the tree. An ancestor card will appear that looks like a 3 x 5 index card with their vital information. At the bottom of that card you will see TREE and PERSON. Click on Person to see more detail.
FamilySearch has added a section at the right that says RESEARCH HELP. Once you are viewing your ancestor, click under Research Help on Search Records. This will automatically open another window, use the information provided on your ancestor’s person page, and bring up any records that match your ancestor. Then you will be able to click on the blue name and see your ancestor on actual records.
Continued next week….
For more information, contact Shanna Jones shannasjones@msn.com (435) 628-4900.