What makes a "Good Search" on Ancestry
What makes a "Good Search" on Ancestry?
by Geoffrey Slinker, Ancestry Employee
The postings on this site are my own and do not reflect the views or opinions of Ancestry.
The postings on this site are my own and do not reflect the views or opinions of Ancestry.
The audience of this post is those that are new to searching, inexperienced, and those just learning.
If you have tried to find something and you didn't find what you are looking for have you considered:
- Do you know what you are looking for?
- Information of someone that is completely unknown, such as, I have no information about my great grandfather and I would like to find out his name.
- Information about someone that you know something about, such as, I know my great grandfather's name, but I don't know when he was born.
- Do you know where you are looking? What does this mean? Do you understand that when you are searching "Historical Records" you are looking for a "piece of paper" that has information on it matching your search?
- Are you searching for your self? Searching for living persons is very restrictive and if you are "testing" Ancestry to see if it has your correct information that is not necessarily what Ancestry is about. Ancestry has collections of historical and public documents. You may find yourself in a Yearbook, but because of local privacy laws you may not be able to find your birth records.
I have "no" information
If you really do not have any information then you have nothing you can type into the "search form".
If you don't have anything to type in to the search form then you really can't do a search.
You are going to have to gather some information from some source. This post isn't about such a task, but you need to talk to people that might have information and gather a time frame and a location and something that is distinguishing. Distinguishing means that you learned that the person was a farmer, or the person went to jail for bank robbery, or the person was a fireman or a war hero.
But, if the situation is that you are looking for your great grandfather and you have no information, not even his name, then you have to pause and take account of what you do know. You know you are a grand child, and you know your parent is a child. See, you know something. You might know where your parent was born or you might know someone that could know. If you can find where your parent was born then you can start searching with that information.
When you have some information then you can start.
I have "some" information
When you have some information you can start to search. I personally like to start this type of search in "Family Trees". Why? Because a person in a family tree is the result of the compilation of information that is "linked" together by family relations. This information might be accurate and if you look to see if historical records are attached to results that you find those attached records can guide you and give you confidence.
Briefly why "Historical Records" are tricky when I only have "some" information. First, remember searching historical records is looking for a piece of paper somewhere in an archive, or a repository. Searching for a piece of paper that has a death year set to "Exact" 1910 means that the search will only find pieces of paper that have a death year of 1910 somewhere on the paper. Guess what, birth records usually do not have death information on them, so by selecting "exact" you just excluded all records that do not have death information. Did you realize that? That means birth records, marriage records, census records, draft records, and many other types of records will not be found.
When you are looking for anything in general do not use "exact" searches on historical records and lean on "Family Trees" also known as tree search.
I am going to make up an example to walk you through this. If this person is your relative please forgive me, but I am going to suppose that this person doesn't have anyone they can talk to.
The person is Stephen Works. Stephen knows that his father died in WWII on D-Day and he never knew his father. Here is a start:
Notice I have not selected anything exact. I do not want to only include records that have death information, but I want death information to be used if it is found on any record.
There are two possible candidates found that died on or near D-Day. Elton Works and Bernard Works.
Stephen knows that his parents hadn't been married very long. So, Stephen searches for a marriage date really close to his birth year and adds his name as a child. Nothing is checked exact because Stephen does not want to limit the search to only birth records or marriage records.
Stephen did not specify a given name of Bernard, he just searched for the surname Works. Stephen finds a record for "Bernard Works, married on 19 Sep 1942 in Cazenovia, New York.
Stephen switches the search to "Family Trees".
Stephen finds Bernard again. Could this be his father? One of the trees has this information:
Stephen now has information and is looking for additional information.
Also, you may have noticed that I choose someone that is dead, Stephen Robert Works died in 2007. I did not want to be searching for information on a living person for privacy concerns. However, I have performed this exercise not knowing that I would find information that wasn't already available in a public member tree, which is the marriage record found above.
I am looking for additional information
Stephen has an idea that Bernard Works is his father and maybe Congetta Pullmain is his mother. Stephen would like to find a marriage record and birth record.
Following the link in the family tree result for Congetta...
And looking at the marriage information we find a record that shows her name to be Congette Pullman Works, that she is a widow and that her previous husband died June 10, 1944.
Notice that Congette was born in Cazenovia New York. That is where Bernard Works was married!
The death of Bernard has an attachment from "Find A Grave".
Pvt. Bernard J.Works was killed in action in France during the invasion of Normandy a War Department telegram in forms his wife the former Congetta Pullman. Surviving besides his wife Congetta,is a son Stephen. Also he is survived by his parents Claude and Mary (O'Neill) Works, three sisters, Miss Agnes Works, Miss Sarah J. Works, and Miss Mildred Works; one brother Seaman 2/c Robert Works now at Sampson.
He resided at 305 Ballantyne Road, with his wife,son and parents.
6-30-1947
Pvt Bernard J. Works 32 846 898
Plot G, Row 8, Grave 152
St. Laurent, France. Remains have since been returned to St. Mary's Cemetary, Syracuse, N.Y. December 10, 1947.
Stephen now has more information to research. He might have three aunts and an uncle! He knows that Congetta was known as Pullman and Pullmain in historical records and family trees.
How did we find what we have found so far?
- We had to start with something. Stephen knew that his father died on D-Day and that his parents were married shortly before.
- We kept the searches very general. We did not check "Exact".
- We looked in "Historical Records" and in "Family Trees".
- We leveraged other resources such as "Find A Grave" and found further information.
Use "Exact" Carefully and Sparingly to make a "Good Search"
Use "Exact" very carefully, especially when searching historical records.When you search for a record you are searching for a piece of paper that has been archived and you are searching for something to appear on that piece of paper.
Consider this search:
https://www.ancestry.com/search/?name=Glen_Slinker&birth=1900_kentucky-usa_20&death=1980_kentucky-usa_20&count=50&types=r
This is considered a "good" search for someone that is new to genealogy. Why is it good? Because nothing is marked exact and there is a name, some dates, a "Lived In" place, and the mother's name. A name, a birth date, a lived in place, and the mother's name makes the fundamental "good search". Why? Because many record types have the person's name, their mother's name, a birth date, and some place the person lived or was at least in. Birth records and Census records often have this information and are a good place to start.
Notice how many types of records were found with the search.
Now suppose you do not understand "Exact" and you think it only means, "I am sure about this date".
Did you expect that?
If you want to really search across all of the data, do not use "Exact". When you want to limit your searches to records that have birth information then check "Exact" for the birth information. I recommend that you use "Expansions" for the birth date and place so that you do not narrow the search so much that you miss records that have inaccurate or broader information.
This search will find results in Kentucky records as well as the neighboring states. Keep your searches as broad as possible. If there is a record in Kansas this search would not find it.
Conclusion
Global search is the default search page you find at Ancestry. It searches across all of the data.
What makes a "good search" at the global level?
- A name of the person, the given or surname. Do not make it exact to begin with.
- A birth year. Not exact.
- A lived in place. Not exact.
- Mother's given name. Not exact.
That is the minimum for a good starting search. Why is it a good minimum starting search? Because many records have the persons' name, birth date, and mother's name.
Which things make a search better?
- Names of relations. This is the most important thing in many historical records. The more names the better.
- A place to narrow down from the entire world.
- A date to narrow down a time frame.
Names are the key. If you look at your family tree and just take the given names of your ancestors within a few generations your name sequence will be very unique.
Abraham -> Thomas -> Abraham -> John -> Mordicai
I wonder who that is?
I wonder who that is?
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