Calling all
Genea-Musings Fans:
It's Saturday Night again -
time for some
more Genealogy Fun!!
Our assignment from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing:
1) Do you use Timelines to help you in your
research? Create a Timeline (a chronological list with dates and events)
for one of your ancestors that includes their parents, siblings, spouse(s) and
children. Tell us how you did it, and show us your work.
2) Put it in your own blog
post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook post. Please leave a
link in a comment to this post.
I use RootsMagic as my genealogy software program and there
are two ways to show a timeline. The first is to create a report from Reports
> Lists > Timelines. One can make an individual timeline or one from
people in a list. I’m not sure how to create a list of people, so here is the
individual timeline for Honora (Gleeson) Douras.
There is not much in her timeline—only birth, marriage, and
death information plus the five Canadian census records she appears with her
husband, James. This timeline is only as good as the records I have entered as
events.
There is another way to see a timeline and that is the timeline view in RootsMagic. Here, I can change options to show more people who interacted with her such as her children, siblings, and parents. I have selected children only, and there are now more events listed such as birth and death events of her children and husband.
Adding More to the Story
After watching a webinar today given by Michael D. Lacopo
for the Sonoma County Genealogical Society called “Telling Their Story: Adding
Character to Your Genealogical Narrative,” I need to do some social history
research about the Gleeson and Tierney families who immigrated from County
Tipperary to Upper Canada in the 1820-30s and settled in Carleton County near
the towns of Goulbourne and Richmond.
He said our ancestor’s stories need to be more than B-M-D
(birth, marriage, and death). Unfortunately, that is about all I know about my 2x-great-grandfather’s
sister, Honora and her family. After doing a little internet browsing, I have found some sources I could add to a research
plan:
Library and Archives of Canada (https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/genealogy/places/Pages/ontario.aspx) specifically the Ontario Genealogy Resources.
FamilySearch Wiki page for Carleton County, Ontario Genealogy. I spent yesterday downloading the death index pages, as well as the death records for some Gleeson and Tierney relatives.
Carleton County Pioneer History (https://www.ontariogenealogy.com/carletoncountyancestors.html). This website looks promising, having some stories and recollections of times gone by. There are also newspaper indexes, probate file indexes, and historic maps and photos. I might find some background information about the place in which they lived.
Carleton County Gen Web (http://sites.rootsweb.com/~oncarlet/index.html). Though this site is looking for a host, there are some good resources, specifically some book titles on the history of the area.
Ontario Genealogy Records Online (http://www.genealogysearch.org/canada/ontario.html). There is a page about Irish immigration in 1823 from Cork that might be useful: http://obrienr.idirect.com/cork1823.html. There are listings for church records in Carleton County.
Bytown or Bust (http://www.bytown.net/). This website is devoted to the settlement of the Ottawa area of Ontario and the Gatineau area of Quebec during the 1800s. This should have some background information about Irish and French immigrants to the area.
Ottawa Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society, (https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/). I think most of the good stuff is behind the member wall.
The above should be a great start to help me add "meat to the
bones" of James Douras and Honora Gleeson and tell more of their story besides
BMD. What are you doing to add to your ancestor’s timeline and story?
Great idea to include all those resources...I was born and raised in Ottawa, so know that area well :)
ReplyDeleteGreat! I want to visit someday and hope to get in some research, too.
DeleteI have made my own timelines! With many relatives that share names, sometimes in the same generation (all the sons like to name one of their sons after the mutual grandfather), a timeline helps me attribute which marriage belongs to which cousin, which child belongs to which family, and (whoops, this week) confusing fathers and sons with the same name and fuzzy birthdays.
ReplyDeleteTimelines are so helpful and one of the best tools a genealogist can use.
DeleteI like that you showed the single person timeline and the ability to add more people to it. Timelines are a great way to expand our knowledge about an ancestor's life - love that you pointed out other places to fill in more details.
ReplyDeleteThanks. If it hadn't been for listening to Michael, I probably wouldn't have thought about what to do to expand on her life.
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