I forgot to add a question. I have noticed on the Ancestry site that when I get a death record listing where the person died...hospital as an example. Sometimes the discription field is not listed. I have been leaving it to was it is and not changing it. But, I agree with you that it should be city/county/state/country and in the comments area that they died at such and such hospital and other data. Is it a hitch in the system or just save the data and then go into the profile and enter in the data in the comments area?

You've got it. When a description field is not available, use the comments field or notes for the additional details about a location more specific than the town/city level.

There is no consistency in good genealogical research if it comes to church book records and locations. If you are a good genealogical researcher you should know that you can't change history. Our ancestors did not live in 2022 but many years before and our descendant in 2050 have no right to change your birth place to the place it maybe in their living time.

@@lenayarker2008 I posted the original answer seven years ago. Since then I have learned to translate places to their current descriptions, but to keep that offline (Excel). I keep the original descriptions as found in the data.

In my own tree, I enter everything in English. But, that is a personal preference. (~Crista)

@@AncestryUStotally agree re. dates. Please see my question about foreign place names. 😊

JudyIn Ocala I was going to post about this too because when I want to attached a record to someone's wife "Mary" and I have to pick from a list, I have no idea which Mary it is! So I started doing the same thing you are doing. I also want to know if there is a better way.

I have seen and // in peoples name field. I know it is easy to do that so that from a list of names you can find the person. However, when the system comes and looks at this person, having () or or // in the name field, the system does not recognize that and searches for the husband's surname. You do not find the records you want to find. But, if your big reason is so that you can find the right person in a list. Ok, whatever floats your boat. I'd rather have the system work for me then me for the system.

+Matthew Donovan As you attach records and create source citations each of those name variations are documented and accounted for. However, I usually come to some genealogical conclusion based my analysis of all of the evidence, regarding the name of an individual. That is then entered as their name with all variants, nicknames, titles, etc., included in source citations and research notes. (Crista)

+Matthew Bode Thanks for the clarification, Matthew. I have created a custom fact in Family Tree Maker that has transferred over into my online tree. I also use the "Also Known As" fact. (Crista)

+Matthew Donovan Typically, if it is just a spelling variation and not an actual name change, I will pick one spelling and stick with it throughout my tree, making notes of variations in a notebook for research purposes. If it is an actual name change, you can use the AKA fact (and attach a date regarding when the name changed).

I'm trying to figure out the best way to capture people who Americanized their name when coming to this country (e.g. Rochle Mere = Rachel Mary). Currently, I've been using both names in the name field because I want to search feature to pick up the variations, but as I'm getting ready to put everything into rootsmagic I'm wanting to clean things up a bit. If we're to "pick" one name, would you go with the birth name or the name they used at the end of their life? Does it make a difference at what age they made this change/how many years they used one name vs. the other?

Personally, I omit the word county if I know the city/town name. If I don't know the specific location and am entering just the county, I include the word. Hope that makes sense. (~Crista)

I think I get it lol. For me I always put it in because of places that have a town with the same name as the county, I'm not as good with geography as I used to be. For me I find it easier so when I'm quickly glancing at a person I don't have to wonder if Essex Massachusetts is the town of Essex or the county of Essex for example.

My choice is that, where possible, I use the name they were born with. Then, I add an AKA fact when the changed names throughout their life because that can usually be tied to a specific date or event - like when her parents married, for example. Make sense?

Ancestry Yes, thank you!

Those are generation numbers so you can keep track of where you are. Usually, in the Silver Books, the men are not listed with a surname because it doesn't change. The women are listed by surname because their name changes once they get married. Every compiled family history will handle the numbering a little differently. So, you will always need to read the first several pages of the first volume to understand how they are arranged. But, I happen to be very familiar with the Silver Books so here is what your example means: 1. John Alden (he is the Mayflower passenger) 2. His daughter, Elizabeth Alden who married a Paboodie 3. Their daughter, Elizabeth Paboodie who married a Rogers 4. Their daughter, Hannah Rogers who married a Bradford 5. Their daughter Hannah Bradford who is the 377th person listed in this particular volume and who this specific entry is about. Hope that helps! (~Crista)

If you have the name of the city then it would be City, County, State, Country (withOUT the word County). If you do NOT know the name of the city or if the event took place outside of a particular city limit then you would enter then name of the county with the word "County" and list it as County, State, Country. Hope that helps!

@@CristaCowan Yes, that is very helpful. Thank you for the clarification.

+Karl Restall That's what I use the NOTES fields for. (Crista)

+Ancestry But...search doesn't use data from those fields! Searches will not pick up on those additional names.

+Karl Restall Keep in mind that doing auto searches from your tree is (like hints and suggested records) meant to be a small PART of the research process. I would hope that you are still crafting your own searches in specific categories and databases to surface the records you need. If you are doing actual research instead of just "searches," you can account for all of those variants. This video explains in more detail: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/hMqCl66Xm8yRaZs.html

+Ancestry Actually, I'm not referring to searches for source materials...I'm referring to searches for people meeting some criteria ON MY OWN TREE. And, I certainly don't understand what you mean by "if you are doing actual research instead of just "searches" you can account for all of those variants." This implies that none of what is done is actual research when you are casting a net with a search. Untrue. Yes, research also involves the critical evaluation of material found...but searching FINDS the material, thus it is a necessary part of research. Look, my comment was clearly focused on suggesting you increase the field length of the description field to allow for more information to be contained therein. Putting notes in the Notes field is fine, but then you don't have the convenience of them being associated with specific events. I'M SUGGESTING you look at how the system works and how to improve it. Don't do it if you don't want to...

I still use five underscores in both my Ancestry online tree and synced with Family Tree Maker and have no problems at all with searching.

+Karl Restall When you do a search from the tree, it includes both maiden names as entered and married names, when a spouse (or spouses) is attached.

+Ancestry Ummm, perhaps on the FTM...but it does not work in the tree online. I tried my wife's first name with my last - NO GO. I tried her first with her maiden - SCORE. This could be fixed, I'm certain. Now, for a twist...to ensure my tree, which now exceeds 10K people, does not grow even more, I don't include the families of those who married into the bloodlines. This would affect the search function if the married woman had previous marriages before marrying into the family ...the search would not function unless I also added her previous husbands to my tree. Now, I could add additional name fields to her profile to show her previous married names, but the search and hint functions don't use the alternate name or aka fields, either.

+Karl Restall Most desktop genealogical software (including FTM) offers an option to make a universal change for a location. So, if, for example, California were to decide to become two separate states, I would be able to, very simply, make a universal change in my database that reflects the newly named states as the locations for the events that occurred there. (Crista)

+Ancestry Perhaps the desktop versions allow for a universal change of location names...but if you are doing your work online, many of these functions are not available. Perhaps, they should be?

Just put in the county.

His given name is Richard. I would enter that in the given name field. He has no surname so leave that field blank. Enter a title fact, you can date it based upon his coronation date, that reads King of England.

What I do with royalty/nobility is enter the name of their house, which is basically a surname. For example, James IV House of Stewart. Richard I was of the House of Plantagenet (and was born post-1066, by the way).

Karen Bellamy I have the sound only coming from the left earphone, so there is some problem there but you should be able to have sound.

TheQuetzalcoatl No I have no sound. And I am listening on a PC with speakers. The previous video had sound issues also so I think it must ba a tech issue in loading it into KZfaq.

No problem here.

Hey Robert. Thanks for calling by to check out this video from our archives. We're delighted to see your interest in family history and would be pleased to help in anyway we can. Please note that this video is quite dated now so is no longer monitored by Crista should you be looking for an answer to a specific question. Nevertheless, we would be happy to help you in anyway we can should you like to get back in touch with any particular query for our team. Alternatively, you can head over to our FB page to check out our extensive back catalog of amazing videos on all things genealogical. This is also where you can find our regular Q & A events which take place with Crista should you be interested in taking part in such an event in the future : facebook.com/AncestryUS/videos/?ref=page_internal . Thanks again and we wish you all the very best in your research project! 🌳

Hey there, Don, thanks for getting in touch! You can add family members to people in your tree even if there isn't a marriage connection. Please do check out this support guide with all of the information to show you how to do this: support.ancestry.com/s/article/Fixing-Relationships-in-Trees. We hope this will help but you can of course reach out if you need more help!

@@AncestryUS thanks! I found what I was looking for with "unmarried parents" classifications.

That's great to hear, Don. We're delighted that you've found what you were looking for. Enjoy your research! 😊🌳

Thanks for the perspective, Victor. I still use Family Tree Maker and sync it with my Ancestry Online Tree. One of the features of Family Tree Maker is that I can make universal changes to places. So, it doesn't matter if I need to update one place or 10,000. It takes the same amount of time and effort. So, I will continue to do it the way I have outlined. You are welcome to do it your way. My only super strong feelings about the matter are that whichever way you choose to do it, be consistent in your tree. (~Crista)

@@AncestryUS Another reason I like to use historical records rather than current records is that in my family most of my ancestors on my mother's side are from farms in Norway. Often, I can easily find the historical farm name with some specificity, but I have only a vague idea of where it actually was. The historical records are usually very clear about farms, what local parish they were in, and what parish the local parish was in. Sometimes a municipality is listed as well, but usually not. I was originally going to comment about the maiden name comment in the video because maiden names normally refer to family names used at birth. In Norway before 1923 and in Iceland currently, people don't have family names. But then I decided the real message in the video was to use whatever the name was at birth, and that's possible with or without a family name. That's what I do. One issue with Norwegian names on shared genealogy platforms is that there is not a consistent way to do it. A name is typically one or more given names, a patronymic, and a farm name. Rarely, there is also a family name. Some people put the patronymic in the surname field. Some put it in the given name field. Still others use one of the supplemental fields for this. Same with farm name. At some point, people adopted family names, since that became law in Norway in 1923. Some used the patronymic. Some used the farm name. Others used something else. Unfortunately, the GEDCOM data structure (maybe it will be fixed in version 6) doesn't facilitate this sort of name. So inconsistency is rampant. As far as Ancestry is concerned, it makes certain assumptions about surname that don't apply at all, and I think it affects some of the website features, like DNA Circles. I have only 3 DNA circles. My daughter has 15. The difference, 12, is from her mother's side, obviously. To my point, my daughter has more DNA matches whose common ancestors are known, through my side than through her mother's side. There are common ancestors whom I know the connections via other trees on the website that have 6 or more descendants in various trees. Yet for some reason Ancestry doesn't make a DNA circle. Why? I think it's related to this surname inconsistency. And I think that is the point made in the video. Consistency helps out these algorithms. But what if the underlying data is not consistent, i.e., father and son have different surnames. The algorithms should be able to handle that.

Thank you for the feedback, Victor. I will be sure to pass that along to the appropriate people.

I consistently record CURRENT locations in the location field on my online family tree for all events. This allows the mapping software to assign the latitude and longitude coordinates for where that location is on a map. This also allows my family members who are not as geographically sophisticated or knowledgeable to know WHERE an event occurred should they want to visit that place. I then ALSO record the historic location in the description field for that event and/or my notes for that person. This way I know how the geo-political boundaries may have changed over time and what other places I may need to look for additional records for that person. It works for me. It works for my family. It works with the technology available today. And, it provides me with context for the historic and current locations.

I'm not. But, we are in the middle of a big rebranding of my show and it will include guests from time to time. ;-) (~Crista)

We're sorry to hear this, Jennifer. We have much more recent videos available too that you might find more interesting or helpful. Crista Cowan does regular live presentations on our Facebook page and you can catch up on all the recordings there. 🙂