Self Help

One reason to always cite your sources for any family information is to give yourself, or someone else, the best possible chance of locating that source again at a later time. You may need to look for more names you identified later, or you may need to recheck conflicting information that crops up.

Another reason to keep research logs and to cite your sources is that life gives you only a few windows of opportunity to trace your family tree. You may have to put away your genealogy for months, or even years, at a time. When you come back to this puzzle, it is nice not to have to start all over again. With completed research logs and your sources fully cited on your paper forms or in your computer files, you can pick up where you left off.

Always cite your sources, whether you use paper forms (ancestor charts and family group sheets) or a computer and a genealogy program. Your source citations tell where you found each piece of information about each person. In genealogy programs, you have the option to attach one or more images to each source citation. They also provide a field to type in (transcribe) all or part of the original source. This is where you type the person’s name exactly as it was spelled in that source. Most programs give you an additional field for your comments. Include such details as that source’s condition when you looked at it or whether the author is prone to err.

You can even buy special books that are designed to help your keep better source records. These books make excellent travel tools when you are on the road doing genealogy research. They don’t sound like exciting travel companions until you are standing in the family cemetery plot in Great Smoky Mountains National Park - worrying about bears, ticks, and chiggers and trying to remember what pieces of information to record. Use them as a checklist to determine what source details to record on your research log and copies.

Make it a habit - before you set foot in the cemetery, before you open the book at the library, and before you begin interviewing family - to always write down source details in your research log before you search, interview, or use that source. Once you get involved in the hunt, it is hard to slow down and go back to record your source details. Locate the source, cite the source, then search the source. After searching through that source and making copies, go back to your research log and check one more time to make certain you have recorded all the information pertinent to that source (and don’t forget to record your source details on your copies, too). Locate, then cite, then search.