Month: January 2021

1938 Aerial Photograph of My Grandparents’ Farm

It took some doing to find this 1938 aerial photograph of my grandparents’ farm in Hancock County, Illinois. The original images are located at the University of Illinois Map and Geography Library (https://clearinghouse.isgs.illinois.edu/webdocs/ilhap/county/). That web page was located via a Google search for historical aerial photographs of Hancock County, Illinois. When using the overview of […]

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How Do I Know?

It’s often referred to as “correlation and analysis” in genealogical methods courses, but a certain aspect of it is fairly simple: Is this record really my people? When genealogists gather records, saving them in an organized fashion is crucial. How can you later find it otherwise? It is also important to capture enough information about […]

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It’s Wrong…But Why?

Genealogists often lament errors in census records. I’m not certain census records contain any more errors than any other record where there’s not really a punishment for providing incorrect information. The errors are easier to notice and remember because virtually every American researching their ancestry in the US before 1940 has a census enumeration on […]

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