G2G: What are your best searching tips?

Question

What are your best searching techniques, both in general and also those specific to particular databases (Family Search, Ancestry, FindMyPast, The National Archives), etc.?

My knowledge is spotty and I can be an experienced user of one website/repository (or just one of their features) and a complete beginner with another one.

What have you learned over time that you wish you had learned sooner?

Comments

Location, Location, Location.... I could not find information about my 3rd great grandfather.  I knew where my 2nd great grandfather's birth location per his obiturary and census records pointed.  i made an assumption the township was in one county, but when I learned there were more than one township in ohio named Bloomfield in the early 1800s I changed location and it made all the difference.  I found marriage records and census details to coraborate Knox county not Trumbull county.  It is now part of Morrow county based on when that newer county was formed.

Answer 1

For Italy, you must know that the Antenati and FamilySearch databases are not identical, they overlap in parts but not as a whole.

Antenati has civil records for the most part, those indexed can be find through FamilySearch too, but not those that are not indexed yet. Marriage "processetti" (folder with the documentation they had to present prior to getting married) are specially useful though not indexed. Many times they have info about the parents of the groom and bride, previous marriages of one or both of them and children born before the marriage that are not reflected in the marriage record itself.

On the other hand, if you search in FamilySearch through the "Catalogue" for a certain city/town/place in Italy, you may get lucky and find Catholic Church records, not available elsewhere. Also some census records. Neither are indexed for the most part, but it's better than nothing. usually they're very easy to read.

A general tip for research, since my family has branches in many countries (and languages), when I get stuck or blocked or confused with one, I jump to another for a while, then when I come back to the first one after a while I recheck all the info I have and many times I immediately notice a detail that leads to new discoveries, something that I may have overlooked earlier because my brain was too tired or overloaded with data and just going around in circles.

Also something that has helped me a lot with research (specially in Europe with all its dramatic geopolitical changes in the past centuries) is to learn a bit about the history of the particular town or place I'm researching (through Wikipedia usually - sometimes the names of the places change over time) and to check historical maps like the ones you can find here: https://maps.arcanum.com/en. The overlapping feature between the historical map and the modern GoogleMaps area is awesome!

I hope this helps!

Comments

Grazie Cristina! I’ve been using the FamilySearch catalog for vital records (only reason I have some information on the Italian side of my family) but had no idea they had some census records for Italy. I’ll have to find them. And I didn’t know Arcanum. 

Answer 2

When I cannot find a subject in a database, I try lateral searches on known siblings which often results in extra information on the family in general which in turn might assist you to locate the subject.

I rarely type the name in full and often truncate using *.

Another tip is to use just the forename OR surname and place of birth. Bit long winded but often works if the subject has been horrifically mistranscribed as is sadly often the case.

Comments

Thanks, Pippa. This is exactly the kind of information I am looking for. 

Answer 3

There are heaps of videos on Youtube covering all aspects of geneology.

Family Search videos:

https://www.youtube.com/@familysearch/videos

RootsTech 2023 | Research 101:  Tools and Techniques for Beginning Genealogists:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i461VO_RXPk

A Researcher's Golden Ticket: Using the Research Wiki:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPbBxcsQGQs

Google Tools for Genealogy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8M49R5CmV8

Researching Archives and Finding Elusive Records in FamilySearch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn2VY-wSfkw

Getting the Most Out of Find a Grave

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlZbXzngsFI

Many of these videos take you through the best process to search on various sites. Lots of small hints that can make thing easier.

Comments

Thanks for the links, Rich. This will take some time to get through. 

Answer 4

Search by collection in FamilySearch. For example, maybe you have a profile for a person there who only has two US census records, but not the others in their lifetime. Many times you can go find that collection and search for them in the census record specifically, and find it. Then you can attach to their profile. The "search records" function doesn't always find everything, so try it from all angles.

Comments

I didn’t realize that the “Search records” function did not include all searchable records. Good tip!

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I think it is not a problem of the "Search" engine itself but the way records are indexed. Sometimes the names were misspelled in the original record (specially for migrant persons) or misread for indexing (specially now that they're using bots for indexing) but when you see it in context (say, a census records for the right location with the other family members listed too) it becomes easily recognizable.

Answer 5

It's not "research" per see, but if I contact an older relative, I'll often ask if they have any family photos that they'd be willing to share? It often will help give you a clue, as to where ancestors ay have come fro, & if your extremely lucky someone may have on the back, names, locations, dated, etc.It's worked for me a couple of times, they've dragged out old pics. that their parents or G'parents have had & lo & behold there was ib=nfo. written on the back. Not sure if this is what you wanted or meant. Jack

Comments

Thanks Jack, I like that the tips that are coming in are so different from each other. :)

Answer 6

One thing I find useful if it's hard to find information about an early profile because of surname spelling differences (stop me if I've told you already!), on archive.org, british history online etc, is to search for the place name, especially useful if they came from a small place. Not so useful if all you have is London. :)

Comments

You did tell me about archive.org and I've been using and finding lots of good stuff. British History online I started using only recently and I've only scratched the surface. 

Answer 7

Make sure you search using all the variations of the surname

Check surrounding Counties and  States  , as they were changing their boundaries  

If you know of any Family members information, search them , families tended to stay close together      

Search wife, if known.

If you can't find them in census, try tax lists, probate records and cemeteries, to locate where they were.

Comments

Ah, yes, those shifting county boundaries I keep forgetting about… 

Answer 8

Often one of the best tactics is to Google Search for a name, location and approximate dates especially if you don't know a lot about the person.

I fell into a very deep rabbit hole 2 days ago, ancestors and descendants, of a 2nd great-grandfather of the wife of a 2nd cousin 2x removed.

Some of the family emigrated from Scotland to America and Canada in the early 1800s.

A google search of the family name and locations provided a lot of names and dates.

Now that I have that information, I can search various databases for records that will confirm or maybe not the connections between the family members.

This is actually how I started family history research 20 years ago. I knew nothing about the 2x GGPs of a family branch.

I didn't know anything about how to do the research, the results gave me a start point. And it worked then and is still a useful tactic.

Comments

In FS you can search by Place. If you know the place that the record is likely registered at, the date range, and use some wildcards (*) in the names, sometimes you get lucky. Just found a surname spelled Fynd when the family name is Friend.

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Thank you both