Do you have a favorite ancestor?
A favourite ancestor would have to be my 4-greats-Grandmother. She was a musician, a composer (even if some male claimed her work as his own and got away with it), and she has the most glorious name — Tempest.
Do you have a favorite discovery?
A current favourite discovery (these do tend to change the more research is done, the more problems get solved) is also a brick wall breakthrough. My Scottish great-great-Grandfather's brother died rather horrendously. He (the brother) and his wife had had two sons, both of whom vanished from Australian records until the younger one was "discovered" years later in Queensland with his uncles. (Well, we knew he was there, but there was this huge gap in records between infancy in New South Wales, and adulthood in Queensland.) The older one had been thought to have died young, because of the no records thing. Some while ago I found non-Australian records for the younger son and the mother, but not the older son, pretty much reinforcing the idea that he had died in infancy. None of the cousins had any record of him, either, so we noted that he most likely died at, or soon after, birth and only one registration for him was made.
Recently, while looking for something else, I found a death registration in England that simply jumped up and yelled at me "Here I am! Here I am!" — and what genealogist can resist such a siren call? I looked at it, bookmarked it, then went on with what I was doing. Came back to it later, looked at it again, thought about it some, made some notes in my text file, and went on with what I was doing. Much later came back to it again, looked at it, analysed it as coldly as I could, thought about it, then applied to purchase the certificate. (Anyone researching using the GRO knows just how little information is actually given on the results of a search. There's just not much at all to say "this is THE one".) I then waited as patiently as possible for the email to tell me my order had been processed and my pdf copy of the death certificate was now available. Brick wall down — this young boy was my long-lost, thought to have died an infant, cousin. He had, indeed, died young, just aged 6-years, not 0, and in England, not Australia. His story now has a proper ending, not a speculative one.
What is your toughest brick wall currently?
I'd have to say the end of my Paul line, because the name is just too common, and too little is known of that end of the family. All the other "dead ends" I have are just temporary stops along the way. When I find I am going in circles, I stop working on that particular thing, and pick up something else. Take a break and get some "fresh air", as it were.
How long have you been on WikiTree?
I've been on WikiTree since 2018. I had done my usual random internet search for my ancestors, to see what people had for them (and to see how correct they were), and found my Paul line was here, fairly well documented from the Doctor up, but with a few things that needed tweaking. So, I messaged the then manager of whichever profile it was, offered my information, and any corrections, and it just went from there. It wasn't long before I actually signed up for an account, eventually getting the Wiki Genealogist badge.
What do you spend the most time doing on WikiTree?
I probably spend more time researching than doing, because without the research how can you verify what you do? I like to be as accurate as possible (hence the ongoing search, off and on, for that missing cousin mentioned earlier), and you cannot be accurate without proper sources to support your statements. It's all well and good to say "so-and-so is the child of this-person and that-person", but if you cannot support that with documents, how can it be trusted? I work on somewhat obscure Notables, too. I enjoy creating profiles for people who have made an impression on me, even if they are no longer as well-known as they once were. The absolutely brilliant Black American pianist Gene Rodgers, for example, blew me away with his playing in some old movie I was watching, so I looked him up. He was on Wikipedia, but was not on WikiTree. Now he is (and he was my first "from scratch" USBH profile, too). Nora Lane (Schilling-1876) is another, Gabby Hayes (Hayes-20962), Wild Bill Elliott (Nance-2994), David Rappaport (Rappaport-121), William Sampson Jr, (Sampson-5017), Ross Martin (Rosenblatt-205), Allan "Rocky" Lane (Albershart-3), and so on. More recently I've been working on Notable Australians, particularly Notable Australian WOMEN. (There was a G2G post (https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1581689/notables-gender-bias-among-others) about the imbalance in profiles, more Americans than non-Americans, and more males than females, so I just had to do my little part in addressing the issue!)
