Any thought to tracking where an individual lived at various points in there lives?

Question

I just finished reading about the BBC 2 TV show called "A House Through Time" which tracks the history of a specific residence.  If WikiTree's data structure could be set up to track an individual's residences through their lifetime, it would provide a greater understanding of who they were and possibly encourage cooperation between members in research even when there was no cross over in ancestry.  The data could range in coarseness from country of residence down to individual properties with time period of occupation.  If the data could flag ancestors who lived in a village in Wales within 10 years of 1750, there would be a connection and an opportunity to share research experiences.

If this idea has merit, I would be willing to volunteer in working towards its creation.

Patrick Donaghy

pdonaghy@rdmw.bc.ca

Comments

Not a new idea: RootsMagic allows you to do this. Any event in a person's life, including residence, can have a date attached to it.

Answer 1

If you put the census data/source on a person's profile, that will show you where s/he lived during their life.

Answer 2

Perhaps Patrick may be thinking along the lines of . . . If you have a brickwall, you may find some clues by looking at the people around them.  For example, when people emigrated to Canada, USA, or Australia (or elsewhere), you may be able to track their exact origin (village) by looking at the origins of those who live near them in the destination location.

People tend to migrate with or to near the same place as other relatives and neighbors.  (I write to you in the home country and tell you I don't have the problem we hated there and you follow.)

Answer 3

As a person who loves maps, and has lived in a lot of places I can tell you that I love this idea - also just fascinated by the way my family came together and how they came across from the east coast to the west - I have virtually no time for this, but hope a lot of folks jump on board and make this into some sort of thing- why do folks move? How do they choose where to go?  All this is really part of genealogy I would think!