A LOOK AT RELATIVE FINDER FROM FAMILYSEARCH

Back around Thanksgiving fellow genealogist Dave Robison shared on Facebook a link to a feature from  FamilySearch.com  called Relative Finder. I filed the bookmark on my browser but didn't get around to checking it out until the past weekend

You'll need a free FamilySearch account and then upload your own family tree to the FamilySearch site. Then when you log into the Relative Finder page it will take your tree's information and compare it with information from others to determine how you may be related to famous people. These are divided up into Groups as seen in this list:

I spent some time exploring some of Categories. In Authors and Poets I saw some I already knew are distant cousins, such as John Greenleaf Whittier and Laura Ingalls Wilder. But I was surprised when I looked at the "Famous Americans" to see the name Massasoit Osamequin  at the top of the list. Massasoit was the Native American who helped the Plymouth colonists when they first arrived. According to the website, Massasoit was my 12th great uncle. I clicked on his name to see exactly how we were supposedly related:

The chart shows Massasoit as being the uncle of a Native American woman named Oguina Quadequina, the wife of my 10x great grandfather Gabriel Whelden/Weldon.

This differs from my information, which is that Gabriel's wife was name Margaret whose maiden name was unknown. I checked out the tree of the person who has Gabriel's wife as Oguina and I didn't find any source or citation, so for the moment I am sticking with what I have in my own database.

While this is interesting and fun to look at,  I will need to check all of these out one by one and look for documents and records that will substantiate the relationships. I'll put off starting that until 2019.

MY MORMON PIONEER RELATIVES

Back in July I received an email from FamilySearch telling me Pioneer Ancestors, by which they
meant Mormon pioneers. There was a link directing me to a webpage where I discovered 15 names
and the pioneer companies in which they journeyed west. I meant to do a blogpost about them back
in July, but then my old laptop began to die and the blogpost was forgotten while I purchased and
set up my new notebook computer.  

The other day I was going through older emails and found that pioneers email once more. Strictly
speaking, these 15 people are distant cousins. I recognized some familiar family names (Abbott, Bartlett,
Willard and York) but the rest are unfamiliar. None of them were already in my database, Still, it's
interesting to find out I have Mormon relatives.

Here's the list. Are any of them your relatives too, or did your ancestors travel west in the same companies? 

Brigham Young Company
Clarissa Alger 1830–1907
John Alger 1820–1897
Fanny Cummings 1835–1908

Daniel Spencer/Ira Eldredge Company
Benjamin Franklin Cummings 1821–1899
Alva Cummings  1832–1917
Rufus Abbott 1784–1879

William Snow/Joseph Young Company
Asa Bartlett York 1832–1920
Julia Ann York 1833–1931
Martha Eliza York 1849–1931
William Aaron Carter 1848–1926

Philip De La Mare Company
Alonzo Harrington LeBaron 1818–1891

John Wood Company
Ezra Carter Chase 1833–1903

James W. Cummings Company
James Willard Cummings 1819–1883

George A. Smith/Dan Jones Company
Martha Ann Appleby 1834–1855

Company Unknown
Samuel Brown 1801–1882

MORE BIG NEWS FROM ROOTSTECH!

Another big announcement from Salt Lake City: Findmypast and FamilySearch are teaming
up to put 100 million U.S. marriage records online.

Here's part of the press release from earlier this morning:

FINDMYPAST ANNOUNCES LARGEST ONLINE COLLECTION OF U.S. MARRIAGES FROM 1650-2010
100 MILLION RECORDS, 450 MILLION+ NAMES

Salt Lake City: 4 February 2016
Time: 7am MT, 9am EST, 2pm GM


Leading family history company, Findmypast , announced today at RootsTech that, in partnership with FamilySearch International, it will launch the single largest online collection of U.S. marriages in history.

Covering 360 years of marriages from 1650-2010, when complete this landmark collection will contain at least 100 million records and more than 450 million names from 2,800 counties across America.  More than 60 per cent of these marriage records have never before been published online.  When complete, this collection will only be found in its entirety exclusively on Findmypast.
 
To kick start the collection, Findmypast has launched the first 33 million records of this ambitious project today and is offering them to the public for free from now until 15 February.  The records include marriage date, bride and groom names, birthplace, birth date, age, residence as well as fathers’ and mothers’ names. Customers with family trees on Findmypast will benefit from leads connecting relatives on their trees with the marriage records, thus generating a whole new source of research.

CH-CH-CH-CHANGES IN THE ONLINE GENEALOGY LANDSCAPE

I was doing my genealogy online tree building routine last night at Ancestry.com
last night. Right now that involves adding data from the Florence O'Connor
Ellingwood genealogy book and checking the Ancestry records and trees
for additional descendants. I try to source as much as possible so I cross
reference each name at FamilySearch Record Search and add the records 
I find there to my Ancestry tree.

Sometime last night this appeared on my screen when I clicked my Record
Search link.:

August 23: Last Day for Record Search Pilot!

Record Search Pilot will be replaced by FamilySearch.org

Thank you! Record Search Pilot has been a great success. Your feedback 
led to the first phase of an improved search experience on FamilySearch.org. 
Look for more of your ideas to be implemented in the coming months.
Why is Record Search Pilot ending? The Pilot website was never intended
to be permanent—it was a place to gather and test ideas. It was never designed
to handle more records, more features, or more visitors. In order to fully
implement improvements, we need to end the Pilot and shift resources to
our main website.

Now I know most people would wonder why I'd be unhappy about this.
After all, there's more records on FamilySearch.org. But I've found on
the times I've used the new site that it's not very user friendly. It takes
too long to narrow the search parameters down and it seems to me in
that respect to mirror the same process on Ancestry. I liked that all I had
to do in  most cases at Record Search was enter the name, place and
exact, partial or close (or all three) and I was good to go.  I also think
the green background on Record Search was easier on the eyes(well, mine
at least.) than the white background of FamilySearch.org



Then this morning I started seeing references on Facebook from my genealogy
friends to something called Fold3. It turned out that Footnote.com also
changed over night.It's now focusing on Military Records and changes at
the website now reflect that move  The menu that was formerly divided
into periods of American history now has war headings such as "Revolutionary
War" "War of 1812", "Mexican & Indian"and so on. The other records such
as newspapers and censuses are at the end of the menu bar under "Other
Collections". Now I am a Footnote..er...Fold3 subscriber and will be forever
grateful to it for all the Revolutionary War Pension files I found there of my
ancestors, but I must confess that trhis change has me confused. There is
quite a bit more there than just military records and the changes don't let
genealogy newbies know that very well.

And then there's the name, "Fold3".

This is what they say about it at the Footnote.com blog, now known as
"Fold3HQ" (why do I feel like I should be wearing a helmet and camos
reading that name?):

 Footnote Becomes Fold3
One change that won’t impact how things work, but is significant and will 
probably get a lot of attention, is the site’s new name.  Footnote has been 
a great name, but it doesn’t relate to military records and can carry a 
connotation of insignificance which doesn’t seem appropriate for a site 
focused on records related to the great sacrifices associated with military 

We wanted a name that would show respect for the records we are 
working on and for the people who have served in the armed forces.  
The name Fold3 comes from a traditional flag-folding ceremony in which
the third fold is made in honor and remembrance of veterans for their 
sacrifice in defending their country and promoting peace in the world.

Now my Dad participated in military funerals as a member and Commander of
the Abington VFW and I've never heard of "fold 3". Neither have others with
military backgrounds who commented about the change over on Facebook,.
As someone said(sorry, can't find the name again) it sounds like an origami
instruction. They could have picked a much better name, I think. Nor am I
happy as a historian and genealogist with the idea in their explanation
that footnotes are items of "insignificance"

All this comes on the heels of the Geni.com controversy of this past weekend
which has already been well covered by others. Randy Seaver over at his
Genea-musings blog has a list of blogposts on that subject. If I were a guy
who believed in conspiracies O'd wonder about that but it's possible that the
folks at FamilySearch and Foot...er....Fold3 were hoping to take advantage of
Geni.com uproar to announce their own changes with minimum flak.

To be fair, the FamilySearch move to close down Record Search has been
 known to bescheduled for some time now. Since Footnote.com was
bought byAncestry change had been expected there as well. Both companies
have every right to make whatever changes they want, even lamentably poor
name changes. It doesn't mean that I, geneafuddyduddy that I am, have to
immediately like them.

 I suppose in time I'll get used to the changes eventually.

And when I do, they'll change again....sigh.