Always Something

Funny how we all have certain assumptions when it comes to genealogy. We assume that if we’ve seen a name somewhere spelled a certain way, then that must be right. I can’t begin to remember how many times I have had to change/alter surnames in my genealogy. And some of those items I’ve had to change were done by individuals trying to do their best.

I have added some census images to Almeric Saurette and Guillaume Saurette’s pages. I also have updated the Drouin images under ‘deaths’ to reflect the latest images I have found. Seems like I always have something new to add or change of late. That’s okay, that is part of the fun. I’ve been having great correspondence lately with several people and said correspondence has taken me down paths I might not have bothered looking into. I think the excitement for me is chasing down things that have eluded others and knocking down those research walls. Keep the e-mails coming!

I continue to source information and merge duplicate people as I find them. Each time I upload my database to the site, it gets more and more accurate to reflect what I have been doing. If you have issues and/or problems with anything, just let me know so I may address them.

The Super Bowl is this weekend. I’m not really excited about either team. There’s always the commercials and the half-time show . . . . .

iPod touch and iPhone

I’m a tech person. I love gadgets and new technology. That said, I don’t always want the newest gadgets or fad devices for a variety of reasons. I have never owned any iPod anything – until now. I received the iPod touch this year as a gift. To say that I’m hooked would be an understatement. I have spent the past 4 days using it almost all the time. How does this relate to genealogy, you ask? It doesn’t, really.

The iPod touch is not going to be used by me to do new genealogy – it would take way too much time and be very hard on the eyes. I love how web sites render completely on the screen. If it is too small, then you can make it bigger. I got to wondering, though, if there was a way to optimize my genealogy site for the iPod touch and iPhone. Well, turns out there is. I spent this AM adding the capability to all the WordPress sites that I run.

If you visit Saurette.com from the iPod touch or iPhone, it will look pretty sleek. I was very impressed with the results. There’s a drop-down bar to move from page to page. The one big caveat is this: to view the database will still require viewing the site as normal and then magnifying what you are looking at. If, however, you want to read my posts or pages about my genealogy, then those will render very nicely.

I can tell from my tracking that there have been some visits by iPhone of iPod touch. If you come back or land here with that device, let me hear about it in the comments! If you also know of any killer apps I must have, give me a shout out for that too. I’m looking forward to many happy years with this new gadget.

Multiple Projects

The newest version of the database is up and over 20,000 individuals. I currently have a few things going on with the genealogy data.

  • Finishing up the Drouin images for deaths (hardest ones to locate)
  • Sourcing all the marriages in my ancestral lineage
  • Adding info to surnames/families that people have searched for on the site

That last item is interesting. I can monitor the visitors on the site and what they are looking at. Thus, I can see what surnames and individuals people have looked at. Starting today, I have been checking the visits and then adding in information (if I have it) that pertains to the surnames people have looked for, that way, if they come back, there will be more information and more sourcing available.

As is typical, however, I fully expect to get sidetracked and start other projects along the way, but those three I outlined are on the front burners. I will continue to provide help as needed to those who contact me. If you do request help, you get my attention first and foremost.

It seems like the genealogy never ends even when it feels “done”.

Images, Updates and a Milestone

This is basically just a progress report on what I’ve been up to recently. First off: I am just shy of 20,000 people in my database. I have been doing a lot of data input on one surname right now: Bergeron. More specifically, I have been concentrating on the Bergeon people who were married in Nicolet County, Quebec. I have almost completed those marriages up to 1900. While I haven’t put them all in, I have been collecting the marriages as long as they were descended from Barthelemy Bergeron and Genevieve St. Aubin. I hope to have those uploaded soon.

Also, I have rescanned in some documents I had for better quality. The Almeric Saurette page got some updates as well. I had his death certificate for a long time, but hadn’t scanned it in a while. I finally got that done. Also, his daughter, Marie-Anna‘s page has been updated as well with another copy of her marriage record that just became available to me yesterday.

I will probably head back to finding some Drouin records for that section as well. This seems somewhat urgent to me since the Drouin images were taken down once already by Ancestry. Also on my to-do list is to rerun the descendant reports just in case the information has been changed from the last time. Basically, I’m just trying to keep things current and fresh (for me at least). Look for the new database to be updated to 20,000+ later this week.