Important search result? Take a screen shot right away!!
When your genealogy search on Google turns up a really valuable result, immediately take a screenshot!! Then copy and save the text in several places, including the ancestor’s family tree profile.
Why?
Because the next time you do that exact search, you very well may NOT get that same special result. You may get part of the valuable text, or just the books that contain the full text that is special for your research. Here is the specialized search that I did after receiving a negative research report – using quotation makes and number range to improve that chance of a meaningful result:
“pamelia hall” “new hampshire” 1800-1830
The very first time I did that search, I got an extraordinary result, text like this – here’s an excerpt:
History of Pembroke, NH 1730-1895 – Epsom History
Ch. 3. Pamelia Hall,^ m. Church of Chicago, 111. Notes: 3 is for the third person in a family list, the III is Ill for Illinois, the ^ replaces a small 3 for third generation as I was to find.
A similar result for that name in that book came up for archive.org. When I went into the book to find that string of text, I found it in The Clement Family section of the volume, pages 32-33.
SO EXCITING!! I had found my 3rd great-grandmother, name now seen as Pamelia Hall Clement, daughter of James Head Clement and Martha French of Pembroke, New Hampshire!! Her brother George went to sea. I had had middle initial H. and surname Hall, and middle initial C. and surname Clemens in different records. And knew my 3rd great-grandfather Benjamin F. Church – from Ulster County, New York – had spent time in Chicago before and after settling in early day Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
To get this result to come up now in Google, I have to include the terms Church and Chicago. Otherwise the results include the History of Pembroke, NH, book but NOT any family names that were so important to my discovery.
Here are versions of results in the two books, one with the important surname and Chicago:
Again, here are steps I urge you to take when finding a valuable search result:
[1] Take a screen shot of the search results page
[2] Keep that search page whole but also crop the important section and save it
[3] Copy the text into a word document, family tree entry etc.
Then use those results to see if your impressions were right. Mine were as I realized that Hall was Pamelia’s middle name, Clement was her maiden name. Note: the Clemens name is rare in the 1820 Census for New Hampshire while there are many Clement households. Finally all the clues I had had about my third great-grandmother came together. She likely was named for her father’s sister Pamelia Lathrop Clement who married Ivory hall, a silversmith, jeweler and watchmaker in Concord.
After 15 years, I have broken through this stubborn brickwall! Thank you to Carter, N. F. (Nathan Franklin), and Fowler, T. L. (Trueworthy Ladd) who gathered all the details for the genealogy volume of the History of Pembroke, NH, book, and to the web sites providing access to history and genealogy books like this!
Remember, take that screen shot of key search results!!
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Thank you! And good researching!
Relative Musings 