KEEPING ELECTRONIC FAMILY AND GENEALOGICAL RECORDS

Hardware

amazon.com sells pretty much everything and is an excellent source for all types of hardware and software for all types of computers. It has a good search function.

www.pcconnection.com is a good source for hardware of all types - computers, digital cameras, software, storage, etc. PC Connection is a well-established and highly-respected firm which deals in both PC and Apple computers despite its name. It had a search line, or use the list at the left side of the page to focus in on a particular type of product.

Ames stores that sell a variety of computers and computer equipment, including peripherals and software, are Best Buy, Sam's Club, Staples, and Wal-Mart - all on US 69 (Duff Avenue in the southern part of Ames and Grand Avenue in the northern part).

Internet Resources

Search engines such as bing.com or google.com or search.yahoo.com can be very useful. It can be used for locating information about people, places visited or lived in, schools attended, and so forth.

• If you are looking for a relative named “Harry Hodges” who seems to have generally been called “Horry Hodges” you can type either of these into the search box, using the quote marks so it looks for web sites with the full name “Harry Hodges” rather than all web sites with a “Harry” somewhere and a “Hodges” somewhere, but not necessarily together. If you are looking for a “Harvey G. Hodges” you might want to search with both “Harvey G. Hodges” and “Harvey Hodges” or even another variant that uses a nickname, if the gentleman had one.
• If you get too many websites, many of which are clearly not of interest to you, you might also want to add other terms to focus in. If many sites seem to have a particular phrase that isn't wanted, you can add it to the list with a minus sign: "Elvis" - "Presley" will look for sites with "Elvis" but not "Presley."
• Different search engines seem to have found different web sites, so try more than one. Also go back and try a few weeks or months later to see if any new sites have appeared.

Wikis are collections of articles, pictures, etc., contributed by many different persons. Especially useful is Wikipedia at en.wikipedia.org, which has articles about many different people, places, events. It is full of good pictures and maps, too, often in high resolution. There are also Wikipedias in other languages, often readable in poorly-translated form. The Wikipedia Commons at commons.wikipedia.org has good, free pictures of many different objects and people and places throughout the world.

Ancestry.com. This is a site that charges (from $19.95 for one month to $12.95/month for a year or more) but provides for a 14-day free trial. Higher charges apply for access to worldwide records.
Records include census records; voter lists; immigration and emigration records; family trees; newspapers and periodicals; military records; birth, marriage, and death records; court, land, wills, and financial records; directories and member lists; stories, memories, and histories. These can be searched for free, and once you have a likely hit, you can rest your cursor over “View a Record” to see part of the information, at no cost; this can often be very useful.
Example: Search for “Jesse Hodges” born in 1754 and died in 1842. A small amount of information is found. Also go to 1840 census records and search for “Jesse Hodges” in Tennessee.

FamilySearch.org is a free site provided by the Mormon Church. It is nicely organized and is often quite useful, at least for suggesting clues. However, since the information was provided by individuals who were not always careful in making sure the information was correct, it may (and sometimes does) contain errors. Example: Search for “Jesse Hodges” with birth year of 1754 in the United States (but no particular state identified).
Example: Search for Josiah Hodges, Jr. in Tennessee and check the pedigree for #5 or #8.

Cemetery Records Findagrave.com enables you to locate many graves throughout the United States. The emphasis is on graves of notable persons, but the resources are often useful for ordinary genealogical research as well.
Example: Check for Lee Hodges in Texas to find 9 persons, including my father (Lee Hodges) and my younger brother (Lee Hodges, Jr.). Then click on “Jacobs Well Cemetery” to get photos and a map and a list of all internments there; a search there for “Hodges” locates my father, my mother, and my brother.
gravelocator.cem.va.gov is a listing of graves of veterans at military cemeteries in the US. Exact locations and maps are linked to. Example: Entering just "Harry Hodges" gives quite a few veterans, the first a relative who died in the Civil War.

Ellis Island Records (New York)
The Ellis Island site at www.ellisisland.org provides access to Ellis Island records. There is no cost, and you can search a name without registering, but to view the actual records you do need to register for free, so you might as well. We found "Alois Feitl" (Linda's father) who arrived from Austria in 1923, at the age of 16, with only $25 in his pocket (he was going to stay with relatives already in the US).

Heritage Quest
Heritage Quest is an extremely valuable reference available free through the Ames Public Library if you have a library card. In your web browser go to the URL catalog.amespubliclibrary.org:81/rpa/webauth.exe?rs=hq and enter the barcode number on your library card and your PIN. You will be taken to the main page of HeritageQuest which lists all the options to check. Warning: the Ames Public Library appears to be changing a lot of things on its web site, and this URL could also change; in that case go to the main APL web site at www.amespl.org and click in turn on "Online Catalog" then "APL Website Links" then "Online Databases" then "Genealogy" then "Heritage Quest Online" then click where it says "Click Here."

Legacy.com. Enter a first name, last name, state, and decade of death (e.g., 1990-1999) to check for possible obituaries. Only the beginning of the obituary is shown; the full obituary can be purchased for $2.95. Example: Lee Hodges in Texas in 2000-2009 decade links to an obituary for my father, but Lee Hodges in Texas in 1970-1979 does not locate one for my brother, rather a different Lee Hodges.

The National Hall of Records at NHOR.org lists dates of birth and death of individuals; there may be other information, too, if someone has added it, or even a photograph. May occasionally be useful. Example: Lee Hodges in Texas gives a long list which includes both my father and my brother, with dates (just the month of death for my brother), but no actual obituaries in the records. Example: Leone Hodges in Texas shows dates (but no other information) for my mother.

The Social Security Death Index is available at several places, including ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com, for persons who died after 1962. Use the “Advanced Search” option to include year of birth, state, and other helpful information. Example: Leone Hodges born 1912 lived in Texas.

US Gen Web
www.usgenweb.org/ is the free genealogy site of the USGenWeb Project, with many different types of records from many states, nicely organized, but very spotty in its coverage due to the fact that volunteers have provided most of the information. But you might be lucky and find something of interest - I found quite a few items of interest, including old photos of relatives and reminiscences.

Software

Microsoft Office 2007 - for PC (Windows) computers
If you are an Iowa State University faculty or staff member, even if you are retired, you are eligible for a current Microsoft "Home Use Program" offer of Microsoft Office 2007 (including Microsoft Word, Power Point, and Excel) for $9.95. You first need to obtain a product code, then you go to a Microsoft site where you can pay by credit card. Start the process at www.it.iastate.edu/hup/. This is probably such a bargain because Microsoft will soon be releasing Office 2010. The software will be downloaded right on your computer and you will be sent a product key by email. It is easy to install, and you will need to be connected to the internet to activate the program.

OpenOffice
Open Office, available at OpenOffice.org is a free office suite comparable to Microsoft Office. As far as I can tell, it seems to do everything done by the Microsoft Office programs (Word, Power Point, and Excel) in a similar fashion. It can read Word .doc files and save to that format, as well as to other formats.

Prizmo - for Macintosh (Apple) computers
This program, available for a free trial at www.creaceed.com/prizmo/ (but priced at $40) is supposed to make it easy to use your digital camera as a scanner. I have not tried it.

SyncBack - for PC (Windows) computers
This free program is excellent for backing up files from a computer to an external drive (such as an external USB hard drive or a flash drive or even an SD card) or vice versa. There are more advanced versions that are not free, but are inexpensive, but I find the free version does exactly what I want. It is available at www.syncback.com.

Be careful using Syncback, however, as it can overwrite newer files with older files if you are careless. Here’s what I do:

1. Let’s say your computer has C: as its main hard drive, as is customary. Suppose drive F: is your backup drive. Suppose all your family and genealogical files, like mine, are in a folder named “Family.”

2. Set up a Profile named “C to F (Family).”

3. Click on “Modify” at the bottom and then set up “C:\Family” for Source and “F:\Family” for Destination. Under “Sub-dirs” choose “Include all subdiretories and their files …”

4. Click on “Advanced” and choose these options: “Source overwrites destination always (backup)” under the first set of options; “Copy file to destination” under the second set of options; “Delete file from destination” under the third option. You will be warned about this third choice, but that’s what you want. The meaning of these choices should be clear: If there is a file on the source that is different from that on the destination, or not on the destination, it will be copied onto the destination, and if there is a file on the destination but not the source (because you deleted it or renamed it, usually), then it is deleted from the destination drive F: (to avoid having obsolete files on F:). When you are done click OK at the bottom.

5. If you have been careful only to work on files on the C: drive, this will properly make an exact copy of your files on the F: drive. However, when you select the profile “C to F (Family)” and then click “Run” at the bottom, SyncBack will run a while and then give you a list of the changes it is about to make. Double-check that this looks correct before clicking on “Continue Run.” When SyncBack is through it will list “Success” under the “Results” column and you can close SyncBack and remove your backup drive F: from your computer.

6. Once all the “Family” files have been backed up properly, SyncBack can be used to transfer them properly to a different computer’s C: drive using a Profile “F to C (Family)” in which F: is the source drive and C: is the destination drive. Then you should safely remove the F: drive and work on the C: drive on that second computer.