In lieu of rehashing the monthly Genedocs E-magazine I have posted or e-mailed since 2009, the Genedocs blog will now serve nicely as the new reader forum for monthly featured forms. If time allows, I will also try to include a bonus form and a series exclusive.
In past years I elected to begin with the Ancestor Outline List, but this year, I will be shuffling the Pedigree Map View to the forefront of the spotlight. This is mainly due to the fact that sibling data is, more often than not, key to knocking down many of the brick walls we all end up facing somewhere in our family tree. Why are siblings of ancestors so vital to this most frustrating obstacle in our family history vernacular? First, siblings lead to one amazing thing in our research - living cousins! When we trace the descendancy of siblings of our ancestors, we can't help but stumble into a real live person we can claim as our newest cousin who very often has the same desire to know more, may have a mass of family data and precious photos of their own, and, if you are lucky, even a network of other cousins or other relatives who may be able to and will to help you out.
It only takes a basic understanding of Microsoft Excel to plug in names into cells and format line colors of cell borders and before long you have an amazing reference tool that most genealogists don't even know about! Here is an example image...
The PMV is a great intro tool for several reasons:
- It is visually appealing with a new look
- It effectively combines ancestor data and sibling data
- It can be as detailed or as simple as its designer desires
- Any researcher exponentailly increasese their odds of craking the case with the PMV!
On the other hand the Ancestor outline list (pictured below) is a pretty plain although also useful key form especially for beginners.
Stay tuned - next week I'll be going into the awesome organizational power of the Folder Cover Sheet/Tabs and At-A-Glance Improved File Labels for both physical and digital storage methods.
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