BYU Historic Journals Collection

I've got a new site for you tonight. This one is an invitation only site but I believe it is a great example of where genealogy research is going in the near future. The site is the BYU Historic Journals Collection. This site opened on July 4 and is currently in beta testing phase. As their news release says "Our "invitation only" public beta has begun! The interface is still a bit clunky, but the site is ready for people to start contributing information, tags, and journals. We are using an invitation system to make sure that we don't get too many users faster than we can handle."

I received my invitation last night and I am user#10 on the system, so they are obviously taking it slow. The development team rolled out their method of linking digitized journals with genealogical information at the Joint Conference on Digital Libraries held in Austin, Texas on June 15-29, 2009. So what does this mean? Well, the collection consists of the digitized collections from the BYU Library. This includes The Overland Trails collection and the Mormon Missionary Diaries collection. So far this is about 420 journals. Currently the authors of the journals are cross referenced with the newFamilySearch (nFS) database. That means that you can search by nFS PID# to see if there is

a digitized journal in the collection by that person. But there is more. When you get an invitation to join the beta test you use your nFS login information to create your account. This allows the journal collection to search your ancestors as they are laid out in nFS to see if there are any journals that match your list of people. Another thing that you can do is tag names as you read the journals. If you find a name in the text you can cross reference it with that person's PID# in nFS and they will be linked to that individual for others to search. Can you imagine the power of this type of tool in genealogical research. Consider if we had the censuses or court records cross referenced to individuals by their PID#. We could select the individual and ask to see all of the documents that reference that person. No more searching through various results in the hope of finding the right person.

In a discussion with Doug Kennard, one of the site developers, he stated "We're hoping that people will contribute information about journals they know about and upload scanned images of the journals they do have, since it is my belief that the majority of journals are in peoples' private possession instead of in libraries. We have done the work of developing the site, but we're hoping other people will see the value of adding content and reference information to it. Just like wikipedia bacame a great information resource because lots of people added content to it, we're hoping that lots of people will use this tool that we have built and add content (reference information and scanned journals). If they do, the combined effort will result in huge payoff for everybody who uses it."

The website can be found at http://journals.byu.edu/. A video is available on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9etZDmOQj0. I hope you get a chance to visit the site and find something of interest. By the way I have a few invitations to give out. Only 10, so first come first serve.

Happy New Years!

1-1-2009 - It seems like just a few weeks ago we were celebrating the beginning of 2008. As we get older the years seem to get shorter and we never seem to be able to keep all of our resolutions we make each year. So, knowing this, what have I resolved to do?

This year I resolve to do better on FamilySearch Indexing. I have been slacking on this in the past and have only completed 3350 records since it first started. I read the news about Alta Mesa Stake in Mesa, Arizona completing over 4 million records last year. That is a huge accomplishment. We need to make sure everyone we know is doing something to help the cause of indexing. It doesn't take much time to complete one set of records each week. If we all did just one set of records (approximately 25-50 names) each week, each one of us would complete 1300-2600 records each year.  Those of us who have more time can easily double this number.

This year I resolve to do better keeping my journal. Journals are an important record of our times and will help our descendents understand what our lives were like. Just think how useful it would be to you to have a copy of a journal written by your great grandparents. I do try to keep up with mine but it is hit and miss. Sometimes I go for a week writing every day. Other times it is 3 or 4 weeks between entries. I have only been keeping my journal since July 9, 2006 and it is currently only 72 typed pages.

This year I resolve to exercise regularly. While doing my family medical history (see my blog for December 22, 2008 for ideas) I discovered that the cause of death of many of my ancestors is listed as of cerebral hemorrhages, diabetes, heart disease and various cancers. Many of these diseases can be prevented by being more physically fit. We bought a treadmill for Christmas and I have been using it several times each week. I have already noticed that my belts fit a notch or two smaller.

Sometimes the worst thing to do is be over ambitious in your resolutions. I took a look at my suggested resolutions for last year. The following are what I put in my January 2008 Family History Newsletter as examples of what we can do in the new year - http://milesmeyer.googlepages.com/January12008.pdf

1) To organize and label all your photographs.

• For the techies—scan all of your photographs, label them and create backup copies stored in a safe location.

2) Rededicate yourself to writing in your journal.

• Techies, why don’t you use that new video camera that you got for Christmas to begin creating a video journal.

3) To keep up with the new genealogy resources and attend a genealogy class. It is not enough now to just know all of the research techniques to find records in the court house. The internet is bringing us new ways to research on a daily basis. Learn how to effectively use these new websites.

4) Find sources for everyone in at least one direct line of ancestors.

5) Dedicate a few hours per week or a whole day each month to work on my family research.

6) Keep track of correspondence.

• Techies, make sure you have replied to all of the e-mails and file them away in folders for future reference.

7) Get organized. Look through that pile of papers and see what you may have forgotten about.

8) Genealogy is more than names and dates. Find out about the lives of your ancestors.

9) Put your research to good use. Share it with others.

10) Volunteer to help others. Make your time in the Family History Center a productive time. Help others by joining with sites such as Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness (http://www.raogk.org/)

I hope everyone had a good 2008 and wish everyone a great 2009! Only 364 more days until 2010.