Cousins, Recently someone called my attention to a web site that includes a "Genealogy Tip of the Day" <http://www.emazing.com/> written by George G. Morgan. Many of these are rather ordinary; the sorts of things we all know to do. Occasionally, however, they post one that is so clever, or practical, or essential that I just say "YES!" and so I've occasionally saved them to remind myself of ways to improve my research. If these interest you, you can visit the web site, and subscribe to a daily e-mail which contains the "Tip of the Day." Regards! JS Here are a few of my favorites: Wednesday February 9, 2000 PERPETUAL CALENDAR Have you ever wondered on what day of the week your great-grandmother was born? Or have you wondered whether someone famous was born on the same date as your father? An excellent perpetual calendar resource on the Web can be found at Calendarhome.com's 10,000 year calendar Web site at <http://www.calendarhome.com/tyc/>. Here you can select a century, a year and a month and click to display a calendar. Then, click on the day of the month if you want to learn the moon phase, historical events on that date, the names of famous people born on that date, and much more information. Thursday February 10, 2000 RECORDING LOCATIONS For each of your ancestors' vital dates (birth, marriage, death), always record the precise name of the location as it existed at the time of the event. That means listing the town, the county or parish, and the state for U.S. events. For foreign locations, record the town, province and county. More important, because boundaries and jurisdictions change so much over time, make certain you have recorded the correct names of county or state or province or country as it existed when the event occurred. This is important to you for purposes of locating copies of records and important for future researchers who want to confirm your research and obtain copies of documents for themselves. Friday February 11, 2000 TAKE COPIES WITH YOU Never take your original materials with you on a research trip. Always make copies in the event that you lose them or need a quick place to make notes. You can always make another copy but originals are difficult to replace. Copies of pedigree charts, family group sheets and other documents make excellent 'working copies' when you are on a research trip. Monday February 14, 2000 SEEK ALTERNATIVE PATHS When you encounter a dead end in locating the parents of an ancestor, look for records for his or her siblings. Your ancestor's obituary, a family Bible or another record may provide the names of brothers and/or sisters. Try to trace one or more siblings' records back to identify and locate information about the parents. Tuesday February 15, 2000 RECORD SOURCE INFORMATION ON COPIES When you make a photocopy of a page from a pertinent book at a library or archive, make a note of the publication information for your source citation. Include: -Author's name(s) -Title -City and state (and country if foreign) of publication -Name of publisher -Year of publication -Other appropriate information (volume number, edition, etc.) When you return home, enter this information into your word processor in a bibliographic citation format. Feed the photocopies through your printer so that the citation will be neatly printed on the back of the photocopies you made from that source. Friday February 18, 2000 RECORDING NEIGHBORS FROM THE CENSUS When working with census records, be sure to record the names of neighbors in six residences on either side of your ancestors. This can be helpful in other censuses, before and after, in determining when and where you ancestors arrived in or departed from an area. It can also be helpful in locating any land and tax records for your ancestors if they owned property. ____________________________ James Shuman, art instructor Modesto High School jshuman@telis.org ____________________________