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NEW FAMILY SEARCH IS LIVE FOR WASHINGTON DC TEMPLE DISTRICT ON SEPTEMBER 20

The wait is over. The official date for the rollout for the Washington DC Temple District has finally arrived, and that is September 23, 2008. But we learned that you really can get onto it on Saturday, September 20.

OPENING INSTRUCTIONS:

  1. Go to welcome screen at
  2. Select “Register for the new Family Search.” The “Enter Your Membership Screen” will appear
  3. Enter your Membership Number & Confirmation Date.

Also enter the security text on the registration menu. ClickCon- tinue.

  1. New Family Search will match your membership information with Church Records. Review the information and click “Yes” if it is your information.
  2. Read Conditions of Use Statement.
  3. As you continue, you will see your User Profile with some information from Church Records filled in. Add your phone number and e-mail so that Family Search Support can respond to your future questions.
  4. Enter a Sign-in name and click Continue.
  5. Enter a Password twice and click Continue.
  1. Select your password recovery questions.
  2. Enter a Contact Name for yourself, like JSonneborn, and click Continue.
  3. Click the box for each type of contact information you would like NFS to display, and then click Done.
  4. You are now registered and have access to new Family Search.
  5. You will now be taken to the new Family Search home page.
  6. Browse around to become familiar with the information.
  7. Click on “Me and My Ancestors” to open into the pedigree of your ancestry.

Make a record of your information above and keep it in a safe place for future use. Form from Terry Glasgow.

This newsletter is compiled by Jack and Sylvia Sonneborn, family history consultants of the York 2nd Ward, for use within the ward. It is also e-mailed to parties interested in family history, but it is not an official publication of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

For copies of Genealogy News, go to

Thanks to Don and Jeanine Hartman of Utah for posting the newsletter online for us.

NEW FAMILY SEARCH

SOME BASIC INSTRUCTIONS FOR OPERATING IN NEW FAMILY SEARCH

You can operate NFS by using the Home Page tabs along the top, or the information to the left. To begin, click on the left bold “See Me and My Ancestors.” There will be a horizontal pedigree chart at the top. The dark gray box should have your name in it. If your children are listed, they will be listed to the left. If they are not there and are living, you can add them but only you can see them. If deceased, they may already be listed. If you do not connect to any ancestors, begin by using the buttons at the bottom left of the pedigree view to add children, or click in a block, “Add or find husband/wife.” As you add father and then grandfather, if your temple work is completed, it will begin to connect and will add more people from the New FamilySearch automatically.

To move around in the pedigree, click on the arrows to the left of the names in the children spaces or to the right of the ancestors’ names. You can move any ancestor into the gray box by clicking the little arrow pointing left, right beside the ancestor’s name.

When using the SEARCH functionto locate ancestors, there is a principle “More gets less, and less gets more.” This means themore data filled in the blanks before starting the search, the fewer records it will find; if less data is entered in the fields, the search will find more records. If you don’t find the person right away, try to simplify the search by reducing the information provided for the search. If needed, keep reducing down until there is just the person’s name and country. On the other hand, if you have the search finding too many records, try adding some more information to the search, and it will reduce the records it finds.

There is a special case when searching for people from countries and groups that used the naming convention called patronymics. The patronymic is a component of a personal name often appearing as a surname that is based on the name of one's father. The suffix -son or –sen for 'son' or -d?ttir 'for daughter' is added to the father's given name to form the child’s patronymic surname. Carl, the son of Peter Larson, would become Carl Peterson. Even when a family had an established surname, the patronymic surname may have been used in some records or when extractions from records were done. In these cases, you may want either to create the patronymic name for the search or search without any surname (just include the father’s first name).

One other suggestion on searching, if you have a last name with multiple parts like "de la Vega" or "van der Linden" and don't find what you're looking for, try the Single Name Fieldinstead of the multi-name field. They yield different results.

CHANGING VIEW: To change the default pedigree view, in the upper right hand corner, click on Change View. You can also display a pedigree that covers the whole page, or you can display the Family Group Record (FGR). You can edit in the FGR by using the Edit links. If you want to print the FGR, start at the bottom of the FG record and click and hold and move to the top and then print “selection.” In many of the FGR’s, there are pages of source information that you will not want to print.

BOTTOM OF SCREEN BENEATH THE PEDIGREE:

SUMMARY: In the pedigree, click the name of the person whose information you wish to view, and his name will appear in the horizontal box below the pedigree.The data on an individual can be seen in Summary. The Summary view looks nice and clean, but the information may not be to your liking. For instance, the form of the name may not be complete. You can click on the down arrow at the end of the name, and any additional names that have been combined will appear in a window that opens. You can click on the one that you like. Or you can add another name by clicking at the bottom of the window. Repeat this for birth and death information, but if you add information, be sure to list both the date and location to get a complete piece of information. Beside the changed information, it will list your name as the person changing the viewed information.

DETAILS view has an expanded view of the items. This Details view is often more useful when trying to clean up information on the person or for doing more research. For example, it can show if someone tried to change data on a person you have combined with someone in your pedigree. This might show a dispute on one of the records you combined with someone in your pedigree. These may not be visible in the clean Summary view. If you submitted the information, you can edit it. If you did not, you cannot edit, but you can add a dispute or add another opinion. This will allow the submitter to collaborate on the information or fix the information. Since you can change only information that you have submitted, you may find information contributed by a deceased relative but cannot edit it. If you click on his name, there will be a note telling that you cannot edit the information, but if you are that person or have a good reason for claiming the information as you own, you can declare legacy.

LDS ORDINANCES: Click on this to see almost instantly what temple work has been completed and if any needs to be done. If there has been duplication, it should show the oldest date of an ordinance. If a spouse’s work is listed as needed several times, then switch to the spouse and combine the duplicate records. Go back to the other spouse’s record, and the opposite spouse should be listed only once.

TIME LINE: Click on this box to see a time line of the ancestor whose name is bold on the pedigree and listed in the box at the bottom of the page. You can add other events.

MAP: Click on map to see red markers indicating the location of events in the person’s life. Click on a red marker to see details of the event.

PARENTS AND SIBLINGS: Click on this box to see the highlighted ancestor’s parents and brothers and sisters. If there are duplicate siblings, combine them on this icon . Look for instructions below.

CAUTION: BE CERTAIN WHEN YOU ADD HUSBANDS AND WIVES THAT YOU ARE IN THE RIGHT SPACE ON THE PEDIGREE. IT IS DIFFICULT TO DELETE THEM WHEN YOU MAKE A MISTAKE.

SPOUSES AND CHILDREN: View children and use the same icon to make changes.

POSSIBLE DUPLICATES: Click on this block to see if there are duplicates What if you CAN’T FIND A PERSON on nFS that you know is there? You are sure that he should be there! This happens. FIRST, do a thorough search on New FamilySearch, including the refined search; see the search tips in this document. SECOND, for LDS, if the search does not find him and you have reason to believe the temple ordinances have been done, do NOT resubmit him. Try searching the Internet International Genealogical Index (IIGI) on

or on the CD IGI in a Family History Center, or look for the completed ordinance cards in your possession. When you find the person, carefully copy down the data in detail. Then go back to New FamilySearch at

and enter the data exactly the way the other records showed it. This often will help you find that record in New FamilySearch.

COMBINING DUPLICATE RECORDS

COMBINING in New FamilySearch means linking different records about the same person. This is also referred to as putting ALL RECORDS – correct or incorrect – about the same person into one folder. The individual records are NOT changed. Because of multiple database systems that the church combined, there can be many records on the same person. New FamilySearch already combines records that are 100% the same, but the rest is left to us. If there is a small number of records, combine all of them. If there are excessive numbers of records, combine the best matches till you get to the point that you have all the data on the person. Stop there for now. In time, those who own those other records may help combine the others with yours. AttitudeChange: We need to have a positive attitude that this is not “my” family history but God’s family history. Combine even incorrect information so that the submitter can find his record and not perform duplicate work!

  • COMBINE WITH CAUTION. It is easy and relatively fast to combine records. We should be very sure that the records are of the same person before combining. A family who lost a child would often give a later child the exact same name. So combining individuals with the same parents and same names can often be a mistake.
  • ADVANTAGES OF

COMBINING: Combining all of the information about individuals and families into one place has these advantages:

  • Since you need to look in only one place, you spend less time looking for information about your ancestors. You and your relatives see the same information about individuals and families. You can easily work together to evaluate the information. You can add new information and make corrections in one place, and everyone can see them. When an individual’s temple ordinances are done, that information is added to the same place. This eliminates the risk of temple ordinances being done more than once for an individual and his or her family.
  • HOW TO COMBINE: Go to the “Possible Duplicates.” In a matter of seconds, it will show duplicates. Check the box beside those that you feel are the same party. Then click “Compare in More Detail.” The records will appear side by side. Even if the information differs, if you know it is the same person, go to the bottom and click one of the “Yes” buttons (they mean the same but the second one makes some people feel better). If different, click “No.” Check all records. Then click “Done” and then click on “combine records.” Then just click through the buttons until the record is combined. Go to “Details” and at the bottom click on “Combined Records” to see what is combined. You can un-combine those you think are in error (but so can anyone else.) You can also refine your search to try to find others not showing up. When you combine, also check “Spouses and Children” and “Parents and Siblings.” If you find duplicate siblings, go to the arrow in front of the child’s name. Click on it to open a drop-down window. You can delete or dispute the individual, dispute the relationship to father or mother, and combine the siblings. Your child will appear on top in the next screen and all siblings of that sex will be displayed below. Check on dup- licate siblings. You can combine if you are sure it is the same person without comparing, or you can compare the records in more detail and decide whether to combine or not.

ADDING DATA to your family tree can be done in several ways.

  • During the initial rollout to the LDS church, when first registering and getting started, New FamilySearch will look for an LDS church membership record for members. If found, it adds it to your pedigree along with any immediate family members shown on your church membership record.
  • When we have searched and not found an ancestor, we can type in the information on that person, or we can use a commercial software program to sync the person.
  • When we have searched for an entire family unsuccessfully, we can upload a GEDCom file with the information created by our home computer’s genealogy program or sync the family from a compatible software program to NFS.
  • There are restrictions and limitations.

1) Any GEDCom created from the records in Ancestral File, Pedigree Resource File
or the online temple records will be rejected.

2) GEDCom files of 1,000 names or more will be rejected. I recommend keeping the GEDCom to a single family unit. DO NOT ADD AN ENTIRE GEDCOM AS IT WILL GENERATE TOO MANY DUPLICATES.

3) Upload information on a person only after a thorough search for him on New FamilySearch has shown he is not there.

  • In the near future, software programs will help us sync our home databases with what is on New FamilySearch website. These include Ancestral Quest, Legacy, RootsMagic, Family Insight. AQ 12.1 is already doing that. There is a charge for these programs. PAF will not be updated but is still a good program to keep as a repository, esp. for notes, sources and pictures,

ADDING A DISPUTE TO INCORRECT INFORMATION

Many have been frustrated with inaccurate records on the Internet that we could not get corrected. New FamilySearch comes to the rescue with the ability to DISPUTE information or leave an alternative opinion about data in other records that we do not own. Before creating a dispute (think of as an Internet Post-It), please consider the following:

  • Contact the submitter/owner of the record about the issue and share your evidence. He may gladly correct the record, especially when you have more to support your point of view than “I know it.” It can be difficult to find some submitters to Ancestral File and Pedigree Resource File, especially when the submittal was made a long time ago.
  • In most cases, when collaborating with another submitter, do not dispute that the person does not exist. Focus on particular events, dates and places in question.
  • Only when all efforts to contact the record owner have failed should we put a dispute on the record. In the dispute, explain the details being challenged and what evidence there is to support the claim. Re-read it before doing the final posting.

Don’t use disputes for every minor issue; use them only when it is sufficiently misleading.

Use the dispute sparingly; only you can remove a dispute you create. It is more difficult to remove one than create one. There are cases where the owner of a record may alter his record regarding what you disputed; then the dispute no longer applies. In some cases the dispute icon will still be there, and in some cases it may not be visible, but it could reappear again if someone else enters a record with the same inaccurate data.

As we learned about new Family Search from Family History Support, the teachers begged us to not get angry when we find incorrect information. Just dispute or add another opinion and try to work out the correct record.

HOW TO DISPUTE: