Organizing Your Electronic Genealogical Documents Leland K. Meitzler Lmeitzler@gmail.com (Sept 2017) A good genealogist will document every fact in their family history We can now do far more than cite sources. We can link to our source documents. However, we must still cite our sources, for several reasons, including the fact that it may not be obvious where the linked document came from. You most likely already have a filing system for your paper documents. If you have been actively involved in genealogy for more than a week, you probably figured out that organization of all that paper was essential. Most genealogists use files or three-ring binders. As technology has advanced and increasing numbers of documents are available on the Internet, genealogists are faced with more data. We typically download and print this data in paper format, citing the source in our genealogy program (RootsMagic, Legacy, Ancestral Quest, Family Tree Maker, Brother s Keeper, etc.), upon entry into that program. Then we file the paper Digitize and organize your paper as electronic genealogical documents. You can now dispose of much of the paper, and easily set up a system that is logical and comfortable. What you will need (besides your computer). A scanner, with the appropriate software Photoshop Elements software Time enough time to scan your paper documents A Note about Folders and Files Before we get any further, we should understand what the difference is between a folder and a file. For computer purposes, folders typically hold files. Files are those documents that we have downloaded, or scanned and digitized and placed within folders. Electronically file just as you would in a 3-drawer filing cabinet. Do this by putting all your genealogy source documents in one master folder. In my computer, I call this master folder simply My Genealogy Docs. I currently have this folder on my computer hard drive, and use a separate 1 terabyte external USB hard drive as an immediate backup. Inside the master folder, set up folders for each surname. I have virtually hundreds of these surname folders within my Master Folder. Typical folders are called: GenDocs Canfield, GenDocs Feller, GenDocs Meitzler, GenDocs Titus, and so forth Inside each Surname Folder, set up Country Folders and Family Folders.
Country Folders You will have fewer Country Folders for each surname. Examples: GenDocs Meitzler 1 United States; GenDocs Meitzler 1 Canada; GenDocs Meitzler 1 Germany. Why is there a 1 in the folder name? It s there to force the Country Folders to sort to the top automatically. By doing this, these folders will always precede your Family Folders within the Surname Folder. I use Country Folders for documents that apply to numerous families or unknown persons. Examples: PDF files that may contain a portion of a book found Using Google Books; A hand-written transcription of a marriage record index from a courthouse; Collections of documents that may or may not pertain to your family; and documents that need further study before they can be inserted into a Family File and then linked from your genealogy program. In the Country Folder, I will make State Folders, and County Folders within them. Then break it down to City Folders as needed. If you need to make a County Folder, be sure and make the State Folder to place it in. By doing that, you can add other County Folders that you may not need now. Don t waste your time making folders that you are not using now however; they can be created easily upon need. Be very exact when naming your folders, always using the same format to keep them sorting in the correct order sometimes an extra space can cause the folder to be misplaced. As I will point out later, you don t want to have to rename or move folders unless necessary. Family Folders Family Folders will naturally sort up to follow the Country Folders since we are not placing a numeral within their title. You may have dozens or even hundreds of Family Folders within a Surname Folder. Files within these folders may make up the bulk of your data. Within a Family Folder, you will keep all documents that pertain to a family. What Constitutes a Family? A typical Family Folder starts with the marriage of a couple. All documents pertaining to the individuals prior to marriage are kept in the folder of their respective parents. There are exceptions in my collection. Unmarried individuals for whom I have extensive data often get their own Family Folder. Labeling a Family Folder. Label each Family Folder with a combination of: the name of the couple it pertains to, and a 4- letter code. Examples: Canfield, William & Abigail Titus CWAT; Meitzler, George & Nellie Canfield MGNC; Titus, Robert & Susan Crane TRSC. Using the surname first allows me to quickly locate any file since it will sort up alphabetically by the name of the husband. And I can also locate the folder by doing a search of my hard drive by looking for my ancestor s name. I put the woman s name in its normal order since it just reads easier (eliminating another comma). The Four-letter code is another identifier of that folder, based on the names of the couple. I can use this code to identify any document (file) found within that Family Folder. Examples: CWAT01; CWAT02; CWAT03, etc. These consecutively numbered designations given to documents (files) kept within the Family File, allow the contents of any Family Folder to be easily listed on a Contents Sheet. Example: CWAT01 The marriage license of William Canfield & Abigail Titus from Washtenaw County, Michigan. The documents (files) don t have to be in any order, although placed chronologically to begin with seems logical. However, as additional documents are added, the Folder will naturally lose it s 100% chronological format. Just remember that this isn t an issue. Contents Sheet Place a Contents Sheet (file) within each Family Folder titled simply with the four-letter code. Here again, that forces the Contents Sheet to always be first in the Family Folder. My Contents Sheets
are a listing of the contents, descriptions, and source citations for each document (file) found within that Family Folder. My Contents Sheets are simply Microsoft Word files, saved in RTF format so they can be opened in any word processor. A note and a warning about files Not knowing the future of technology, but aware that already we have issues with reading file formats, I am attempting to save all files in a format that I think will be available for some time. I currently save most documents as Rich Text Files (RTF), JPEGs, TIFFs, and PDF files. It s also important to remember that if you rename or move a folder or linked file in your Master Folder, you will want to change the location in your genealogy program also, so think twice, and then do whatever is needed so you don t lose your link. Use Photoshop Elements to edit, enhance and change file structure of documents that you download, screen print, or scan. The program is inexpensive, easy to learn, and makes file conversion and document editing a simple matter. Access the Master Folder from more than one computer and/or program. If you set up a home network, you can access the Master Folder from more than one computer and/or genealogy program. You can also do the same by using an external USB hard drive and plugging it directly into an airport (such as Apple Extreme), allowing numerous computers to access that airport wirelessly. Of course, you must to have wireless technology to do this, and your old computer system might need to be replaced or upgraded. Sharing Documents (files) We often want to share data. Using the above system, you can copy your Family Files, save them to a CD-ROM, flash drive, or portable hard drive and share them with relatives. Then again, you can bypass the hardware, and just save the files directly to icloud, Dropbox or a similar internet cloud service, and give your relative access. Let them print out what they want! Link to your files from within your Genealogy Program. Since the early years of computerized genealogy, we ve could cite our sources. In the last few years, the programs have upgraded to the point where we can now attach multimedia documents and files from within the program. This is done by clicking on the appropriate links from within the edit screen of the genealogy program, and then inserting the file name to link to (done by using the browse feature in the program). What About Photos: We all have photos. I inherited 5,000 or so. Add to that the ease of taking digital photographs with our mobile phone or digital camera and we are annually adding hundreds, if not thousands more to our collections. What to do with them? The following are my recommendations. 1. I have a Google account. I use Gmail as my principle email. So I also have a Google Photos account, that I ve used since 2006. Google Photos is their replacement for Picasa. Any photos saved in Picasa were automatically transferred to Google Photos when the change was made. Whenever I take a picture with my mobile phone, it automatically uploads to Google Photos. The photos are saved by
date, and can be quickly found by just scrolling back through time. I ve gone through many phones over the years, but my photos all save to the same account thus I have no lost photos when a phone dies. I can identify photos, create albums, edit, crop, delete, and share my photos directly from the screen (both my small screen of the phone, and any online computer screen). I can also upload photos from others adding them to albums, and doing all the things mentioned earlier. 2. I have thousands of photos on my hard drive most are pictures that I ve scanned over the years. To organize them, I set up Picture Folders within the Family Folders. I put the picture files within the appropriate family Picture Folder, and identify each picture using an extensive description of the photo within its file name also noting where I got the photo. Every time I get photos from a newfound cousin, I eventually save them within these files. Note that I am also uploading them to Google Photos, making for easy sharing and another back-up. Electronic document storage systems You may store your documents on your internal hard drive, or an external hard drive as mentioned above. Hard drives have become increasingly less expensive. Two Terabyte drives are now under $75.00. Back-up your files. Never lose your files again. I have a separate external portable hard drive to which I back up, and I use BackBlaze <www.backblaze.com> as my off-site backup. This is Cloud storage that you can depend on. I ve used BackBlaze for several years, backing up as many as eight computers at a time. I never think about it. The cost is $50 per computer per year. In the last three years, I have had three harddrive failures. I got all my data back. The cost of off-site storage has more than paid off for me. I also use Time Machine for backup of my imac. This is an outstanding feature of Mac computers. The back-up is made nightly to an external hard drive sitting behind my imac. Dispose of your paper clutter & keep the good stuff. Once you have all your data scanned and placed in file folders, you can get rid of a lot of paper you no longer need. That includes your hand-written notes, photocopied pages from books, and other paper that is easily replaced. I found that these papers made up the bulk of my own paper files. Keep all original family letters, certified documents, journals, and so forth. These will vary from collection to collection. But whatever you do, don t throw out something that should be archived. Once you have all your data scanned and placed in electronic file folders, you can get rid of a lot of paper. That includes your hand-written notes, photocopied pages from books, and other paper that is easily replaced. I found that these papers made up the bulk of my own paper files. Keep all original family letters, certified documents, journals, and so forth. These will vary from collection to collection. But whatever you do, don t throw out something that should be archived. Take Your Family Documents on the Road I take my laptop when I travel, thus taking the equivalent of several four-drawer file cabinets of family data with me. If your data is kept on an external hard drive, just unplug it and take it along (it s backed
up, remember!). Dependent on the size of your files, you might be able to put all your data on a flashdrive, allowing you and your family access even if you don t have a laptop along. References Organize Your Genealogy a FamilySearch Wiki Page <https://familysearch.org/wiki/en/organize_your_genealogy> Cyndi s List Organizing <http://www.cyndislist.com/organizing> Organizing Your Genealogy Research: Tips, Tricks & Strategies by Lisa A. Alzo and Denise May Levenick; Moorshead Magazines, 2016. <http://www.familyrootspublishing.com/store/product_view.php?id=3234> Organize Your Genealogy: Strategies and Solutions for Every Researcher by Drew Smith, Family Tree Books, 2016. <http://www.familyrootspublishing.com/store/product_view.php?id=3382>