Every Researcher Hits A Brick Wall At Times
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By The Tree Shaker-
You are stuck on a particular generation and can’t go back any more generations.
Well, fear not, we have all been there, and there are some tips to try to see if you can break through that brick wall.
Sometimes when you think you have looked hard enough at the census records you can sometimes go back to them and look at the surrounding neighbors to see if there is a connection. Oftentimes, the neighbor could have been a relative, especially if the residence was a family farm and the different pieces of land from that farm was passed down to another generation.
Try researching the ancestor’s siblings instead of your direct ancestor. Sometimes a misspelled name or wrong date can throw your research off if you have looked at all census, birth, marriage and death records. The next step in trying to break that brick wall is to broaden the research to looking at land records, school records, occupational records, meeting minutes from clubs that your ancestors may have been involved in.
You can try searching through grandma’s attic to search for old letters, diaries, address books and funeral cards for clues. Sometimes when reading through old letters and diaries you find clues and sometimes those clues make you think. You need to research more. For example, I found some old letters in my great grandmother’s old trunk that were from Ma Maybelle Carter of the Carter Family and Ma Maybelle was writing to my great-grandmother and called her cousin. So my search is continuing to find the connection to the Carter family.
If you have time on your hands and want to read more, newspapers are a great source of information if you can find an article, birth announcement, marriage announcement or an obituary of an ancestor.
In most cases it is key to know the date of the event before heading to your local library or historical society to search through the microfilm of newspapers.
Good Luck breaking through those brick walls!
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You are stuck on a particular generation and can’t go back any more generations.
Well, fear not, we have all been there, and there are some tips to try to see if you can break through that brick wall.
Sometimes when you think you have looked hard enough at the census records you can sometimes go back to them and look at the surrounding neighbors to see if there is a connection. Oftentimes, the neighbor could have been a relative, especially if the residence was a family farm and the different pieces of land from that farm was passed down to another generation.
Try researching the ancestor’s siblings instead of your direct ancestor. Sometimes a misspelled name or wrong date can throw your research off if you have looked at all census, birth, marriage and death records. The next step in trying to break that brick wall is to broaden the research to looking at land records, school records, occupational records, meeting minutes from clubs that your ancestors may have been involved in.
You can try searching through grandma’s attic to search for old letters, diaries, address books and funeral cards for clues. Sometimes when reading through old letters and diaries you find clues and sometimes those clues make you think. You need to research more. For example, I found some old letters in my great grandmother’s old trunk that were from Ma Maybelle Carter of the Carter Family and Ma Maybelle was writing to my great-grandmother and called her cousin. So my search is continuing to find the connection to the Carter family.
If you have time on your hands and want to read more, newspapers are a great source of information if you can find an article, birth announcement, marriage announcement or an obituary of an ancestor.
In most cases it is key to know the date of the event before heading to your local library or historical society to search through the microfilm of newspapers.
Good Luck breaking through those brick walls!
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