Sunday, August 28, 2011

SNGF - Who is your genealogy model?

Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings poses a challenge every Saturday night (hence the Saturday Night Genealogy Fun) for those of us who like to blog on such things.  His challenge was to look at another blogger's list of types of genealogists and determine who best fits our style and write on tit.  I looked over the list and thought that while I could lay claim to a few of the types, no one in particular really summed up who or how I approach my passion for genealogy.  I settled on two types:

Frank Buck (hunter and tamer) - I love the hunt for new information, the elusive middle name, never settling for just the direct family line, but looking at all of the siblings and neighbors, trying to find ways to connect all together.  And certainly I did not have my notes in any resemblance of order, until this last month when I read an article about how to organize my research.  And then by deciding to write down family information in a blog form, helps to keep my thoughts in one direction.  I, too, would go from family to town, from paternal to maternal sides like innings in a baseball game.  No hits, next side up. 

Then again, I wanted to be like Steve Jobs, (Techno junkie).  I love the information that is now available on the 'net and don't have to leave the comforts of my home.  Yet that is not who I was either.  So I felt that I would think about it for awhile and maybe come up with another model. 

Deciding to look at others blogs, I came across the model I think explains me best.  In the blog, Research Journal, Melody writes "The Oprah Winfrey model is a genealogist conglomerate. She devours data left and right. When she has bought up all the data for one side of her family, she works on the other. If those lead to dead ends, she’ll work on the neighbors tree and possibly the postal carriers. She is involved in various projects (organizing her digital files, researching for the Korean War MIA Project, working on her own project to document the Portuguese people of Kauai, writing for her blog, networking online with other genealogist, and setting up special pages on Squidoo). Her genealogy empire keeps expanding. Family data spreads through 25 binders. And, that doesn’t count the ones who aren’t related. She helps others where she can, whether it’s aiding them in researching or providing ideas for how to research. Genealogy will never be boring for her because she will always find a new outlet even if her own lines dry up." 

Yup, that's me.

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