Monday, October 4, 2010

Mailbox Monday: Community Trees Redux

Dear Insider,

I was wondering how family trees or community trees get put on the FamilySearch Community Tree website. Can ordinary folk like you and I contribute to the Community Trees?

Signed,
Karl and Sandra Jarvis *

Dear Karl and Sandra,

Ordinary? Who are you calling ordinary?!? You’re an Ancestry Insider reader. That makes you a reader extraordinaire! But I digress…

Keep in mind that a community tree is not just any genealogical tree. Community trees have an extremely narrow focus.

In my opinion, focusing on a closed-location is the the best project possible. It targets a location with minimal migration over several generations past. Project members scour the records of the locale, identifying each and every individual mentioned in the records. The closed nature of the locale and the comprehensive nature of the investigation yields genealogical data galore because the process of elimination can produce proof aplenty.

It is unfortunate that the FamilySearch Community Trees home page does not contain a link to the What’s New page. That page says, “If you have questions or have a project you would like to publish on FamilySearch Community Trees contact Raymond W. Madsen at madsenrw@familysearch.org .”

Signed,
-- The Insider

3 comments:

  1. I really like the concept of the Community Trees and wanted to understand more about them. But every time I click on the "search" icon beside a tree, it takes me to the "search strategies" page. If I go to the "advanced search" and look for a name, it does the same thing.

    Do you have to be signed in somewhere to even view the trees? If so, where? What am I missing?

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  2. I have the same question bjs does - I think previously you were able to look at the various trees. Another question are these trees done in a particular program or format - it looks like the The Next Generation website program but am unsure.

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  3. I hope Mr. Madsen is not overwhelmed today! I try so hard to keep up with what is going on, but the whole community trees thing really passed me by. I found a relative on it and added information by clicking the 'suggest' button. Hope that was the correct way?

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