Organizing Your Digital Genealogy Records

[@SM16]

Thank you for this valuable information, makes things a whole lot easier.

[@GenealCymru]

Glad to help! Also, I'm thinking of making an updated one at some point. One thing I didn't realise back then is just how many records there are out there. So for everything I suggest in that video in terms of the folders, break it down into smaller pieces. I ended up with folders with like 1000 records in, so I found some different ways to break those down into more manageable chunks.

[@rosemarykavanagh7350]

Dai, I have recommended this to all our family history members in North Queensland, Australia. Thank you - you made me smile as I recognised my own early attempts at researching my Williams line. Cheers

[@GenealCymru]

Thanks! Glad to bring a smile-job done for the day! :D Know that there will, eventually, be some videos that take us to Australia too. I've got a Morgan who went there and become a millionaire in the railways, Joseph Jenkins the Swagman, and some Rattenburys who went to Tasmania, all in my tree.

[@deborahstevens9587]

It certainly is a huge undertaking.

[@GenealCymru]

It is! But it becomes more manageable when you do it in little pieces. This video is due for an update because my organizing has changed a lot since I made it.

[@FJgenieter]

​@@GenealCymru yes please!!

[@Danielle-nz9tn]

Dai, I am so excited that I found your channel! Not only do I love listening to your lovely relaxing and calming voice (and especially hearing you pronounce Welsh-it’s just beautiful!), but I am so fascinated by your thorough educational videos! Your explanations are so helpful and easy to understand, especially to help navigate the Welsh naming systems. I now understand that naming systems didn’t always operate like our current hereditary surnames in the US (duh, I guess! :). It might help explain why some of my ancestors in Norway have the same surname as their spouses. Maybe it’s similar to Wales, like just a small number of surnames during those medieval times. You also make this genealogical process sound possible! Thank you! I subscribed right away! :-). Your accent…are you Canadian. Did I mention I love your voice !

[@GenealCymru]

Oh thank you for the lovely message! I'm so glad you're enjoying the videos and finding them helpful! And what you said about making it sound possible was my #1 goal when I started this channel. I think Welsh genealogy really gets a bad rap and I want to help people jump into how much fun it really is! And I think Norway used a similar patronymic system as Wales. I did some Icelandic research for my friend once and her ancestors were like so-and-so Arason/Aradottir (child of Ara) and then their children would have a different second name. That system would have come from Scandinavia.

[@Danielle-nz9tn]

I’m wondering what kind of Ancestry membership you recommend for a newbie? I have part of my tree created on my partner’s Ancestry account, but it’s not super ideal, so I’m thinking of getting my own account. I also need to have the access for international databases, which he does not have. I assume I can transfer my tree over to my own account, but I’ll have to check. I can’t wait to watch all your videos! And you have videos about Welsh homes too?! Looking at those Welsh hutches, I think my parents’ furniture that I grew up with might be Welsh, or Welsh-style anyway. I’m so interested in exploring my Welsh roots now, as I just found out that I’m a descendant of Rhys ap Thomas of Wales. 😊 Thank you for your channel!

[@GenealCymru]

As for the best Ancestry account, I try to be very thrifty. Ancestry, FindMyPast, and The Genealogist, all have free 2 week trials. So when I started, I used those to get as many records as possible as quick as I could. Then I usually wait for when the specials are on before I buy. Ancestry sometimes has 1 dollar deals for 3 months of the premium membership. Luckily for the Welsh records there's also a lot of free records (newspapers, journals, tithe maps, wills, document summaries through the National Library of Wales site, local archives with document summaries online, Google, Archive.org, etc) available that I use in the in-between subscriptions times. So yeah, it really depends on what you can afford. If you haven't done a FindMyPast 2-week free trial yet, here's a link to get that: ( tidd.ly/3QmPMrk ). Just make sure you cancel the subscription a couple days before the trial ends so that they don't assume you want the paid-for subscription.

[@kimlarsen1391]

Can you tell me how you sort and store the census documents? please. Normally with more than one member in the household - do you copy the same document for each family member saved under their names? Thank you in advance

[@GenealCymru]

That's a really great question. The first answer is it depends. In my tree, I'm usually safe to assume that most of the children live with their parents until they get married and move out. it's not always the case, but usually. So I generally save one copy of the census under the name of the head of the household when I'm related to both parents. When I'm only related to one of them, I save it under that one person's name. In my tree, I put everyone's address, so if I want to see their census, I'll know where to look-if I'm looking for their parent, an aunt or uncle, the grandparents, or just them on their own, whoever it may be. Hopefully that helps. There will definitely be more videos on how I keep my tree and files organized, don't you worry. :D