I uploaded a new gedcom file today updating the database with my latest research. This update adds close to another 350 relatives to the Bush family genealogy. Most of the additions are in the Rowles line, along with a few updates submitted by cousins. There were several unannounced updates in February besides the normal update at the beginning of the month, so for many of you who only check back when I post you will find nearly a thousand new relatives. Keep sending those updates and photo’s and documents.

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Yes, it’s that time again. I have just updated my database on the website. This update brings an additional 600+ people to the family and the total number of relatives to just over 25,000. The vast majority of my newly found relatives are members of the Rowles, Ogden, Smeal and Bloom families. I won’t lie to you it has been a chore to keep it all straight, there a lot of cousins marrying cousins and as if that wasn’t enough in some cases a generation or two later they remarried back into the same family. There is still a lot of info yet to enter, so don’t be surprised if I update the database again before the end of the month.

Many of these newly added relatives have birth announcements, marriage announcements, and obituaries transcribed into their notes (Including the name of the newspaper, date of publication and page number(s) if known. I have also been fortunate enough to find a few useable pictures, and original scanned documents. I intend to get these all uploaded and linked to the people they relate to. That project is on my “To Do” list for the time being as I need to find a way to get them all organized, labeled, and formatted for the web. I am not sure just yet what my plan of attack will be, but I do know it will be a huge undertaking, and as such will likely be put on hold until I can take a week off from work.

If anyone finds an error and there are many (I know because I find them all the time.) Please let me know. There are many ways for you to submit corrections, updates and additional information as well as photo’s and documents. As always if you submit something I post I will credit you so that others will be able to find and contact you as well.

I am also looking for cousins who have their genealogies on the web to add to my links pages. If you have a website, ancestry tree, Family Search tree or any other website where you share your genealogy and we are related I would like to trade links with you.

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Tonight I finally updated the data on the website. I know that I have been threatening to do this for a little over a month, but It’s hard to decide just when one should say enough is enough and run the update. The new website has been well received and I have been fortunate to have connected with a lot of new cousins, and fellow researchers. New data and corrections have been steadily coming in.

You will find in this update corrected information for approximately 300 individuals and families. I have been able to add about 250 new people to the database as well, mostly by digging through the old newspapers at newspaperarchive.com. You will find a lot of new obituaries, marriage announcements and other articles in the notes areas for several hundred people. This information helps to chronicle the lives of those who came before us, and see what their lives were really like. To me this is one of the most interesting aspects of doing the research.

As always if you find a link let me know, if you have anything to add or share or want to suggest a correction or addition for any person or family, please let me know. You can find links on every page that will allow you to send pictures and documents, as well as to make a suggestion. If you aren’t sure where to click or which one to send it to, just send me an e-mail using the contact me page.

I wish to send out a huge thank you to those who have made suggestions and helped me correct errors, there are plenty more errors that need correcting, so keep those e-mails coming in.

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I bet you didn’t know that there was an exercise plan designed with the family historian in mind. Well the good news is that there is. This is not like those plans you see on television commercials, and for most of us it won’t cost you a cent. All you need are your walking shoes and a camera. The fine folks over at Find A Grave have all of the details you need. Simply go their website and sign up, then the next time you visit your cemetery of choice take you camera along with you and take pictures of the headstones. That’s all there is to it!

For those who don’t know, Find a Grave is a free website that catalogs cemeteries. Here is how it works, each cemetery has its own area on the website. You start off by adding the name of the person who is buried there, if they aren’t listed already. Then you can add photo’s of that person or their marker, as well as obituaries to their entry. You are also able to link family members together if you know the family connections. It is really quite an amazing website.

There are thousands of people already signed up and working on the project and new entries are added all the time. If you have a friend or relative who you know is buried in a cemetery and you are unable to visit that cemetery yourself, you can make a request of one of the volunteers who live in the area to take a picture for you. So consider becoming a volunteer when you sign up for your account. Volunteers are sent an email when a request in their area is made; however, there is no obligation to fulfill the request. You can simply pick and choose which ones you are able to fill and which ones you can’t. If you decide to fulfill a request but can’t locate the persons grave, you can let the requester know on the website that you did not find the grave.

My wife and I have fulfilled several requests, and have even photographed entire cemeteries and uploaded the pictures just because we were already there. I even got my father to fill requests in his area while he is out taking pictures of scenery and wildlife.

So the next time you are planning to go out and walk through your local cemetery, follow the Find a Grave exercise plan and take your camera along. You will not only fill those missing dates in your own research, but get a little exercise and help another family historian in the process.

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