OMG! The Ultimate Strategy to Find Records

That was one of the best episodes ever!

Dang! You smashed that brick wall! It was bad enough that we don't have the 1890 census because of the fire.

Thank you for the FamilySearch tip. I just found a treasure trove of documents I've been looking for!

Very interesting story. I found my great-aunt in the census listed as the daughter of her great-grandparents and living in their home. At the time her parents were in the process of a divorce and her mother had obtained a job with lodging that didn't allow for children to come with her. Her father took in his son and the older daughters were quickly married but the youngest daughter was too young for that. Finding all the census records of the family helped me narrow down the date of my great grandparent's divorce within 3 years and then going through newspaper records for a very common first and last name looking for the divorce became a doable task. But a different last name than expected certainly makes things harder and once I found her then I was frustrated with myself for not having looked at the census in more detail previously to figure out who the teenager is in the household with the 90 year olds!

Good work. I think the FBI needs your skills!

Took 36 years to find my great grandfather. Now I know why my grandmother never spoke of him. 😧

I liked that, your hard work paid off

You are amazing, this is a very factual and detailed strategy...thank you so very much for sharing your processes.

I can't thank you enough for this. I had an ancestor whom I knew had several children, but I could not find most of them. After watching this video, I went on family search and looked him up through the experimental search, and found some deeds from various points of his life that listed the names of all of his children. THANK YOU! ❤

Seems like a "one off." Congratulations on your find, but what of this is of general use?

I hope they add more records soon.

OMG is right! I know my McKenzie family came to NY in 1803. They moved west and settled in Waukesha Cty, Wisconsin. But I had no idea when. A Land Patent was issued in 1849 and the first child born in WI was in 1853. In the Real Estate Grantee Index in the full text records I found a records dated 1839 and 1841 that put my Mcenzies in Waukesha. Happy Dance!! Now I need to fill in the NY to WI gap. 😊

Just curious about what made you search for guardianship? Did you know that Nannie had property? Otherwise, I didn't think that "orphaned children" would have a guardian unless they owned or were an heir to some property?

Why wouldn't you have just checked the households of the Grandparents and Siblings first? 🤔🤔

I love this!

I found my great grandfather Bell by searching death records and obits where I stumbled upon my great grandmothers death certificate which had been signed by her brother in law. Turns out, he lied about his middle name being Alexander bc he had been locked up for swindling and being a William Lasseter Bell in GA with a rap sheet at that time would have caused a stir since my great grandmother was a founder of Atlanta and very well known. Alexander Bell was the brother of the GA congressman Hiram Parks Bell. The Bells were very well known and prominent in GA.

My Sister had given up after 10 years of trying to figure out who he was, but I found it from reading and thinking outside the box in a couple of days! Sometimes coming in with a fresh set of eyes can be a benefit! Thanks for the search tools tips too!

I use Add Custom Event routinely to add Surviving Children statistics from the 1900 and 1910 US Census. A comment might read "5 out of 7 children surviving as of the 1900 US Census." It could also be useful with an obit, but I rarely use it that way. I would source the new fact to the appropriate census record. This information is always useful for evaluating a household.

Very good, do the same rules apply when researching UK & Irish ancestors.

On the Facts page for Nannie I see you have added a couple more Name rows. You have Name (alternate). Can you please share how to do that? I have used Ancestry's AKA but they put that at the bottom of the column; which to me is kind of dumb, as it is listing a name and should be near the name. I have a great uncle who changed his name and would like to show it like you have it. Did you use Add and then the Custom Event that you just showed in this video? Thank you for your help. And thank you for all your videos as you really help explain things very well.

This is why i go down the whole rabbit hole and research all familia relationships. Im so happy for you. Great tip on using familysearch.

So interesting!

Right above that family in the 1880 census is a Sarah Hale, age 81. Is that Nanie's grandmother?

Really liked this one and have recommended my group watch it before we meet at the library next week... As an aside, even in Google Sheets the Paste as plain text doesn't work for me...

My name is Hill Kiah. It’s very unusual. Too easy to trace me! … I know, I’ll only marry women named Mary. Marry Mary! I like it. A curve ball you future kinfolk will never see coming! Ha Ha, good one Hill Kiah! (unsung author of the original lesser known genealogical show, “Lil Orphan Nannie” courtesy of composers Winslow, Hale, and silent partner McDaniel.

Huzzah 🥳 I think I found an Aunt using this method. In the 1930s, 2 years after the death of her father, her sisters - including my grandmother, moved across the river from Georgia to South Carolina to live with their oldest sister and her husband. She stayed behind with an Aunt/Uncle to continue her education, graduate from high school and then go to college. I could not locate her or her mother (still working on that) but, I tried using the catalog the way you suggested and searched for her in the town she lived in previously. No luck. Then I tried searching by her first name and year of birth since her name isn’t really common. Voila 🎉 I believe I located her living as a boarder with an Aunt/Uncle, not to far from my great, great grandparents. She was listed under their surname, like Nannie. Her age is right and I know they didn’t have a daughter that age. I’m 99.9% sure it’s her, but before I break a hip doing the happy dance, I will dig deeper to be sure. Thanks for the tip.

Oh it’s in my heritage. I don’t have that. Thanks anyway.

My daughter started building the family tree a few years back when she was in her late teens. She found that my husband’s grandfather’s first wife died shortly after childbirth in 1904. (It seems that no one in the family even realized there was a first wife). Initially my daughter had entered that the child had died as well. We saw no mention of the child in the census records, but my daughter found someone with the boy in their tree living with another family the details were sketchy. Then one of my husband’s cousins contacted the military asking for his military records. In paging through the dozens of pages, I found a reference to an amount of money paid monthly to the family that was raising the boy. We did a bit more research and learned that it was the deceased wife’s sister who was raising the boy. Unfortunately he died without having any children.

I wish this was as easy for German Ancestry - So many records destroyed. They have such prominent surnames - they have those family shields. But again - no records. And because I am Registered English - SOOO many forms. One thing I do know - - - Some actually went to America and became part of the Amish. I have no chance.

Newspapers are helpful in these cases, also.

One person I was researching began their life with their family in a town in Illinois. The family moved to Kansas when she was still small. A few years later, she is back in Illinois (without siblings) living as a "Servant" at the former neighbor's home. The Census after that, she is listed as a "daughter" for that family (still no siblings).

Newspaper articles revealed that the father was accused of molesting her, and the mother had filed for divorce. The father never went to prison, but the mother had no husband/alimony to support the child, so she wisely sent her away from the scandal and gossip to live with former neighbors. The siblings were all boys and almost all old enough to work, so they stayed in Kansas.

Without newspapers, none of this would have been explained, and I would not have had any way to confirm the person at the neighbor's house was not a same-name confusion situation.

You are amazing! I'm 75 and wish I had the info on my grandmother who moved to America from Ireland, married my grandfather who moved here from England after fighting in the Boer War and had six children. I didn't meet any of Dad's relatives until I was 18. My grandparents were long gone at that point. Our families didn't stay in touch. So, I don't have a lot to go on despite having lots of cousins I never met.

Tracked down a couple of children from my 2nd great grandmother's first marriage mentioned on a Quit Claim deed including their married names. Was able to find much information on the first daughter but still nothing on the second one. I am thoroughly convinced I would never have this information without this timely video. Thank you Connie Knox! Again!!

Congratulations on your find. Don’t know if you noticed that Sarah Hale is on that 1880’s census record right about the McDaniels family. I know it’s time consuming and takes me down rabbit trails but I often research the other family members (siblings, spouses , in-laws) because occasionally I’ve come across someone labeled grandchild, niece or nephew and I wonder, who’s child is that and why are they raising them? Later it’s exciting when I put the pieces together. 😊

Wow! I love your vids. I believe you can find gold in a salt mine!

I didn't do it that way but it's basically how I found my grandfather and his actual mother.

Can anyone explain why I traced my family to 1730 and it was 100% pure English, but my DNA came back 100% pure Irish? The DNA must be from 500 or 1,000 years ago?

I am going crazy trying to find my mother in the 1939 UK census after she was evacuated from London to Harrogate. I don’t know who her carers (guardians) were.
It doesn’t help that the parents listed on her birth certificate were her aunt and uncle.

I successfully used this method from the earlier video to find an 1880 record I had been looking for for 20 years. Looking to use it again on another stubborn problem had the same problem as others with the paste special coming in vertically instead of horizontally. After experimenting I found the problem was not with Excel but with my browser. My standard browser is Firefox and no matter what I tried the paste always came in verticly. As soon as I opened Ancestry in the Microsoft browser everything worked perfectly. Thanks for this valuable strategy. If anyone else has this problem try switching browsers.

Awesome Video! So much information. I do have a problem though, how do I find what township a town is in? I am looking at maps that show the counties and towns but when I fill in the panel to the right on the "Browse this collection", I don't know how to find the township. Would the township be the County Seat?

I know the feeling!

Thank you so much! This was so helpful. I finally figured out how to copy the record info into Excel.

Brilliant! thank you, Connie!

Fantastic video. If you ever run out of video ideas Id love one on how to find a child in the 1850's Canada/ USA with no paperwork prior to a baptism at an estimated 4 years old. If there is anyway to find documentation for a lost, missing, abandoned, or orphaned child with an unknown name...It's a long shot :)

I think I heard the scream of joy across the country from you. Well done!

You can address the single column paste problem with Data->Delimiter probably Space based on what you’ve shown. Use Textsplit if it’s more than one type of delimiter.

When will Family Search apply this new full text search to other records? There are a whole lot of probate records not indexed in South Africa and there should be one from my ancestor who died in 1874.

Emojis are available on Windows by pressing the Windows Key + . (period) Faster than searching.

This is SO great, I have one ancestor in particular (2nd grandma) that I THINK had a similar situation and have struggled to find her. Same time period, too. I cant wait to try this out, thank you!

my great grandparents are McDaniel and I have Hale Captain Nathan is my cousin . My middle name is Daniel just take the Mc off I have their last name as a middle name.

I'm doing the happy dance with/for you!!!!
This is so awesome and gives me hopes that I can also find some documents.... hope this also work on Latinamerican countries which is where I'm having most problems finding things at

Awesome find! ❤❤