Don't Believe Everything You Find Online
By Gayle H. Van Horn
The Internet has changed genealogy forever. In a matter of minutes, we can search census records, cemetery databases, newspapers, military records, passenger lists, family trees and countless other sources that once required letters, long-distance travel or hours spent scrolling through microfilm.
But there is one important rule every family historian should remember:
Just because you found it online doesn't mean it's true.
One of the easiest traps to fall into is the online family tree. You search for an ancestor and suddenly discover someone else has already traced that family back several generations. Names, birth dates, marriages, parents, and even photographs may already be there.
It can look convincing.
Unfortunately, it may also be completely wrong.
One Mistake Can Become Hundreds
Genealogy websites make it remarkably easy to copy information from another person's tree into your own. That's convenient when the information is correct. When it isn't, an error can spread quickly.
Suppose someone mistakenly identifies John Smith's parents as William and Mary Smith. Another researcher copies the information. Then another copies it from that tree. Before long, twenty online trees contain exactly the same parents.
Twenty trees agreeing with one another does not necessarily mean twenty researchers independently reached the same conclusion.
They may all have copied the same mistake.
This is especially dangerous when researching families with common names or families who repeatedly used the same given names from one generation to another. Two men named William Johnson living in the same county at approximately the same time can easily become one person in an online family tree.
A Family Tree Is a Clue, Not Proof
I enjoy looking at other researchers' family trees. They can provide excellent clues, particularly when you have reached a dead end.
But I treat what I find as a lead to investigate, not a fact to immediately add to my own genealogy.
If another researcher identifies the parents of an ancestor I have been trying to find, my next question is simple:
How do they know?
Are there birth or baptismal records? A marriage record? Census records? Probate files? Land transactions? A family Bible? Newspaper notices? Cemetery records? Military documents?
Or does the tree simply provide two names with no source whatsoever?
The difference is important.
Even Records Can Be Wrong
There is another lesson genealogists eventually learn: an original record isn't automatically correct either.
A death certificate may contain the wrong birth date or incorrectly identify someone's parents because the informant didn't know the answers. A census taker may misspell a surname, record the wrong age or misunderstand an accent. An obituary may contain an incorrect relationship. A tombstone can even have the wrong year.
That's why good genealogy rarely depends upon a single record.
When possible, compare several independent sources and look for information that consistently points toward the same conclusion.
Watch Those Online Hints
Those little leaves, suggestions, and automated hints on genealogy websites can be enormously useful. They can also send your research in completely the wrong direction.
A computer sees similarities. It doesn't necessarily understand the family.
A matching name, approximate birth year, and the correct state may look promising to an algorithm, but another record may show that the suggested individual was living fifty miles away with a completely different wife and children.
Before accepting a hint, look at the entire record.
Does the age fit? Does the location make sense? Are the spouse and children correct? Does the occupation fit? Is there another person with the same name nearby?
Most importantly, ask whether this record fits what you already know from reliable evidence.
Don't Force the Pieces to Fit
Perhaps the greatest temptation in genealogy occurs when we desperately want to solve a mystery.
You've searched for someone's parents for years. Then one evening you discover an online tree that provides exactly what you've been looking for.
There they are—father, mother, and another four generations stretching backward.
It is very tempting to click "Add."
Don't.
Not yet.
Investigate those people as though you had discovered them on a handwritten note tucked inside an old book. Look for the evidence connecting one generation to the next.
Sometimes the connection will prove correct.
Sometimes you'll discover that someone, somewhere, simply made an educated guess—and over the years that guess became accepted online as fact.
It's Okay to Say "I Don't Know"
Perhaps one of the hardest lessons in genealogy is accepting an unanswered question.
We naturally want every blank filled in. We want every maiden name discovered and every set of parents identified.
But "unknown" is better than "wrong."
There is nothing wrong with placing a question mark beside a possible relationship and returning to it later. New records are digitized every day. Newspapers become searchable. Archives put new collections online. DNA results may provide another clue.
The answer that isn't available today may appear several years from now.
Do Your Own Detective Work
Online genealogy is an extraordinary resource, and I certainly wouldn't want to return to the days when virtually every discovery required a trip to a courthouse, library or archive.
But technology hasn't changed the basic responsibility of the genealogist.
Follow the clues. Examine the records. Compare the evidence. Question contradictions. Record your sources.
And when you find an online family tree that takes your ancestry back another six generations overnight, enjoy the discovery.
Then start checking it.
Because in genealogy, finding an answer is only the beginning.
Proving it is where the real research begins.
