Diana Elder

About Diana Elder

Diana Elder AGⓇ AGL is a professional genealogist, author, and speaker. She is accredited in the Gulf South region of the United States through the International Commission for the Accreditation of Professional Genealogists (ICAPGen). Diana graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in Elementary Education and has turned her passion for teaching to educating teens and adults in proven genealogy techniques. Diana is the author of Research Like a Pro: A Genealogists Guide and creator of the “Research Like a Pro” study group. She writes regular articles for FamilyLocket.com, the genealogy website created by her daughter, Nicole Dyer. She presents regularly at genealogy conferences, sharing the methods she uses every day to solve challenging genealogical problems.

Researching African American Ancestors in Government Documents Part 3 : WPA Projects and Slave Narratives

Sep 18, 2020

What additional records can you use to research African Americans in the United States? You might be surprised to learn of the many documents created by WPA projects during the 1930s. These projects provided thousands of jobs and recorded hundreds of first-hand accounts of slavery from interviews of the previously enslaved still living at that time. Learning more about these records can give you another avenue to research in your quest to discover family connections....

Researching African American Ancestors in Government Documents Part 2 : Land and Military Records

Sep 2, 2020

If you are conducting African American research you might wonder what records are available? Could land and military records reveal information about an African American ancestor? Those records created by the United States government in the years before emancipation, during the reconstruction era, and post reconstruction do pertain to African Americans and this article will give a brief overview of the history involved and what records could be searched. Part 1 of this series focused...

Researching African American Ancestors in Government Documents Part 1 : U.S. Federal Census, Freedmen’s Bureau and Freedman’s Bank Records

Aug 19, 2020

Do you have African American ancestry and wondered how to begin researching those lines? Perhaps you have an ancestor who enslaved African Americans and you have discovered documents mentioning their names. If you help others with their family history research you may eventually come across either of those scenarios. Many resources are available to aid in African American research and this series will outline those created by the United States Federal Government. I recently attended...

Using OneNote for Genealogy Research

Aug 6, 2020

Are you a Microsoft Office user? Do you need a way to organize the plethora of documents, photos, emails, and more that come with research? The Microsoft Office suite includes OneNote which has many applications for organizing our genealogy. It may be just the tool you have been missing in your genealogy toolkit.Today we have a blog post from a guest blogger, Nancy Avis, who shares the way she uses OneNote. Using OneNote for Genealogy...

Writing a Historical Novel and Author Interview: Isle of Canes by Elizabeth Shown Mills

Aug 2, 2020

How do you learn history? Watching a movie? Taking a course? Reading a historical novel? Discovering the nuances of time and place can make all the difference in our ability to make connections in our family history. Personally, I have found the historical novel, based on research, to be my favorite learning vehicle. A memorable story engages our brain and helps to absorb more information. The Family Locket Book Club on Goodreads is featuring Isle...

Plagiarism and Copyright for Genealogists

Jul 25, 2020

When you are writing a family history article or book, have you wondered if you could use a photograph, quote, or record image legally? That town map you found might be perfect to illustrate your point in a research report or presentation, but can you use it? With the proliferation of images and information across the internet, plagiarism and copyright issues need to be addressed. As family historians and genealogists we want to be ethical...

Reduce Browser Clutter with OneTab and Increase Productivity

Jul 16, 2020

Are you ready for a new productivity tip? Imagine you are in the middle of a research session with ten different tabs open on Google Chrome. Glancing at the clock you realize you have to join an online meeting and close your tabs, but you hate to lose the web-pages that will take you several minutes to relocate and reopen. Perhaps your internet has slowed down because you have so many tabs open but again,...

Back to the Basics with Naturalization Records: Part 2

Jul 11, 2020

Naturalization records are important sources to explore for information on our immigrant ancestors – especially those who arrived in the United States in the 1800s and early 1900s. If we want to discover the home country or village, a naturalization record could help to make connections between our ancestor and the family left behind. Part 1 of this series discussed why we want to seek out naturalization records, detailed the process of naturalization, and gave...

Effectively Adding a Source to your Ancestry Tree

Jul 3, 2020

As you discover new sources for an ancestor, do you add them to your online Ancestry tree? How do you create a source citation for that source and what notes should you include? With so many genealogists using Ancestry’s tree building and hinting capabilities, our added source may end up being multiplied and added to other trees. If we document our source well, another researcher will be able to retrace our footsteps and find the...

Disproving a Hypothesis and Moving the Research Forward

Jun 25, 2020

What do you do when your research hypothesis is disproved? Perhaps the discovery of a new record, lack of DNA evidence, or even discovering another person of a similar name could lead to your proposed ancestor turning out to be incorrect. Do you give up or use the findings as an opportunity to move forward with a new avenue of research? The silver lining in this scenario can emerge with a reexamination of the research...