Nicole Elder Dyer

About Nicole Elder Dyer

Nicole Dyer is a professional genealogist specializing in Southern United States research and genetic genealogy. She is the creator of FamilyLocket.com and the Research Like a Pro Genealogy Podcast. She co-authored Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist's Guide and Research Like a Pro with DNA and is an instructor for the study groups of the same name. She lectures at conferences and institutes and previously served as the secretary and publicity chair of the Pima County Genealogy Society. Nicole holds a bachelor's degree from Brigham Young University in History Teaching. At Family Locket Genealogists, Nicole is a project manager, editor, and researcher.

RLP 374: Preparing for Onsite Research – Part 1

Sep 8, 2025

Nicole and Diana discuss the critical steps to ensure a productive genealogy research trip. They emphasize the importance of thorough preparation to avoid frustration and wasted time and money, highlighting that onsite research presents unique challenges compared to online research. Listeners learn that creating a clear research objective is the first crucial step, and Nicole shares contrasting examples from her own experiences: a successful, targeted trip to Love County, Oklahoma, for her Kinship Determination Project,...

RLP 373: Heirloom Charts with Robert Stevens

Sep 1, 2025

In this episode Diana and Nicole host Robert Stevens, co-founder of Heirloom Charts. Robert, who began genealogy in 2010 to help his wife, Jodi, join the DAR, discusses their family-run business that creates customized lineage charts, emphasizing their custom-made, meticulously researched designs. They typically use approved record copies from hereditary societies like the DAR or Mayflower Society and sometimes hire professional researchers to ensure accuracy. Robert shares that charts start at $159 and highlights a...

Love County Tax Records: Research Adventures in an Old Jail

Aug 28, 2025

After my successful morning discovering over twenty Harris family deeds at the Love County Courthouse, I was eager to dive into tax records that might reveal more about my ancestors’ financial status during their time in Oklahoma. What I didn’t expect was to find myself kneeling on a concrete floor in a converted jail cell, using an upturned plastic bin as a makeshift desk while my phone battery slowly died. Sometimes the most valuable genealogical...

RLP 372: Onsite Research: Beyond Digitized Records

Aug 25, 2025

Today, Diana and Nicole talk about the many valuable genealogical records still waiting in courthouses, archives, and historical societies that aren’t digitized. Nicole shares her personal journey into onsite research, with recent trips to the Love County, Oklahoma courthouse and Historical Society, and the Kentucky Historical Society and Department of Library and Archives. She also talks about visiting Brigham Young University Special Collections to see an ancestor’s diary, and other facilities like the FamilySearch Library....

RLP 371: Comparing Marriage Records – Original License and Return vs. Marriage Book Entry

Aug 18, 2025

Diana and Nicole discuss comparing marriage records, specifically original licenses and returns versus marriage book entries. Diana shares her experience analyzing the marriage record of her 2nd great-grandfather, John C. Harris, to Rebecca D. (Alford) Harris in 1888. She explains how her father received the original marriage license and certificate from the Milam County, Texas, Courthouse in 1977. They examine the details of the original document, noting the different inks and handwriting from the county...

RLP 370: Tracing the Enslaved in the 1900 U.S. Census and Enslaved.org Project

Aug 11, 2025

Before the episode’s main topic, Diana shares how she uses AI in transcribing deeds and court records and for creating source citations and abstracts for her research log. Nicole shares that she’s been using ChatGPT to summarize profile pages from FamilySearch’s Tree for her research log. Nicole and Diana discuss tracing enslaved individuals in U.S. records, specifically focusing on the 1900 U.S. Census and the Enslaved.org project. Nicole introduces the challenges of researching enslaved people,...

Treasure Hunt at the Love County Courthouse: Uncovering Land Records

Aug 11, 2025

There’s nothing quite like the thrill of walking into a courthouse and uncovering a treasure trove of your ancestors’ records that exist nowhere else online. My research trip to the Love County Courthouse in Marietta, Oklahoma, turned into exactly that kind of genealogical treasure hunt. What started as a search for one specific 1913 deed mentioned in a newspaper article led to the discovery of over twenty records documenting the land transactions, oil leases, and...

RLP 369: Decoding the 1819 Weatherford Assault Case in Frontier Arkansas

Aug 4, 2025

Today’s episode, sponsored by Newspapers.com, focuses on decoding the 1819 Weatherford Assault Case in Frontier Arkansas. Diana introduces the topic of researching challenging court records and how new AI tools can assist with finding, transcribing, and understanding them. She discusses her project to discover the father of Henderson Weatherford, which led her to Lawrence County, Arkansas, court records. Diana explains how FamilySearch’s Full-Text search capability helped her find records for William and Buman/Bunyan Weatherford. Diana...

RLP 368: AI in the Driver’s Seat – Using Technology to Identify Vehicles in Family Photos

Jul 28, 2025

In this episode, Diana and Nicole explore how artificial intelligence can help identify vehicles in old family photographs, adding depth to family stories. Diana shares her experience using a custom GPT called “Genealogy Eyes” through ChatGPT to analyze a photo of her mother, Anna Mae Kelsey, seated on a sheep in front of the family car. Listeners learn how AI can identify specific car models and features, providing insights into the family’s economic status and...

High-Quality Handwritten Text Recognition with Gemini 2.5 Pro in Google AI Studio

Jul 22, 2025

Today I pasted three screenshots of a 1791 South Carolina deed into Google AI Studio, and the resulting transcription was so good, I almost didn’t have to change anything. The deed spanned three pages, so I simply took three screenshots and pasted them one at a time into the same conversation, with the prompt to “transcribe and keep line breaks.” Google AI Studio is a free tool for anyone to try Google’s AI model, Gemini....