Blog – Page 12 – Family Locket

New Features and Apps Announced at RootsTech 2025

During the last in-person class I taught at RootsTech, on Saturday afternoon, I asked attendees which tech announcements they were most excited about. The answers included Ancestry’s upcoming clustering tool, FamilySearch’s new catalog, Ancestry Networks, and the FamilySearch Together app. These are just a few of the many exciting announcements made at RootsTech 2025! It’s fun to see so many companies announce new technology that will help us with our genealogy research. Here are a […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer March 10, 2025 Creating and Sharing Family History, DNA Tools

AI and FamilySearch Full-Text Search: Working Together to Make Discoveries

Although we know there are likely more records of our ancestors somewhere, it is difficult to know precisely where to search when the known locations are exhausted. Full-text search by FamilySearch has been a game changer in this respect. Introduced at RootsTech 2024, I jumped on and started using it to discover more about my ancestor, Thomas Beverly Royston. I didn’t find anything new for him then, but during RootsTech 2025, I again did a […]

By Diana Elder March 9, 2025 Artificial Intelligence, Research Tips

RLP 347: Effie Kelsey and BitterSweet-A Poem, Researching Material Culture

In episode 347 of the Research Like a Pro Genealogy podcast, Diana and Nicole discuss researching material culture through family heirlooms, specifically a book. They use a historical research process similar to the genealogical research process to examine the poem BitterSweet by J.G. Holland, which Diana inherited from her great aunt Effie. Diana inherited the book and, using Gena Philbert Ortega’s methods from her institute course on Material Culture, researches its origins and significance. The […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer March 3, 2025 Podcast

Citing Digitized Records on FamilySearch

FamilySearch has billions of digitized records, many of which are indexed or available through the AI-assisted Full-Text search. When we find a record about our ancestor, we can attach it to their profile, download it to our files, or add a row to our research log. In each case, a precise source citation should be created to point back to the original record. One of the challenges with citing the source is that with the […]

By Diana Elder March 1, 2025 Research Tips

RLP 346: The Mystery of Claude “Dock” Harris’ Nickname

Diana and Nicole explore the mystery of Diana’s great-grandfather’s nickname, Dock Harris. They discuss how his name was recorded as D.H., Dock H., or Dock in records, which was puzzling because it seemed like a nickname. They explain how this caused confusion for Diana’s father, Bob, when he began researching the family history. Bob knew his grandfather as Grandpa Harris and had no other information to go on. The family bible even listed his name […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer February 24, 2025 Podcast

Jemima Griggs and Joseph Knight Sr.

Joseph Knight Sr. and his family were instrumental in Joseph Smith Jr.’s work to translate the Book of Mormon. I learned this week that he is my half third cousin eight times removed—the half third cousin of my paternal grandmother’s fourth-great-grandmother, Jemima Griggs. Joseph Knight and Jemima Griggs’ son both joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the 1830s. This week’s Come Follow Me Lesson was February 17–23: “Upon You My Fellow […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer February 24, 2025 LDS Family History

Texas Migration Patterns and DNA Connect Lucinda Wright Rinker to Her Father

Last week, we were fortunate to host Cathy Duncan for an enlightening webinar on her genealogical research combining Texas migration patterns and DNA analysis. Cathy, a member of our Research Like a Pro study group, shared her journey to connect Lucinda Wright Rinker to her father using a methodical approach that integrates traditional and genetic genealogy methods. This blog post summarizes the key insights from her presentation. This blog post was written by Claude Sonnet […]

By Diana Elder February 22, 2025 Research Like a Pro, Research Tips

RLP 345: Edward Raymond Kelsey – Horseman and Sheriff’s Posse Member

In this episode of Research Like a Pro, Diana and Nicole discuss how to choose a favorite photo out of a large collection. Diana shares a photo of her grandfather, Edward Raymond Kelsey, on his horse, Pal, and talks about his love for horses. She experimented with using AI to analyze the photo and shares her findings. Diana used Mark Thompson’s Historical Photo Analyzer custom GPT and was impressed with the results. The AI provided […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer February 17, 2025 Podcast

Clarinda Knapp Allen and Jerusha Barden Smith

This week’s Come Follow Me lesson was February 10–16: “That You May Come Off Conqueror, Doctrine and Covenants 10–11.” Section 10 was given to Hyrum Smith, who wanted to learn what he could do to assist with the work his brother, Joseph Smith Jr., was doing. To learn more about Hyrum, I thought it would be interesting to see if any of my relatives were related to Hyrum’s descendants. Unlike his brother, Joseph Smith […]

By Nicole Elder Dyer February 17, 2025 LDS Family History

Separating Women of the Same Name: A Tale of Two Cleo Zinns

Merged identities are always difficult in our research, but it is even more so with women. In the U.S., women have a maiden name and could have several different married names. Ensuring that the correct facts and sources are attached to a woman can be tricky without thorough research. However, using a research log and timeline helps put together a profile for a woman that can separate her from others of the same name. The […]

By Diana Elder February 15, 2025 Research Tips