In this podcast episode, hosts Diana, Nicole, talk with Michelle Mickelson, AG, and discuss the crucial role of church, cemetery, Native American, and Spanish language records in Southwestern genealogy. They emphasize that these records, often predating government documentation, are indispensable for exploring family relationships, migration patterns, and cultural practices through details found in baptism, marriage, and burial entries. The discussion covers a variety of denominations including Catholic, Episcopal, and Methodist, among others. They also offer strategies for accessing these records, whether through diocesan archives, historical societies, or online platforms like FamilySearch and Ancestry.com. The hosts highlight the unique insights that cemetery records can provide, and discuss specific records for Hispanic and Native American ancestries prevalent in the Southwest. They stress the importance of both online and physical archives for a comprehensive genealogical search, sharing a case study on efficient research methods for accessing Spanish Catholic church records.
Transcript
Nicole (1s):
This is Research Like a Pro episode 304 Southwestern Research with Michelle Mickelson Part two – Church Cemetery, Native American and Spanish Records Welcome to Research Like a Pro a genealogy podcast about taking your research to the next level. Hosted by Nicole Dyer and Diana Elder Accredited Genealogist professional. Diana and Nicole are the mother daughter team at FamilyLocket.com and the authors of Research Like a Pro A Genealogist guide with Robin Wirthlin. They also co-authored the Companion Volume, Research Like a Pro with DNA, Join, Diana, and Nicole as they discuss how to stay organized, make progress in their research and solve difficult cases.
Nicole (43s):
Let’s go. Today’s episode is sponsored by newspapers.com. Hi everyone. Welcome to Research Like a Pro
Diana (53s):
Hi. Nicole, how are you today?
Nicole (55s):
I’m great. I’ve been doing a lot of research on my portfolio and ordering vital records. It’s been really interesting and fun to go through all the people in my Kinship Determination project or KDP and just see what vital records I need to order. So yesterday I mailed several letters off to order things that are not available online.
Diana (1m 16s):
Oh, that’s so great. What state were you working in?
Nicole (1m 20s):
Oklahoma.
Diana (1m 21s):
Ah yes, I will remember that. They have an online index, but then you have to actually order the records. So
Nicole (1m 27s):
Yes, and I really appreciate the index because it’s a little bit of a scary thing to send off a letter not knowing if you put the right death date or the right name. So you’ve been able to check the index is very helpful.
Diana (1m 42s):
Oh, I agree. It’s a really good index and it’s really easy to use. Well, that’ll be exciting. I hope it comes back quickly. Your different orders and you can make progress on your KDP. It’s so fun. I’m
Nicole (1m 53s):
Hoping they come back quickly as well, but if not, it’s okay.
Diana (1m 56s):
You have other things to work on, right?
Nicole (1m 58s):
Well I can extend, you know, no stranger to extending my deadline.
Diana (2m 2s):
Oh, that’s true, that’s true. Well, let’s see some announcements for today. We’ve got our Airtable quick reference guide available on our website and we’re looking forward to our next webinar in our Research Like, a Pro Webinar Series. And this will be on Saturday, May 11th at 11:00 AM Mountain Time. And this is by Scott Dixon, who is one of our former Research Like a Pro study group members. And the title is Who was Mary FE DeShazo, A case study using indirect evidence in Burn Counties. So I’m looking forward to this. I am working in burn counties as well as you probably have all heard me talk about my Cline case and all those burn counties in in Arkansas.
Diana (2m 44s):
So that will be a great to learn from Scott. We are excited because we are almost ready to open registration for the next Research Like a Pro study group, which begins the end of August. And this is a study group without DNA and a lot of people like to take this one before adding DNA So. if you’re interested in that. Registration will open May 21st at 10:00 AM Mountain Time. And we are excited about our new offering, which is an AI workshop, which will be July 29th to August 1st and our registration opened May 1st. So you’ll want to check that out if you’re interested in a deep dive into AI and seeing how that can work with the Research Like a Pro process.
Diana (3m 25s):
If you’re interested in being a peer group leader for the study group, we have our application on the website, so make sure that you check that out if you’re interested in that and getting a free registration and working with a small peer group. And we are excited about the National Genealogical Society Conference, which is now just around the corner coming on May 17th and 18th So. if you haven’t registered, be sure to register so you can listen and watch all of the amazing talks that will be given there. And as always, join our newsletter for the latest in what we are doing and for any coupons that we’re offering on our products.
Nicole (4m 5s):
Well, thanks for those announcements. It’s fun to hear all that. And I’m really mostly looking forward to our AI workshop because that’s the hot new thing. And of course always the Research Like a Pro study group, which we’ve been doing for so many years. But it’s always wonderful to focus on our own research and make progress on our questions. So even though we’ve done it so many times, it’s still a delightful thing to do.
Diana (4m 30s):
Yes. and I have many reports written from those study groups and I’m so grateful it’s how I’ve made progress on all these brick walls. So agreed. It’s always fun to look forward to what the next subjective will be. What will I tackle next time?
Nicole (4m 43s):
Well, today we have Michelle Mickelson with us again. Hi Michelle
Michelle Mickelson (4m 47s):
Hi Nicole. Hello Diana.
Nicole (4m 49s):
Well, just a little bit about Michelle. We already had her on the podcast a few times, but I thought it would be fun to introduce her again. She is an accredited genealogist in the United States Southwest region, which includes Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and New Utah. And so we’re very lucky to have her here today continuing our series on these states and researching in the Southwest states. And we’re excited to talk about all of her case studies and things. She has spent some time researching in Spanish church records and she has experience in different types of languages and things. So it’s interesting to hear about like her colonial Spanish ancestry like we did last time with people in New Mexico and things.
Nicole (5m 32s):
So this is gonna be fun.
Michelle Mickelson (5m 34s):
Well Thank you for having me today. I’m excited.
Nicole (5m 37s):
Well let’s get started with talking about the role of church records. So of course we know that anytime we’re doing Spanish language research, we’re gonna probably look at some church records. So can you tell us a little bit about these church records?
Michelle Mickelson (5m 51s):
Yes. Catholic church records are so fun to look into. There’s so many relationships and generations that can be found in one record and these are staples in the southwestern region because they predate government records. So that timeframe from when the United States government purchased Mexico in 1850 until those territories became states, the Spanish mission records are the go-to for researching those, those ancestors during that time. Details include baptismal dates, marriage dates, burials to really help understand migration patterns and understanding the cultural practices.
Michelle Mickelson (6m 40s):
They’re, they’re just rich and valuable in information. The Catholic Church has volumes of registers and besides the Catholic church, there’s also within our region is Utah, which includes the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and they have membership records and there’s also Episcopal Presbyterian, Lutheran, Dutch Reformed Congregational kind of covers the Chinese groups and Methodist, Protestant Episcopal, all kinds there. So lots, lots to look into,
Nicole (7m 15s):
So many churches to think about. But yes, I think anyone who’s done research in Mexico or anything like that has seen these wonderful Catholic church records.
Diana (7m 24s):
Right. I’ve accessed those a little bit and I’ve noticed with some of these church records, they’re a little bit more difficult to figure out where to find them. So can you give us some tips on accessing church records?
Michelle Mickelson (7m 38s):
Yes, they can be a little bit tricky to find. You want to start by identifying the church or the diocese of the area and then contacting their archive. Typically they have regional repositories. Sometimes they’re in a historical society or a lot of them can be found on ancestry and family search in their collections and others are becoming increasingly accessible online. One of my favorite places to start is Family Search Wiki’s, United States Church Records. That’s a page that you just go on, you click a state And, it will come up with the denominations, the collections that they have available and it’s a really great place to start.
Michelle Mickelson (8m 28s):
That’s my favorite place to begin.
Diana (8m 31s):
That is such a good tip. I love the Wiki and I think that’s exciting that you can go to a clickable map so you can just hone in right away on exactly the state that you’re interested in because the states are all different and the churches are all different. Yes. So that’s so good to know.
Nicole (8m 49s):
I think your tip about contacting the diocese and the archives is so good because you know, often beginning researchers will think, oh, if I don’t find it in a collection on Ancestry or you know, an index collection at Family Search, maybe there, there just isn’t a church record. But a lot of the time it’s just not online yet. Right,
Michelle Mickelson (9m 6s):
Yeah. and I find that most people are happy to help out or to give recommendations or suggestions. I’ve had really good luck with that. So
Nicole (9m 16s):
Wonderful. Let’s go to on and talk about cemetery records. I know these are really important in any locality, but what can they offer us in the Southwest region?
Michelle Mickelson (9m 25s):
So these offer unique insights through details like epitaphs, the layout of the cemetery. Those things can indicate religious beliefs, they can indicate social status or historical events. And they’re particularly valuable when church and civil records are missing. So during that 1850s to early 1900s when there there were no records, you know the church and civil are missing, then cemeteries can really come in and be a great tool. I like to use Find a Grave and Billion Graves. Although visiting a cemetery in person can really give you a great context for the feel and the layout of the area.
Michelle Mickelson (10m 11s):
We took a family trip to California and our experience at a veterans cemetery in San Diego was very sobering. There were fields and fields of just white symmetrically placed gravestones. There was a memorial wall and the plaques often displayed their emblem of belief. So researching emblems of belief can lead you to the correct church for your ancestor. And I’ve put a link to that in the blog post. It’s given by the US Department of Veterans Affairs, easy to find. And it’s one of those little hidden tools, those little gyms that that can help get you on your way.
Michelle Mickelson (10m 56s):
We also took a visit to Salt Lake City, which has one of the largest cemeteries in the United States. It’s like the size of a small city. The roads are paved, some of them, some of them need some work. But I thought the most interesting thing was that they had names of the streets. I mean It is just, it’s huge and it’s a really great place just to get a sense and a feeling. And you can see there’s pockets of religious groups even within that area. So fun place to visit.
Nicole (11m 28s):
Oh yes, I love Utah cemeteries and I’ve been to a lot that happens to be where a lot of my more recent ancestors are buried and my husband’s and I love what you said about them having streets within them. But it’s really nice also when there’s a map telling you where your ancestors buried or where to look, you know, in different parts. But of course find a grave and fill grave can also give us those GPS coordinates, which sometimes we’ve had to use.
Michelle Mickelson (11m 50s):
Yeah, yeah, it’s like an address in Salt Lake. It’s just, it’s funny to me that that’s how they identify the, the grave is here’s the address.
Diana (12m 0s):
Yeah, there’s nothing like trekking through a cemetery trying to find that one gravestone that you know is there but you cannot find it. We’ve done that so many times and then finally find it. And it’s so exciting. I love this link that you have given with these different emblems of belief because there’s so many different little emblems that can be on a gravestone that will give you so many clues to the ancestors. And before I learned that, I just would say, oh that’s nice. That’s a little lamb. And then I would would learn what that signified. So you know, that’s a great tip. Well in the Southwest we have Hispanic and Native American records and I’m just wondering how different these are, what they are, how you find them, how you use them.
Diana (12m 44s):
I know they’ve gotta have some unique qualities.
Michelle Mickelson (12m 47s):
They are. So the Southwest’s Hispanic and Native American heritage is reflected in these church and tribal records. Often you’ll find Native American families and individuals in the Catholic church records. So there was a part where they were trying to teach them how to grow things and and educate them and, and so there’s a lot of interesting cultural aspects there. These are usually stored in regional diocesan diocesan archives or government tribal repositories.
Michelle Mickelson (13m 27s):
And these, these can really help in tracing the lineage and understanding the affiliations with the different tribes. There are lots of Hispanic archives located throughout New Mexico, California and Arizona a lot in the Southwest. And then Native, American museums are found throughout Utah and Arizona and the national agencies, they also go throughout the United States so, so they’re definitely far reaching and not so specific to this area, but they’re a good place to start. And one of my favorite libraries is the Sutra Library in California because it has resources for all 50 states and So I, think I touched on that last time.
Michelle Mickelson (14m 9s):
People coming from the east moved to the west. And so that has a lot of information that can connect you from our heritage here in the Southwest and where ancestors were before they came here.
Diana (14m 24s):
Hmm, that’s so interesting. But that makes sense that these records are going to be in church and tribal records and I love that. We have so many museums and archives that have sprung up that we can go onsite to go research more. and I would imagine that most of these don’t really have an online offering, but maybe there would be some that have a few things that generally do find that you just need to go in person.
Michelle Mickelson (14m 49s):
There are a few things online that’s a good place to start. So go to the online databases. You wanna prepare for these visits, you wanna know what records they have, check their catalogs, check their indexes, kind of like we were talking about in the beginning with Nicole’s Oklahoma records. They do have finding aids and these finding aids can really speed up the process. For example, most California missions can be accessed at the Family History library or an affiliate. You have to be inside the building. But one of the best ways to find these family history records is to use a finding aid, what’s created by the San Francisco genealogy.
Michelle Mickelson (15m 31s):
And when you combine that with a database search developed by Huntington Library in San Marino, this dramatically increases your efficiency. You use one to get to the other and we’ll go more into depth at the end of the podcast about the steps to take and exactly how that would work, what that would look like.
Diana (15m 52s):
So basically each one of these archives or repositories will have some kind of an online finding aid hopefully that will guide you to what actually is there in their building the records that they have. Is that right?
Michelle Mickelson (16m 6s):
It is, yeah. Just going to the, the library, I, again, I always start at Family Search Wiki and on the blog there are links to each date with compiled genealogies, places to start, record sources, histories, societies, that’s where you wanna start. ’cause each place is so unique and so different and there’s so much that going to your page, going to your specific timeframe and location will really give you a sense of of what’s out there. And then just call them and ask what they have and what’s available and what you need to do before you show up.
Diana (16m 44s):
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Diana (17m 30s):
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Nicole (17m 46s):
Let’s talk about Native American ancestry now. So the record sets available for that are a little different than what we’re used to with non-Native American ancestry in the US So can you tell us about those?
Michelle Mickelson (18m 1s):
Yes, they are very different for Native American ancestry. We use sources like enrollment lists, treaties, Indian census roles are really important. These documents provide the detailed information about each individual and the tribes they’re affiliated with. And these are found in the national archives. These are in special tribal offices or agencies throughout the United States. For instance, in the Southwest region, the Navajo Nation is one of the largest groups within the southwest. It’s kind of like a country within the United States. A country within a country.
Michelle Mickelson (18m 41s):
And so their business is conducted by treaty, the business done between them, the transactions. So in simple terms, it’s a formal agreement between two or more countries. That’s what a treaty is. and I, it took me a minute to understand that I’m, I never understood you know, what the significance of that was. But it’s because they are their own, their own nation. So it’s important to first identify the tribe that your ancestor may have belonged to. There is a list at usa.gov that offers the federally recognized tribes as well as the tribal leaders and how to contact them.
Michelle Mickelson (19m 21s):
It’s a really great starting point to researching your Native American ancestry. There are links to how to contact who to talk to, the enrollment process. They really have updated that and made it more user friendly to Genealogists. So I would definitely start there. That’s the place to go.
Nicole (19m 43s):
Great. Yeah. If you know that your ancestor was a particular tribe and then if you don’t know and you have that research question, I love Roberta Estes’s book about Native American ancestry and using DNA to help with that.
Michelle Mickelson (19m 56s):
Yeah, in the list, I mean there are hundreds of tribes and so it’s just, if you go on, you know there are maps that show where they lived and kind of what areas. So it gives you an idea of where they could be. It’s a place to start.
Nicole (20m 10s):
That’s a good idea.
Diana (20m 12s):
Right. That can be kind of a tricky thing when you know there is this history of some Native American ancestry but then trying to determine where that comes from can be a challenge. Well let’s talk now about the Spanish language challenge because we have another language that’s involved here.
Michelle Mickelson (20m 32s):
Oh yes. So because of the extensive Spanish influence in the Southwest, a lot of the records are in the Spanish language and they require translation to, to be used effectively. And the great thing is there are resources available to help researchers learn key genealogical terms to interpret the records accurately. You can do this, I am an English speaker, I do not speak a second language, but I have learned enough to translate and understand the Catholic church records. And so what’s really helpful is to understand how they’re organized.
Michelle Mickelson (21m 15s):
There are phrases they are put in a particular order. And so once you understand that organization, it really is easy to go in and do it. And that takes time. You have to be patient. I even took records to a neighbor or my son who speaks Spanish and they had no idea they couldn’t even translate it because they’re different languages used. It’s kind of like legalese here in the United States, you know, probate, what do all these different terms mean? And so that’s where it’s helpful. And one of the great places you can start is again, Family Search Wiki. They have a word list focused on Spanish terms for genealogy such as relationships, mom, dad, grandma, grandpa, days of the week, occupations, those things, you know can help you identify those specific words within the record.
Michelle Mickelson (22m 9s):
For more in-depth learning though I learned through BYU script tutorial and other courses, but this BYU script tutorial has charts of letters and spelling and abbreviations and they have images of documents, but It is a whole process you go through and they have practiced documents and they’ve updated it since I did it. And it’s really fantastic. Everything you need, as long as you have patience with yourself, you can do it. I believe everybody can learn how to do this.
Diana (22m 40s):
I absolutely agree. I had, you know, this one project that went into Mexico and I, remember looking through the birth records and thinking I had found it, you were looking for those names and It is a challenge and my husband speaks some Spanish and I was having him help me a little bit too. But yeah, it’s, it’s kind of a fun new thing that you have to learn when you’re gonna tackle another language. So thanks for giving us that tip on the Family search Wiki and the BYU script tutorial. You know, if you really wanted dig in and learn you can do it.
Michelle Mickelson (23m 11s):
Absolutely.
Nicole (23m 12s):
Well I just have been loving learning about the potential for artificial intelligence to help us with this. and I know that the new family search full text search does include some Spanish language records, doesn’t it? With the Mexican Notarial records
Michelle Mickelson (23m 26s):
There are the Notarial, yeah those are the land records. But even within the, the civil records So I mean this is where Spanish colonization comes into play is is understanding they had to register civilly and with the church. So yes, within the Notarial records there are civil registrations of birth and sometimes whole families would come, you know, depending on how close they were to the parish and they would register multiple children at the same time. But yes, they’re usually in both So if you, I was able to find family for my grandmother in church records, but there was a daughter that was missing and I did find her in the civil records portion.
Michelle Mickelson (24m 10s):
And that’s why learning the record keeping practices are really helpful to our genealogical research. ’cause there are certain nuances that, you know, some denominations believe about baptism age or ceremonial or who can be a witness. There’s just lots of different, even outside of the Spanish portion. So it’s important to understand like the Catholic part for the Spanish but then also for our own church records in general, how to understand the baptismal practices of other denominations.
Nicole (24m 45s):
That’s really helpful to consider that impact of Spanish colonization and how it trickles across various record and churches.
Michelle Mickelson (24m 54s):
Yeah and even Native Americans can be found in those records. Europeans were baptized, you know as they came in for the gold rush in California, some Europeans converted or were married. So yeah there’s just a lot of interesting dynamics found in those records.
Diana (25m 11s):
Well I would love to just learn a little bit more from you with the case study. So can you tell us a specific, you know, experience that you had in researching in the Southwest?
Michelle Mickelson (25m 24s):
Absolutely. So when I was doing accreditation with my second great-grandmother, I think I mentioned her name, Antonia ’cause her father’s name was Antonio. So one of the things that helped me was this mantra fast It is slow and slow is fast and just repeat this to yourself often because efficiently accessing California Spanish Mission records at the Family History library or one of its affiliates requires three steps and the first two can be done at home. And this, I’ve condensed probably five years of figuring this out into just a few steps.
Michelle Mickelson (26m 6s):
So these were the things that now that I know what I’m doing, I would go back and do the first two steps can be done at home. As soon as you know the mission that your Spanish colonial ancestor lived, there are 21 in California, for example, there are others in Arizona, I know San Javier and Toba there. There may be another one, but there are a couple there too. But most of my experience was in the California missions. So this will be your first step. You will search in the early California population project database. They call it the ECPP for short And. it was recently updated in I think about 2023.
Michelle Mickelson (26m 49s):
This database was once restricted to only university students and professors. So there is a little bit of a learning curve, but no worries, just download the guide, read the guide and remember, fast is slow and slow is fast. On this database you’re going to find translated and abstracted information from your ancestors church record. So baptisms, marriages, burials, they’ll include a record number So if they are in English, the abstraction is in English. And so you wanna look for the record number. And then the second step is to access the finding aid for the mission record microfilm numbers at family search.
Michelle Mickelson (27m 38s):
And this was indexed by a researcher at San Francisco genealogy and there is a link to that in the blog post, I believe you’re going to locate on that finding aid, the record types. So again, it will specify baptism, marriage, burial, and the years that they’re available and the mission where they’re located and the microfilm number associated with that mission. So you’ll keep track of those things. Step three is to walk into the family history library or affiliate a family hit search center or such. And you find, sit down your favorite computer, you’re gonna locate the collection using the microfilm number from step two and then you’ll browse through the digital images it, it takes time to look through them.
Michelle Mickelson (28m 29s):
But one of the things that you taught me Diana, was to look at the beginning of the record collection set and to look at the end and kind of figure out the layout of how they were imaged. Then you start to see patterns of years or locations, well mostly years for these ’cause you’ll have your location, but that’s how you’ll use then that record number from step one to find your ancestor. And each scribe is different. So depending on the padre or the father that was there keeping records and if he had a helper and those are all things that will come through BYU script that you’ll, that you’ll learn about.
Michelle Mickelson (29m 10s):
Santa Barbara mission records are not available to access the Family History library, but you can call the Huntington Library or the Santa Barbara mission with the record number and the name and the dates and they’ll perform a lookup and they’re really great to work with and they’ll send you a digital copy for like 50 cents. It’s not, again, this was four or five years ago, so it may have increased a little bit, but not much. So something that really helped me when I was researching family groups, because we know our Catholic ancestors had a lot of children. So I would put them in a table.
Michelle Mickelson (29m 51s):
I would record by mission, I’d record the citations, I would would even color code by family or generation or event. But that way you can do a lot of searches all at once because once you get into one book or one mission, you want to find all the records that you can. So there’s so much you can find pretty quickly if you have these. So remember to access the ECPP database, find your mission number, and then go to the Family search center and look for that specific number and record it in your research log or your table.
Diana (30m 29s):
Well I love that explanation and I can see why you said fast, slow and slow as fast because this is a detailed process. It’s not as easy as just going to an ancestry collection and popping your ancestors’ name in and then getting all the information. But the records are there. You just have to know how to go about getting them. So thanks for walking us through that. I think this early California population project is amazing. That is, I mean what a gift for us. It’s so
Michelle Mickelson (30m 55s):
Fun. It’s fun. Yeah. There is a guide though, just trust me, you want to download it because it will help you understand and and research more efficiently there. Which is crazy to think there’s a guide to how to research this database, but it’s excellent.
Diana (31m 11s):
I totally get that. Sometimes it just looks Greek to us when we look at a a database that we just do not understand the, how it’s been put together and what everything means. So yeah, so sometimes we wanna skip the guide and then we waste all this time messing around not knowing what we’re doing. So always better just to read the instructions, right?
Michelle Mickelson (31m 29s):
Absolutely.
Nicole (31m 30s):
Yeah. I wish all databases were like ancestry and family search. We’re so used to searching in there where we have like a year range of plus or minus 1, 2, 5 and 10 or you know, we can like put in the first name initial and like a wild card. But other databases are different and we have to try to figure out how they work. That’s how I felt with the Oklahoma Death Index and birth index where it’s just on their state website and they don’t have everything that Ancestry has to search for.
Michelle Mickelson (31m 58s):
Yeah, and they’ve really done a great job with this website. They’ve simplified it. It used to be a little more complex, but you know, it’s the same basic design. They’ve just broken it down into Windows and tabs and so you’re wanting to look for names and so you could, there’s just so many possible ways to search by surname or by mission or by parent or baptism date or there’s just so many. And so that’s why using that guide Will will be really helpful. Really
Nicole (32m 29s):
Helpful. Great. Well, I think we can imply the fast is slow and slow is fast to a lot of different things in our genealogy research where if we take the time to do the preparation upfront, learn about the record set or make a research plan, which sometimes feels like we’re going slow, then we do become more efficient and faster, like you said. So that’s a really good tip. Well, Michelle, do you have an offer for our listeners?
Michelle Mickelson (32m 54s):
I do. I am so appreciative for you having me on the podcast that for all the listeners with Southwestern Ancestors, I’m excited to offer a special resource that I designed during accreditation, but that will help guide your research for your family history in the southwestern United States. It’s a one page at a glance guide just focusing on birth and death records. They’re categorized by each state, so Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and Utah. There was a standard already in place for marriages to be recorded at county formation, but there was not a standard for births and deaths.
Michelle Mickelson (33m 38s):
And so that’s why I have just those two on here. But this handy guide will provide you with the, the starting dates for official records in each state, the general compliance years to understand when most records became standardized. There are suggestions for substitute records when the official documents were unavailable. There’s also information on the restricted access periods. So five of our states have restricted access and so this will help you navigate those privacy laws. Then there are also just a few practical tips on where and how to obtain these records. So the ones that are available, it’s, it’s pretty simple to call the health department or call, you know, it gives you just a quick resource to go to to order the records when, when you’re ready to find them.
Michelle Mickelson (34m 28s):
There’s also a breakdown of what information is typically available by time period, which is so important in the Southwest knowing what records are available and where to find them. Because our boundaries were constantly changing and sometimes a territory could have been part of Nevada and Colorado, but now it’s Utah or they were always changing. And so this table does it specifically by time period. So deaths before this time or births during this specific period. It’s also applicable to anyone doing research anywhere. The same principles apply and you can download that and use it as a template to put in your own locality guide as part of the the Research Like a Pro process.
Michelle Mickelson (35m 18s):
But to, to download your free copy, just visit my website at mygenealogy.com and sign up with your email and this will help get you started and give you the confidence to just kind of know where to look and to know what’s available if something’s not available. We don’t want to spend our time beating our heads against the wall and trying to find something that’s not there. So that’s why I created this is to to help keep us from getting frustrated and just to focus on what we have to work with.
Nicole (35m 49s):
Well Thank you so much, Michelle So. we will put a link to that in the show notes of this episode and we really appreciate you offering that. That’s really awesome. Okay, well thanks everyone for listening.
Diana (36m 3s):
All right, thanks everyone. We’ll talk to you next time. Bye-Bye
Nicole (36m 6s):
Bye. Thank you for listening. We hope that something you heard today will help you make progress in your research. If you want to learn more, purchase our books, Research Like, a Pro and Research Like a Pro with DNA on amazon.com and other booksellers. You can also register for our online courses or study groups of the same names. Learn more at FamilyLocket.com/services. To share your progress and ask questions, join our private Facebook group by sending us your book receipt or joining our courses. To get updates in your email inbox each Monday, subscribe to our newsletter at FamilyLocket.com/newsletter. Please subscribe, rate and review our podcast. We read each review and are so thankful for them. We hope you’ll start now to Research Like a Pro.
Links
Michelle Mickelson’s website: https://migenealogy.com/ – go here to download her free guide to Southwestern States birth and death records – Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and Utah
Southwestern Research Part 2 – https://familylocket.com/southwestern-united-states-research-key-records-and-repositories-part-2-church-and-cemetery-records-unique-to-the-southwest/
Southwestern Research Part 5 – https://familylocket.com/southwestern-united-states-research-key-records-and-repositories-part-5-native-american-and-spanish-language-resources/
Sponsor – Newspapers.com
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Research Like a Pro Resources
Airtable Universe – Nicole’s Airtable Templates – https://www.airtable.com/universe/creator/usrsBSDhwHyLNnP4O/nicole-dyer
Airtable Research Logs Quick Reference – by Nicole Dyer – https://familylocket.com/product/airtable-research-logs-for-genealogy-quick-reference/
Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist’s Guide book by Diana Elder with Nicole Dyer on Amazon.com – https://amzn.to/2x0ku3d
14-Day Research Like a Pro Challenge Workbook – digital – https://familylocket.com/product/14-day-research-like-a-pro-challenge-workbook-digital-only/ and spiral bound – https://familylocket.com/product/14-day-research-like-a-pro-challenge-workbook-spiral-bound/
Research Like a Pro Webinar Series 2024 – monthly case study webinars including documentary evidence and many with DNA evidence – https://familylocket.com/product/research-like-a-pro-webinar-series-2024/
Research Like a Pro eCourse – independent study course – https://familylocket.com/product/research-like-a-pro-e-course/
RLP Study Group – upcoming group and email notification list – https://familylocket.com/services/research-like-a-pro-study-group/
Research Like a Pro with DNA Resources
Research Like a Pro with DNA: A Genealogist’s Guide to Finding and Confirming Ancestors with DNA Evidence book by Diana Elder, Nicole Dyer, and Robin Wirthlin – https://amzn.to/3gn0hKx
Research Like a Pro with DNA eCourse – independent study course – https://familylocket.com/product/research-like-a-pro-with-dna-ecourse/
RLP with DNA Study Group – upcoming group and email notification list – https://familylocket.com/services/research-like-a-pro-with-dna-study-group/
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