It only took me five years

Way back in 2007 I took out a monthly subscription to Ancesty.com.au. I searched and downloaded feverishly for a month, then cancelled.

The collection I hit the hardest was the Australian Electoral Rolls. Now almost five years later I have finally made my way through all those pages I downloaded and entered them in my database.

My Family Historian plugin provided the final push I needed to get the job done. It made setting up the source records that little bit easier, so I could get on with concentrating on the information.

Information I have gained by entering the records in my database includes:

• Middle names I didn’t know before
• Clues as to birth, death and marriage dates
• Occupations, and occupation changes over time
• Addresses
• Names of people who are probably spouses or children of known relatives

It feels so good to have the backlog cleared! Of course, back in 2007 Ancestry only included electoral rolls up to 1936. Now, they have them up to 1980 – and I have an ongoing subscription. I might just have to search out some more electoral rolls entries…

Data entry tally - June 2010

Back in February I described my backlog of 190 electronic files to process and enter into my database. To make myself actually enter all that data, I was going to report back regularly on my progress. So far I've only reported back once, but I have been diligently checking and recording my progress on the first of each month.

Today, the total number of files left to process is... (drum roll)... 225.

Sigh.

It just keeps getting bigger! On the other hand, the source list in my database is definately getting longer. I am entering a lot of data, but am accumulating information even more quickly! Better luck next month...

Data entry tally - March 2010

A quick update on data entry, because I said I would.

I had 190 electronic documents to deal with on 5 Feb 2010. I said I would consider the month a success in data entry terms if I didn't add to the count, and preferably cleared at least 5 files.

So how did I do?

Fail! 

On 1 March 2010 I had 198 electronic files outstanding, an increase of 8. This was a surprise, as I put a lot of time and effort into entering data this month! My database had 42 sources and 520 source citations with a change date between 5 Feb and 1 March. The majority of the 'changed' sources were new.

I blame the National Library's online newspapers!

Making myself accountable

I tend to accumulate genealogy data more quickly than I enter it in my database. I was going to say "than I can enter it" but I know that isn't true! I want to keep a check on myself that I am at least entering new information as I gather it, and preferably catching up on some of the long overdue data entry! There's a folder on my hard drive that contains various digital bits and pieces that I haven't yet entered into my database.

Right now, there are 190 files in the folder, sorted into 25 sub-folders.

This doesn't include all the email correspondence that I have yet to act on, or the many photocopied pages (not relating to my direct line) kindly sent to me by other researchers.

I will post my progress from time to time. It may not make for interesting reading, but perhaps it will keep me motivated to sort out my information!