Checking

Just a reminder that even though it's the holiday season, your monthly checks are still due by December 31. Most of you have already done them. Good job! A few of you are cutting it really close to the wire.

As we begin collecting USCT, you'll want to inform your checking partner which database your soldiers are in. It will be easy to tell from the RecIds if the soldiers are USCT (all USCT RecIds begin with 90), but out of courtesy, you should inform your partner of the correct database.

Let me know if you have any comments, concerns, or questions about the checking system.

Speed counts

This is just a reminder that speed counts. We would like the average time for each soldier to be about 4.5 hours. That includes all searching and inputting, and is a tall order. We recognize that if the soldier has 10 kids, you're probably not going to get it done in that amount of time. That's why we look at averages over time.

Here is a trick you can use to estimate the maximum amount of time you should spend working on a soldier. When you begin work on a soldier, check how many children he has, either from the Mil info or from previous census work. Calculate one hour per child to get the maximum number of hours you should spend on that family. You do not have to spend all of that time. Getting the work done, while still doing good work, in less time is better.

If you're still on 100% checks, then you don't have to worry about tracking your time. Everyone else should do so and make an effort to speed up. If you'd like me to calculate your average time, I can do so. When I calculate it, I will use the number of hours you submit on your time sheet, and the number of soldiers you've completed during that time period (it's a rough number).You can also do it yourself using the information from your logs. That will give you a slightly different answer, but will help you know if you need to improve. I know your times will be slower if all the soldiers you've worked have many children.

Another thing to consider is whether what you're doing is adding value.  All the extra time you spend on one soldier is time that won't be spent on another. We still have about 11,000 soldiers to complete during the grant period. Is it worth the extra time to find documents to bring your quality code from 2 to 1? No. Is it worth spending an extra 10 minutes on a decade when you've exhausted all reasonable searches in five minutes? Probably not.

Please be aware of what you're doing and how long it is taking you to do it. If any of you have any time-saving tips, please share them in the comments.

We do appreciate all your hard work.

Surgeons Certificate video, part 2

As you know, we've been making videos demonstrating how we collect our data. Here is the link to part 2 of our surgeons certificate video. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV01NWjfO08

USCT

I'm about to begin assigning soldiers from the new USCT sample. We don't know yet how easy or difficult it will be. It will be the same work you're doing now, just with black soldiers instead of white.

Three of you (Audrey, Stacy, and Kristy) have expressed interest in working on the new sample. One person has said she would rather not, and one has said she has no preference.

Will you please let me know by comment or email if you're interested in working on the new sample? I'll need about six people (give or take), so if only three of you are interested, then at least three of you who are not interested will still have to work on it. Sorry. I will try to take your preferences into consideration.

Quick checks

DO NOT spend more than 60 minutes on a quick check. Check the most important items first. If you're not done at 60 minutes, please STOP checking.

Naming your checking documents

There was some confusion about a previous post. I've noticed several of you have started doing this incorrectly since you read the blog post.

I would like you all to change the way you name your checking documents. From now on, name them in the following manner.

SOLDIER'S LAST NAME,  Soldier's First name by Checker name

For example:

SMITH, John by Heather

This DOES NOT refer to what you type at the top of your Word document. You should still be typing the RecId, the name of the inputter, and how long it took to check. That is, you should still be including at the top of your document, everything you included before you read the original post.

This DOES refer to what you do when you hit the SAVE button, and you're asked to name your document. The above is the file name.

Please ask if you have questions.

Births and deaths within the census year

This is a repeat of a post from October. Many of you are still having difficulty remembering this information, so I thought a little reminder would help.


There is a little confusion about what to do when individuals are born in the census decade, but after the census was taken. There is also confusion about what to do when individuals die in the census decade but before the census was taken.

If the individual was born after the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a black dot for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person was born in 1880 after the census was enumerated, the system will have black dots for the decades 1850, 1860, and 1870. Mark 1880 with a black X.

If the individual died before the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a purple gravestone for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person died in 1920 before the census was enumerated, the system will have purple gravestones for the decades 1930 and 1940. Mark 1920 with a black X.

This does not hurt the data. From a data perspective, black dots, purple headstones, and black Xs all mean the same thing. They are just administrative tools to make our jobs easier.

November 2015 checking stats

In November, we checked 44 soldiers under our new system. I've reviewed all of the checks, and I've tallied the number of errors. I recognize that some of the "errors" were judgment calls and should probably be called differences. Sometimes, words are just really difficult to read. Sometimes a family is just difficult or Ancestry is acting up. Every person had errors, and there is always room for improvement. Here are the categories and the total number of errors for each category.

GRID Errors

• MILIN?/MAR? - 7
• Missing HH member - 1
• Duplicate people - 0
• Wrong person - 4

Inferred Relationships

• Incorrect relationships - 3

Census Errors

• Name - 60
• Typo/Reading/Wrong - 170
• State Code - 0
• Missing/Wrong URL - 9
• Missing data - 80
• Additional finds - 20
• Quality Code - 22

Death Errors

• Typo/Reading/Wrong - 10
• Missing data - 22
• Missing/Wrong URL/Source - 16
• Quality Code - 3
• Additional finds - 4

Tree Errors

• Missing/Incorrect information/relationships - 7

The total number of errors for all 44 soldiers is 438 (exactly 100 more errors than in October). Some errors affect the data more than others. If we checked other pensions, we'd probably find similar errors. 

Thank you all for taking this so seriously. Let's set a goal to reduce our errors in December.

Leading zeroes

There has been some confusion about leading zeroes in the page and sheet numbers in HH0.

You do not need to remove these. It doesn't matter if you delete them, but you are not required to do so. It does not affect the data.

Please do not write on your check sheets that the inputter forgot to remove them. It is not a mistake.

Something to look forward to

In January, we will begin a new project to run concurrently with Project 1 for the rest of the grant period. The new project will be USCT_VCC. We will search for the children of approximately 4,500 black soldiers.

To meet our goals, I will probably assign 6-8 people (depending on various factors) to do the USCT work. Right now, my plan is to just begin assigning USCT soldiers in January as people finish their current assignments.

Do any of you have a particular interest in working on the USCT project?

Just a reminder about family trees

When you've finished your assignment and any checking that needs to be done on it is completed, please download your family trees.

If you're in the office, please either email them to me or save them to the file server. If you're not in the office, please email them to me.

Some of you are doing a great job with this. Some of you have difficulty remembering to do this.

Some notes on checking

I would like you all to change the way you name your checking documents. From now on, name them in the following manner.

SOLDIER'S LAST NAME,  Soldier's First name by Checker name

For example:

SMITH, John by Heather

There is no need to add the RecId, since you type it in the checking document.

Please use care when selecting which soldiers you want checked. Try to send soldiers with 5 or fewer children. If you've just begun a new assignment, and all the soldiers you've completed so far have 9 or 10 kids, then you may go to your previous assignment and select a soldier. We want current work to be checked, but we don't want the checkers to have to spend hours and hours checking.

If you had a difficult soldier you want checked, please let the checker know that is the case. That way, she/he can make that the full check rather than the quick check.

Please send the soldiers you want checked to your partner in a timely fashion. Choosing the day before a holiday that's near the end of the month to send the soldier is unfair to your partner.

Most of you have gotten your November checks done. That is appreciated.

Death information for grandchildren

We recently had a question about entering death information for people such as the soldier's grandchildren and spouses of the soldier's children. You do not have to enter this information. Definitely, do not go out and search for it.

Often we will input it, because we see it in Find a Grave, and it's easy to do, and it's good information. Feel free to do this. If you've already spent a long time on a soldier, it might be best to move on.

Summary:

If you have it, you may input the death information for non-target family members into the grid. It is not a mistake to leave it out.

Good job, Lisa!

We thought this was fun, so we decided to share it with everyone.

Lisa input Nathan Stewart. He had five households. Lisa found all census, marriage, and death records. All her data was quality code 1. How often does that happen?

Great job, Lisa!

Progress report

Here is the weekly progress report we sent to Dr. Costa on Wednesday. To finish our data collection on time, we want to complete 75 soldiers per week. As you can see, you exceeded that. Great work!

• Project 1
• 1732 total soldiers complete
• 88 soldiers completed this week
• 199 soldiers without children (to be removed from sample)
• 1533 total soldiers with children complete
• % of sample with children complete (n=8,500) = 18.0

Adding hints to the family tree

A question came up about adding hints to family trees. Here is Sandy's response.

There is no requirement to clear all the hints (either by attaching or clicking ignore). Some people like to do this because it makes newly added information more apparent when a new leaf pops up.   Please be sure to attach all the records we use for inputting (federal census and all death records) and the ones we've requested that you attach (WWI and WWII draft cards). Adding state censuses is optional.  A State census can be helpful especially when it provides new information such as additional family members or a new address, and in those cases probably should be attached to the tree.  But you do not need to attach  everything.  Often there will be numerous city directories and state censuses.  Also there might be lots of pictures, which I don't like to attach unless I'm sure it's the right person.  I have noticed when you click on pictures that sometimes the person who posted them is unsure of the accuracy of the person's identity and is requesting other relatives to weigh in, so be careful. Sometimes there are just too many records and it becomes too time consuming to attach everything.

Another note on quick checks

We're still noticing that many of you are spending a long time on quick checks. Please keep it to no more than 60 minutes. Check the most important items first. When you hit 60 minutes, please stop. You do not have to check everything when you're doing a quick check.

Our booth at SSHA

Last week, one of our Senior Investigators presented a paper and we had an information table at the SSHA conference in Baltimore. It was a success, and we got to introduce a few people to our data.

Here's our table. Pretty cool, huh?

Quick checks - a reminder

Just a reminder about quick checks. As I stated in the email assigning the November pairs, we would like you to keep the quick checks to under 60 minutes. Several of you have spent considerably longer on your quick check this month. We really would like it to be a quick check. If you need to do more checking than fits into 60 minutes, then please make it a full check.

Summary:

Spend no longer than 60 minutes on a quick check.

Home values

We had a question about home values this week.

The manuscript said that the home value was 12.50. The checker thought we only take the dollar amount. That is incorrect. This decimal will not break the screens. Please type what you see. The value of the home should be entered as 12.50.

Display

This poster, designed using data from our project, will be displayed in our booth at the SSHA conference this week.

Race and ethnicity in the US census

Thanks to Donna for informing us of this interesting article in The Washington Post about how the US census has described various races and ethnic groups since 1790.  You might find the descriptions of African Americans especially interesting since we will begin USCT VCC in January.

Hope you enjoy the article.

Servant inferred relationships

We've noticed in the checks that sometimes you're asking the inputter to change a servant's inferred relationship from unknown to non-relative. You don't have to do this. Occasionally servants turn out to be relatives. Enter whichever makes sense for your situation. Checkers, you don't need to comment on it, as it's not that important.

If you have an argument for why it should be one way or the other, please let me know in the comments.

The hardest people you've found

We are going to be participating in a round table discussing both mechanized and human census linking. We like to provide examples of difficult finds that our inputters have made. Please let me know of the find you're most proud of. Who was super-difficult to find, but you still managed to find her/him?

Please provide the RecId number and all relevant information, so that we can use these as examples.

Evidence of how awesome you guys are

At the request of our PI, Chris has been testing a system of mechanized searching and matching of soldiers to the census. Most people who use the census in their research use some form of mechanized linking. We've always maintained that humans are better than machines. It looks like Chris has proved us correct.

He took soldiers from our POW sample and did a mechanized search for them in the 1870 census. I will not explain it, because it doesn't matter, and I don't really understand it.

Chris searched for a subset of our soldiers. That is, he only searched for soldiers we'd already found. The mechanized search "matched" 37% of our soldiers. Unfortunately, 16% of those matches turned out to be incorrect. When we originally searched for these soldiers, we found 80% of them. Even if you just compared 37% with 80% we'd look good. But what that number really means (based on who Chris searched) is that the mechanization only found 30% of the 80%. Hope that is correct and makes sense.

What it amounts to is census inputters rock! This is one job that won't be taken over by robots.

Feedback on the new checking system

Thanks to those of you who provided feedback on our new checking system. Here are some of the issues that were addressed.

• Some of you don't like to do full checks. Sorry, for the time being, we will continue with both full and quick checks just as we've been doing. If you have any confusion about what either of these are, please let me know.

• Some of you found census or death information that the original inputter missed. Good job! Unfortunately, sometimes you did not write your search in the checking document. Please explain how you found the new information. The original inputter should be able to replicate your search and find the same information. This helps everyone improve.

• Some people were really good about getting their checks done in a timely fashion. Others waited until the last minute. Some people were stressed out because their partners didn't send them a soldier to check until the last few days of the month. They were worried that they would not have enough time to complete the assignment. From now on, please send your soldiers out to be checked no later than the 20th of the month. That gives your partner enough time to do the check. If you are unable to do that communicate with your partner about what is going on, so each of you knows what to expect. You might consider sending out soldiers for November and December checks even earlier since there are holidays at the end of both months.

On the whole, I think the system worked pretty well. I think you were all able to get a little more inputting done because you spent less time checking. If you think of anything else you'd like to say about the new system, feel free to contact me. Keep up the good work!

October 2015 checking stats

In October, we checked 40 soldiers under our new system. I've reviewed all of the checks, and I've come up with categories of errors. I've tallied the number of errors. I recognize that some of the "errors" were judgment calls. Sometimes, words are just really difficult to read. Sometimes a family is just difficult or Ancestry is acting up. Every person had errors, and there is always room for improvement. Here are the categories, their definitions, and the total number of errors for each category.

GRID Errors

• MILIN?/MAR? - Forgot to mark the column - 8
• Missing HH member - Forgot to add a person from the manuscript to the Grid - 4
• Duplicate people - An individual was included on the Grid multiple times - 2
• Wrong person - An incorrect person was added to the Grid - 1

Inferred Relationships

• Incorrect relationships - This is an incorrect inferred relationship (do not confuse it with the relationships on the manuscript) - 1

Census Errors

• Name - The name was not changed to match the manuscript - 46
• Typo/Reading/Wrong - This is a typo, a reading error, or some other way that data was entered incorrectly - 85
• State Code - The state or country code was entered incorrectly - 3
• Missing/Wrong URL - The URL for the census manuscript is missing or incorrect - 0 (yippee!)
• Missing data - A field that had information on the manuscript was not entered in the screens - 35
• Additional finds - The checker was able to find decades the original inputter missed (Some inputters sent soldiers they had difficulty with out for checks. That is fine. You can see by this number, that checking helped improve the data.) - 58
• Quality Code - The quality code is incorrect - 16

Death Errors

• Typo/Reading/Wrong - This is a typo, a reading error, or some other way that data was entered incorrectly - 8
• Missing data - A field that had information on the death record was not entered in the screens - 13
• Missing/Wrong URL/Source - The URL or death source is missing or incorrect - 11
• Quality Code - The quality code is incorrect - 9
• Additional finds - The checker was able to find death information the original inputter missed - 22

Tree Errors

• Missing/Incorrect information/relationships - There is wrong information on the tree or you did not include on your tree information that you entered into the screens or that you otherwise used to do the work. This does not include saving all those relationships in the early decades that aren't marked on the manuscript. - 16

The total number of errors for all 40 soldiers is 338. Some errors affect the data more than others. If we checked other pensions, we'd probably find similar errors. To put this in perspective, (provided I did the math correctly) at this rate, the total number of errors for all of Project 1 would be 71,825. Of course we corrected the 338 errors. We plan on checking and correcting about 10% of the sample. This means we will correct about 7,183 errors. At the end of the sample, we will still have 64,642 errors in the data. 

Thank you all for taking this so seriously. Let's set a goal to reduce our errors in November.

Births and deaths within the census year

There is a little confusion about what to do when individuals are born in the census decade, but after the census was taken. There is also confusion about what to do when individuals die in the census decade but before the census was taken.

If the individual was born after the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a black dot for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person was born in 1880 after the census was enumerated, the system will have black dots for the decades 1850, 1860, and 1870. Mark 1880 with a black X.

If the individual died before the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a purple gravestone for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person died in 1920 before the census was enumerated, the system will have purple gravestones for the decades 1930 and 1940. Mark 1920 with a black X.

This does not hurt the data. From a data perspective, black dots, purple headstones, and black Xs all mean the same thing. They are just administrative tools to make our jobs easier.

Computer tips

Thanks to Sandy for these handy computer tips!

Opening links

• Click the mouse wheel on a link to open it in a new tab.

• CTL + Clicking on a link also opens it in a new tab

• Right click on link and choose from menu to open link in new tab or window

Enlarging/shrinking screen
This will enlarge beyond even where the mouse wheel zooms in and out on your manuscript.  This is great to zoom in on photos of the gravestones, etc

• CTL + Plus or Minus keys  OR
• CTL + mouse wheel 

Return screen to normal: 

• CTL + 0  (the number)

To reopen a tab you accidentally just closed:

• CTL + SHIFT + T

Use the snipping tool to take a picture of a portion of your screen.  You can then copy and paste to an email if you have a question about a word or something else.   Go to all programs and accessories to find it.  Then you can move it into your tool bar for quick access another time.

MOVING IN THE SCREENS:

You probably can input faster if you try to just type and tab rather than stopping to use your mouse all the time for drop down menus.  You can get through all the inputting without your mouse until you have to click Ancestry and add the URL.

Move backward without the mouse:  Click ESC or SHIFT-Tab at the same time.

Keep CAP locks on all the time.  This will keep you from getting the error message when you enter state codes.

ON THE MANUSCRIPT:

• With the cursor on the manuscript page, click Ctl-s to get your source citation, and detail.  (Remember we are not using the related data hints because it creates bias in the data.  Refer to you hints from the hints page).
• Clicking DETAIL gives you the preview page information. 
• From there you can click on one of the other people's names, or click on their name in the index to change the URL to specifically be for that person 
• Clicking on a different person in the index or on the DETAIL page under source will also highlight that person in yellow on the manuscript page  

Progress report

You all did a good job this past week, exceeding by a couple of soldiers the number we have to complete each week to finish the sample by the end of the grant period. Keep up the great work!

Project 1 (as of 10/28/2015)

• 1482 total soldiers complete
• 181 soldiers without children (to be removed from sample)
• 1301 soldiers with children complete
• % of soldiers with children complete of total sample (n=8,500) = 15.3

Checking reminder

Just a reminder to everyone that we are near the end of our first month on the new checking system. You must send your checks to the checkee and to Sandy and me by the last day of the month. Most of you have done all or part of your checking (yes, I'm keeping track). Thanks. Only one pair doesn't seem to have started yet.

I'm interested in your feedback. What worked? What didn't work? How onerous was it? Did you like the feedback you got from your checker? Did you learn anything new? Please email me your comments and suggestions.

Collage

Here is what we made with all the cool photos you shared with us. It will be displayed at a couple of upcoming conferences.

When the soldier has no children

I've noticed that many of you are spending way too much time working on soldiers who have no children (not to be confused with soldiers whose children you are unable to find). It should not take you four hours to determine that the soldier has no children.

Please try to keep your time on these soldiers to about an hour. Do not spend more than 90 minutes. If you hit 90 minutes, and you haven't found the soldier in one or more decades, then please mark the decades with yellow Xs and move on.

Adding records to family trees while checking

We've decided that when you're checking and you find records that the original inputter missed, that you should add those records to the family tree. If you add it to the tree, then there is no need to include the link on the check sheet. Please continue to explain how you found that record. The original inputter will not benefit if you don't explain how you found the record.

Summary:

• If you find additional records while checking, add them to the tree.
• If you add the record to the tree, then there is no need to enter the link in the checking document.
• ALWAYS explain how you found the additional records.

Reminder on quick checks

Several of you have emailed me to ask how to do a quick check. To save you the trouble of going back to your email to find the explanation, I will give it again with a little more detail.

In a quick check, search for the NFs and spot check the rest of the work. This spot checking will be primarily for the inputting. But if you see a mistake beyond inputting errors, please note it.

Right now, there is not a time limit on quick checks. After we get all the checks back, we might change that if we notice that it's taking many hours to do a quick check. That said, try not to spend hours and hours on this.

A note about input logs

You will remember that I asked you to enter the names of all the children and spouses on your input log, even if you were unable to find them. Mostly, you're doing this. Many of you are not doing it if you didn't find any of the children.  That is, if you find 3 of the 5 children, you're entering all 5 kids and the spouse on your log. But if you didn't find any of them, then you're not writing any them down on the log.

Please enter on your log all children and spouses you searched for, even if you didn't find anybody.

So if you didn't find them, your log might look like this:

GILL, JOHN 1313609034
Mary (02)
John (06)
Cordelia (07)
Thomas (10)
Jane (11)
Helen (01)-sp

Note that all the names have been listed, but there are no household numbers.

Please check your email

I know some of the youngest among you don't like to check your email. But, please, do it anyway. Please do it on a regular basis. It is the primary way we send out work communications. It is how I've instructed you to contact each other for the new checking system. Nobody should have to wait two or three weeks to get a response from you about checking, or any other work-related issue, because you don't like to check your email.

Please, check your email.

A helpful tip about times

A few of you are struggling to get your inputting times down, so we thought we'd give you a rule of thumb to gauge how much time you should spend on a soldier's family.

If a soldier has 5 children, set a goal to complete all the work for that family in 5 or fewer hours.
If a soldier has 8 children, set a goal to complete all the work for that family in 8 or fewer hours.

This comes out to about 1 hour per child. If you can do it in less time, even better. If you're working on a soldier with 5 children, and you've already spent 4 hours on the family and you haven't input anything yet, then this tip will help you realize that you should stop searching and start inputting information. We want to help you speed up by giving you a framework for measuring your time.

We know that some families are complicated and difficult. But in general, you should be able to work within these time constraints. Please keep in mind that if a soldier has 6 kids, you do not have to use all 6 hours. If you can do it faster, please do.

Some of you are fast workers. If you'd like to give helpful tips to others, please do so in the comments.

Columbus Day

Monday is Columbus Day. You're all welcome to work, but you do not have to. It is OK to submit hours for work done on a holiday. Sorry, if you decide not to work, we cannot pay you.

For those of you who work in the office, it will be open in the morning on Monday.

We hope you have a great holiday weekend!

More on photos

One of you asked if you should go back to your previous work to find photos. The short answer is yes. The slightly longer answer is yes, but...

If you have a good idea where you'll find the photos, and if you don't spend much time on it, you may search through your previous work. By not too much time, I mean less than an hour.

Photos

We're working on a project that will require many photos of soldiers. We are hoping to make a giant collage for an upcoming meeting.

If you come across any while doing your work, will you please email them to me? When you email them, please put the soldier's name and RecId in the file name.

If you have any really good photos that are of the soldier's family, you may send them as well.

Another note on checking

When you're checking another inputter's work, please keep the following in mind.

As you check NFs, sometimes you'll find someone that the original inputter missed. Please don't assume that the inputter doesn't know what she or he is doing. Don't assume the inputter was lazy. There are several good reasons the inputter might have missed someone that you found.

• Ancestry was acting up that day.
• You know a trick that the original inputter doesn't.
• The inputter already spent 6 hours on this family, and remembered that time counts, so was not able to do more than a cursory search.

So when you find someone, please just tell the inputter how you did your search and leave it at that. Even if it was a really easy find.

Checking example

Below is an example of a check sheet. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Include the soldier's name, the inputter's name, your name, if it is a quick or full check, and how long it took to check at the top of the page.
• Add the name of the person whose household it is next to the HH#.
• If you found something the inputter didn't, enter your search in red.
• Explain when necessary.
• Avoid using terms that might be considered judgmental, such as "clearly" and "obviously." If it were clear or obvious, the inputter would not have done it that way.
• You are welcome to praise the inputter for correct or good work.

(Sorry, the bullet lists didn't copy in perfectly. They hyperlinks are not live, but they are underlined and in blue.)

Riley Damon, 3101801040
Inputter:
Checker:
Full check, 2 h 20m

GRID:

• Forgot to mark the MilIN? column for vet’s siblings, Alpheus and Sarah. They were listed on the last page in the mil info under Remarks.

RELATIONS PAGE:

• Looks Good!

HH0 – Riley (00):

• TREE: I added 2 Iowa state censuses that showed up on Ancestry Hints for him. You should add all state censuses to the tree if you find them. They may not have shown up when you were working on him though. (same for Glen and Emma below)

• 1850: Quality Code – can be a 1 instead of a 2 because he is in the household with his parents and siblings who were listed in the mil info.

• DEATH: I found 2 death sources for him on a Washington Death Cert index and on FindAGrave. I searched on Ancestry’s Search All Records page for Name: Riley Damon; Death: 1920 (exact) Washington (exact). Both of the sources showed up. I attached them to the tree. Please add the additional info from these 2 sources to the grid: Death Index & FindAGrave.

HH 1 – Glen (15):

• 1910: Town – should be blank instead of HARTFORD; Supervisor’s Dist – should be 1 instead of blank; Street – should be MAIN AVE instead of blank.

• 1910: Boyd (23), Place of Birth and Parents’ Birthplaces – should be SD, IL, IA instead of blank; Also, Language and Occupation – should be ENG and NONE instead of blank.

• 1930: Quality Code – should be a 1 instead of a 2 for several reasons. First, her mother from the mil info was in this household.  Secondly, you have a marriage record that names Glen’s parents from the mil info and her spouse from the census. Either one of these situations on their own is enough for a QC1.

• 1940: Quality Code should be 1 instead of 2. (She was still with the husband from the good marriage record.)

• 1940: Michael (19), Industry – should be BARBER SHOP instead of BOOKSHOP.

HH2 – Emma (14):

• 1860: Page – should be 471 instead of 63. On 1850 – 1880 censuses, we get our page numbers from Ancestry’s indexed info under Tools and View Source. Even when it says Page No. on the manuscript and a number is written in, we do not use that number.

• 1860: You forgot to enter everyone else in the household. Please add the rest of the household members to the grid.

• TREE: Accidentally saved the wrong person in 1860 to her tree. (You had her as Wealthy Davis, her mother.)

• GRID: In 1850 you have her as Not Searched (yellow). Since she was born in 1857, this should have been a black dot. When that happens, you can use the People To Be Deleted google doc to have someone with administrative access to fix it for you.

HH 3 – Emma (14):

• 1870 & 1880: You have a No Find. I couldn’t find her either!

• 1910: You have a No Find. I found a pretty good match for her. I searched for Name: Emma Damon; Born: 1857 Illinois. Since she moved around a lot, I didn’t type in a residence. She was living in Whiteside County, Illinois which was close to the county she was born in according to FindAGrave. Although her age was off a bit (it was in the QC1 match in 1900 too), her name, birthplace, parents birthplaces, and number of children all matched. Her estimated marriage year was also pretty close to the mil info. I think this match could be a QC3. Please add this to the tree and grid: 1910 Census

• 1920: You have a No Find. I found another pretty good match. The problem with finding her, other than she moved around and wasn’t living with the vet or other family, was that her age kept “changing”. I knew she should have been in Billings, MT in 1920 from city directories and the vet’s pension index card. I searched for Name: Emma Damon; Lived In: Billings, MT (exact). I did not enter any birth info (because I tried that earlier and it didn’t work). Again, although her age was a bit off, her name, residence, birthplace, and mother’s birthplace were all a match. Please add this to the tree and grid: 1920 Census

Even more odds and ends

Here are some answers to a few questions we've had lately.

The Social Security Death Index gives an address (street, city, state) for last residence but no death place. DO NOT assume that the last residence is the place of death.

"If you have just the year from the Find A Grave record and you see the specific month and day on a public family tree (and the matching year), should you include it, and if you do, what should the quality code be?"  Stick to the manual which says, "A family tree is the last resort, to be used only when you have been unable to find any other death information."  In other words, don't take anything from the family tree unless that's all you have.

You DO NOT have to type the word "cemetery" for the name of the cemetery. It is unnecessary. You are never wrong to type what you see. If another word or phrase is given besides cemetery, such as "memorial park," then you must type that.

New checking system

I sent all of you an email about our new checking system, which will begin on October 1. It is summarized here for easy reference.

Who

• All inputters, who are fully trained, will be divided into pairs.
• It is your responsibility to coordinate and communicate with your partner.

What

• Each person in the pair will select two soldiers from her/his current assignment for the other person to check.
• One soldier will have a full check, and one will have a quick check.
• Email the checking documents (follow the guidelines in your manual), indicating if it was a quick check or a full check, and how long it took to do the checking. The email should be sent to the inputter, Sandy, and Heather.

When

• This is a monthly assignment.
• Checking documents should be emailed no later than the last day of the month.
• Pairs for the next month will emailed on the last day of the month.

Why

• We need to check our data for quality control and ongoing training.

Soldier's spouse and adopted children

If the only children the soldier had were adopted children, please go ahead and search for the children. Do not search for the soldier's wife in this case. Here is information about searching for the soldier's spouse.

• If the spouse had children with the soldier, then search for the spouse.
• If the spouse did not have children with the soldier, then DO NOT search for the spouse.
• If the spouse brought step children into her marriage with the soldier, but did not have children with him, then DO NOT search for the spouse.
• If the spouse and the soldier adopted children, then DO NOT search for the spouse.

Maiden names on the family tree

One of you had a questions about listing women under their maiden names on the Ancestry family tree. Here is Sandy's explanation.

The females should always be by maiden name.  This, I believe, is an Ancestry recommendation and standard for genealogy, but I couldn't find where I had read that before.  We can see what a female's married name is by virtue of her placement on the tree.  This way the veteran's daughters will all have his last name and can easily be differentiated by daughters-in-law with the same first name as the daughters.  If we are using maiden names for some females, it makes sense to keep the tree consistent and have all females listed with maiden names.  You can mark the married name as an alternate name.  From reading comments on Ancestry, it is apparent that the computer will know a female's married name and still give you hints for her with a married name even though her maiden name is the name that shows on the tree.  The other advantage of having the maiden name show is because it is a constant.  The married name may change if the person gets married more than once.  If we don't know the maiden name, then she should show up on the tree with first name only.

Progress report

Here is our Project 1 progress report as of Wednesday.

• 1107 total soldiers complete
• 141 w/o children (to be removed from sample)
• 966 soldiers with children complete
• % with children complete (n=8,500) =  11.4

Here are your link rates for all children outside the soldier's household. That means, this is the percent of children you found and input who were living in their own households.

• 1910 - 57%
• 1920 - 64.7%
• 1930 - 65.5%
• 1940 - 57.6%

These are excellent find rates. Great job!

New checking system

Beginning October 1, we will have a new checking system. Everyone except Jessica and David will be off 100% checks, so it's time for everyone to check and be checked. The purpose for this is ongoing training and quality control of the data.

We will probably tweak the system, but in the beginning, here is how it will go. I will assign each of you to a pair. During the month, the people in each pair will email their partners. The two of them, they will each do two checks of the other person's work - a full check and a quick check. You get to choose which soldiers you want checked. The next month, you'll all be assigned a new partner.

Next week, look for an email from me with more detailed instructions and a list of the October pairs. You will each still have to check the work of trainees in addition to your partner.

GEDCOM files

Just a reminder about your completed family trees.

Some of you have been doing a great job of sending me the GEDCOM files of your completed family trees. Others need to improve.

When you're finished with your assignment and any checking is completed, please download ALL the completed family trees for that assignment from Ancestry. Please EMAIL all the files to me. They are small, so you should have no trouble sending them as attachments. After you've sent them to me, you may delete the trees from your Ancestry account. If you're unsure how to do this, please ask or consult your training manual.

We might want to use these files later, and it would be a shame to lose all that work.

More comments and clarifications

Thanks to Sandy for making notes on a few things that have come up in the checks recently.

• Town of anything--No need to put "town" in either before or after.  Same goes for city of...

• Town following the name--You don't have to put it in unless you think it's part of the name of the town.  It's never wrong to input it if it's there.

• District No.--  You don't need to put in NO, but it's not wrong if you do.  Checkers may say it once to inputter,  but the inputter doesn't need to go back and fix it.  Just remember going forward that it saves time by not typing in NO.  Do not ever include the symbol # for number.

• Marking death records --Mark all the death records you found and attached to the tree.  Include data from all of them onto your grid. Only include the links from the two best sources. 

• Grid names -- It doesn't matter how the name appears on the grid. It's just an administrative tool to help the inputter. You can make the prime name whatever is best to help identify that person.  (If you have 5 Ann Banks on your grid, spouse of vet, child of vet, spouses of vet's sons, then by all means pick the name that is easiest to identify them.)  However, the females on the trees should always be listed with their maiden names.

• WWI Draft Cards --  If the draft card has an exact birth date matching your child to the mil info AND an exact address matching to a census year, then that census year is a QC1 even if the spouse's name is not on the draft card.

Looking for an interesting Civil War POW soldier

Those of you who worked on soldiers in the POW database, please look back on all your fond memories of that time. We will be making a video and would like to feature an interesting POW. We're looking for a soldier that matches some or all of the following criteria.

• POW
• heroic
• interesting disabilities
• has photos
• interesting life story

If any of you input such a soldier, could you let me know?

Death causes

One of you requested a post about some of the death causes we've collected in our data. CSL was kind enough to generate a list of the most common causes of death and find images for each of them.

First some general rules about inputting death causes.

• Spell the words correctly even if they are spelled wrong on the document.
• Do not use a dash (-) to separate multiple causes of death.
• To separate multiple causes of death use a slash (/), semi-colon (;), or the word AND.
• If you are not sure what it says, please ask.
• Do not write nonsense words.

Here are some of the more common death causes. These will be input in the fields "Primary Cause of Death" and "Contributory Cause of Death."

The primary cause of death is APOPLEXY and the contributory cause is ARTERIOSCLEROSIS. There is no need to have a space between arterio and sclerosis.

The primary cause of death is ARTERIOSCLEROTIC HEART DISEASE. The contributory causes are ARTERIOSCLEROSIS GENERAL/PARALYSIS AGITANS.

The cause of death is CARCINOMA STOMACH.

The causes of death are CANCER UTERINE and METASTASIS. Note that you should not enter the dash (-) between cancer and uterine. Metastasis is often hard to read, but it will be related to cancer and will usually look like the letter M followed by what might or might not look like a bunch of letters.

The cause of death is CARCINOMA OF STOMACH. It is fine to leave in the word "of."

VALVULAR DISEASE OF HEART is a common cause of death. Valvular is often spelled incorrectly. The contributory cause is ANEMIA.

This cause of death should be entered as follows HEART DISEASE/AORTIC STENOSIS. The contributory causes are ARTERIOSCLEROSIS and NEPHRITIS.

The cause of death is CEREBRAL HAEMORRHAGE. It is correct to type haemorrhage or hemorrhage.

The cause of death is HEMORRHAGE CEREBRAL, and the contributory cause is ARTERIOSCLEROSIS. Note that arteriosclerosis appears frequently, but is often spelled creatively or written poorly. Please always spell it correctly. We have seen it input many different ways.

The cause of death is LA GRIPPE, not la triffe. La Grippe means influenza.

Here the contributory cause of death is INFLUENZA.

The contributory cause of death is MYOCARDITIS. We've seen this misspelled more ways than we can count, so please be careful.

The causes of death are PARALYSIS/CHRO MYOCARDITIS. We know the slash (/) goes before chronic, because chronic usually proceeds the word it modifies. If you're not sure, please ask.

The primary cause of death is MYOCARDITIS. The contributory causes are ARTERIOSCLEROSIS/HYPERTENSION/DIABETES.

The cause of death is CHRONIC INTERSTITIAL NEPHRITIS. I know the second word kind of looks like "intestinal," but that word does not go with nephritis, where as "interstitial" often accompanies it.

The cause of death is CHRONIC PARENCHYMATOUS NEPHRITIS. Nephritis is difficult to read here, as it looks like an "r" where the tail of the "s" runs into the cross of the "t."

The death is causes by BRONCHO PNEUMONIA, and the contributing cause is BRONCHIAL ASTHMA.

This cause of death is LOBAR PNEUMONIA, not tober. Lobar is very difficult to clean, so it's extra important that you spell it correctly. If you see a word that looks something like the above before the word pneumonia, then it will be lobar. The contributory cause is INFLUENZA.

This death cause is HYPOSTATIC PNEUMONIA. The contributory causes are CEREBRAL VASCULAR ACCIDENT/TRAUMA.

This is PULMONARY TUBERCULOSIS. There are many types of tuberculosis, but you will most often see the type pulmonary.

 

This reads PHTHISIC TUBERCULOSIS.

A common cause of death is PHTHISIS PULMONALIS. It means pulmonary tuberculosis.

The primary cause of death is CORONARY THROMBOSIS and OCCLUSION. The contributory causes are CORONARY SCLEROSIS/ARTERIOSCLEROSIS.

The cause of death is CORONARY THROMBOSIS, and the contributory cause is ACUTE CHOLECYSTITIS.

The primary cause of death is UREMIA FROM URINARY SUPPRESSION. The contributory cause is GANGLIO NECROMA AROUND URINARY BLADDER. Note that suprapubic cystotomy is an operation and does not need to be included.

The cause of death is URAEMIA FROM SEPSIS. It is correct to type uraemia or uremia. The contributory causes are HYDRONEPHROSIS and HYDROURETER.

The causes of death are RETENTION and UREMIA. The contributory cause is CARDIAC HYPERTENSION. Note that you should not include the dash (-) between cardiac and hypertension.

More on names

Please see Irene's comment on the original Names post. She had some examples of strange ways names can appear.

What you're trying to accomplish is to make the name conform to our standard name format rules using whatever information you have. Anything that is not a last name, first name, or middle initial/name should be in parentheses ( ). If the first name or last name is left blank, let us know by inputting "(BLANK)."

This is NOT family history

I recognize that all of you are aware that the work we are doing is data collection for a research study, not family history. Unfortunately, it looks a lot like family history when we're doing it. The data user does not see what you see. She will not see a Grid. He will not see your helpful notes in the Remarks. She will not see all the hyperlinks you included to demonstrate how you got to the data you entered. She will not see any individuals.

All of our data is aggregated and users take what they want from it. They'll never see your carefully constructed Grid or all that extra work you put into your Family Tree. They will see data in specific variables, and that is all.

With that in mind, here are some things for you to consider:

• If you do a lot of extra work that you have not been trained or asked to do, then the data you're generating will potentially be different than the data everyone else is collecting. This might add bias.
• DO NOT EVER make up a code. We have standard codes for a reason. That is, data users can go to the code book and user guides and see that DT stands for Deutschland. If you've decided to call Dakota Territory DT, then you've entered incorrect data. It doesn't matter that you explain what you did in the remarks.
• Don't use public Family Trees to enter death information for grandchildren and in-laws. This is a waste of time, and we do not have the funding for this. It doesn't make sense for a couple of you to do this when nobody else is.
• On the Death screen, there should never be a hyperlink to any record that is not a death record - no marriage records, no WWI service records, etc. Save the hyperlinks for the two best sources of death information.
• Also on the Death screen, you do not have to type in remarks the death source you read in the Mil Info. As long as you've checked the Mil Info box, you've done what you're supposed to do. We already have that other information; please do take the time to type it. Of course, type the cause of death if you find it on the Mil Info.
• When you're using Other as a death source, type or copy and paste the full title of the record.

If you're not sure about something, please ask. It's more important to ask a question than risk entering bad data. Please read this post twice.

Names

Sometimes, you'll be looking at a census manuscript or death certificate and notice that parts of some of the names are missing. Here is what you can do in some of those situations.

The census manuscript says:

Smith, John
Smith, Jane
Smith, baby

Enter the baby in the following manner:

SMITH, (BABY)

The death certificate lists the parents names. (Yea!) But the mother's maiden name is missing. (Boo!) Enter her name in the following manner:

(BLANK), Mary

Can you think of any similar situations? Let us know in the comments.

New video! Surgeons' certificates part 1

We've completed a new data collection demo video. This is part one of the surgeons' certificates video. Please take a few minutes to watch it.

WooHoo!

Good job, everyone. We've completed 10.1% of Project 1! Keep up the good work!

Death place

Recently, we noticed that you're often marking death certificate as the death source, but you don't have a place of death.

If you're getting the information off a death certificate, then there MUST be a place of death, even if it's only the state. To register a death (that is, get a death certificate), you must know where the person died. So, if you don't know where the person died, then don't mark death certificate as the source.

State codes and abbreviations

After explaining how to understand a RecID, I thought it would be useful for you to know the two-digit numerical codes associated with each state. This will give you a better idea where your recruits are from. Note - our soldiers never served from many of these states.

Code	State	Abbreviation
41	Alabama	AL
81	Alaska	AK
61	Arizona	AZ
42	Arkansas	AR
91	Army
71	California	CA
62	Colorado	CO
90	Colored Troops	CI
01	Connecticut	CT
11	Delaware	DE
43	Florida	FL
44	Georgia	GA
82	Hawaii	HI
63	Idaho	ID
21	Illinois	IL
22	Indiana	IN
31	Iowa	IA
32	Kansas	KS
51	Kentucky	KY
45	Louisiana	LA
02	Maine	ME
52	Maryland	MD
03	Massachusetts	MA
23	Michigan	MI
33	Minnesota	MN
46	Mississippi	MS
34	Missouri	MO
64	Montana	MT
92	Navy
35	Nebraska	NE
65	Nevada	NV
04	New Hampshire	NH
12	New Jersey	NJ
66	New Mexico	NM
13	New York	NY
47	North Carolina	NC
36	North Dakota	ND
24	Ohio	OH
53	Oklahoma	OK
72	Oregon	OR
14	Pennsylvania	PA
05	Rhode Island	RI
48	South Carolina	SC
37	South Dakota	SD
54	Tennessee	TN
49	Texas	TX
93	United States	US
67	Utah	UT
06	Vermont	VT
40	Virginia	VA
73	Washington	WA
55	Washington DC	DC
56	West Virginia	WV
25	Wisconsin	WI
68	Wyoming	WY