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Having
retired in February with lots of free time, an interest in family
history, an interest in databases, a background in IT and helping
Christine, my wife, tracing her Filby ancestry, I volunteered to
help with the Filby Trees database.
I was amazed at how much data the Association had
compiled – not just the trees submitted by members but also the
extracts from the GRO indices of births, marriages and deaths,
parish registers, wills, obituaries, etc. I spent many a happy hour
exploring this wealth of information, and, with my database hat on,
thinking of ways to cross-reference it all. I am still thinking
about it.
Jim and Marion helped me to get to grips with the many
trees – large and small – and the methods used to keep track of
trees merged, to keep the databases up-to-date. Fortunately, at the
start, there was little to do whilst I was settling in to my new
role. Jim, Marion and I began an e-mail debate about changing the
tree-numbering system and, after numerous e-mails back and forth
came up with the current system. All the trees have a sequential
number assigned to them. Single trees submitted by members are
prefixed with an M, merged UK trees are prefixed with a T, USA trees
are prefixed with a U and others with an X. It seems to be working
quite well.
I then had to devise my own record-keeping procedures.
One result of this was that I was able to provide Marion and the
other researchers with a different way of identifying in which tree
an individual was recorded. It also meant that it was easier to spot
potential commonality between trees making them a target for further
investigation and possible merges. |
