“You can’t know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been.”
Looking back thirty years ago, my earliest genealogy efforts to research my ancestors was conducted with a somewhat lackadaisical approach to methodology. My focus wasn’t always concerned about source evaluation, formal source citations, weight of evidence, and other critical research practices. The only important thing to me at that time was just finding information—anything—to help me better understand those from whom I descended.
In retrospect, I wish someone in those earlier years had taken me aside and had emphasized the value of source evaluation, thorough analysis, citation assignment, critique of methodology, etc. If that had happened, I could have avoided many misguided or wasted searches, overlooked clues, premature or faulty conclusions, misinterpretations, or self-imposed research barriers. In the eternal words of a fellow genealogist of years past, “Yes, we’ve all been there and done that.”
YOUR GENEALOGY RESEARCH DILEMMA
Does the above sound like your current situation? Are you now stumped? Could you use a formal review to gain new direction? If so, I can help. Like yourself, I’m not interested in reinventing the wheel here. I’m resolutely interested in grasping your research question or problem in its proper context. To best assess your predicament, I need to be brought up to the same level of understanding of your genealogy research and material that you currently hold.
FORMAL REVIEW: YOUR FIRST STEP to planning future research and getting back on track
My thorough review of your prior genealogy research and your existing compilation will:
- provide an assessment of your body of research as it now stands
- assess sources already examined and identify unexplored sources
- locate undetected clue(s) which may already answer your question or problem
- identify scrivener or terminology issues relative to your existing evidence
- address premature or errant conclusions drawn from your evidence
- address faulty conclusions drawn from misinterpretation of your evidence
- identify areas of redundant research to be avoided in future pursuits
- identify areas of prior research that may need to be revisited
- provide the foundation upon which a RESEARCH PLAN can be constructed