HAPPY NEW YEAR ~ And WELCOME 2021–Here are my year end stats for 2020 and GOALS for the new year

Good riddance 2020 and hello 2021.  May this be a much kinder and gentler year for all of us. 

I always like to look back and see what’s changed in my Legacy tree. 

• How many new ancestors and/or collateral people have I added?
• Have I kept up with my sourcing? 
• What else has changed in my tree?

Let’s take a look.

Here is a side by side comparison created by Legacy

(Click on any image to enlarge it)

On the left are the stats from 2019 and on the right the stats from 2020

I appears that I’ve made steady progress consistent with previous years.  That certainly makes me happy.  My goal has never been to see how big I can make my tree, but rather, to add people that are well researched and confirmed.  Speaking of goals.  I shared my goals for 2020 in my first post last year.  Let’s see how well I did.

Speaking of goals.  I shared my goals for 2020 in my first post last year.  Let’s see how well I did.

HERE WERE MY GENEALOGY GOALS FOR 2020

• Continue to blog about our family and share their stories – DONE

• To break down my two biggest, long standing brick walls – SADLY NOT DONE

• To become better at reading DNA results and connecting the dots – SOME PROGRESS

• To have a great time at Rootstech 2020 in February – ABSOLUTELY DONE!

• To continue to occasionally teach classes and help others grow their family tree – DONE

• To finish the small box of scanning that’s been in my office for several years – NOT DONE

• To continue to enjoy what started as a hobby and has now become a passion for me – DONE

What were your goals for this past year?  How did you do?

Here is my list for this coming year – writing them down helps motivate me

• To break down my two biggest, long standing brick walls
• To finish the small box of scanning that’s been in my office for several years
• To do a better job of citing my sources.  I was a bit lazy this past year
• To connect with more cousins and exchange information
• To continue to teach and help others
• To get my blog post count back to where it was in previous years (before 2020)

That top goal is huge for me and my most urgent desire.  What are your goals for the coming year?  I’d love to hear about them in a comment or your own blog post.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2021   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

2019 YEAR END FAMILY TREE PROGRESS REPORT ~ By the numbers–A comparison of the past 6 years of my research

As a year and a decade draw to a close, how has my family tree changed?

I began writing my blog in 2010, but it languished until I got serious in 2013.  It wasn’t until the end of 2014 that I began looking at the statistics and charting my progress

Our ultimate goal is to find ancestors.  It’s never about how many people we can add to our tree, but more about being sure we have done our work in verifying and sourcing.  We never want to leave false information for our descendants.

However, that being said, we can look at various statistics and come to a conclusion about whether we are doing our work well.

Let’s take a quick look at a comparison of my statistics from year end 2014 and year end 2019.  This will cover 6 years of research: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019.

CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT

2014 and 2019

What I can see from the comparison of my Legacy database over 6 years are the following changes.

I’m pleased with my progress.  I’m not just willy nilly adding people to my database, but slowly growing my tree by about 363 people per year.  My source list is fairly steady, as I’ve created many Master Sources and rarely have to add to my list.  I’m pleased to see that I’m adding Events on a regular basis.  This means I’m adding to a person or family story by creating events based on census records, city directories, obituaries, military information etc. 

• How have you done over the past few years or even the past year? 
• Are you happy with your progress? 
• What would you like to accomplish this next year?

HERE ARE MY GENEALOGY GOALS FOR 2020

• Continue to blog about our family and share their stories
• To once and for all break down my two biggest, long standing brick walls
• To become better at reading DNA results and connecting the dots
• To have a great time at Rootstech 2020 in February
• To continue to occasionally teach classes and help others grow their family tree
• To finish the small box of scanning that’s been in my office for several years
• To continue to enjoy what started as a hobby and has now become a passion for me

Here’s to a year full of genealogical breakthroughs and fun!

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2019   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

2018 YEAR END FAMILY TREE PROGRESS REPORT ~ By the numbers–How many new people? How many new events and sources?

This is a topic that was first shared on Randy Seaver’s blog Genea-Musings.   It’s all about the statistics or numbers in your database.  How well did we actually do in our research of family?
2018 is quickly drawing to a close.  Each year I take a look back at my Legacy database to see how my family tree has progressed.  
To get to your statistics report in Legacy go to the Help tab>About Legacy and click on General.

• Have I added more people? Although that isn’t my primary goal.
• Have I kept up with citing my sources?
• How about events?  Have I continued to enter events for ancestors lives?
• Am I continuing to add media to my tree?

I’ve run this year’s report and here is how it looks.



Let’s go back to the 2017 year end report and see what that looked like.



I see that I have 508 more people in my tree.  That’s an addition of 1.4 people per day.  Since I don’t work on my tree each and every day, that’s not bad.

How about citations?  Have I continued to be diligent about adding sources to the items I am entering, census, vital records, newspaper articles etc.?

By dividing the citations by the number of individuals you come up with a percentage.  Last year that percentage was 222.5%.  This year for 2018 the percentage is 213.7%.  That’s a drop of 8.8%.  I believe this is the first year in 5 years that my citations have dropped.  What this means is that I’ve gotten lazy.  I add people and events and I’m not citing them like I used to.  For me it’s vitally important that what I put into my tree, be verified by sources and those sources MUST be cited. Legacy makes it so easy and I’ve been doing it for years, so I have no excuse.

Let’s take a look back 5 years and see what’s happened in my tree. 
Here’s the year end report from December 2013. (Aren’t these some ugly colors I was using back than?)



Here’s a comparison table of 5 years of work on my family tree.



In these 5 years I’ve added about 360 people per year to my tree.  That’s an average of just under 1 person per day.  This means I’m discovering new families.  How many new families?  According to the stats I am adding about 128 families per year.  The largest jump I see is the number of times I have linked media to events in my tree.  I will admit to being a media junkie.  I want the visual proof of what I record.  Whether it’s a marriage register, a page from a book, a draft card, pension card or census report.  I like to add that image to my tree.
 
The question for me is, what are my goals for 2019? 

• Definitely to increase my citation percentage and quit being lazy about citing sources
• To continue to add individuals and families to my tree
• To go back and look at some of the families I haven’t looked at in a while
• To continue to blog about my journey
• To keep attending conferences, seminars and classes to increase my knowledge
• To break down a couple of brick walls I’ve had for over 15 years

That sounds like enough goals to keep me out of trouble in the coming year.  LOL!

What are your goals for 2019?  I’d love to hear about them.  Perhaps you’ll mention something I’ve missed and inspire me.  Are we cousins?  Maybe we can work together on our goals?  I love collaboration.

I wish you the greatest of success in your research in the coming year.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2018   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

TIME FOR MY YEARLY PROGRESS REPORT ~ FAMILY STATISTICS FOR 2016–How Have I Done?

This is a topic first shared by Randy Seaver on his Genea-Musings blog several years ago.  I enjoy seeing my progress for the year, so I’ve taken a look at these numbers for the last 4 years.
 
I can generate this information in Legacy 8 by selecting the “About Legacy” icon and then clicking on General.
 
HERE IS THE REPORT FROM 2015
 



Have I made progress in my research?

• Have I added more people/individuals?
• Do I have more Master Sources?
• How about my source citations, more or not?
• How does my percentage of citations compare to last year?

THIS IS MY REPORT FROM 2016 (created on 12/31/2016) – the build date refers to the date of the last update to my Legacy program.

I see an increase in almost every number, so that’s good news.
 
One of the statistics I’m always interested in is my Citations.  We all know how important it is to cite our sources. Have mine increased from last year to this year?  What is my percentage?  Last year my percentage rate was 225.9”% per person.
 
To get the number for this year,  I divide the Citations by the Number of Individuals – 11492 divided by 5060.
 
That gives me a percentage rate, per person of 227.1%.  That’s an increase of +1.2% from last year.  This means I continue to cite my sources and have improved over last year.  However, I’d like to see an even bigger improvement.  Because, between you and me, I’ve been a little bit lazy when it comes to entering my sources this year.
 
With an increase of 264 people in my database, I should be doing better.
 

Let’s take a look at the other numbers compared to last year.

	2015	2016	CHANGE
NUMBER OF INDIVIDUALS	4796	5060	264
NUMBER OF FAMILIES	1681	1784	103
UNIQUE SURNAMES	1223	1297	74
MASTER SOURCES	703	738	35
CITATIONS	10834	11492	658
MASTER EVENTS	4861	5591	730

I’m happy with what I see.  I’ve added .72 individuals per day, 1.8 citations per day and 2 events per day.
 
My primary goal has never been to see how many people I can have in my tree.  I’ve been researching for 13 years.  Since I’ve been retired these past seven years, I research almost daily.  My primary concern is to document what I find and do thorough work, while growing the tree.  These results prove to me that I am meeting those goals.
 
DO YOU HAVE GOALS FOR 2016?
If so, what are they?

• Better sourcing
• Finding more ancestors and adding them to your tree?
• Going back to review the family members you added long ago?

Whatever they are, I wish you a successful year.
Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2017   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

IT'S TIME FOR THE YEARLY PROGRESS REPORT ~ FAMILY STATISTICS FOR 2015 - HOW DID I DO?

This is a topic first shared by Randy Seaver on his Genea-Musings blog.  I enjoy seeing my progress for the year, so I’ve taken a look at these numbers for the last 3 years.

These various reports that I generate in Legacy 8 will tell me how much progress has been made in my family tree.

HERE IS THE REPORT FROM 2014

 Have I made progress in my research?

• Have I added more people/individuals?
• Do I have more Master Sources?
• How about my source citations, more or not?
• How does my percentage of citations compare to last year?

 




HERE IS MY REPORT FROM 2015 – Let’s compare

I see an increase in almost every number, so that’s good news.

One of the statistics I’m always interested in is my Citations.  Have they increased from last year to this year?  What is my percentage?
 
To get that number I divide the Citations by the Number of Individuals – 10834 divided by 4796.
 
That gives me a percentage rate, per person of 225.9%.  That’s an increase of +3.2% from last year.  This means I continue to cite my sources and have improved over last year.
 
Let’s take a look at the other numbers compared to last year.

	2014	2015	CHANGE
Number of Individuals	4363	4796	+433
Number of Families	1543	1681	+138
Unique Surnames	1143	1223	+80
Master Locations	1561	1742	+181
Master Sources	712	703	-9
Citations	9719	10834	+1115
Master Events	4228	4861	+633

I’m happy with what I see.  I’ve added 1.5 individuals per day, 3 citations per day and 1.7 events per day. I suspect the small drop in Master Sources is probably just me cleaning up my list, which I do regularly.

My primary goal has never been to see how many people I can have in my tree.  I’ve been researching for 12 years.  Since I’ve been retired these past six years, I research almost daily.  My primary concern is to document what I find and do thorough work, while growing the tree.  These results prove to me that I am meeting my goals.

DO YOU HAVE GOALS FOR 2016? 
If so, what are they?

• Better sourcing
• More people added to your tree?
• Go back & review the family members you added long ago?

Whatever they are, I wish you a successful year.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

HOW MUCH PROGRESS HAVE I MADE IN ONE YEAR? FAMILY STATISTICS REPORT FOR 2014

      

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL MY READERS.  

I APPRECIATE EVERY ONE OF YOU.  I WISH YOU ALL A SUCCESSFUL RESEARCH YEAR IN 2015!

This is a topic that was first shared last year on Randy Seaver’s blog Genea-Musings.   It’s all about the statistics or numbers in your database.

OK, numbers aren’t so much fun, right?  But, they can certainly tell us if we are making progress in our research.  And, that is a good thing.

If you use Legacy you can read my post from last January about how to find your statistics.  Click here http://www.michiganfamilytrails.com/2014/01/how-to-find-your-family-statistics-in.html

Here are my statistics from last year:

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)

• Have I made progress in my research?
• Have I added more people/individuals?
• Do I have more Master Sources?
• How about my source citations, more or not?
• How does my percentage of citations compare to last year?

Here is my report from 2014.  (I am leaving town for a couple of days and know that I won’t be working on my database until after January 1st, so I can post these numbers for 2014).



I see some increases in the numbers, so apparently some progress was made this past year
. 
One statistic that I am particularly interested in, is my percentage of citing sources.  Last year I had a great result in that I was 222.3% sourced.  To get that number you divide your number of individuals into your citations.  So last year I divided 9060 by 4075.

This year I will divide 9719 by 4363.  That comes out to 222.7%.  So, I am still sourcing my entries and in fact my number has gone up a bit.  That’s good to know.

Here are the some of the above statistics compared between years.

	2013	2014	CHANGE
NUMBER OF INDIVIDUALS	4075	4363	+288
NUMBER OF FAMILIES	1451	1543	+  92
UNIQUE SURNAMES	1062	1143	+  81
MASTER SOURCES	687	712	+  25
CITATIONS	9060	9719	+659

I have only listed some of the statistics, but you can see that there has been an increase in all of them.
 
My challenge to you is to run the same kind of report from your software.  Then, at the end of 2015, compare it and see how you are doing
. 
WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS FOR 2015?
* To increase the number of source citations you have?
* To increase the number of individuals?
* To be better at citing your sources?

Whatever they are, use your software to it’s full capacity and it will help you stay on track.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST

ADDING A RECORD TO LEGACY FROM ANCESTRY - Step by step instructions

LEGACY 8 - The Search Function - What Can You Find?

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2014   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

HOW TO FIND YOUR FAMILY STATISTICS IN LEGACY

The idea of family statistics was presented by another blogger, Randy Seaver, on his http://www.geneamusings.com/

He kept a record of what his database statistics were at the end of 2012 and then ran them yesterday and compared the numbers.

What a GREAT idea!  I encourage all of you to do the same.  That is a wonderful bench mark to let us know how our research is progressing.

Not so much just to see how many more people are in our database, but more to let you know if you entered more citations or master sources during the year.  I just ran this report in Legacy with a couple of clicks of my mouse.

I am using Legacy 8 now so here is what I did.

I clicked on the “HELP” tab, then clicked on “About Legacy.”

This is what will pop up on your screen. 
Now click on the word “General.”

You will see this report come up and it will look like this.  Your report should have your customer number in the upper right, but I have redacted mine for privacy purposes.



That’s all there is to it.  Pretty easy huh?  I’m sure you can do the same thing with whatever database you are using, Family Tree Maker, The Master Genealogist, Roots Magic, Reunion or any of the others.

This report tells me that my citations per person are 222.3%.  
My thanks to Randy Seaver for his comment about my math (see comment section).  Now at least that figure is correct.   

• How does that compare to your percentage?  
• What can you do to improve your percentage? 
• My goal by the end of this year is to add more event addresses and make better use of the to-do list.

I have never been about collecting names, although it’s a natural course of events as you continue your research.  I remember my excitement when I hit 1,000 people a few years ago.

Now, go run that report and save a copy.  I’ll do the same and we’ll compare notes at the end of the year.  

What is the one thing that we might not want to take the time to do, but which is the most important thing we can do in our research.  

CITE THOSE SOURCES!!!

Happy Hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright © 2014   Diane Gould Hall