Wednesday, May 23, 2012

FTM2012 - Use of TimeLine Feature

Genea-Blogger Randy Seaver put up a blog post on Legacy Family Tree 7.5 and a feature he learned about:

Chronology Report in Legacy Family Tree 7.5

Please read his blog post.

I thought that I would show how I used the TimeLine Feature to help understand something that was going on in Randy's Family Tree, and where the TimeLine Feature gave me hints to resolve Why his Brick Wall person (William Knapp) had been in Middlesex County, New Jersey, the ended up in Newton, New Jersey.

Without going into details, I had not found William Knapp as head of household, and in the pre-1850 Census, could not find him. The only clue was that he may be been living in another household. I had suspected that he may had been living with 'in-laws', but couldn't find enough details to prove anything, it was just a theory to follow up on.

Here is where the Time Line feature of FTM2012 came into play. Going to the People Workspace, Person View, there is a TimeLine Button.


It's not very impressive, just that he was Married in 1804, in Middlesex County, New Jersey, and the next is 1830 in Newton, New Jersey. Today, that's not a big deal, but in 1830, not so much.

There are two other options for the TimeLine Feature. Show Family Events, and Historical Events.


 Not sure that historical events has an impact here, but what was happening within his family.


This is showing, and some Family Events above what is here, show that he had children born in Middlesex prior to 1823, then the children were born in Newton, New Jersey. Nothing clear, just that something happened.

Since there is very little information about William Knapp, and the his wife Sarah was from Middlesex County, and that there was some guessing that they may have lived with "family", I looked as the Time Line for Sarah'a father.


Clearly he was in Middlesex County, but he DIED in 1823.

So, the next hint for the move from Middlesex  County to Newton, may be caused by the death of Williams' father-in-law.

I am still looking for documentation to back this up, but the TimeLine feature of FTM2012 provided some clues.


________________________________________________________________ Copyright © 2012 by H R Worthington

10 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Randy,

      I actually missed a step, but the result was the same. If I had switched over to Sarah, I would have seen that her Father had died. Meaning, that if a person's parent dies, it will also be listed.

      Welcome Back ... you were missed.

      Russ

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  2. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  3. I love the timeline feature as well. I'm adding all sorts of local events to the historical events database, like epidemics, failed crops, sieges and so forth. I create a separate category for each village that a lot of my ancestors come from, and one for each province to cover events that impact an entire region. I've found that it helps to make sense of some facts, for example to discover an ancestor died right in the middle of an outbreak of scarlet fever in the village.

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    Replies
    1. Yvette,

      Me too. I have created a Time Line of my Revolutionary War Ancestor and now have done a couple of Civil War Ancestors. I entered the Battles Fought for the units involved into my database and can track them during the Civil War.

      Thank you for another GREAT use of this feature.

      Russ

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  4. Fantastic... thanks for posting this - it's not a feature I've even noticed before, let alone used! Looking forward to hearing more about how you use it.

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    Replies
    1. Jay,

      I use it all of the time and in several ways. This was just one example.

      Good luck,

      Russ

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  5. Great feature. Love the new look. Thanks. See also family trees to trace your family heritage.

    Cathy,

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  6. Russ I know this is a very old post but I am having problems setting up Historical Events. I want to track the county formations for the state of ky. Can you show me an example on how to start this? Thanks

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    1. Roger,

      This is a great question and I will do a blog post. I don't normally use this feature, but I have used it, but have not blogged about it.

      I may do two blog posts, on from the Publish Workspace and the other from the People Workspace.

      There are a couple of details that I want to think about to create a blog post on this feature that makes some sense.

      Thanks again

      Russ

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