Amanda Butterfield Genealogy

As a Family History major, I have fallen into the trap of the Family History Library Catalog. Don't get me wrong, the Family History Library is a wonderful resource, and its catalog aids researchers in finding microfilms and records. However, the way it categorizes records does not always suit a project. The catalog breaks down records by county jurisdiction. Usually, this works just fine to find our ancestors. However, county boundaries change. Your family may have been in one county for 50 years, but suddenly disappear. The county still exists, the family is still alive and living in the same place as far as you can tell, but they are no longer in the county records. A slight shift in the boundary may have placed them in a neighboring county. Or, often families on or near county boundaries may report to whatever courthouse is closest, not necessarily which county court house they belong to. As genealogists, we need to remember to take a step back, and forget about boundaries. Families were not trapped by invisible lines in the dirt. They may have owned land in another county, or may have friends and family living in another county they would visit often. If we take a closer look at where those friends and family are located, we may find that they are really just down the street.

The trap of the FHLC that I fell into this week was slightly different, though. Sometimes we get so caught up in searching in our counties and neighboring counties, that we forget to step back and look at the statewide records and collections. I have been searching for death records in Ohio in the 1900s, and searching the counties provided few results. I was then informed that the FHL has microfilmed all death certificates for the state of Ohio. I wasn't finding them in the county collections, because they were listed in the Ohio State catalog. I guess we all have to learn by experience.