Hello and welcome to Fan Muti Talk. My name's
Helen Tovey and with me is Nathan Ward. Hello
there. Hi Nathan. Hi Helen, you alright? I'm
very well, yes. Do you know, just this morning
we had a very, very cool email from a podcast
listener and it's going to extra gladden your
heart for lots of different reasons. Shall I
read it out? Go on then, yep. Okay, so... Liam
writes from down under his words. Firstly, can
he say thank you to me and you? That's me and
you, Nathan, for the February Tree Talk podcast.
He's based in Melbourne, Australia, and is a
big fan. And he's training for a marathon at
the moment. And normally he listens when he's
out on his long run. Nathan will relate to this.
Liam writes, and he needs something to take his
mind off the tiredness in the legs. So he switches
to our podcast after an hour of running and he
often finds a nugget of wisdom from our conversation.
So thank you. So that's very, very exciting.
And he's written in with the questions which
we can dig into in the future. We'll try and
get one of our. Wonderful researchers who answer
the questions on our Q &A page as a family tree
magazine. We'll see if they can help him and
we can go from there. But anyway, thanks for
listening from the other side of the world. Yeah,
brilliant. Good luck with your marathon as well.
Yes, yes. We have had some other lovely podcasts
as well. Shall I quickly read those out as well?
We have a little dose of... Let's, let's. It's
a nice way to start the day, isn't it? Okay.
So... um marion wrote in and she said that she
loves our podcast it has a natural flow well
it does have a flow because it's um completely
unscripted as you don't need telling that to
know if you listen and she loves um she's recently
got up in the whole series whilst ironing and
staining her new shed nice yeah and she's been
i love it i do exactly the same listen i listen
to podcasts And when I'm doing other things and
it just takes an ordinary everyday job and takes
your brain away somewhere else. And you have
a wonderful time whilst doing something quite
mundane. And Mary has been in and out of family
history since the 1980s, but there's always something
new to learn. So that's very cool. So that's
very nice, isn't it? It is. It is lovely. Yeah.
So how's your research gone over the last week?
Not well, to be honest. I'm still in a funk,
I think. I'm pretty much just not sure what I
want to do. And so I thought, right, instead
of just sitting there and not doing anything,
I'll just dive into, like, a top player and try
and, like, add as many census records, et cetera,
you know, the core facts, and just see what happens
from there. And it didn't go well. I guess I'm
getting close to the 1841, and obviously I'm
a little bit freaked out by the 1841. It was
just really hard work. nothing quite matched
up as quickly and as easily as I wanted it to
and this is my disclaimer now I think I was quite
tired when I was doing it initially and I recommend
not being tired when you're doing this stuff
because I had this one woman I think it was Grace
Turner she is married to my third time great
granddad Benjamin Ward and I was tracing her
line back and I got my fourth time's great grandparents
already for them, for her, through this. But
it was wrong. What happened? I'll start again.
Yeah, basically, so I was doing my census records.
Boom, boom, boom, writing these names in. And
on the census, I had four matching names. So
I had Grace, a brother and a sister, maybe, and
then her parents. So I had four names matching.
I was like, this is brilliant. Four names matching.
Lovely job, Blair. Boom, boom, boom. put in a
bunch of census records, and then I found her
marriage certificate. And on her marriage certificate,
her father's name was not the father that I was
getting on the census records. So I was like,
oh, my God. Is that his middle name? Do I have
to research this guy and see if he's just got
a different name at different times? Or have
I made a massive mistake? And I think I've made
a massive mistake, basically. I think I got too
comfortable with all these names matching up
and actually it was just circumstance because
I have since found a Grace Turner with a mum
and dad that matched the marriage certificate.
So then I had to go in and delete a few records,
which absolutely was terrifying. So I might have
a few new stragglers on my tree that I don't
know. Yeah. so you're pretty sure that you got
it wrong and you had to do that deleting yes
like literally I did it on one day and like I
said I was really tired pressing these buttons
and then so I think originally on the census
records I was looking for this Thomas Turner
who was her dad and it was all fine and dandy
married to Mary blah blah blah and then the marriage
certificate it said Charles Turner It was then
definitely my Benjamin Ward and his father was
correct and the occupations were correct. Everything
on the marriage certificate lined up a lot more
than just circumstantial names. So I was like,
OK, this must be right. And I had a hissy fit
at that point and just stopped. I thought, OK,
carry on, I'm too tired. So then when I've come
back to it with a slightly more level head, I've
looked into it more and I am confident that the
wedding certificate is the right match. Therefore,
the other stuff was wrong. So I deleted a couple
of census records. And again, that's kind of
where I stopped. But I'm a little bit concerned.
I've added brothers and sisters that aren't actually
real. And because I deleted those records, I
don't know if they're tied to her. Are they tied
to her anymore? Or are they just free floating
in my tree somewhere? People, if you delete the
records, the people will still be there. Because
as we all know, you can build a tree, have a
tree on Ancestry, and you can have not a single
source if you wish. Obviously, that's not what
we advise. We're all about the sources and we
mention them every single week, along with our
other pet topics of research logs and things
like that. So just because you delete a document,
your tree will remain constructed exactly as
you've constructed it. And you remember, I had
this problem as well. I had to do the kind of
embarrassing thing of realising I've made a mistake.
I had to delete off some documents. And when
you delete the documents out of the sources column,
you realise they're completely not connected
to your family. then it does advise you, a little
pop -up, advise me anyway, it said, what's the
effect of, make sure you delete any facts. So
you're deleting the source. You're on your facts
place in Ancestry where you have the timeline
of facts down the left -hand side, you have the
sources in the middle, and then you have all
the relationships, like the mum and dad and their
siblings, children, whatever, over on the right
-hand side. So just because you delete a source
from the central column, from the sources column,
you have to manually go and remove those facts.
So let's say you had something saying that one
of those people, I'm saying their occupation,
and that had fed out into the facts column. You
need to make sure that's been removed as well.
Otherwise, you're going to have stray facts,
which are going to confuse you because they're
now, they relate to somebody who is no longer
on your tree. And they're also going to damage
your tree score because you'll have deleted that
source out of the central column. But your...
you're still going to have a fact. It would be
an unverified, an unsourced fact in your fact
column. So for your tree score project, you're
going to need to make sure you've got rid of
those facts. So it's all okay. It's a bit of
methodicalness going through. Yeah. Okay. I think
I've pretty much given up on tree score now anyway.
Like I realised, again, I was tired and a bit
grumpy, but as I was doing it, I was realising
how hard it was to actually gather facts now.
for these people that are in like 1800s and 1700s
it's it's obviously trickier to link and relate
to i'm like this is just gonna naturally damage
my tree score as i go i would disagree with you
because i think i could be wrong about this my
sense from the ancestry tree score is not that
you need to have millions of sources per person
but what you do need to have for every fact you
have they want to have a source provided for
it so it's that um sourced fact which will bring
your tree score down. So you say they're born
in 1846 in Witham -on -the -Hill and you have
no proof, no like document, no link, no information
about why you think that, your tree score will
nibble down a bit. Whereas if you just need to
say where you found that information, which document,
which historical source, whatever the source
is, I think they even provide capacity for oral
history. You just need to... to provide some
way or some breadcrumb trail of why you thought
what you thought don't worry about that don't
worry you have to find loads of things you just
need to make sure all your facts are sourced
and that's when in when we're doing our family
history we might even even in one session we
might add sources for most of the things but
it's highly likely we're not going to add a source
for everything just because we're in the flow
we're having fun and we just inadvertently forget
to add a source for a particular aspect So this
was going to happen a little bit. That's why
it's good to do a tree do -over occasionally,
isn't it? And just like go back to the start,
just check through everything. Definitely. Like
I was feeling the tension with this one. Like
I said, I keep going on about it, but I was quite
tired. It seemed like an overload. It seemed
too much. But equally, I was like, I do need
to stop doing this now and look at it objectively.
But I actually need to make sure I come back
tomorrow and look at it objectively and not in
three weeks time because it will just have gone
by then. Yeah. Mentally confused. So it's just
making sure I don't get tangled with it all.
I think, I mean, it's so relatable, everything
you're saying, Nathan, because we all have these
problems where suddenly we've realised we've
made a mistake. And I agree with you that the
ideal thing is to come back to it while it's
as fresh in your brain as possible. I'll be giving
yourself a little bit of a break so you can have
a fresh pair of eyes when you look at it. But
come back to it as soon as you can to reassess
it. But also, I know from my life, sometimes
weeks, months, however long can pass before I
come back to a problem, either because I've got
too busy with other things or I've been naughty
and got distracted by other things. But that's
where writing some sort of note to yourself.
on that key person on grace's in her little note
area you could say put the date and say i i realized
i made a mistake with her father this is now
calling into question which ones of those siblings
on the tree are actually her siblings i need
to verify this nuclear family so i need to verify
grace her parents and her siblings double check
everything and i did i would i'm so forgetful
i literally write it myself i go i need to check
are each of these siblings really grace's siblings
are both those parents definitely grace's parents
and are they each of those siblings parents just
to make sure that there isn't a second marriage
somewhere and if If they're not, you know, and
go through the facts for each of those people.
And it's not masses of people. It's seven people,
isn't it? Six people. Yeah. go through all of
the facts for those people and make sure I haven't
got any stray facts which are left behind from
a document I've now deleted and make sure just
not for the gold star um make sure that I have
got a source for each of those facts so I'd write
a little plan to myself that plan could sit there
for five years then when you come back to it
even in five years time you go I know exactly
what I need to do it's all right i know it sounds
mad but like i think this is the flip side you
know when you sometimes hear some people and
it'd normally be if you're just meeting somebody
casually or in the pub or something like that
and they go oh my auntie's done our family history
she's finished it all and i'm just like i always
find that conversation i'm always a bit kind
of gobsmacked i'm not quite sure where to take
it because i'm like personally it's your auntie
so she's only going to be have done probably
your dad's side of the family or your mum's side
what about that old other other side of the family
tree that your auntie hasn't even touched on
she's probably not interested in you know the
her brother or sister's spouse's tree is she
um oh so many questions anyway so this is the
flip side of that that if you do get family history
under your skin and you just keep chipping away
at it your whole life long once you've kind of
once you're just you've got it it's like malaria
and it will just keep coming back you see in
your blood you're not getting rid of it okay
once you're in that position sorry to make a
facetious joke about a disease so apologies for
that but what i mean is once you've um once you've
watched this part of your life then sometimes
a long time can elapse and you'll before you
can get back to revisiting an aspect of your
family tree with enough diligence as you would
wish yeah i guess that just again goes back to
our whole conversations about note making and
research logs and making sure it's all as solid
as it can be which it isn't but I am enjoying
my little genealogy journal I do think that's
it's turned a corner for me that it's it's not
necessarily as detailed as a research log but
at least I'm making notes it's good yeah really
good it is good I'm just I'm just a bit frustrated
I've just found this stage a little bit Well,
obviously making a mistake is irritating, but
then I want to be excited by something and nothing's
quite grabbing me yet. You know, like previously
I've had little families that I've got really
involved with and love names and just gone off
on tangents. It's all just a bit data gathering
at the moment still. But I guess I am getting
to that stage where it's getting a little bit
more challenging as well. So maybe that's showing
my laziness coming out. It's like, oh, this is
harder than it used to be. But with all your
running you've got the perfect your running is
giving you the perfect training because it's
the same mentality, isn't it when You know you
keep if you keep showing up for something. Sometimes
you'll have a really good I haven't run for a
billion years, so I've gradually started my memory.
But when I used to go running, sometimes you'd
go for a really good run and sometimes you'd
go for quite a bad run. And sometimes, because
I was running so long ago, you wouldn't particularly,
it wouldn't be a high tech environment. You'd
think you'd done a really good and or bad run.
And then when you got back and actually checked
the time on the cooker clock, then you'd realise
that you might have thought it was a bad run
and actually it was a good run or vice versa.
So it's doing something consistently. quite an
emotional journey and um it can feel tough sometimes
but you have to keep going yes definitely that's
where you need to return to page one of your
genealogy journal and read your mission statement
oh god still embarrassed by that don't be do
you know who who i've been finding really inspirational
and um your your mission statement really chimes
with the sort of things that she's been saying
as well is jen bulwin who's a expert genealogist
at find my past and she's done a brilliant well
she's done loads and loads of podcasts over the
years but this recent series she's done on the
irish potato famine it's just four i think it's
four episodes long and it's so thought -provoking
and so wise and perfect for perfect for ironing
perfect for painting the shed perfect for going
on runs with perfect it's so wise it's perfect
just for sitting on the sofa and listening too
intently anyway she says lots of wise Wise and
reflective points. That's what we need. Really
recommend it. If anyone wants to listen, you've
probably already heard it and listened to it.
It's called A Family History Of. So if you put
that in, you can find it in all the usual podcast
places. Nice. Delightful. I think I might be
having a trip soon. I found a grave. There's
an image of a grave for... But this, again, I
was jumping around my tree quite a little bit
just to try and get some momentum going. And
I was looking for Edward Lupton, who I think
is my... I will just check this fact before I
even speak. He's my fourth -time great -grandparent.
Coming from I don't know who. But anyway, there's
a grave for him. It's like 1800 and something
grave. Him and his wife. And it's... It's in
a village that I don't really know, but I know
it's not too far away. And I kind of, I want
to go and do an etching of the grave. I don't
know why. Oh, how lovely. Because there's a picture
of it and you can make out some details on it.
I couldn't just tie this picture to my tree,
but I think it'd be quite cool to go there myself
and see this grave, find some real history. I
think that's a great idea. I think you should
take yourself a thermos of coffee. Make sure
that you have all your art equipment. And going
a while away, beautiful spring afternoon drawing.
I just think it'd be a fun thing to find, wouldn't
it? Yeah, it's in Otley, so it's not too far
away at all. Yeah, that's an amazing project.
But it's got... This is daft now. The reason
for going is it's got both the birth and death
dates on this gravestone of Edward Lupton and
his wife. And I can't find those records. In
Ancestry, at the moment, I probably should look
a bit harder and maybe I will. But I figure if
I find the gravestone and I've got an etching
of it, I can photograph it. And that becomes
my official source then. Again, like I could
just link to the other members who have actually
photographed this grave, but I kind of want to
do it myself. I might be doing that. I think
you should do that. Can I tell you something?
No, I don't. Shall I tell you something which
will make you go, make you say, oh, I feel all
sweaty again? go on then so it is great that
you find the gravestone but as you know with
everything you don't just want one source of
information and there's like this it's not an
urban myth it is a fact but it's it's a it's
obviously like a less it's not going to occur
that often but it's worth knowing that it can
happen so obviously when you get a gravestone
um carved it's an expensive process so if a mistake
happens on it you do occasionally see them corrected
isn't it there's been an obvious amendment to
a wrong detail but sometimes they have to just
let the errors go so um just so you know that's
a possibility i mean why would you say this to
me that's awful we're just keeping an open mind
to the to the evidence that you're seeking isn't
it and understand Yeah, equally, it could be
a really circumstantial Edward Lupton that isn't
mine as well. There is that possibility still,
despite everything matching. Thanks for that,
Helen. Sorry. I'm not going now. No, I think
you should go. I love the idea of you doing a
sketch of it. That sounds so special. And also
just giving yourself that time sitting there,
sketching the grave, that you'll just be thinking
loads and loads of family history thoughts. It
will be... you'll have loads of brainwaves. You
know, when you just allow yourself that time
for a bit of not rushing around in the daily
life hecticness. Yeah, I think that appeals more
than anything, to be honest. Like, I can pop
down to Carver Church any time I want to and
have a look around. And it is nice to be there
and have a nosy about, but just to actually go
for a day out somewhere but actually have a little
subplot of, oh, there's a bit of family history
here as well. It does just seem quite relaxing.
You could find yourself going back to do loads
of different sketches of that church as well.
The obvious one would be the font, in case you
find family members who've been baptised there.
All sorts of things. Yeah, you never know. Yep.
Oh, man. Yeah. Not that the facts are going to
be correct, because it's been etched wrong, whatever.
There's every chance they're correct. The chances
are they are going to be correct. You just need
to be... You just all need to keep... Open to
the fact that they could be a little bit wrong.
Yeah. And going off on a slight tangent now,
everything I've been doing with these fourth
times and a little bit fifth times great grandparents,
I'm getting the birthdays, unless I've got concrete
facts, can be really, really varied. Is that
commonplace? Previously, it's been like one or
two years with everybody until you find the proper
one. But I've got one now. Well, it's Edward
Lupton. I've got one record that says he was
born in 1795. And then I've got another one that's
saying he's born in 1786. So that's quite a big
range. But I'm finding this is happening a lot.
So did you say 86 and 95? Yes. So that's a very
big range. So I think you need to kind of keep
your serious thinking hat on about that because
that is a big range. And so the things which
are going to help resolve it is, I think we chatted
about the other week, the more evidence you can
gather, not just for that person, but also for
their surrounding people, their parents, their
parents, siblings, all of that, building out
the family more and more, then it helps you double
check that you're not getting in a muddle with
somebody else. Because with a kind of eight,
nine year gap, then that could be similar to
the problem I had the other week, where I thought.
You could be looking at two babies, one of whom
was born baptised in 1786 and one of whom was
born baptised in 1795. And you or somebody else
in the intervening years and decades in their
family history or the ancestry algorithm or whatever
is conflating those two people into one people
and giving them a broad birth span. So it could
be that... That's happened. So it'd be worth
checking through the baptism registers. You could
just really methodically, if it's just with a
very static family and you're just looking through
one parish, just go through page by page and
read all the entries and see, are you spotting
two little Edward Lutons getting born and baptised
at any point? The other point, if you're looking
at somebody and they're... their kind of start
of life information is from before 1837 in england
and wales you've only got that baptism record
to go on you haven't got a birth record sometimes
the kind recorders of the details will include
the birth date on the baptism record so you'll
go you'll be able to know that the baby was born
then and it was baptized six weeks later or two
years later or 10 years later whatever it is
but very often those baptism records are only
going to show the baptism date so from that we
infer that it's a little baby getting born that
is on the whole it's a little baby getting born
but you don't know how old that baby is so And
sometimes siblings will get baptised in a batch.
So they've all got the same baptism date, but
they're not quadruplets or whatever. Yeah. Yeah.
So there's lots of there's lots and lots of thinking
which needs to happen. So another thing is, so
let's say I'm your Edward Lupton. Let's say we
establish through further research that he was
his baptism date. His birth date or his birth
year that comes to light from subsequent research
is that it is 1795, but actually he was baptised
in 1797. Through tracing his life, you're going
to hopefully find lots of other records for him.
And so the more and more information you're going
to get about him, the more clues that will give
you when he was actually born. Just because his
baptism record doesn't include his birth date
doesn't necessarily mean that he doesn't know
his birth date. He may know it. Future decades,
it could be a 30 -year -old man and he's asked
what his birth date is and he provides it correctly.
So it's that building the picture thing and completely
keep being mindful of what source you're using.
Right, okay. Who recorded the details? Because
if it's him recording it about his life, he stands
a good chance of being accurate. Whereas, for
instance, if somebody was recording it after
his death and they're just trying to remember
an event from 70 years ago that they weren't
actually there at, it's more open to error. Or
did they have a family Bible with all the details
neatly written in and it's not open to error?
I don't know. It's all variable, isn't it? Okay,
cool. I mean, the Edward Lupton one might not
be a good example because I do have that tombstone,
which may or may not be correct. But that tells
me when he died and how old he was when he died.
So I can see that that's right. Agree. But it
was just like a commonplace thing that, I mean,
that was extreme variable, but it seemed to be
happening a lot with a lot of people. The year
ranges were fluctuating more than I'd previously
seen. And there's things which are going to impact
that. So although, you know, you are not a fan
of the 1841 census yet, but one of the other
reasons which is going to potentially cause a
discrepancy in people's age when you're looking
at people in the 1790s. In the 1841 census, for
anyone who was over the age of 15, then their
age was rounded down to the nearest five years.
So if you're on the 1841 census and you're 54,
then you're going to be recorded as 50. If you're
in the 1841 census and you're 28, you're going
to be recorded as 25. So suddenly we're introducing
this little, the census will infer that that
person is born. you know, on that five -year
mark. So it's an inferred birth year from the
census. You have to know that the 1841 census
does this to people's ages over the age of 15.
And so that's going to, again, start giving you
a parameter for when somebody's born. That's
really good to know. That explains a lot as well,
doesn't it, for me there? Yeah. Because I didn't
know that at all. Right. On a hunch, let's say
the only two pieces of evidence you had for somebody
was their baptism. in 1795 and you had the 1841
census entry for them so by then they're inevitably
going to be whatever they're going to be 46 years
old so they're going to be recorded as 45 so
immediately that's introduced to one year error
hasn't it and then their baptism you don't know
how old they are when they when they get baptized
but just by tradition and hunch and just think
of the size of if you have like we have a beautiful
um christening gown in our family which has been
handed down many generations i think from my
second great -grandparents so okay that's the
second half of the 1800s but when our babies
got baptized we got them baptized when they're
six months old and they actually couldn't fit
into this little tiny dress I just had to drape
a shawl around the back and they were like wedged
into it because the christening gown was designed
for a three -month -old baby yeah but I wanted
them to wear it because it was so cute and so
like family history and historic and also because
you needed to be baptized to ensure that your
soul could go to heaven yeah and you could if
you were to die very young and You don't have
to get buried in an unconsecrated part of the
churchyard. So there's lots of complicated reasons
why somebody is highly motivated to baptise their
children, babies when they're very young. So
that means that the baptism date is going to
give a closer indicator of when somebody's actually
born, most likely than a census. But it's all
to play for. You have to keep thinking all these
thoughts the whole time. Right. OK, cool. That's
really good to know. Got to keep your wits about
you. You do. You do. And it is a fun thing. It
does make you kind of slap your head at loads
of moments with family history, doesn't it? I
can't believe I forgot to think about that aspect.
Yeah. It's just terrifying when I'm clearly just
stumbling on easy things like people's names
and then you've got to factor in all these little
variables that I didn't even know about. I can
remember. Yes. Don't do family history when you're
tired. Make sure you've got a nice cup of coffee
with you. And you're fully alert. That's that's
my new mantra. I'm going to delete my mission
statement and make it caffeine based. Or you
could do that. There's lots of other lovely aspects
of family history. And this can be a really fun
thing to do. If you if you kind of have lost
your research like fire for the moment and you're
just feeling a bit confused or a bit daunted
or whatever it is, just, you know, reading about
the local area. So just. Even just Googling local
history to find out about Calverley in the area
and Pudsey, you know, over the last few centuries
from the 1700 onwards. You're going to learn
loads of interesting things. Yeah. Searching
through old newspapers for the local history,
looking at maps. I think my problem is I get
a bit jealous listening to you telling me your
stories because you've got such good history
knowledge that you can put everything into a
context and a place and a time and it all just
sounds wonderful. I'm like, these are great stories
and then I'm just like, this man had a baby and
then they died and then this baby had some babies
and I've got nothing. I've got no texture. I
need to add texture. Yes. So, well, thank you.
I think I'm actually a really forgetful person.
I do love trying to find out about the historical
context and it does really, really, it makes
so much more sense to everything once you know
it. It brings the story alive, doesn't it? Yeah.
It really does. Because otherwise it's like watching
a period movie and then they haven't got, not
that they haven't got any costumes on because
they'd be naked, but they're just not wearing,
they're wearing present day clothes. It's a bit
trendy, but you much prefer, well, I prefer to
see them in the period clothing so I can really
see it brought to life. So you need to learn
all of this stuff or try and, even little bits,
the smallest nuggets can help with that. And
there's really, there's like one thing you could
do and you could even do it for free. Find a
trade directory, which includes... um your ancestors
village and so these are like um the like the
phone book the phone book equivalent but going
back in the day in the 1700s and 1800s and so
you find their parish covered and in there it'll
have all sorts of juicy little nuggets it'll
say things like um who the local bigwigs are
so the prestigious people in the community listed
up at the top normally and then it will have
things like what day market day is it'll say
what day there are carriers so carriers are the
people who would um literally transport things
so like um like dpd for but for back in the day
so they would take things from your village to
the nearest big town for market or they would
collect things from the nearest big town and
bring them back to you yeah and so you'll find
people their job is a carrier they'll just be
taking things once a week to the local big town
or bring back um you'll find what days the um
post i forgot what it's called now but you know
the the post what's it called post chase you
know the the really speedy royal mail um and
early post wagons which had to fly along the
bumpy old tracks very dangerously at high speed
to carry everyone's letters around the country
you'll find what days they're going to be arriving
you'll find just lists of people potentially
with their occupations, but not going to be everybody.
It's going to be people who are working on their
own account on the whole. So if you were working
as a milliner or in a hat shop or something like
that, or you're owning a hat shop or you're selling
coal or you're making umbrellas or whatever it
is, all sorts of people, you'll find out about
them. And it doesn't even matter if you don't
find your ancestor. listed because what you'll
learn is that you'll learn that in calverley
in the late 1800s either it's a deeply non -conformist
area and there's no pubs and there's lots of
um like places of sobriety that people can go
and get entertained or you'll learn that there's
17 pubs in a tiny community of like 1700 people
and so you get funny little insights it's so
so different yeah that you don't even know Yeah,
I guess maybe doing some local family history
would actually benefit me as well, because I
am literally in this area and I am running around
all these places. So it would actually be like
interesting to understand why and where. Like
there's a section called the Calver Cutting,
which is like it's a very steep path and it's
got like bridges over it. It goes through the
woods. It's been carved out. And initially I
thought, oh, maybe there was a train that went
under there. But there isn't. It was some sort
of. stagecoach track or something. Stagecoach,
that was the word I was looking for. You've got
that. There's loads I don't know and I'm so forgetful.
You know so much, it's embarrassing how much
you know. It's like, oh my gosh. No, it's worth
reading. I think your local history project is
great. Yeah, well, because then hopefully I'll
have an interest because I've got an excuse to
go wandering around and look for these places.
Yes. I guess it's an evolution of the family
history aspect though for me, isn't it? I'm not
just looking for people. Suddenly I'm learning
about history. And I've not bridged that gap
yet. I think I'm at that point. I think that's
where my frustration is coming from. I need to
step forward and become a historian. And even
just wandering around your village with your
family history or your local history. hat on
you'll suddenly realize there's so many points
of interest so you know when i said about the
places of worship but then through the 1800s
then loads of non -conformist places of worship
sprang up but then in the intervening time we've
become a much more secular society so lots of
places of worship have been sold off and have
made into very charming homes now to lucky people
who live there so but going around your local
community you can suddenly realize that there's
quite a lot of places of worship you know or
there's quite a lot of pubs which you'll find
from um sometimes once you know there's been
a pub they go oh clearly there was a pub there
looking at the architecture of that house that's
clearly used to be a pub or houses which have
very big plate glass windows at the front and
the way the steps are in up you're like yeah
clearly that used to be a shop and it's fascinating
and then you'll be able to see these in the trade
directories just said you could get free so there's
a website and it's run by the university of leicester
it's really good for english and welsh trade
directories and so you can go on there so you're
not going to find a trade directory for calverley
um you're going to be looking it'll be like this
is my geography so rubbish anything but you'll
be looking for a trade directory of yorkshire
and then the places will be listed in there alphabetically
and it could be that calverley um is too small
so you need to go for the next biggest place
yeah but it depends it might be mentioned hopefully
it would be mentioned The church is definitely
a hub for the local area, like not just the village.
Everybody seemingly came to Carver to get married.
That's a good sign then, it's a big enough place,
yeah. We will see. All right, well, that will
be some challenge for me. It's a good time of
year to get out and explore things. It is, it
is, it's nice. I'll stop ranting now. What have
you been up to? Well, do you know, it's contagious.
To be fair to us, anyone who's listening, it
is very busy at work. So we are a little bit
tired. So my problem is, what I love is normally
I start every day with a bit of family history
and I'm sitting in bed doing family history,
drinking a cup of tea. But I keep being so tired
at the moment that I miss my family history window.
So tragically, this week, I've done no family
history myself. I have been having a good family
history time. wherever i can sneak a moment through
the rest of the day but it's not i'm not able
to actually get my hands on my own family tree
so i have been having fun which sounds awful
i've been having a fascinating time rather than
fun listening to jen baldwin's um a family history
of podcasts about the orange potato famine i
mean it is heartbreaking but it's so i think
it's valuable listening for anybody and they
just tell it so evocatively and interestingly
She does it with Fiona Fitzsimmons. And then
what else have I been doing? I went to a really
cool conference recently and I met some people
who I normally only see on a little tiny screen.
So that was very exciting. I met the wonderful
John Cleary, who sometimes does talks for Family
Tree Plus and Dr. Sophie Kay and Professor Rebecca
Probert. dr pennywalters they all sound very
academic they are actually quite a lot of academic
people um and lots of other family history friends
some new people who i'm hoping we're going to
see their articles coming through in family tree
in the coming months so that was exciting by
the end of the day my voice was croaking because
of um too much family history chat is there such
a thing i don't know but yeah you just need to
start yeah having a drink or something to yeah
help me away so that was fun what else have i
been doing oh and then we're working on this
um lovely publication which we've done for the
last quite a few years now called start your
family tree and so i've been going through that
and updating everything and it's amazing even
within one year just how websites change themselves
little tools that were available evolve or new
ones come into being so I've been having a lot
of fun doing that in the process I was reading
through the family search how to build a family
tree on family search articles checking that
everything was as it was and it has changed a
little bit and just to get an example I went
to look at my great granny and I had thought
in the past, I always say about how I love the
fact that I can sync my Ancestry tree and my
Family Tree Maker tree. I still love that. And
I'd always wished I could sync my Family Search
tree with my Family Tree Maker tree. Now I am
so pleased I don't. Because on the Family Search
tree, other people can edit your tree, which
is good and bad. It's nice. It's collaborative.
So that's nice. That's team spirit. But it does
mean that not just you can make errors. Somebody
else can make errors. You know, I'm terrified
right now. My great granny now has three siblings.
And she honestly, honestly, honestly didn't have
three siblings. And it was always like the tragic
story that her mum had had my great granny. And
then there were complications and she wasn't
able to have any more children. And so that was
something we all got brought up knowing. I knew
my great granny died when I was 22. So I was
hugely lucky to know her for a big chunk of my
life, my early decades. our family's fairly close
so we'd see each other quite often there just
weren't any other siblings around there's no
they don't exist so now I was just like a bit
shocked about that and so I didn't want to just
and also that those the siblings have been on
the tree to my shame I haven't checked my family
such tree as often as I should do about 10 months
like all right so I think I need to add a note
to say I think these are the wrong people I don't
like this. This is awful. Like, what if you're
doing really diligent work and then somebody
comes and completely changes your tree? Well,
I think the thing is, FamilySearch is such a
great organisation and it does so much for the
family history world. It doesn't just support
the family history world, it invents loads of
aspects of the family history world. It's such
a kind of pioneering organisation. So I think
it's good to do your family tree on FamilySearch.
Partly to kind of pay back and support the growing
of a massive global family tree. That's such
an amazing human endeavour, isn't it? Yeah. But
then don't just have it on FamilySearch. Have
it somewhere else as well. That's what I'd say.
Yeah. I'm not sure it's for me. Nathan doesn't
share. But it is fun sharing as well, though.
Yeah. You know, it's making me sweaty. Yeah.
So that's my kind of... recent discovery so I
think that's also interesting so last week I
realized I had loads of major mistakes this week
you've realized you've made some mistakes and
this week I've also realized that somebody else
has made some mistakes and so I think we probably
all need to keep that in mind that we're doing
the best we can and even if we put a lot of work
into something sometimes we have to acknowledge
that it might be a mistake and yeah and you really
do and you've got to be careful what you say
because I think last week I was like I wasn't
bragging, but I was saying how I do diligent
research. I don't put things on my tree unless
I'm 100 % sure. And then this week I've just
been like, yeah, yeah. Thomas Turner, he sounds
cool. Yeah, go on my tree. Naughty, very naughty.
But you spotted it and you've corrected it. I
think we've got the makings of a new subdivision
of our company here. Family Tree Coffee Shop.
We sell extra strong family tree coffee. Yes.
I'm well up for this idea. I think that's brilliant.
Yes. But you know, when you open up your family
tree, then it could say, have you had enough
coffee yet to be working on your family tree?
How wide open are your eyes right now? You have
to measure it. And if they're not wide enough,
you've got to go have another cup of coffee.
So, you know, I just was mentioning family search.
So that's the kind of the web face of the Church
of Latter -day Saints. And so they are the people
who put the kind of energy and resources into
enabling such great access to free online family
history records via family search. But as part
of their religion, then they are not allowed
to. drink any stimulants. They're not allowed
to drink any tea or coffee. So they do amazing
family history just without the caffeine. Pure
energy of their own. More energy and good thoughts.
Oh, wow. Yeah. If we're mere mortals, we're going
to be drinking the coffee. I'm drinking the coffee.
I did make a tiny little start on what I was
hoping to do was I was going to do a fan project.
So I was going to find not quite. So fan project
is when you find the friends, associates and
neighbours. I wasn't going to do that, but I
was going to find two generations of siblings
and track their migration because that was really
interesting to me. So I made a slight start on
that, but I haven't progressed that. So I think
for me, that's what I'm going to be doing this
week. Picking that up again. obviously last week
i was talking about my um oh my god clifford
who died in a motorcycle accident i might go
to the newspapers and see if i can find something
on that because that's that's something that
i've not done and that sounds like quite an easy
research to i say easy it's it's something i
can try quite easily shall i say when i find
something another question i think that might
be good it might expand my horizons a bit What
I'd really like to do, I don't know why I'm having
this thought now, it'd be quite cool if I had
somebody else in the village with a different
family that was also doing their family tree
research and we could cross -reference lives,
like build the community. You know, like, oh,
did our ancestors interact? That would make it
easier to do this sort of historical aspect.
I'm just waffling now. Clearly I need more coffee.
No, you're not waffling. I think that's a lovely
idea. Obviously, there'll be your local family
history society, but they're probably not local
enough. What you want is like you have a microbrewery.
You want the microbrewery equivalent of a family
history society just for your village, the people
in your village. Well, there is. I think there
might be one because Helen, who I run with, she's
been mentioned previously on the podcast. She
sent me a link to some sort of Carver -based
history society, and it is quite in -depth and
interesting. So maybe there is one. I need to
explore this a bit further. And even if it's
a local history society, that doesn't matter.
That could be just what you need. Yeah. Yeah.
That's in fact, that could almost be more useful
to you because you're very fortunate that you
have lots of Calvary ancestors, whereas many
of us keep. um transiting like the whole time
so you could find a family history buddy in calverley
today but their ancestors let's say i was your
family history buddy in calverley today would
be no help to you at all because i would have
no calverley ancestors apart from me um whereas
if you go to calverley local history society
or whatever they call themselves i just don't
know the official name but that sort of organization
they're going to have a wealth of information
that is only relating to calverley it's going
to be brilliant yeah yeah definitely It's just
finding that hook to get me in, like a date range
to make me go, right, okay, I'll go in. Obviously,
clearly, I've got lots of date ranges because
everybody seems to be about it. Even like some
of the ones I was researching last week, I'm
in the 1700s and then you look on the census
and it's, oh, 18, must be the 1851 census and
they've moved to Calvary. It's like, how is this
still happening like 200 years back? It always
shocks me that there's still gravity towards
this village. It's weird. Fun. OK, we're going
to have a fun week. Yes, I will endeavour to
do something positive and proactive. Well, I
think if you get good weather at the weekend,
that sketch of the gravestone is lovely. And
that kind of ties in with the vibe of exploring
the locality. So your local history society investigations
to find out who they are and what they do. That
could be cool. Yeah. I don't think I'm going
to get out anywhere. I've got two more weeks
of marathon training and then I'm free. So I
think that might be when I start doing my exploring
and adventuring. I think maybe investigating
this website about Calvary. And the newspaper
reports. Just quick wins, I think. Like you're
saying, we are busy and you only need a couple
of hours a week really to get yourself going,
don't you? You do, because when you do research,
you do do research while you're sitting there
in front of your computer or if you're lucky
enough to go to an archive. But it also just
chunters around in your head the rest of the
time while you try and work things out and work
out what you want to do next. So it makes your
head have a fun time in any spare moments, even
when you're not actually actively sitting in
front of a census record. But it's good to have
that urge to want to go back and do things and,
oh, I'll just explore this. But if I could just
dedicate that time, which I can, it's just been
sensible about it and just feeling like I'm making
some progress. And I am making progress. I don't
know why I'm being miserable about this. It's
just I've been locked in facts, figures and numbers.
I'm ready for texture. Well, I think I've said
it before, but I mean, you literally are doing
amazingly, Nathan, that how many people, how
many generations back you found, how thorough
you've been. Yeah. Yeah. Until this last week
where I'm just willy nilly putting anybody on
the tree. Naughty. Yes, it is naughty. I haven't
really done that. I've obviously done it once.
I've hated myself for the rest of my life now.
But yeah. Yes. Because you're a perfectionist
probably, isn't it? Yeah. It's a lesson learned
as well. It's like. Stick to your guns, do what
you know works for you, and go for it. Yes, and
in the Helen Tovey school of hard knocks, then
I'm going to say another thing you won't like,
but just don't be deterred by it. You will make
more mistakes, yes? Oh, definitely. I can see
it happening all the time, yeah. Yeah, but just
correcting them and learning from them and keeping
going. It's like a life lesson, isn't it? It
is. Not just you, I will as well. And I feel
like I'm now at the point where when I'm trying
to go back, I actually have to spend some time
with the closer generations again first, just
to really familiarise myself with names and dates
and numbers that I've obviously forgotten because
I've left them for a while. So it feels like
more of an investment if I'm going to go down
a line, whereas earlier on it was like... bang,
bang, bang, you pick up all these facts quite
quickly. Now it's like, right, I need to be diligent
and know the names of the children and the sisters
and flesh it out a bit more before I actually
commit to that, yes, this person's on my tree
button. That's it. That's good. So have fun,
everybody, over the coming week. Do drop us a
line and let us know what you're getting up to.
Even if you're brave enough, if you've made a
mistake and you've spotted it and you've corrected
it, we'd love to hear what your mistake was,
why you made it and what you did to correct it.
Because that's such a useful learning lesson
for all of us. It's a tough way to learn, but
it's a really good way to learn. Never forget
those lessons. Indeed. Always make sure to ask
more questions. Yes. Yes. And we look forward
to you tuning in next week. Yes. Good researching,
everyone. Bye. Thank you.