What Every Family Tree User Should Know About Name Finding Apps

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There has been a lot of buzz lately about Name Finding Apps. We have several that have been certified by Family Search. Take A Name is one, another is Hope Chest. These apps have been prepared to assist people in preparing names for temple ordinances. Several people are concerned about them for the simple reason that people will just go through their ancestors descendants and "mine" the green temple icons for the name submissions.  You may ask, well why exactly is that a problem?  There is much to be done and this looks like an approved way of submitting your family names.  If they are certified by Family Search doesn't that mean they are correct?  In a word, no!

The reason this is not good is that people are not always taking the time to make sure the information is correct, or that the sources are attached to verify what is on the person page of the Family Tree. They are not checking for duplicates, and in general, not researching their submissions.

Kathryn Grant has done a marvelous YouTube video at the BYU family History Library site that is a must see.  Please watch it here: https://youtu.be/1P1qTBvxauU. 

We need to be very aware that the internet makes our record finding and sourcing and collaborating and many other things easier but the basics steps and practices of a good genealogist have not changed a bit.  There is no free lunch in this department if you want to do it right.

I ran across an interesting experience while doing my family history yesterday.  I have a great aunt that had four husbands.  It took a long time and a great deal of effort to unravel all the things about this lady, her husbands and her five boys.  I finally finished it all up yesterday and was ready to reserve the sealings for the various segments of the family. Two of the four husbands had been reserved by a man and sent to the temple system to be completed. It takes about three years to get a person's work done when it goes through the Temple Submission System.

I called FS and inquired about whether there was a way to unreserve those so that I could do all the husband sealing and finally be done with this family's paper work.  They said yes, as long as the cards have not been printed yet.  Luckily they had not been printed so I contacted the man and he was happy to unreserve them for me after we talked.  

The man was a good man, very kind and wanting to do his part in getting this temple work completed.  I inquired if he was related to them and in what way.  He checked his data base and told me to add in a particular ID number of a woman from the 1600's and then he stated that he was descended from her and so was my great aunt. 

 He was happy to relinquish the work when he realized that I had been working on this aunt for a long time and had added many sources and that he did not really have a knowledge of her, etc.  I was grateful and happy that he had not only put in his email address in his setting preferences but has also added his phone number and address.  So I quickly got this taken care of and that was great.

In the course of the conversation I asked him how long he had been doing family history.  He said just about two years. Red Flag for me.  He really loves the work and works diligently at it like a full time job. He said he has more names than just about anyone he knows.  Double Big Red Flag. 

I had to ask, "Mike, how do you do it?  How many names do you have?"  He said, "Over 100,000 names, it's easy with the App "Hope Chest!"  I fell silent for what seems like a very long time.  100,000 times 5 ordinances equals a half a million ordinances that haven't been thoroughly reviewed and have been sent to the temple system for completion.  And this is just one guy!

Yikes, be aware of the trappings of finding the easy way because there isn't one.  This man, with all due respect, was simply misinformed.  Educating ourselves is a must and we have to know these things if we are to teach others.  Please watch this video by Kathryn Grant sometime this week.