Book Recommendation: "Organize Your Genealogy: Strategies and Solutions for Every Researcher" by Drew Smith

Friday Book Reviews and Recommendations

This is my first blog post of many that I hope to do in 2023 sharing my book recommendations and reviews. I am an avid reader of non-fiction history, biographies and genealogical books. I hope you enjoy what I share and I encouraged you to read more in 2023!

Since January is that month we all think about New Year's Resolutions and getting organized, I wanted to recommend a fantastic book to help you organize your genealogy research. The author, Drew Smith, has done an excellent job with this book that was originally published in 2016 but very relevant today. 

Organize Your Genealogy: Strategies and Solutions for Every Researcher. By Drew Smith. Published by F & W Media, Inc., 10151 Carver Road, Suite 200, Blue Ash, OH 45242; http://www.fwcommunity.com; 2016. ISBN 978-1-4403-4503-6. 239 pp. Appendix, index

When I heard that Drew Smith had a new book out and it was on organizing your genealogy, I was excited. As a certified archives manager, I am asked all the time about how to organize records, photographs and other ephemera since that is a big part of what I do on a daily basis. As a professional genealogist, I teach classes and give presentations on organizing your genealogy with an emphasis on records preservation.

When I first opened the book, I was struck by a few of the topics listed in the Contents section. While most of the chapter titles are what you would expect to find in a genealogy organizational book, a couple of the titles were unique. Such topics as Organizing Your Communication, Organizing Your Learning and Organizing Your Volunteering, I thought were unique in genealogy organization.

Smith’s target audience for this book is to the beginning genealogist to the professional genealogist and all levels in-between. I can attest to the fact that everyone, no matter where you are in your genealogy journey, will learn something from this book. Smith emphasizes the concept that genealogy organization is a personal thing, individual to each person; there is no right way or wrong way. Find what works for you and be consistent.

In Chapter One, Smith talks about Organizing Yourself. He says: “Your mind is without a doubt your most important genealogical tool”. Smith points out things like sleep, your diet, simplifying your workspace, time management, using calendars, taking breaks and your stress levels as important aspects of genealogy research and organizing yourself. He also explains that establishing a genealogy research routine is part of the genealogy organizational process.

Smith talks about Organizing Your Space in Chapter Two. I appreciate and applaud Smith for suggesting the work space needs to be hospitable for documents. Smith goes into great detail about the space you use for your genealogy research and what you need to be successful. He includes a workspace check list which includes everything right down to the drink coaster.

In Chapter Three, Smith encourages us to Organize Your Goals. He says: “…choose a goal that has a realistic and concrete result and allows you to track your progress and remain motivated over time.” Smith does a great job of explaining how to set such goals, with examples from his own genealogy research. He also explains the importance of to-do lists and how to implement them either by using an app or using an actual printed calendar.

Organizing Your Notes and Ideas is the subject of Chapter Four. Smith describes several options to capture and organize a genealogist’s notes and ideas. Taking those scraps of paper and sticky notes and turning them into a workable format. The reader will get an extensive tutorial on Evernote in this chapter.

Misc. Documents, Houston County, Tennessee Archives & Museum

In Chapter Five, Smith gets to the meat of the subject of organizing your genealogy with Organizing Your Files. Smith describes organizational methods to use with paper files and computer files. The emphasis being that each person needs to find a system that works for them. Everyone is different and gravitates to different organizational methods. I particularly appreciated Smith’s emphasis on using archival materials to preserve and safe guard genealogy documents. His description of preservation methods are right in line with archival methods used in any professional archives setting. Smith’s explanation of how to set up computer files is easy and straight forward. The added use of cloud technology will hopefully insure genealogists will not lose their data.

The genealogy research process can be overwhelming to some genealogists. Smith explains how to Organize Your Research Process in Chapter Six. Smith says: “Having a well-organized, purposeful, and methodical research process is the key to productive and fruitful research”.  Smith explains how research logs, blogs and genealogy software programs can help the genealogist organize their research process. He also provides a genealogy software comparison worksheet at the end of the chapter, comparing all the current genealogy software programs.

Genealogists wouldn’t get anywhere without communicating with other researchers, libraries and archives just to name a few. In Chapter Seven, Smith helps the genealogist Organize Your Communication. Smith helps the genealogist organize their correspondence. I was particularly glad to see Smith spend time on how to organize emails since that form of correspondence can be daunting to deal with and organize. His guidelines on how to work with mailing lists, message boards and Facebook is well explained.

Old Letters, Houston County, Tennessee Archives & Museum

Online research is the way most genealogists look for their ancestors. Smith helps with this subject in Chapter Eight with Organizing Your Online Research. Smith does very well guiding the genealogist on how to organize their online research by navigating them through the vast internet with its seemingly never ending genealogy websites. He uses methods of planning your online research and organizing website bookmarks.

Many genealogists get opportunities to travel to do their genealogy research. In Chapter Nine, Smith discusses Organizing Your Research Trips. Smith gives the genealogist great advice on preparing for a research trip and being organized once you get to the facility and what to do when you return home after your genealogy research trip. I specifically enjoyed his section entitled “Create a Mobile Research Office”.

Organizing Your Learning is the title of Chapter Ten. In this chapter, Smith does a great job of emphasizing genealogy education goals, whether you’re a beginning genealogist or an advanced researcher. Organizing your books, periodicals, blogs, genealogy conferences, virtual webinars and other educational opportunities is well addressed.

Lastly, Chapter Eleven is a great chapter on Organizing Your Volunteering. Many genealogists find that as they become more and more involved in their genealogy, they decide to become more active in their local genealogical society, historical society or other volunteer positions. Smith has some great advice on how to keep the genealogists volunteer activities organized so they don’t become overwhelmed.

Throughout the book there are Research Tips that Smith offers. Also, at the end of each chapter there is a great section entitled Drew’s To-Dos.  Smith also includes many different kinds of templates, forms and check lists at the end of each chapter.  

I would highly recommend Drew Smith’s book to any genealogist.

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Get more tips and help by watching my Legacy Family Tree Webinar:

The Home Archivist: Preserving Family Records Like a Pro!

http://legacy.familytreewebinars.com/?aid=4729