Julie Goucher ~ Anglers Rest

Focus is really important in a One-Name Study, otherwise you will flit from individual to individual and not build up your study in a controlled and constructive manner. That said, there are no One-Name study police to come round and check your records!

The focus of your study will be different for each member of the Guild of One-Name studies. Maybe your focus is the United States because that is where you are, or perhaps Italy because that is where your surname of interest is found in substantial numbers, alternatively perhaps you focus on the quick wins of data collection to build a basis for your study. Anyone who has ever read anything I have ever written about the Orlando study will know that I focus on three places:

• Orlando’s in UK (where I am)
• Orlando’s in Sicily (where they were and are)
• Orlando’s in several US States (New York, Louisiana & Alabama) (where they went)

That does not mean I don’t focus on the rest, but these three focus points are my starting points for the reasons I have noted here. Italian is not my first language. It takes me three times as long to research there as it does in English and Italian involves more thinking! so I always have other research in my first language on the go to.

There are no right or wrong ways to build a study and you get to decide the focus point(s) for your study.

My advise to anyone at the beginning of their surname research and One-Name study journey is to decide your aims, consider your methods (and more on that later on in the series) and decide your focus point. None of us got it “right” at the beginning, like with anything our study evolves as does our experience and abilities. I have changed my methodology several times and that is OK too!

When I started my research there was no course such as the Introduction course that I teach. The course gives you a good grounding to understand a study and the different elements to consider and more on that too later on. “Your focus is my focus” is a line from the film, Karate Kid and even though karate and the topic of One-Names studies is poles apart there is a grain of truth there.

Anyone who listened to the Guild webinar in February and heard Paul Howes talk of his study would have heard him say that he runs his study like a business. So, Paul’s focus is what others want to focus on. Genealogists who have a connection to the Howes surname probably do a search online for the surname of Howes. They find the Howes website and then search for their individual Howes ancestor. The site provides a huge amount of information and I personally believe that we should all aspire to that, me included. Paul wanted to produce a website that gave value for money for researchers – it does indeed give value for money as anyone can visit the website and see information and evidence totally free of charge.

By having that focus and achieving that website it also provides scope for others to submit to the study. I have a number of Butcher & Howes marriages, as I have similar overlap with a number of other Guild members. Paul and I have shared & pooled resources and that is a great way to collaborate with others, both Guild and non-members alike. Even members without any ability to create a website can achieve one by signing up to the Members Website Project which is a member benefit, and more on that later in this series.

What is your focus and has your vision of focus changed in anyway?

Just as with regular genealogical research you require evidence to substantiate events in your One-Name study. Of course, if you are undertaking family reconstruction and have two people with the same name and same geographical area then you should  have at least a working theory.

So what is evidence? We all, whether we are conducting a One-Name study or not, see a new data set has been released and insert our surnames of interest into the search box. If there is no search results I personally record that in my research log, but if there is a result then I need to do something with that information.

If there are hundred in the search results then I note that, along with the name of the data set and where it is located; perhaps that is one of the main genealogical providers, or perhaps it is with a genealogical group who has announced their work. I also record the date that I searched. A data set released on Ancestry in 2016 may not be available there in 2018.

If the data set has just a few results I record the date I searched, the name of the data set and the site where the information is found, along with the citation of the information. I also record the information, probably into a spreadsheet. Just recently I found three Orlando’s cited within the indexes of Jewish Gen of those that perished at Dachau Concentration Camp. These three individuals are currently sitting in a spreadsheet and will do so until I am able to research more at which point they will enter my database. If I work on just one of the individuals then I turn that line in the spreadsheet a different colour so I can come back to it later.

Evidence is a paper trail that links an individual to what we are claiming. For some it will be a certificate or other document and I have a fair few of those, for others evidence will be nothing more that directing others back to the source of the information, so in the case of the individuals who died in Dachau that will be Jewish Gen. Overtime, more research will be undertaken and perhaps that will provide additional evidence.

We will be covering citations later on in this series and we discuss core data for a One-Name study in more depth in the Pharos course for One-Name studies.

Students who have undertaken the Pharos Introduction to One-Names Studies course will have heard me mention numerous times the website Public Profiler and perhaps if they were very lucky even heard me relay this story!

Just before the last course started, I went through and checked the various links and added a few bits into the course material. For some reason I went to World Family Names Profiler and inserted the surname of Orlando. Quite why I did, I don’t know because I have done it before, numerous times! The map displayed and I have included it below

Map courtesy of Public Profiler

I noticed to my amazement the patch of colouration over India. Public Profiler allows you to drill down a bit further so you can see the region where the surname appears, like this

Map courtesy of Public Profiler

Armed with the name of the region which happens to be Maharastra I did a quick Google search to find out about the area. Maharastra came under British rule from 1818, first under East India Company and then from 1858, the Crown. Not getting very far, I turned to FamilySearch

Searching for Orlando in India revealed four results, one Orlando which was a death in 1869 in Barrackpore, Bengal, India,  two of the results related to the surname of Orland which I discounted and the other Urlando which I found curious, for no particular reason.

Map courtesy of Public Profiler

I then put the surname of Urlando through the map at Surname Profiler and was surprised at the results.

Low results in Australia, United States, Europe, India and China, Low results in Canada, but more than the United States, and Italy had a high concentration.

From just this one action of looking at the frequency of the surname, I have found an instance of the surname in India, been surprised by another surname, which may or not be a variant, which we talk about later this month, revisited the map for the output of the surprise surname. I have a hunch that I might explore the surprise surname a little more because I cannot resist a mystery and I will also explore records in China. Not to mention I still need to explore the Orlando & Italian connection to Maharastra.

I then went to my trusty Italian mapping site, Gens.info and inserted the surname of Urlando feeling sure that there would be a concentration of the surname there. Wrong!

Courtesy of Gens.info

Such low instances of the surname in Italy I find surprising, either the map is way off, the surname is dying out, the surname hails from elsewhere or Urlando is perhaps a variant.  I need to do more investigation on the Urlando surname and see where that leads.

The distribution of a surname is an integral part of a One-Name Study. It enables us to explore other elements, bring a different dimension to a study. It enables you to explore migration patterns which you can then align with other historical events for example.

As a number of other Guild members can attest I am sure, those genealogists with a One-Name study, are never be genealogically bored!

More details and information about surname distribution maps is covered in the Pharos Introduction to One-Name Studies course.

Most One-Name & surname researchers end up working alone, sometimes by design and other times just the way it works out. That said, several Guild of One-Name study members successfully run a study in a collaborative spirit. Two examples are the Howes and Featherstone studies and I am aware of a number of others.

Collaboration can be achieved by connecting with others in whatever fashion that takes, here are a few examples:

• A Facebook Group for a surname study – The Orlando one has increased it’s numbers substantially although we could be more interactive!
• A Blog for a surname project
• A website, my favourite personal favourite is this Guild Members’ benefit, which is called the Members’ Website Project – the ability to preserve, share and continue working on your study, but more on that later in the month.
• Articles in genealogical magazines – in the last few years I have written a great deal about my Orlando study and recently received the Guild award of Excellence for an article about the Orlando study
• A Surname DNA Project – when the Orlando DNA project began in 2007 it was very slow going and it took me 10 years to get to 6 members. Following on from a number of articles and a DNA case study in Family Tree Magazine (UK) the number stands at 11!
• Connecting with others who are interested in the surname is a great way of sharing information and a real scope for engagement. When I first started researching my family history I received a letter from someone in New Zealand. We didn’t have any connections at family level, but did share an interest in the same surname. Over the last 25 years we have continued to share a great friendship.
• Profile Pages – These are available to every Guild member with a registered surname. One of best and easiest ways to get the word out there about your One-Name study is to use this Guild benefit . The profiles are indexed by Google and members do regularly receive communication from others, but the more common the surname, the more likely you are to receive enquires. You do need to provide some information on the profile; perhaps about the origins of the surname, or distribution maps and you can do this over time as your study evolves. You can see the Orlando profile HERE and there are a great many others displaying similar amounts of depth.

There are a number of books about surname studies and undertaking a One-Name Study and it might not surprise many of you that I have a good number of them on my bookshelves.

THE book to have on your bookshelves is this book, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom is available from the Guild directly (Guild members should login) and for those of you wanting a Kindle version, via Amazon.

Other books are:

• Family History Nuts and Bolts: Family Reconstruction Techniques by Andrew Todd
• Surname Detective by Colin D Rogers
• The Surname Handbook by Debbie Kennett who is a Guild member studying the surname of Cruwys
• Our Italian Surnames by Joseph G. Fucilla
• American Surnames by Elsdon C. Smith
• The Meaning of Names – A social and cultural history of personal naming in Western Europe by Stephen Wilson
• Surnames and Genealogy, A New Approach by George Redmonds
• The Surnames of Sussex (English Surnames Series) by Richard McKinley
• What’s in a Surname by David McKie
• Research Your Surname and Your Family Tree by Dr Graeme Davis

If you have other surname books on your bookshelves please leave a comment.

A number of these books is mention in the Pharos Introduction to One-Name Studies course.

As with any research project it is important to have the aims of the project.

Members of the Guild of One-Name Studies will be familiar with the requirements that all studies must be eventually global and that a member must respond to all enquiries.

As someone who has two studies, I have the same aims for both, but essentially someone embarking on such a project should consider the aims before commencing. Of course in a perfect world that is what I would have done when I started back in the late 1980’s, but I didn’t and truth be told I had not actually realised that I was undertaking a One-Name Study.

As I say to all students on the Pharos Introduction to One-Name Studies course, decide where you want your study to be. There is no point collecting references to your surname on card indexes if you want to eventually host a website on your surname.

I am very envious of people starting their study now. Being in the digital age it is much easier to begin a large study. There is likely to be reduced amounts of paper records in the study and the use of genealogical software to record data means that family reconstruction is much easier.

Broadly put:

• If you simply want to collect material then a spreadsheet works well but this is a simplistic approach, even for a large study.
• If the aim is to reconstruct families without “fuss” then a family history programme is the way to go.
• If you know that you want a website for the study and want to get your material and your study out there, then you need a programme that has the ability to produce a GEDCOM file.

So take the time to establish your aims. Choose the right product for the task and remember that in the digital age it is much easier to gather material for a study and it is much easier to publish and share your study.

If you share your study with others using the internet then you are likely to find that others with interest in the surname will come to you and want to either share what information they have or ask questions and see information, and perhaps they will do both.

I wrote an earlier post about the Aims of a One-Name study and we talk more about a number of these points in the Pharos Introduction to One-Name Studies course.

It has been a few years since I took part in the A-Z challenge, but thought that I would again this year.

This year I plan to focus my efforts on the genealogical concept of a One-Name Study or surname research.

Each day, from 1st April until 30th April I shall write linked into the letter of the alphabet. Sunday’s will be missed with the exception of 1st April.

In order to give some context, I am going to explain what a One-Name Study or surname research project is. Quite simply it the tracking of a single surname, across all time spans and across all Countries. Members of the Guild of One-Name Studies agree to make their study global and there is no time constrains on the globalisation of the project. Simply put, it takes as long as it takes.

So, with that in mind I will be back tomorrow with A is for…… and you can read other posts about Surname research HERE.