74,484 Faces

This number represents the amount of names my father has indexed as of April 27, 2016!!

 These names become “faces”when a person uses online genealogical programs to search and find names, histories, and facts of their own missing ancestors.

Volunteers from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have been indexing since 2006, producing more than one billion searchable records!! Hundreds of thousands of volunteer indexers have participated in this effort throughout the world. This has allowed millions of people worldwide to find information and discover stories about their ancestors. Volunteers add millions of names of ancestors weekly to the Church’s FamilySearch.org archive. How amazing is that?!!

My dad indexes almost daily. He averages 50-100 names per day. He is one of those hundreds of thousands volunteers who take the time to record valuable genealogical information from handwritten records and type them into transcripts that can be searched online. I think that’s incredible. As stated at the top, since he has started indexing, he’s indexed 74,484 names as of April 27, 2016. I think this is a wonderful, selfless act, by him and many others! Thanks all you indexers!!

I have been the benefit of such selfless deeds. I recently searched among the historical records that have been made available due to those who index and within a fairly short amount of time I found “missing” people from my ancestor line that lived in the 1800’s. What an exciting find! Who would have thought that I’d someday enjoy searching for my ancestors?!! I love it!

…NAMES…PEOPLE…FACES…

It’s an incredible feeling to find ancestor names, learn about them as a person, and even sometimes find photos of them. In this process, names become people and people become faces. Sometimes we don’t really know what they look like, but we start to create images in our own minds, just as I created a face with paint and paper. What wonderful and exciting times to search and find and discover someone you’re related to!!

For those involved with Genealogy and Family History: Happy hunting!! Happy finding!! Happy discovering and learning about your ancestors!!! If you haven’t ever gotten involved, try it! It’s exciting!

“Getting into Indexing,” by Brittany Beattie, in the New Era magazine of May 2012 is an excellent article about indexing, especially for the youth. You don’t have to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to index. I hope you enjoy this article.