Going Beyond Birth and Death Dates in Family Tree

One of the most rewarding parts of doing family history is discovering the stories of ancestors. The next most rewarding thing is having the chance to share those stories with others. What unique details make up your ancestors’ stories? Did your ancestors come from a noble or titled family? Did they leave one country and start a new life in another? Was an ancestor married or never married?

As you search through historical records, it can be easy to focus mostly on vital information, such as dates, locations, and relationships. While these are important parts of an ancestor’s story, records may hold other rich details as well. Is there a place on FamilySearch.org to record these details, so they don’t stay hidden in an attached source? Absolutely!

When working on an ancestor’s profile in Family Tree, you can add events and facts to both individuals and relationships to help fellow FamilySearch users understand more about your shared ancestors. These facts and events give other people a helpful overview of that ancestor’s life, with more of the rich details included. You’ll find this feature in multiple places.

Other Information

The Other Information section for each of your ancestors has a place to add many fun and important details, such as occupation, title of nobility, and military service. To find this section, navigate to your ancestor’s profile. The page should automatically open on the Details tab. If not, be sure to select Details from the options beneath your ancestor’s name.

From there, scroll down until you find the Other Information box. To add an event or fact here, select Add Information at the top. In the mobile Family Tree app, simply tap on an ancestor in the tree, and then tap the green plus sign.

Recently two new items were added to the list that pops up: “Immigration” and “No Couple Relationship.” This kind of information helps others who may be researching your ancestor and can prevent the wrong individuals from being attached as family members. This information can also help someone distinguish between two people with the same name in Family Tree.

Here are examples of the events and facts you can add in the Other Information section:

Relationships

You can also add important facts and events when working on relationships in Family Tree. For example, when you add a child to your ancestor’s page, you can mark the relationship as adoptive, biological, foster, guardian, or step.

You can add facts and events for couple relationships as well. For example, you can add when a couple had an annulment, common law marriage, divorce, lived together, or were married. These event options will appear as you are creating or editing relationships in Family Tree.

The FamilySearch Family Tree can help you share your ancestor’s life story and ensure that the important details aren’t lost with time. As that story is shared, these extra details will help others connect with their ancestors and make more accurate contributions. We need everyone’s contributions, and we hope that these features encourage growth and deeper understanding about family ties.

Source: Family Search