Skip to main content

5 Tips to Break Down Your Brick Wall



Originally posted at Lost Tree Project as a guest post February 2019.

 Eventually we all hit a brick wall.  My first brick wall was with Joseph Thomas {my husband's 3rd great grandfather} I spent months searching.  Brick walls can last weeks to months to years.  Below are some quick tips to help you break through that brick wall.

  1. Research another ancestor for a while and then go back to your brick wall .  You will see your brick wall ancestor with new eyes.
  2. Use a checklist to see if you missed any records.  {You can find my Evernote Research Checklist in my shared genealogy notebook.}
  3. Revisit your research.  Maybe you missed a piece of information in a document.  Maybe something seemed like it wasn't important but now that you have more information you find it is important.
  4. Learn something new.  It does not need to be genealogy related.  When you shift your thinking to something else and then go back to the brick wall you are likely to see your research problem in a different light.
  5. Take a break from your genealogy.  Read a book, watch your favorite TV show, binge on Netflix; do anything to shift your mind off of your genealogy brick wall.

Doing one or all of the 5 things above will help clear your head and allow you to see your genealogy research problems with a clearer head.

How do you break down your brick walls?

By Shannon Thomas
Labels:

Comments

  1. The Bigham FamilyFebruary 4, 2020 at 2:55 PM

    Thank you for this. Great ideas, that I can use to help with my brick walls.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Shannon ThomasFebruary 6, 2020 at 11:23 PM

      Thank you so much for stopping by! Let me know if you break down any brick walls!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Top 10 Posts for 2018

By Shannon Thomas
The top ten posts for 2018 were as follows: The Great Genealogy Shape Up of 2018 US Marine Casualty Cards (from 2014) Evernote Research Checklist (from 2018)   Goodbye Evernote, Hello OneNote (from 2018) Evernote To Do List Update (from 2015) Using Evernote for My Planner (from 2017) Tagging and Notebooks in Evernote (from 2015) How I Process Death Certificates using Evernote Reminders (from 2017) How to add the Genealogy Notebook to Your Evernote (from 2016) Putting Pen to Paper (from 2018) The most surprising one was the US Marine Casualty Cards post from 2014.
Post a Comment
Read more

US Marine Casualty Cards

By Shannon Thomas
Earlier this week I got my copy of Family Tree Magazine and I was reading an article that led me to  World War II History Network  and from there I found a link to an article about the United States Marine Corp making their casualty cards searchable.  You can find the database at  Casualty Cards Database. Fred Thomas, my husbands great uncle, was in WWII and in the Marines.  I searched the database and found : On the first page it states :  While the cards for World War II through Korea are not classified, however, they can often be very graphic.    Therefore, to maintain the dignity and honor of the Marines, the individual cards will only be released, upon request, on a case by case basis.    To request a card, please send an email to   history.division@usmc.mil   or a request in writting to: United States Marine Corps History Division Attn: Reference Branch 3078 Upshur Avenue Quantico, Virginia 221...
4 comments
Read more

Top 10 Posts of 2019

By Shannon Thomas
You might be wondering why I would do a post like this when my blog only had two posts in 2019.    I looked at my stats at the end of 2019 and was amazed at the hits my blog was still getting and what the popular posts were.    This year I included the top 5 searches on my blog.    You can see the 2018 list  here . Top 10 of 2019 US Marine Casualty Cards  - 2014 (+1) Goodbye Evernote, Hello OneNote  - 2018 (+2) Evernote Research Checklist -- update  - 2018  Using Evernote for my Planner  - 2017 (+2) OneNote | A Look Inside  - 2019 (new) Evernote To Do List Update  - 2015 (-1) The Great Genealogy Shape Up of 2018!  - 2018  (new) Evernote to OneNote | Importing Notes  - 2018 (new) OneNote | Anatomy of a Notebook  - 2018 (new) Top 10 Posts for 2018  - 2019 (new) Top 5 Searches of 2019 Evernote Legacy Family Tree OneNote Thomas Rutan Some Thoughts I'm surpris...
Post a Comment
Read more