FamilySearch Indexing Volunteers Set Historic Record

Following the International Day of Indexing on the 20th and 21st of July, 2014, FamilySearch announced the results of the effort in a blog post by Emma Young entitled, "FamilySearch Volunteers Set Historic Record." Here are the results:

FamilySearch volunteers are amazing! On July 20th and 21st, FamilySearch indexers and arbitrators from around the world joined together to set an international record for the greatest number of indexing participants in a single day! We hoped to have an unprecedented 50,000 contributors in a 24 hour period. FamilySearch volunteers excelled, surpassing that goal by 16,511! That’s right—66,511 participants in one day! Incredible! We are grateful for the patience and persistence of many volunteers who faced technical difficulties due to an overwhelming response.

The rest of the results were outlined as follows:

• Indexed: 4,682,746
• Arbitrated: 941,932
• Total Records Processed: 5.7 million

BYU Family History Library Upcoming Classes

The Brigham Young University Family History Library has an extensive schedule of classes. Some of those classes are scheduled for Sunday afternoons and are open to the public. The classes are held of n the 2nd and 4th Sunday each month.

Here is this next Sunday's class schedule:

HAROLD B. LEE LIBRARY FAMILY HISTORY CLASSES
Sunday, July 27, 2014

ROOM

CLASS TIME
INSTRUCTOR 

3:00 P.M. German Research: Bring Us YOUR Research Problems
Eleanor Wollenzien
DESK
NOTE: This class time is 1:00 - 4:00
Kim Hasara Smith

3:00 - 4:00 P.M.
DESK
Tour: Treasures of the BYU Family History Library: Dini Hansma
2233
The Work is Not all Done!: Cathy Anderegg

4:30 P.M.
2212
RootsMagic (Basics): John Hendrix
2233
To Add or Not to Add, That is the Question: Cathy Anderegg
2233
Tools for Correcting Relationships in Family Tree: Marily Thomsen
2238
Ancestry.com: James Tanner

6:00 P.M.
2212
Family History Workshop - For Families: Jill Woodbury
2231
A Survey of Midwest States Records: Ginny Ackerson
2233
FamilySearch Record Hints: Merlin Kitchen
2233
Duplicates in Family Tree: Why They're There, How to Find Them, and How to Resolve Them: Kathryn Grant
2238
Are there Germans in Your Past? Getting Started with German Research: Laurie Werner Castillo

Missionary Assistance Available 10:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.
2nd & 4th Sundays of the Month
*Classes subject to change, update or cancellation

Genealogy and the 24th of July

In Utah, the 24th of July is a state holiday. Elsewhere, depending on the number of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and their awareness of their pioneer heritage, the 24th of July is just another hot summer day or a holiday. As I was growing up, the 24th of July was the biggest holiday of the year. We had pancake breakfasts, parades, dramatic events, rodeos, dances, parties, reunions and the huge pioneer Camporama circle where we would all go out into the desert and cook our dinner over a fire. Let's just say that the 24th was a big deal.

OK, if you still don't get it by this time, you need to bone up on your Church history. The 24th of July is the traditional date the Brigham Young Party of pioneers first entered the Salt Lake Valley. Well, we all know that some pioneers got their earlier and a hundreds of thousands got there later, but the day we celebrate is the 24th of July.

Actually, the 24th of July was a genealogical bonanza. It was a time when I got to meet all those relatives I didn't know. Since most of my ancestors lived in the same small Mormon community at one time or another, going back for the 24th Celebration was like a course in family history. I must admit that I was too young to fully appreciate the opportunity but I did get a sense of the involvement of my family in settling western part of the United States. Much of what I know and how I feel about the pioneers originated in those 24th of July Celebrations.

Now, we can't pass up this 24th without thinking about the pioneers. FamilySearch.org has sent out an very interesting email inviting some of us to look up our pioneer ancestors. Pioneers are defined as those who crossed the plains before the advent of the railroad. The specific definition of a Utah Pioneer is one who came to the Valley, was born here, or one who died on the way before May 10, 1869. Here is a screenshot of the invitation:

The information gathered is based on the entries in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree program. The link to the Web page is here. Here is an example of results showing my own "pioneer ancestors."\

Perhaps, from this list, you can begin to understand my interest and obsession with genealogy. Remember you can click on any image to enlarge it.

The Importance of Properly Recording Genealogy

Record keeping is an essential activity in the process of preserving our family history. In working with an online family tree such as FamilySearch.org's Family Tree, it is easy to become frustrated with the inaccurate records inherited from our ancestors. I was talking to a missionary at the Family History Library at Brigham Young University last night and she was spending most of her time merely correcting the existing records. In this regard, I found the following.

Quoting from a commentary on D&C 128:2–4 entitled, "What Happens If Ordinances Are Not Properly Recorded?" on LDS.org,

Elder Rudger Clawson explained the sacred obligation of keeping accurate temple records: “In the early days of the Church, some baptisms for the dead that were not properly witnessed and recorded, were rejected of the Lord, and the work had to be done over again. We know that great care and attention is given to this matter today in our Temples, and that efficient help must be secured to do this. … Truly it is a great and marvelous work, and not the least important thing about it is that these ordinances are all carefully recorded in the books and are filed away in the archives of the Temple, to be brought forth in due time. From these records the people who have gone to that house will be judged. Nothing that is done in that Temple will be accepted of the Lord, except it is properly witnessed and recorded.” (In Conference Report, Apr. 1900, pp. 43–44.)

 Genealogical records should not be approached in a casual and negligent manner. Especially those records pertaining to Temple work are, as Elder Clawson states, a sacred obligation. Aren't we, in effect, violating that obligation when we fail to record the information accurately? Even more, aren't we ignoring the fundamental importance of the work when we needlessly duplicate the ordinances?

President Gordon B. Hinckley said:

One of the most troublesome aspects of our temple activity is that as we get more and more temples scattered across the earth there is duplication of effort in proxy work. People in various nations simultaneously work on the same family lines and come up with the same names. They do not know that those in other areas are doing the same thing. We, therefore, have been engaged for some time in a very difficult undertaking. To avoid such duplication, the solution lies in complex computer technology (“Opening Remarks,” Ensign, Nov. 2005, pp. 5–6).

The Users Guide to the now discontinued, New FamilySearch website dated December, 2012 urges users as follows:

Occasionally you may find that someone else has already performed or reserved ordinances that you would like to perform. Please honor the work being done by others. Do not add duplicate records into the system just so you can perform the ordinances. Duplication of ordinances, however well meaning, should be avoided.

As I have noted in previous posts, this is not a new problem, in 1934, President Joseph Fielding Smith said,

Temple work should not be done in a haphazard or disorderly way. Those who labor for the dead should endeavor to prepare their records in an orderly and systematic manner. Let each family do the work for their own kindred, and if they do work for others, it must be at the instance and with the consent of the living relatives who are immediately concerned. No person has a right to select names for other than their own family and go to the temple to perform the work for them. This cannot be tolerated, for it would lead to confusion and duplication of work. When names are copied in an improper way and incomplete records are sent to the temples. but one thing will be the result--confusion. The compilers of records should try to find the information so that records can be made in family groups with all the necessary data for correct identification. When names are taken out of books without any accompanying information that will identify them or show relationship to parents and other members of the family, little, if any, good can follow. If work in the temples is done with records that are incomplete and inaccurate it will more than likely have to be done over again. In this way the records are burdened with unnecessary matter which cannot be properly arranged.” (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation Vol.2 pgs. 207-209, 1955)

Lack of careful entry of the information into FamilySearch Family Tree can raise the risk of duplication. Back on 12 November 2013, I wrote on this same subject in a blog post entitled, "The Challenge of Duplication of Temple Work -- Will FamilySearch Family Tree help?" With all of the changes to the Family Tree program since that time, I can safely say that the features of the program are now very much involved in reducing and attempting to eliminate duplication. In using the program today, now eight months after my initial post, you will have to consciously avoid the warnings not duplicate ordinances in order to enter duplicates into the program.

The Prophets Speak on Searching Out Our Dead -- Joseph Fielding Smith

President Joseph Fielding Smith was born in 1876 and became the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 23 January 1970, at the age of 93. Although he was not President of the Church for a very long time, he wrote and spoke prolifically. He was known as a great scriptorian and scholar. Here are some of his teachings on the subject of genealogy, family history, Temple work and baptism for the dead.

From Church History and Modern Revelation, 2:332:

The Lord has placed the baptismal font in our temples below the foundation, or the surface of the earth. This is symbolical, since the dead are in their graves, and we are working for the dead when we are baptized for them. Moreover, baptism is also symbolical of death and the resurrection, in fact, is virtually a resurrection from the life of sin, or from spiritual death, to the life of spiritual life. (See D. & C. 29:41–45.) Therefore when the dead have had this ordinance performed in their behalf they are considered to have been brought back into the presence of God, just as this doctrine is applied to the living.

From Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, 2:323–27:

The symbolism of baptism applies also to the living. When we are baptized, it is as though we are buried and resurrected with Christ. Our old, sinful natures die and we become a new person (see Romans 6:1–7). Baptism also symbolizes the physical process of being born, so that when we emerge from the waters, it is as though we have been born a second time (see John 3:5; Moses 6:59–60). For further discussion of the symbolism of baptism.

Again from Doctrines of Salvation,2:121–22:

If Elijah had not come, we are led to believe that all the work of past ages would have been of little avail, for the Lord said the whole earth, under such conditions, would be utterly wasted at his coming. Therefore his mission was of vast importance to the world. It is not the question of baptism for the dead alone, but also the sealing of parents and children to parents, so that there should be a ‘whole and complete and perfect union, and welding together of dispensations, and keys, and powers, and glories,’ from the beginning down to the end of time.  

If this sealing power were not on the earth, then confusion would reign and disorder would take the place of order in that day when the Lord shall come, and, of course, this could not be, for all things are governed and controlled by perfect law in the kingdom of God. 

Why would the earth be wasted? Simply because if there is not a welding link between the fathers and the children—which is the work for the dead—then we will all stand rejected; the whole work of God will fail and be utterly wasted. Such a condition, of course, shall not be.

Quoted in The Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine, Volumes 12-13, Idaho Falls Genealogical Convention, April, 1922.

My brethren and sisters, keep in mind this thing; that as was expressed yesterday, we without our dead cannot receive the fulness of salvation. We must understand that those who have died without a knowledge of the Gospel are just as much entitled to receive the privileges of salvation as are we who are living now when the Gospel is restored. And the Lord has arranged it so that they shall not be overlooked, but that every soul shall have the opportunity of salvation. And in order that the family chain shall not be broken it becomes necessary for us to perform labors for our dead, and ward workers must keep these things constantly in mind and give them to the people in their visits among them. 

Joseph Fielding Smith, "The Keys of the Priesthood Restored," Utah Genealogical and Historical Magazine, July 1936, 100-101.

I think sometimes we look at this work for the salvation of the dead rather narrowly. It is a wrong conception to think of the people for whom we are doing work in the temple of the Lord as being dead. We should think of them as living: and the living proxy but represents them in receiving the blessings which they should have received and would have received in this life had they been living in a gospel dispensation. Therefore every dead person for whom work is done in the temple is considered to be living at the time the ordinance is given.

Quoted in Hearts Turned to the Fathers: A History of the Genealogical Society of Utah, 1894-1994 (1995), 184.

It doesn't matter whether your computer is able to compile all the family group sheets for everyone that every lived on the earth, it remains the responsibility of each individual to know his kindred dead... Even if the work is done, then it is still each person's responsibility to study and become acquainted with his ancestors.

 See Sealing Power and Salvation, Brigham Young University Speeches of the Year (January 12, 1971) 2-3. Italics removed.

The doctrine of salvation for the dead is one of the most glorious principles ever revealed to man. It is the way in which the gospel shall be offered to all men. It establishes the fact that God is no respecter of persons [see Acts 10:34] that every soul is precious in His sight; and that all men will, in fact and in reality, be judged according to their works.

Now, I thank the Lord that He has restored His everlasting gospel to us in this day. I thank Him for the sealing power returned to earth by the Prophet Elijah, I thank Him for the eternal family unit, for the privilege we have of being sealed ourselves in his holy temples, and for then making available these sealing blessings to be given to our ancestors who died without a knowledge of the gospel.

 

Today's Worldwide Indexing Event

Quoting from the Church News for 10 July 2014,

Beginning July 20, 2014, at 6:00 p.m. (mountain daylight time), volunteers worldwide are encouraged to participate in the Family Search indexing challenge by submitting at least one batch of records within the following 24 hours.

Continuing the quote:

Our stated goal is 50,000 volunteers participating in a single day, though we think the potential exists to surpass that mark by a considerable amount,” said Mike Judson, indexing workforce manager for FamilySearch. “All it takes to be counted in the record is to submit one batch. With hundreds of thousands of past indexing volunteers and thousands more joining weekly, breaking the record won’t take much if people will commit to spend the 30 minutes or so required to finish and submit a batch.

The event begins at 00:00 coordinated universal time (UTC) on July 21, which is 6:00 p.m. mountain daylight time (MDT or Utah time) on Sunday, July 20. It ends 24 hours later, at 23:59 UTC (or 5:59 p.m. MDT) on Monday, July 21. Local start times and status updates can be found on the FamilySearch Facebook event page.

Here is a screenshot of the Worldwide Indexing Event Facebook page:

To see an introduction to Indexing see the video at http://bcove.me/v3nmffo4

FamilySearch Consultant Webinar Series

LDS.org hosts an ongoing Family History Consultant Webinar series. Many of the past presentations are available online and future webinar are announced regularly. Here is a screenshot of the page announcing the series;

The webinars are presented by experienced representatives of FamilySearch and will continue into the future. You do not have to be registered or even sign in to LDS.org to view past webinars. If you click on the image above, you can see the current topics available.