Color Dots Help Control Paper Chase
Mary E. Vassel Hill, an accredited genealogist, has developed a color-coded filing system to help those of us who get inundated with pieces of paper, all accumulated in the noble name of research.
Hill’s plan is set forth in “Family Roots Organizer,” for Video Training Series, produced by 123 Genealogy of Hurricane, Utah.
She delivers the material in the manner of the college professor she is. Hill has taught this method to students of family history and genealogical research as an instructor at Brigham Young University; at seminars and classes; and teaches it now at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, where she’s on staff.
Watching the two videos is like attending a seminar, seated in the front row with an unobstructed view of Hill as the keynote speaker.
Just because all of a genealogist’s information is entered into a computer’s genealogy software program, it doesn’t mean you won’t have paper to shuffle. You need to have somewhere to keep such documents as birth and death records, marriage certificates, land records. Hill divided her four branches of ancestors by colors: blue for herself and her father’s family; green for herself with her mother’s family; red is the color of her mother’s father; and yellow represents the lineage of her mother’s mother.
Every new maternal grandmother you uncover will carry yellow dots.
Likewise, when you see a paternal grandfather seven generations back, tagged with a blue dot, you’ll immediately know which branch is his on your family tree.
Those basic four colors can carry your pedigree into perpetuity.
Hill’s 21st century filing systems is carried out with two large plastic bins that have ridges to hold the four-colored files: one bin for her paternal line, and another for her maternal line. It’s in these tubs where your original documents are held.
Hill recommends using drab-green files in each bin as “holding files” for papers you receive but don’t have time to file at that particular moment. The next time you work on a particular line, there’s the green file patiently holding the newly arrived information that requires your attention.
She prefers open-topped bins to notebooks, which quickly become unwieldy and can hold just so much material, she said. It’s not a good idea to three-punch your precious documents, and placing them in sleeves only adds to the notebook’s bulk.
Placing files in a topless bin is probably a benefit over enclosed filing cabinets, since whatever line you want to work on is readily visible and can be easily removed and replaced.
Beginning genealogists might benefit the most from the videos, since Hill assumes her audience knows little about genealogical research. Still, she speaks to all of us who continue to wage war on paper.
Technically, the video is rather homespun, but Hill comes across as a kindly woman who knows a lot about genealogy and is willing to share her secrets.
It’s probably best to take notes during the screening because it would be hard to try to find the exact video frames to answer questions that might later come up. But then, one would take notes at a seminar, wouldn’t one?
The $24 tapes can be ordered from The Studio, 39 S. Main, Hurricane, UT 84737; or by calling (888) 263-2276. The Web address in www.thestudio.net.