The Search Historical Records page at FamilySearch.org was created with both beginner and advanced genealogists in mind. In a previous article, we looked at the page from a beginner’s perspective. In this article, we’ll do the same but from a more expert point of view.
Using the Historical Records Search Box
Let’s start with the page’s search box, which, in comparison to search boxes of the past, stands out for being so simple. As you can see, it contains just four search fields: First Names, Last Names, Place, and Year.
Keep in mind that this initial experience is intended for beginners; it keeps them from entering too much information and being too specific in the early stages of their research. (Better to have a long list of records to consider than none at all—at least for people just starting their family history.) In fact, the Place field could be any place the person was associated with, not just his or her place of birth.
But what if you want to include the name of the ancestor’s spouse in your search? Or information about his or her parents? You can include all of that information and more with the complete search experience, which you access by clicking More Options, located at the bottom of the search box.
More Options for Advanced Researchers
Once More Options is clicked, this will open the full panel of search fields, beginning with Ancestor Information and the person’s name. Here you can be as specific or flexible in your search as you like. Pay particular attention to the many options for entering a person’s name. Instead of entering a single first name and a single last name, you can click the button for Alternate Name and use the fields labeled Alternate First Name and Alternate Last Name to enter up to 3 additional names.
This is especially useful if you want your search to include maiden names and any other surname that the person might have carried. You can use the same technique when you enter the names of other relatives, as illustrated in the example to the right.
The Record Options section likewise contains important filters that expert researchers will want to take advantage of. This is where you can filter your records by Location. If your ancestor had a common name, you could set the Location filter to the state or country where the ancestor experienced a particular life event (birth, marriage, or death, for example). Instead of seeing all records in the world for a woman named Olga Smith, you could limit your results to women named Olga Smith from somewhere much, much more specific.
You can also filter for a specific Type of record. In the image below, filters have been set to allow only Birth, Baptism, and Christening records from Antofagasta, Chile, to appear in the search results.
Finally, don’t forget the slider for Exact Search, which allows you to filter out everything that doesn’t exactly match your search term—word for word, character for character.
After you turn the feature on, you’ll need to click the check box next to each search field where you want an exact search to occur. In the example below, the exact search would apply to the place where the ancestor was born or died; it cannot be applied to date ranges.
Using Preferences to Customize Your Search Results
Another advanced feature to take note of is the Preferences tab that appears on the right side of the results page after you’ve clicked Search. Once selected, you can make important choices regarding the formatting, translation, and exporting of your search results. Let’s take a closer look.
Fixed Tables and Data Sheets
The first section under Preferences is for formatting your search results—either in a Fixed Table or Data Sheet. Select the format that best serves your needs. Choosing Fixed Table is great for taking in a quick summary of each individual entry. It compresses and simplifies the appearance of the information, which could be useful during the early stages of your research.
Choosing Data Sheet, by contrast, allows the most information to appear on screen, and you may need to scroll to the right in order to see it all. You can customize your Data Sheet so it includes separate columns for each piece of data, as shown in the following image:
Say you’re 100 percent certain about 1 or 2 historical details but not as sure about others. The Data Sheet can make it easy to spot the sources that contain what you know is correct. Again, you may need to scroll to the right to view additional columns not shown on screen. If so, there will be a horizontal scroll bar at the bottom of the page.
The image below is a screen capture of the columns for birth and death information. As you can see, with customized columns in place, it would be easy to identify the records with the right combination of details.
Language Options
Further down the Preferences pane is a section titled Language Options. Here you can choose whether to view information how it was originally recorded and indexed or with slight clarifications (translations) that have since been added. A simple example would be an entry for “Jan 1855,” which, when clarified or translated, might appear as “January 1855.”
Export Search Results
Last but not least, in the Preferences pane is an option for downloading your search results to your own computer. Perhaps you have your own method for charting and filtering information. If so, you can download the information into any of the following file formats: XLS, XLSX, ODS, and TSV. (Good news: CSV is coming soon!)
When you click Export Results, you download the results that you currently see on screen. To move to the next page of search results, click the page arrow at the bottom of the page, and repeat the process for downloading.
By default, the search result page is configured to show 20 search results at a time, which means that with the default setting you can download 20 search results at a time. There is a drop-down menu for increasing this number up to 100.
Striving to Improve
FamilySearch users are an inspiring mix of beginners, family historians, and expert genealogists. We want everyone who visits the website to feel welcome, of course—which means giving them the tools they need to succeed and presenting it all in a format that makes sense.
Our expert users are an incredibly important segment of our audience. We’re grateful for your contributions. Let us know what you think of our most recent updates, and please continue sharing your ideas.
Learn More about the Search Historical Records Page
