Found tons on info, all on a Pedigree Resource File...can I merge??

[natehoule]

From what I've read, you cannot merge from a PRF, is that true? Is there any workaround? I just broke open a line of mine by digging up my person in someone else's tree and it has many more generations back than I presently have. I'm worried that I'm going to need to manually insert every singe person. Please tell me that isn't the case...

[Guy]

Why would you want from PRF, the family trees on that database are unchecked?
Have you checked the information?

It may be accurate it may be a load of tosh, if you have to resort to using such data use it as a guide and chek the original records to ensure accuracy.

By checking original records I don't just mean check they have been copied correctly, but check the data fits.
Check if there are alternatives, check for example that the mother did not bear children 6 months before this one or a few months after this one.

Cheers
Guy

[Janet in Yorkshire]

Agree totally with Guy.
I would want to check each single piece of data had a source, which I would then hope to consult and verify, before I even considered adding that one small fact to my tree. Just because one or two facts on a tree seem plausible, that doesn't mean that ALL the information is correct or valid. I have seen on-line trees where facts for 3 different men of the same name and living within a few miles of each other have been combined to make a nonsensical single profile for one man.

Jay

[GallowayLass]

While agreeing with the foregoing as regards checking everything before you add a person to your master tree, like natehoule, I would want to be able to download the info found to a separate tree file using my preferred programme and then, once checked and verified, I could simply copy and paste the individual(s) to my master tree. I would not want to have to manually copy everything to a temporary tree if I could download instead.

I have no experience of using PRF so I can't say if there's a way to do a direct download which is the question natehoule needs answered.

[Caroline]

It says here that you cannot download it, so it will need adding bit by bit anyway.

Everything you need to know is here:

http://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Pedigree_Resource_File

[Olde Crone Holden]

As it is going to take you a while to verify it all anyway (weeks, at least) it won't seem such a chore to add it bit by bit.

OC

[Uncle John]

As it is going to take you a while to verify it all anyway (weeks, at least) it won't seem such a chore to add it bit by bit.

And a tree that you grow twig by twig stands a much better chance of staying properly joined-up than importing a whole bunch of names in one go, leaving you with the problem of making sense of what in most cases is a tangle of truth, myth and wishful thinking.

[Sylvia C]

as one example of the dangers of unverified trees, or of just plain taking information from someone else's tree without verifying that it does belong on yours ...........


my gt aunt Hannah married John Wrigley in Lancashire on Nov 13 1902. Ten days later they sailed from Liverpool to New York, and went to live in Newark, NJ. They lived there for the rest of their lives, and never had any children.

On ancestry one day, I found a "leaf hint" of a connection to another tree.


He had taken Hannah and John, and added them to his tree as parents of a number of children


It really was rather strange .............. he had a John and Hannah Wrigley who had emigrated from Lancashire to Newark, NJ, and then had several children BUT the emigration had happened about 1830

His "acquiring" my John and Hannah made them parents of children born at least 50 years before they themselves had been born


Luckily, he was a sensible robber ............... he removed them from his tree within 3 days of me notifying him of his mistake.

Of course, I really don't know when he had "acquired" them and how many other people had taken his tree with the wrong information

[Caroline]

Early on in my research I came across a huge mistake with the Pedigree Resource File, which is still there and also appears on Ancestry now ...

http://ftfmagazine.lewcock.net/index.php/volume-one-new/july-2008/424-the-gillett-spoons

[Anne in Carlisle]

Yes, I have seen a strange translation of time like this, copied from tree to tree. A number of trees have a couple with very distinctive, and quite 'modern' names marrying in "about 1540" and emigrating to the USA. Funnily enough a couple with these exact same names marry in 1909 and are found on the 1911 census and never leave the UK. Of course it could be coincidence but the vague marriage date and the unlikely names for the 1500s ring alarm bells to me.
Anne

[Olde Crone Holden]

The question you must always ask yourself is:

If I cannot be bothered to check every fact on their tree, why do I assume THEY have?

OC