Are you In? It Starts Friday!

FamilySearch's 2015 Worldwide Indexing Event, Fuel the Find, begins Friday, August 7, and continues for one week.  The goal is for 100,000 people to index one batch of records during that week.  (Last year there were 66,000 participants in a 24-hour period.  It's a tiny hop to add 34,000 participants in 6 more days.)   

You know about indexing, right?  It's the process of transcribing information on original historical documents so they can become available in an online, searchable database to be used by family historians who are searching for their ancestors.  Family historians and genealogists like you and me!

I use FamilySearch almost daily.  When I type a name into the search box, press the enter key, and lists of names with information suddenly appear, it almost seems like magic.  But it's not magic.  There was someone (probably many someones) behind the scenes who looked at the document, deciphered the name, and typed it into a form for FamilySearch Indexing.  And then FamilySearch performed the magic-like act of making the information searchable and available for everyone to use freely.

I think of indexing as giving back, or maybe giving forward.  Chances are that I will never find an ancestor's name in any of the documents I personally index, but my indexing will help someone else find an ancestor just as others' efforts have helped me.  I like being helpful.  I like giving back and giving forward.  I hope you do, too.

You can learn more about this year's indexing event, Fuel the Find, here.  Go here and here to learn more about indexing.  Go here to get started.

Are you in?  Won't you join Fuel the Find?

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2009-2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.