Events might work well for me too, but I'd appreciate suggestions on other Legacy features which might help - or cautions about traps which I could run into. Basically, I'm using the program for two things. My children aren't much into genealogy and family history, so I'm building a record for my toddler grandson (and some interested cousins), where what's in Legacy files or gedcoms may survive me but my papers and computer files won't. I'm also using Legacy as a research tool for family history, classic genealogy, and DNA genealogy. I'll give two examples.
My parents were active in highly classified WWII activities. From my mother, I learnt that she typed the orders which moved the man who would become Marshal Tito from Moscow to Yugoslavia (on a Canadian passport), mentioned in a 1970s book which also noted that the details were then still classified. It was part of a covert UK/US plot which could/should? have seen the US President impeached, sacrificed about 10% of all Yugoslavs, but was material to the failure of Barbarossa, arguably the critical event of WWII. That, and similar, form interesting family history, and it's propagated, usually destructively (divorce etc.), to and through descendants - inexplicable without knowledge the events and understanding of the stresses which warped those involved. Legacy has been useful as reminder to check again for what has been recently declassified, and can, of course, carry general and research notes. It has some ability to display timelines, but some research needs juxtaposition of unrelated datasets. Sourcing raises questions too. In the above, the source was my memory of a conversation (dimmed by 35 years). Credibility improves with description of the circumstances, the book could be cited for that, and perhaps more declassification will place mother in the right time and war theatre. Where and how, though, to record explored blind alleys and possible approaches for someone a generation down the road? Related, how to cite elements of my own history where I use previously confidential papers and may have the only remaining copy? Deep genealogy is either truncated at the limit of continuous paper records, i.e. classic genealogy, or means must be used to span gaps, laterally and longitudinally. By DNA, one can know, with very high probability, of collateral lines. Legacy wasn't developed to work with anything other than parent/child connected data in a single tree. It's flexible though, so how to exploit that for other genealogy purposes? It seems to work well to estimate a TMRCA and then link collaterals by "Placeholders" at about 35 year intervals. There's essentially no place in Legacy 7.5 to record DNA data, but present major databases may be unavailable to my grandson (example Ancestry yDNA). Fields for "Placeholders" could perhaps be repurposed for much or all of that, notably aiding atDNA application to conventional genealogy search for connections. Longitudinal study seems helped by the "Placeholder" approach in the time domain of Heraldry, for both research and record, regarding STR yDNA, with SNP data newly a factor. For deeper genealogy, my grandson, a Britton, may want to know if he is Brythonic or got his surname some other way, and how he came to Britain from Adam in Africa while his mtDNA came here eastwards. "Placeholders" for that get to be rather long-lived, and time works backwards BCE. Again, this is not what Legacy was designed for, but Millenium must be aware of increasing interest in such, so has a choice to limit Legacy to classic genealogy, modify it in a future version, or to produce, or link with, a companion. Whatever choice, it may be useful for both Millenium and the community to experiment with Legacy's current flexibility to illuminate this area. DNA is not going away, and we certainly need something better to preserve and communicate with than Gedcoms are now for classic genealogy. If the Millenium choice is to ignore DNA, then a clear statement to that effect would keep posts like this off the List, especially if words to that effect were added to the Legacy User Group Guidelines. kb Legacy User Group guidelines: http://www.LegacyFamilyTree.com/Etiquette.asp Archived messages after Nov. 21 2009: http://www.mail-archive.com/legacyusergroup@legacyusers.com/ Archived messages from old mail server - before Nov. 21 2009: http://www.mail-archive.com/legacyusergroup@legacyfamilytree.com/ Online technical support: http://www.LegacyFamilyTree.com/Help.asp Follow Legacy on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/LegacyFamilyTree) and on our blog (http://news.LegacyFamilyTree.com). To unsubscribe: http://www.LegacyFamilyTree.com/LegacyLists.asp
