What are Record Hints?

Why Sources?

Attaching sources to people in the family tree ensures greater accuracy by finding records that corroborate and improve the information in the family tree.

For example, if I believe that Jacob Smith's birth date was June 7, 1883 but you believe it is August of 1884, who is to say who is correct?  We can argue all we want but it is still two people's opinion.  However, if we are able to find a birth certificate, we can probably stop our arguing and agree on the correct date and location.  Sources help us determine the correct information for people in our family tree.

What are Hints?

FamilySearch has launched a feature called "Record Hints" or just "Hints" for short.  To create these "hints", they compared the information in the family tree to the information in the historical records on the website to try to find very high probability matches.  They tried really hard to be as accurate as possible but they can't guarantee they are correct so they are called "Hints" rather than calling them something like "Matches."

Just as an aside, I have found that they are generally pretty accurate in the US but less so on my ancestors from England and Wales.  A big part of the problem is that there are so many Thomas William's or Mary Jones's living in the same town, of the same age, that it is a much more difficult task to find the right Mary Jones.

Note: This post is pretty long because I wanted to explain the different parts of hints, how they work, and what to do with them.  In reality, there are really only a few steps to working with hints:

1. Find a record hint on an ancestor.
2. Evaluate it to see if it is a match for your person/family in the family tree.
3. Attach the source adding a reason statement and missing information, such as birth dates or residence information.
4. Repeat this for each family member on the record.

So, let's explore what these hints look like.

You can find hints on many of my ancestors in the family tree.

When you are looking at a person in the family tree, you might see something like this:

On the right hand side of the page, you can see a section called "Record Hints."  These are records that FamilySearch's computers found that seem to match the information in the family tree for this person.

BTW, you can also find record hints on the Descendancy View in the family tree.  The golden colored icon denotes the person has hints.  If you click on it, it will show you which hints the system found and let you go in to evaluate and attach them.  This is usually the fastest way to find hints on your family tree.  Center the tree on an ancestor a ways back in your tree, perhaps born in the early 1800's and then look at the descendancy view to spot record hints for that person or his/her descendants.

In the first picture of the person page in the family tree, if I click on the 1920 US Census, the system lines up the information from that record with the information for Thomas and others in his family.

On the left hand side, we see information from the 1920 US census.  On the right hand side, we see information from the family tree.  You can see that the census says Thomas A Edwards was living in Paragonah, Utah and it says he was born in Utah in about 1882.  The birth date is actually estimated from his age at the time so being off by a year or so isn't a big deal.  Thomas was born in Paragonah, Utah and he also lived there in 1930 so it makes sense to see him living there in the same place in 1920.

If I felt this was not a correct match, I can click on the gray button "Not a Match" and it will remove that hint.

For further, comparison, I look at how it lined up the other's in his family and, with this many people matching, I have a high confidence I have the right record for this family.

Checking out the image of the original document

I can also click on the link to view the image.  It is on the upper right hand side, just below the words "United States Census, 1920" and the person's name.  If I click on the "Image" link, I can now see the actual image of the document.  I found Thomas and his family and zoomed in on them.  You can see that Thomas was the head of the household, he owned his house and lived on a farm.  He was also 38 years old.  

Looking further across the page (on that same line), I learn that he was born in Utah, his father was born in Wales and spoke Welsh, and his mother was born in Australia but spoke "Scotch".  Thomas is listed as a "laborer" in the "Sheep Herding" industry.  His wife, Olive was born in Utah but her father was born in Illinois and her mother was born in England.  These are all important clues as I search further back in my family tree.

I always like to look at the image to learn more about their lives, what they did for occupations, where their family was from, etc.  I also look to see if the indexed information was correct.

Attaching the Source

So, the next step is to attach the source. I am going to first click on the blue "+ Add" link next to the Residence in 1920.  I like to do this because it tells me where he lived at the time.  This helps me to know to follow him around and see where he may have moved but it also helps me spot potential errors.  If I find he was born in in Paragonah, Utah and lived there in 1930, but this record were from New York City, I would want to double check before I attach the record because I may have the wrong record.

Now, I enter a reason why I am attaching this source.  I often use something a little generic like "Name, birth information, residence, and family members match information in the family tree."  I do this because the system will copy my reason statement into each of the other family members.  If I make it too specific to Thomas, I have to change it for each person.

So, now I have attached the record to Thomas.  Take a look at three things here:

1. The record is now attached to Thomas so his section goes green.  If I had made a mistake, I could click the "Detach" link and remove the record from Thomas in the family tree.
2. I can now attach the records to each of the others in the family tree.  Notice that Olive is listed by her married name of Olive B Edwards in the census record but the tree lists her by her maiden name of Olive Nichols Barton.  The "B" in Olive B Edwards probably stands for "Barton."
3. Notice that the system made a mistake and lined the census record for Alma up with Chesley in the family tree, rather than Alma.  This is easy to fix.  Look below and I will show you how.

Fixing Alignment Problems

If I hold my mouse cursor over Alma's name on the left hand side, I see some little arrows telling me I can move it up and down.

I just click in that general area and I can drag the census record for Alma up or down so he lines up with the correct person in the family tree.  If there wasn't a match for Alma, I could even drag him in between people and drop him there and it would give me the option to add him as a new person in the family tree.

Now that I moved record for Alma to align him with Alma in the family tree, everyone is lined up and I am ready to start attaching records.  After I am done, everyone on the record is now green.

Note: If I had found someone on the record listed as "boarder", "servant" or something else that wasn't family, I wouldn't attach their records because I wouldn't know to whom to attach them in the family tree.  Also notice that we didn't find a match for Chesley or William.  That's because neither was alive when the census was taken in 1920 - Chesley died before that date and William was born after 1920.

Viewing the Source in the Family Tree

I can now look at the links at the top where it says "Go To Record | Thomas Alexander Edwards" and click on his name to visit his person page in the family tree.

Notice that the 1920 census is no longer shown in the Record Hints list.  I also attached the 1930 US Census while I was doing this tonight so that one is also no longer shown.

If you look at the Vital Information section of the page and click on his name, it will expand giving you the option to edit his name.  It also shows you the sources that are attached to this page and that are tagged as sources that show his name.

Finally, you will also see the 1920 US Census was added to the sources section towards the bottom of the page.