I still love birthdays. When I was little my mom hung streamers, balloons, and a big Happy Birthday sign on the wall. Today, my wife continues the tradition, minus the streamers and balloons. I still get the big sign. And I still look forward to it. Maybe I'm just trying to hold on to my youth. (I did find my first grey hair this year though….)
Today marks the birthday/anniversary of a different kind. It's now been four years since our first Legacy News blog article was published. This is blog post number 731. I had high hopes of writing every single day. Turns out that I've only written every other day . . . for four years. I seriously thought that after finishing my four-year degree in Genealogy that my laborious writing days were finally over. Writing is no longer laborious, I actually look forward to contributing to this blog. I'm certainly no expert in writing, but I do try to help our Legacy Family Tree users stay updated with genealogical news and every once in a while, I try to throw in a good tip or two.
Four-and-a-half years ago, I had no idea what a blog was. I remember talking with Leland Meitzler at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy. He hinted that he had an exciting new idea. His idea turned into the first well-known (maybe the first ever?) blog dedicated to genealogy – GenealogyBlog.com. Today, according to Chris Dunham's Genealogy Blog Finder, there are over 1,400 blogs dedicated to our "addiction". Over 250,000 of you subscribe to this blog. (To subscribe, enter your email in the Subscribe Me! section in the upper right of this web page.) This year, Legacy News even made the first-ever "25 most popular genealogy blogs" list.
Our first blog article, published on August 25, 2005, was entitled "WorldCat Reaches 1 Billion Holdings". It taught how to search this wonderful database, but it could only be accessed via subscription. Today WorldCat is freely searchable either online at http://www.worldcat.org/ or on your mobile phone at http://www.worldcat.org/m/. My how times have changed – in only four years.
I've also announced the births of my last two children in Legacy News. Braden in 2005 and Kaitlyn in 2009. Thanks for putting up with these "personal editorials".
Below are many of the most-read and fun Legacy News articles. Are there others that you have enjoyed? (Have a suggestion for an article? With Legacy running, just click on the "Submit News" link in the Legacy News section of the Legacy Home tab.)
- Three proven methods for getting responses from your living relatives
- City in Brazil proposes ban on dying
- Legacy Tip: Organizing Sources
- The Computer Swallowed Grandma
- Free Alaska Genealogy Cruise or Family History Library Trip
- Your Legacy Database – Should You Split It?
- The Genealogy Happy Dance
- Sneak Peek of Legacy 7
- How to Add a Citation to a Digital Image
- Free software – Surname Suggestion List
- Genealogy Goals for 2008, and a few Legacy Surprises
- Why Isn't It Free?
- Get More Done with Two Monitors
- How good are the FamilySearch Indexing indexes?
- Legacy Charting Tip – How to Choose a Different Theme
- Dreaming about Genealogy
- Split Screen and Dual Monitors Tips
- Online backup service brings peace of mind
- How to create a family tree bookmark
- A Year in Review – Legacy Family Tree in 2008
- Genealogy discovery behind the wallpaper
- How to combine multiple family files into one
- Which name should I record?
- Cast your vote – Legacy Genealogy Cruise 2010
- Dangerous temptations in genealogical research
Thanks to all of our readers for all of your comments. Interacting with you has been fun and educational, and has helped make our software, Legacy Family Tree, the number-one rated genealogy software in the market.
I’m a proud Legacy user and delighted to wish the blog a Happy 4 year anniversary. Keep up the great work!