The Expert Way to Demolish Roadblocks in Your Family Tree

The expert way to demolish family tree roadblocks

“How do I know if a historic record is about my person and not someone else?”

I get asked this question ALL. THE. TIME.

Which is great because it’s an IMPORTANT question. We want to find the right info about our people.

In general, if the person’s name, dates, and locations match up, you’re on the right track.

And some people’s lives are easy to research, as if you can’t keep up with the amount of info you find about them.

Other people – like POW William Patton and his wife Barbara – not so much. Trying to discover these two people’s lives was . . . well . . . tough. None of my go-to resources worked.

A big reason was because their names were common enough that when I did find docs with their names, I couldn’t be 100% certain the doc was about “my” William or Barbara Patton.

So back to the most-asked question — What if you don’t have enough info about someone to tell if a record really is about them?

Well, that’s when you get creative.

That’s when to start looking at a person’s FANs.

Everyone has a FAN club that can destroy roadblocks

When you can’t find info about a person, look at records for their Family, Associates, and Neighbors. (See how the first letter of each category spells FAN? Clever, right. 😊) It’s a strategy I learned and adapted from my family-history idol – Elizabeth Shown Mills. (If you’re really into research, I highly recommend checking out her books and lectures.)

Think of this FAN club as a person’s sphere of influence. The person you’re researching is in the center and surrounded by family, friends, neighbors, and community. Kinda like this:

Researching an ancestor's FAN club can help break through Family Tree Roadblocks

The basic idea of researching a person’s FAN club is that understanding the lives of and records for people who have relationships with each other can help you break through a research brick wall.

I’m going to focus on how researching a person’s Family members can solve a family history mystery. And, honestly, focusing on Family will probably solve most of these kinds of brick walls. (The further out in the circle you get, the more advanced the research becomes. I’m keeping things simple here.)

Family members often appear in each other’s life records. For example:

Parents’ names are frequently listed on their children’s marriage, birth, and death records
Family members appear together in census records
Names of living family members are often included in obituaries
And the list goes on and on

So, if I wanted to find the names of John Smith’s parents, I might look for John’s marriage or birth or death records to see if his parents are listed. Or I could find his obit to see what the names of his kids are/were.

Let’s see this theory in action.

Do 3 women = 1 lady?

After spending more time than I’d care to admit researching a family tree, I had a theory:

3 women — Lois Barbara Olson, Barbara Patton, and Lois Boss – were in fact the same woman.

This chart shows some of the info I knew about each woman:

Comparing similarities between 3 women helped break through a family tree roadblock

The year range in parentheses “()” next to each woman’s name is the span of years I could find records for each of these women.

In other words,

I could find records for a child named Lois Barbara Olson born in 1912, but after 1925 I couldn’t find records for her.
I found records for a married woman named Barbara Patton from roughly 1933-1953. But no mentions of her parents, siblings, children, or other relatives except her two husbands.
And I had records for a woman named Lois Boss who lived in California from 1955 until her death in 1967.

From a timeline perspective, they could be the same woman going by different names. However, none of the documents I found linked these women 100% together.

That being said, look at the facts colored in blue on the chart. They show some similarities across the three women, which is what led to my theory that they were the same woman.

But how to prove it?

First, let’s tackle some daddy issues

Since I’d found as many records as I could for each “individual” woman, it was time to look at their FANs. That is, dig into records about their family members. I started with Lois Barbara Olson’s father – Fred Olson (or Olsen, the spelling changes in various records).

I searched through man historical docs, building out his life’s timeline and uncovering the names of his spouses and children. And eventually I came across his 1949 obituary from the Seattle Daily Times:

Obituaries have great clues to help break through family tree roadblocks

The purple highlight in Fred’s obit lists 2 daughters as his survivors (ie, the family members who were still alive in 1949):

Mrs. Clyde Wimbles of Tacoma, Washington
Mrs. Lois Barbara Patton of Oakland, California

Patton! Bingo! The obit links Lois Barbara Olson to Barbara Patton. They’re the same woman.

Keep on linking like a boss

What about Lois Boss? Was she the same woman?

Fred Olson’s obit (above) included another important clue: Fred’s other daughter was Mrs. Clyde Wimbles of Tacoma. Admittedly I didn’t recognize this as a vital clue when I first read the obit. That came later.

As I was researching, I took another look at Lois Boss’s obit.

Her survivors included a Nephew named William F. Wimbles who lived in Tacoma.

Wimbles, again. Could “Mrs. Clyde Wimbles” in Fred Olson’s obit be related to “Nephew William F. Wimbles” from Lois Boss’s obit?

I already knew that Lois Barbara Olson Patton had 1 sister – Constance Olson. Could Constance be “Mrs. Clyde Wimbles”? And could the “Nephew William F. Wimbles” be her son?

If true, that would connect Lois Boss to Lois Barbara Olson Patton – and prove all three women to be the same woman.

It was time to dig into Constance Olson’s life.

I discovered that, yes, Constance Olson married a Joseph Clyde Wimbles and had a son named William. Furthermore, Constance died in Los Angeles in 1966 – which would be a reason she wasn’t listed as one of Lois Boss’s survivors a year later in 1967.

Bam. Lois Boss was Barbara Patton. Or, more correctly, I’d discovered the – unbelievably tragic — life story of Lois Barbara Olson Patton Boss.

Demolish those family tree roadblocks

If you’re stuck on someone and just can’t learn more about their life, start researching their FANs. Begin with their family members.

What I’ve described here is the trimmed-down, squeaky-clean version of my research into Lois Barbara Olson Patton Boss. I’ve focused on the records that finally connected the 3 women together.

However, I spent a lot of time researching even more people: Father Fred’s second wife, Sister Constance’s first husband, Lois Boss’s husband George Boss, and many more. All in an effort to find records or info that could connect Lois Barbara Olsen, Barbara Patton, and Lois Boss.

But the time was worth it because I was able to determine that my theory was, in fact, correct – these 3 women were the same woman. And that allowed me to tell her life story.

The Expert Way to Demolish Roadblocks in Your Family Tree

“How do I know if a historic record is about my person and not someone else?”

Everyone has a FAN club that can destroy roadblocks

Do 3 women = 1 lady?

First, let’s tackle some daddy issues

Keep on linking like a boss

Demolish those family tree roadblocks

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