A while back I was introduced to RootsMapper. It’s a free website that accesses your FamilySearch account and generates a map with ancestor birth locations. You can decide how many generations to show on your map by selecting 1 generation up to 10 generations. On the map you will see colored bubbles with numbers. The numbers represent which generation that person falls into in your tree with you being number one. The pink are for female ancestors and the blue for male ancestors. The bubbles are then linked to their child so you can follow the arcs from person to person if you wish. You can hover over each number to see who that number represents. It will show a small pop-up box with their name and a life span range. See below:
There are several options to change things up. The option I think is especially cool is that you can choose a different start person. So I can switch from me to say my great grandmother and see a map that represents her ancestry.
This information all comes from FamilySearch so of course the map is only as accurate as the tree. If you haven’t put yourself in the tree, linked yourself correctly and checked each of those generations you can’t know for sure that your map is accurate.
My 10 generation map has a lot going on. Here is the full map:
A zoom of the US/Canada:
And a zoom of Europe:
For FamilySearch users, this is another cool way to view your ancestors by birthplace.
Happy Friday! I hope you have an awesome genealogy discovery today.
Very cool! I don’t have a tree on FamilySearch. Is there an easy way to upload there without recreating the tree one by one?
Thank you! Not really. You can upload a gedcom into a very specific section but it won’t put it into “The Tree” which is where you need the data to make this website work for you. But your family members may be there because you can’t have your own tree on there. It’s a collaborative website and the idea is to have only one instance of every human who has ever lived. You could check and see if some of you ancestors are one there. I think you will need an account – totally free – to search the tree but I could be wrong. Or you could send me a screen shot of your pedigree and I could check the tree for you since I know how to search it easily. 🙂
Thanks! I do have an account, but have only used it for research, not for keeping my tree. I don’t like the collaborative idea—don’t do Geni either. I guess I am too much of a control freak!
I understand that! 😉
Oh, I love maps! Seeing one like that is very exciting. Thx for sharing.
You are welcome!
Great post. I had visited this site once before, but after reading your post, I went and did it again. Your locations are MUCH more diverse than mine. I mostly had a purple jumbled line from the UK to New England :o) Such a good reminder about those lines that I don’t seem to pay much attention to though. Very fun. Thanks!
I’m glad you enjoyed it. It is a good way to be reminded of things we haven’t looked at in a while. I love finding new ways to look at things I already know. Sometimes the new viewpoint causes an awesome “Aha!”.
Amberly,
I want to let you know that your blog post is listed in today’s Fab Finds post at http://janasgenealogyandfamilyhistory.blogspot.com/2016/04/follow-friday-fab-finds-for-april-22.html
Have a great weekend!
Hi Jana, thank you! Have a great weekend.
How fun is that? I haven’t been back to FamilySearch in quite some time because I was so frustrated with others linking unrelated people to my line, etc. Maybe I’ll give it another chance one of these days.
Oh that is frustrating! I don’t deal with that very much because I mostly work on my mom’s lines and no one else is working on them. I hope you have a better experience.