English: 145-volume stack of the 1959 World Book Encyclopedia printed in Braille. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)[/caption]How's that for a question? Back...way back...when I first began researching on the internet, there weren't
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Advertisement for Encyclopedia Brittanica, 1913 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)[/caption]very many records that were "indexed." What that means specifically can be explained best by thinking back ....way back....when we had giant sets of books like the Encyclopedia Brittanica or World Book Encyclopedia. There were thousands and thousands of pages of articles that talked about everything you can possibly imagine. Have you ever used an encyclopedia? If not, I can tell you that they were usually 20 to 25 volumes, each of which contained 400 or 500 pages of information.
Now picture having an encyclopedia in place of Google. Except that this imaginary encyclopedia isn't even arranged alphabetically. Everything is just sort of piled in there, stuck every which way with the first article about watermelons followed by zebras then something else totally unconnected to what came before or what came after. How long would it take you to find the article about Hawaii? I can tell you, you'd be late for dinner! But these volumes were "indexed" so that you could go to the back of the book and look up your subject in an alphabetical index. That would send you not only to the right volume, but the exact page you needed....a primitive Google, if you will! No bells and whistles....just words and pictures.
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English: Google Logo officially released on May 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)[/caption]Welcome to the world of un-indexed US Census records or un-indexed city probate files or un-indexed anything!. How is it that finding what we're looking for is so easy today? The answer is simple: indexing!
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Adriana Hernandez baptized 1925 (Photo credit: GoCal83)[/caption]So who does all this indexing? Family Search just announced that they have a billion records indexed. That will sure help all of us in our diligent search for any genealogical records. But the mystery remains: Who does all this indexing? The answer is so simple, I'm sure you already know. It's you and me! Well, I can say "you" if you've ever signed up as a volunteer indexer. How did the search engines get the 1940 US Census up and searchable so fast? Indexers, volunteer indexers.
Here's my point: If everybody, and I mean EVERYBODY could find the time to get involved just a little imagine the amazing, mind-numbing volume of records could be indexed in a single day! Family Search has already had one "mass indexing day" back on 2 July 2012 when a total of nearly 50,000 indexers and arbitrators set a record for the most number of indexers working in one day!
Well they're planning on it again and YOU can help! On Sunday, July 20, 2014 at 9 PM eastern time and continuing for 24 hours, Family Search is challenging all genealogists to break that 2012 record and index as many records as possible. Have you been indexing right along? Then please be sure to participate in the "World Indexing Project" by indexing just one record...and more if you can! But they're only asking for 50,000 plus to help with just one record. That's all!
If you've never indexed records for Family Search, click on the "Indexing" tab on the home page and you'll discover how interesting it can be for a researcher to see how it all works. Here's the "Worldwide Indexing Event" page at Family Search and here's "Worldwide Indexing Event" at their Facebook page which was set up strictly for this project. If you've never been to the site, you'll have to establish a user name and password. But there's no cost, no membership fees, no worries!
Good luck! Give it a shot! No one starts out running, there's a short learning curve with plenty of on site assistance every
step of the way. Like the commercial, "Try it! You'll like it!!"
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