21st Century Organised Family Historian - Week 2 - Develop a Digital Organizational Scheme

Continuing the weekly thread organised by Michelle at The Turning of Generations.

I knew last week that this was going to be a bit of an ordeal. My Maternal ancestry had lived in the area of the Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire borders for around 300 years. It is therefore hardly surprising that I have a duplications of surnames. Not surprising, but very frustrating. In some cases the lines are not know to be connected and in other cases there is an overlap of families. My own Grandparents were 6th Cousins, although they did not know it during there lifetimes. I often wonder what they would have made of that fact. 

My rather ageing genealogical programme is Family Origins 10. There will be an upgrade later this year I am sure. The name of my database MainFile. It starts with me and works back across my own ancestry and then goes sideways into my marriage and then heads back through my husband's ancestry.

I have a series of ring binders that reflect the computer database of MainFile. In theory, if the details exist in my database then a paper copy exists in my paper file. My filing cabinet has a file for each of my surnames running A-Z. If there is a great deal on a particular individual they have their own file inside that.

Meanwhile, my external hard drive is in deep, deep need of being organised. The plan that I have thought about over the last week is hopefully going to work. It will look like this:

External Hard Drive
- Genealogy
--JDG (me)
---Surnames (showing a few examples)
----Ayling
----Butcher
------John Hunt Butcher
----Budd
----Bellasis
----Bowring


Within each surname folder is a series of folders like this - 
--Butcher
---Census
---Migration
---Photographs (all named and dated)


This structure, repeated for my husband's ancestry.

That is my vision for the project. Fingers crossed it will work and will make a huge difference to the current organisation.