Sharing Ancestor Bite-Sized Bios More Widely Because LOCKSS

Many of my husband's US, Canadian, and UK ancestors served in the military over the years. Researching them over the past year, I prepared bite-sized bios as part of a family history booklet for the family. 

What's in a bite-sized bio?

Most of my bios are a paragraph or two in length, including parents' names, birthplace, spouse, children, and occupation.  I usually include birth order to give a sense of family context, and a sentence about the area where the ancestor grew up or moved to. 

Also, I try to mention a historical event (not just war but a natural disaster or movement toward a different geographic area) if it helped shape the ancestor's life. For instance, a number of my hubby's ancestors caught "Ohio fever" and moved to Ohio before it became a state, a point I make in their bios. 

In general, if an ancestor does something that is out of the ordinary or not typical for the time, I point that out too for the sake of readers who might not be familiar with the background. Not military related, that added to the drama of the bio I wrote for a widow who decided to go to Gold Rush country, leaving her children in the care of relatives and neighbors. 

Finally, for this project, I wrote a quick summary of the ancestor's military service and its significance (regiment? rank(s)? actions or battles? awards? capture? service under a well-known figure? health afterward?). More than one ancestor was injured in service, which affected their later lives, I showed in my bite-sized bios. 

The next step was to share the bios on multiple websites so these ancestors and their military service is not forgotten. Remember, LOCKSS (lots of copies keep stuff safe).

Bite-sized bios on Fold3

You don't have to subscribe to post a bio on an ancestor's memorial page on Fold3, which is owned by Ancestry and focuses on military records. Searching the Honor Wall of service men and women is free, as is adding a bio. Search the wall using this link. Also on that page is a link to create a new memorial (free) if none shows up in your search. Sharing ancestor/veterans' bios on that site has been an ongoing project for me.

As an example: For my husband's great great uncle Benjamin Franklin Steiner (1840-1924), I added a bio by clicking the add button on his memorial page (see yellow arrow in image above). You can either type it in or copy from a document and paste it in. Once you save it, you can edit if you like by clicking the pencil tool (see green circle on above image). 

Be sure to bookmark or tag the memorials so you can easily return to them later. The tag tool is at top right (orange circle on above image). You can tag with a phrase like "US Civil War" or use a bookmark tag for a later visit.

Bite-sized bios on Find a Grave

Many (but not all) Fold3 memorials include links to the person's Find A Grave memorial. Since the bite-sized bio is already written, it's easy to copy and paste onto that person's Find A Grave memorial. Above, a slightly edited version of the bio I wrote for Benjamin Franklin Steiner's Fold3 memorial is also posted on his memorial at Find A Grave. 

Benjamin's memorial page is managed by someone else, so I submitted the bite-sized bio using the suggest edits function...also indicating that this man was a veteran. The edits were accepted. A small V shows next to this ancestor's name, a visual symbol of military service that any visitor to his Find a Grave page will see.

Wash, rinse, and repeat

You can post bite-sized bios on even more sites. I added Steiner's bio to WikiTree (above), FamilySearch (below), and MyHeritage (at bottom).  

LOCKSS in action! I don't want family history to fade away--I want to perpetuate it for future researchers and descendants.