A Baker's Dozen: Free Advice to Applicants for Certification

1. Don't be shy; show what you know! 

2. If you read the NGS Quarterly in hopes of finding your own ancestors, don't apply yet. 

3. If you don't read the NGS Quarterly, start. 

4. When in doubt, question every piece of information. When not in doubt, question every piece of information. Then explain. See #1.

5. Breathe deep and savor the difference between a transcription and an original record.

6. Don't sweat the petty things -- follow the GPS. If you think that means Global Positioning System, don't apply yet.

7. If you need to survey the literature, remember that not all of it is in the form of unsourced trees on Ancestry.

8. To analyze is human; to correlate is divine.

9. Get comfortable with the strangeness of the past. It is not the present in funny clothes.

10. Practice. Never, ever submit the first one you did of anything.

11. If your teachers and friends think anything goes, find new ones.

12. Read the directions. 

13. Really. Read the directions. 




Harold Henderson, "A Baker's Dozen: Free Advice to Applicants for Certification," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 6 November 2014 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : viewed [date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]