Hi
I am curious if anyone has used Associations with Census for when you have a person who is a household but the principal / head of household does not (at least at this time) belong to tree.
I am not sure there is much benefit if Associations were used and it likely would not transfer well to other software – thoughts?
Kevin
You can also do something similar with shared facts because a shared role can be shared with a “name only” person who is not actually in your database.
For whatever reason, I simply do not use Associations or Shared Facts with Census facts in this manner. For the head of household, I do include a Census fact note which is a complete transcription of the census entry for the family, including people not in the database. But that’s just using a note, and is not using Associations or Shared Facts.
For what it’s worth, I rely on the image of the census page that is attached to each census fact to trap cousins, in-laws, etc. It has become much easier in recent years with images of all UK censuses and most US censuses on Ancestry (other sites are available!!). I usually find that when the unknown person comes into my database through other means, the census page (for them) will be found and the relationship clarified. I always fear duplicated people if I add ‘name only’ people.
that is a good point about name onlies. I do use them but not very often
I brought up this topic more because another used asked me if I ever used Associations with Census – I never did – but then wonder if any had and how and if it made any sense to use associations.
I have had to entire families in RM db – simply to make the correct Census reference and roles etc. I should mention that I also use SHARED census. and created about 40? roles and sentences for them
RM has “matured” over the years with adding new features.
I enter the Census as a fact for each individual.
When Shared was added, I saw no need to go back and add it or redo what I have. I continue to do 1 by 1 census but the Copy has made it easier (too bad it wasn’t there 20+ yrs ago).
Same for Associations, I’ve only used this for classmates, organizations and celebrities I’ve met. Not really vital to my genealogy.
I think I’m too lazy these days and accept that Ancestry uses Residence as opposed to Census for the fact type. I used to hate that but found it expedient to accept that on treeshare. On reflection I accept Residence for all sorts of other facts (voters registers, military records, 1939 Index, etc) so have now got used to it.
The detail on downloaded census records is good (see example below) and can be attached to the whole family at the same time (with a little help from clipx remembering my last 100 clipboard copies!).
And then on to the image 2 clicks later.
agreed – like people attended wedding etc. or were part of wedding party
That make sense in your cases and to be consistent – I find using shared census a great assest make things “cleaner” with the caveat it does not port to Ancestry or FamSearch which I can live with. Shared facts do work with most other things I use outside of RM so I am good there.
Ultimate Family Tree (discontinued about 30 years ago) had the Share feature but Family Origins didn’t and I used both at the time so I didn’t want to complicate things as I could gedcom between each and compare with printouts, sources, etc to know strengths/weakness in each.
If I was starting out genealogy I may rethink how I do it.
Kevin,
I just posted a similar thread because I wanted to be clear on how I was using it. While there is some cross-over, my main concern was dealing with that the role in the association comes across as the fact. While your post inspired me to write mine, I didn’t know how to get that across in a response.
As to not transferring to other programs, shared roles do come across in TNG but I have not checked with associations.
Charles
When I first started working in genealogy, I was thrilled to “collect” as many Resident Facts from Ancestry as possible. Great to know someone lived in the same place in 1870, 1871, 1872, 1873. Then I learned about census and really hate seeing resident. Since shared facts was already around when I started entering census information it became part of my cleanup. There have been some great information gleamed from seeing a person go from “Son” to “Head” and / or wife to head. Looking at one person, I can see part of their life story looking at census roles.
Well now you made me think to look at the setup for Association fact type and if they are used elsewhere on export or reports etc. – so associations are limited where/how they are used and basically only in RM if they do not flow to GEDCOM
unlike most other facts – there are no include etc variables
that said – based on the way things are presently – one would need to request a feature enhancement to change
Someone else asked a similar question. Here was my answer: You can share (click share fact) the census and add the person (click just type name) (The person doesn’t need to be in your tree). Or if the person IS in your tree, select them. Either way - Change the role (I have a boarder role) and add information to the note field. I do this because MANY times the border has turned out to be a family member (cousin, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, step-child etc).
You might want to change “border” to boarder 
Ooopsy. I have it correct in my database. 
Figured, but it could be a new way of saying that person is your “brick wall” LOL
