©2009-2016 Becky Higgins

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Surnames

Randy Seavers of Genea-Musings has posted our weekly challenge game:
Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to:

1)  Go into your Genealogy Management Program (GMP; either software on your computer, or an online family tree) and figure out how to Count how many surnames you have in your family tree database.

2)  Tell us which GMP you're using and how you did this task.

3)  Tell us how many surnames, and if possible, which Surname has the most entries.  If this excites you, tell us which surnames are in the top 5!


I'm using Family Tree Maker 2011 and this is the first time I've look for this option in this version. It only took me a couple of minutes to figure out I needed to create a report. Go to Publish, choose the Person Reports, then create a Surname Report. In the report options choose All Indiviuals and Sort by Surname Count. Choose Create again and voila!


My report is 25 pages long but, many of the surnames are only recorded once. As my Irish relatives would say, "They're the blow-ins". Really they are just the distant collateral lines I haven't investigated yet.


I like this report because I gives more than just a count of a surnames use; it also breaks the usage down by Male, Female, Earliest, Most recent. I find that very interesting.


Since I always have a problem following directions:) here are my top 12 most used surnames:




Surname Report








Surname
Count
Male
Female
Earliest
Most recent
LEISURE
371
217
154
1719
2004
MILLER
193
106
87
1702
1979
STEWART
179
93
86
1720
1966
WALKER
158
91
67
1655
1923
KENNEDY
155
86
68
1750
1994
BARBER
150
82
68
1652
1896
BENEFIEL
111
53
58
1759
1916
BLUE
94
47
47
1735
1917
STEPHENS
83
45
38
1730
1904
HIGGINS
77
39
38
1808
1996
BUCHANAN
67
33
34
1651
1899



Looking at this, I'm beginning to see why writing up the Leisure family is taking me so long!

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