Timing is Everything

It helps to know what you are looking for before you travel all those miles to do on the ground fact gathering. Over the years, I’ve found setting up timelines shows the outline of the information I have about a family. Going through the outline date by date, generates the research questions I would like to find out about the family line. When the research is about one area where a family lived, I concentrate the dates of the timeline on the time they were in the area. 

Once the timelines are set up, I can trace what happened to the families I am interested in, but what was happening in the area that they were living? A timeline of significant events for the places in which they were living is also helpful. Were they affected by a new area of settlement opening up, building of canals or railways or by war? These dates can be meshed with the dates in the family timelines to see if any of the family’s movements were the result what was happening to society around them. 

The hardest part in all of this planning is to stay on task. It is very tempting to start diving into the research right away. But there is more preparation to be done. 

Timeline for Ontario*

1775-1783           American Revolutionary War

1791                     Quebec is divided into Upper and Lower Canada

1796                     York becomes the permanent capital of Upper Canada

1812-1814           War between Britain and the US

1837-1838           Rebellion in Upper and Lower Canada; American invasions

1841                     Act of Union: Upper and Lower Canada become Canada West and East with an elected

                              Assembly

1849                     The district system is abolished in favour of county administration

1850                     The Municipal Act: towns and townships become officially responsible for local business

1851                     Beginning of construction of Great Western Railway from Toronto to Buffalo, NY

1866                     Fenian raids

1867                     Confederation for 4 provinces with Canada West renamed Ontario

1885                     Completion of Canadian Pacific Railway

*adapted from Merriman, Brenda Dougall, Genealogy in Ontario: Searching the Records, revised third edition. The Ontario Genealogy Society, Toronto, 2002