Genealogy Research and Tips
Avoiding the Pitfalls of Cinderella Genealogy
Just because the shoe fits doesn’t mean it belongs to Cinderella
Cinderella Genealogy is a term I came up with to describe a common mistake in genealogy research. If the shoe fits, the fairy tale Prince’s reasoning went, it must belong to Cinderella. Because no one else in the kingdom wore the same size shoe.
When a marriage document indicates someone was 21 when they got married, the researcher is likely to go back 21 years and look for a birth record. Finding one with the appropriate name does not mean you have ‘found Cinderella.’ The more common the name, the more likely there could be doppelgängers lurking.
My research on my Denyer line provides a good example.
Third Great Grandparents
Information on which I am relatively certain ends with my third-great grandparents, William Denyer, and Elizabeth Sliver. My third great-grandfather, William, was the immigrant, and he married Elizabeth Sliver in America. Most of my information about the early lives of the two of them comes from the work of Rev. Abraham J. Fretz, in A Brief History of John and Christian Fretz and a Complete Genealogical Family Register, 1890. The extent of the information provided about William was, “He…
