Web Merge is one of my favorite features of Family Tree Maker. It offers convenience, efficiency, and accuracy, all of which make my genealogy research stronger. However, there are a few ways I misused this feature when I was first getting started. I would love to save you the time and heartache of following my footsteps! Here are some classic mistakes people make when using this feature…
1. Merging Two Different People
Sometimes in the course of evaluating an Ancestry record, you may click on a different family member than you originally searched for, perhaps to confirm some family details. It is important to also select that new family member in your FTM tree (using the shortcut tree at the top of the screen). If you forget, you’ll end up with the record attached to the wrong person in your tree. Always check the bottom panels of the Web workspace before clicking Merge!
2. Discarding Alternate Facts
If a particular fact in the new record is identical to your existing fact, you can safely select Discard in the Web Merge Wizard dropdown (and check the box to keep the sources). But if the new fact should be kept in addition to existing facts, make sure to select Alternate from the dropdown. You can set your general preferences for this in the Options window, under the Tools menu. But keep an eye out even then! Sometimes FTM still tries to discard my alternate facts.
3. Adding New Children to the Wrong Parents
When adding new children via Web Merge, it is important to select the correct family, especially if there are multiple spouses involved. The newly added child can be assigned to an existing couple or to an unknown second parent. FTM helpfully displays siblings split up under the different parents, so you can confirm your choice.
4. Adding Family Records under a Child
When merging a record that features an entire family, such as a census record, it is best practice to merge it starting with one of the parents. If you attempt to merge it primarily to a child, the rest of the siblings can be missed, as seen below when trying to merge a census record under the child Willie.
In this situation, I will cancel the merge and go back to FTM to select the patriarch Dominic instead by clicking his name in the Ancestry record (making sure to also select him in my tree so I do not make mistake #1 above). This time when I start a merge, the entire family is included.
Leaving Women Under Their Married Name
When adding a new person to your tree via Web Merge, they will be assigned whatever name has been used in the record. If the record features their married name, such as the FindAGrave.com index, that will be the name in your tree.
Since general practice in genealogy favors using people’s birth (or maiden) names, I always take a minute to create a new name fact for the woman and set the married name as an alternate. If I know her father, I will use his surname, otherwise I will use “_____”.
Well, what did I miss? Have you made some rookie mistakes when using Web Merge? Let me know in the comments!
Learn More
Did you find this post helpful? You can learn more about Web Merge in my latest book, Building a Legacy: A Guide to Combining Ancestry.com and Family Tree Maker.