No Genealogist Should Miss the WikiTree Challenge - Thu, 4 Mar 2021

@WikiTree #WikiTreeChallenge

Wikitree with over 25 million profiles, is the 3rd largest collaborative family tree, after FamilySearch Family Tree and Geni. As the name suggests, the site is designed like a wiki, giving all users ability to contribute and change (preferably with sources) and collaborate about the contents of any page.

The goals of the site is to strive for accuracy through collaboration.

But I’m not here to tell you about the site. You can go to WikiTree and find out that for yourself.

What I wanted to tell you about is one absolutely amazing activity that the WikiTreers thought up and are taking on.in 2021, their Year of Accuracy. This don’t-miss event is their WikiTree Challenge.

Each week, they focus on one guest star who is very well known in the genealogical world. Previous to appearing, this special guest has his/her ancestors entered onto WikiTree. The guest appears Wednesday evening in a live kick-off event where Sarah Callis acts as host and is joined by Eowyn Langholf, Mindy Silva and the team captain for the week who do the work to coordinate the event. They review the guest’s family tree together asking the guest about his/her challenges and brick walls.

Then dozens of volunteer WikiTreers work all week on the guest’s tree. They collaborate with each other to find new sources, make the tree more accurate and even break down a few brick walls finding new ancestors and relatives that the guest didn’t know about.

The next Wednesday, Sarah and gang are back with the guest to review what was done, what information was uncovered and to get the guest’s reactions to all this new research.

It is impressive how much the diligent WikiTeam uncovers. They summarize each week with a scoresheet that lists all the researchers involved and how much each has added to the guest’s tree. That’s the “Challenge” part.

This event will be taking place all year, with a new guest almost every week.

WikiTree Challenge deserves your attention and publicity!

Think of it. Where else can you find your genealogy super-stars talking about their own genealogy? Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. is noted for presenting the genealogies of his special guests on Finding Your Roots on PBS. It was so much fun to hear Dr. Gates talk about his own ancestry, and then a week later in the big reveal, was provided with information about his own family that was new to him. At one point he had to call his wife over to show her what was discovered.

All the shows are taped. You can go back and watch them if you missed them. But it is so much more fun to go there while its live and join the chat.

Here’s a list of the challenges they’ve had already, and a link to the videos so you can watch:

Week 1: January 6
      - AJ Jacobs (Journalist & everyone’s cousin): Kickoff, January 6

Week 2: January 13
      - AJ Jacobs (Journalist & everyone’s cousin): Reveal
      - CeCe Moore (The Genetic Detective): Kickoff

Week 3: January 20
      - CeCe Moore (The Genetic Detective): Reveal
      - Jonny Perl (DNA Painter): Kickoff

Week 4: January 27
      - Jonny Perl (DNA Painter): Reveal
      - Jen Baldwin (Ancestral Journeys): Kickoff 

Week 6: February 3
      - Jen Baldwin (Ancestral Journeys): Reveal
      - Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (Finding Your Roots): Kickoff

Week 7: February 10
      - Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (Finding Your Roots): Reveal
      - Judy Russell (The Legal Genealogist): Kickoff

Week 8: February 17
      - Judy Russell (The Legal Genealogist): Reveal
      - a break for all the WikiTreers

Week 9: February 24
      - Thomas MacEntee (High-Definition Genealogy): Kickoff

Week 10: March 3
      - Thomas MacEntee (High-Definition Genealogy): Reveal
      - Katherine Willson (Social Media Genealogy): Kickoff

Katherine will have her reveal next week on March 10. Look who is also scheduled for March:

- Pat Richley-Erickson (Dear Myrtle)
- Rob Warthen (DNAGedcom)
- Dallan Quass (RootsFinder)
- Ellen Thompson Jennings (Family History Hound)

And following that, April has been announced:

- Tim Janzen (Genetic Genealogy expert)
- Cheri Hudson Passey (Carolina Girl Genealogy)
- Connie Knox (GenealogyTV.org)

Do make sure you check out this WikiTree LiveCast recorded Feb 27 as a RootsTech Special, recapping the first 7 weeks of the Challenge.

The Challenge is going to be continuing all 2021, so expect many more great guest stars to be revealed.

In addition to the Wednesday LiveCasts, they also have a weekly recap every Saturday, discussing how research is progressing for the guest of the week. For all of their past LiveCasts, see the WikiTree Video list on YouTube.

For information on upcoming LiveCasts, follow @WikiTreers on Twitter or go to the WikiTree page on Facebook.

If you want the challenge of working with others to break through the brick walls of your genealogy heroes, then join WikiTree (it’s free) and sign up for some future challenges.

Here’s a great presentation prepared for WikiTreers who want to take on the WikiTree challenge and work to improve the profiles of the guest stars.

This is fantastic stuff. It’s so much fun to join in the live chat every Wednesday night. Hope to see you there.