David Rencher, currently the Head Honcho of the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, was the speaker at the 2015 conference of the Washington State Genealogical Society held that year in Ellensburg. David introduced us to the concept of framing the problem.

David began his presentation by showing three slides of the Golden Gate Bridge and explained, “If you’re driving on the bridge, you see the bridge from that angle. If you’re on a boat on the bay, looking up, you’ll see the bridge from that angle. And if you’re landing in a airplane in San Francisco, looking down,you’ll see the bridge from that angle.”

His point with this illustration was that the way you’re currently viewing your genealogy problem is only one way to view it. Right now that’s all you can see. You must “frame your picture differently” and then from that new angle you might see things that you did not see before.

David went on for an hour explaining how to do that but his words of counsel all boil down to this: LOOK-LEARN-DO.

He ended with his quip: “I know where lots of my ancestors aren’t because I’ve looked there.”