Jose Mier. That is my name, and at this point I have to admit that I may have become just a little too interested in finding out who else has been given the same name. What started as a perfectly innocent bit of genealogical curiosity has gradually developed into an activity that consumes an astonishing amount of my free time. I live in Sun Valley, California, and there are plenty of things I could be doing with my evenings. I could be watching television. I could be taking a walk. I could be learning how to make some complicated dessert that requires twelve ingredients I have never heard of. Instead, I find myself hunched over my phone searching for another Jose Mier. And then another. And then another. At some point, I began wondering whether there are enough Jose Miers in the world to keep me occupied for the rest of my natural life. I have a suspicion the answer is yes.
It Started With a Name
Genealogy normally begins with a family member.
Someone wants to know who their grandparents were.
Someone wants to identify a great-grandfather.
Someone discovers an old photograph and wants to know who the mysterious man standing beside the automobile might be.
My situation is slightly different.
I already know who I am.
I’m Jose Mier.
The problem is that apparently a lot of other people are Jose Mier, too.
Once I realized that, I developed a question that seemed simple enough:
Who are all these other people?
This is where innocent curiosity becomes dangerous.
Not dangerous in the traditional sense.
Nobody is being chased by the police.
But dangerous to productivity.
The Smartphone Became My Research Library
The modern genealogist has an enormous advantage compared with researchers of previous generations.
We have computers.
We have digitized newspapers.
We have searchable databases.
We have online archives.
And, most importantly, we have smartphones.
My phone started out as a communication device.
Now it is essentially a portable genealogy laboratory.
I can be sitting in a restaurant in Sun Valley waiting for lunch and suddenly wonder whether a Jose Mier in another state appeared in a newspaper in 1937.
Five minutes later, I’m searching.
I can be watching television and wonder whether a particular Jose Mier ever lived in Texas.
Search.
I can be standing in line at the grocery store.
Search.
Eventually I expect my phone to start asking me why I’m looking up Jose Mier again.
Frankly, that’s a fair question.
The Curse of the Identical Name
People with unusual surnames have one advantage in genealogy.
If your name is extremely uncommon, finding records can be comparatively straightforward.
If your name is Jose Mier, however, things become considerably more interesting.
A search engine can give you results for multiple people.
A genealogy database can produce records belonging to entirely different families.
One Jose Mier might have been born in California.
Another might have lived in Texas.
Another could appear in records from Mexico.
Another might show up in a newspaper article halfway across the country.
And unless you carefully compare dates, locations and family relationships, it is remarkably easy to assume that two records belong to the same person.
That is a genealogical mistake I try very hard to avoid.
The Basic Rule: Don’t Assume
One of the most important principles in genealogy is also one of the easiest to forget.
Just because two people have the same name doesn’t mean they’re related.
They might not even be remotely related.
They might have been born thousands of miles apart.
They could have had completely different parents.
They could have lived in different generations.
They could have had entirely different occupations.
This is why serious genealogical research requires evidence.
FamilySearch’s research guidance recommends trying variations in names, dates and locations and examining original record images when possible.
That advice is particularly valuable when researching a common name.
My “Jose Mier” Research Method
I’ve developed my own informal method.
First, I search the exact name.
Then I add a location.
Then a date.
Then perhaps an occupation.
Then a spouse.
Then children.
Before long, the search looks less like:
“Jose Mier”
and more like:
“Jose Mier, born approximately 1910, possibly California, married to someone whose first name might have been Maria, occupation unknown, probably not the Jose Mier who appeared in Texas in 1946.”
This is when I realize I’ve gone too far.
And then I continue anyway.
The Occupational Clue
Occupation can be particularly useful when distinguishing people with identical names.
Suppose one Jose Mier was a carpenter.
Another was a railroad employee.
Another owned a grocery store.
Another was a teacher.
If records repeatedly associate one Jose Mier with the same occupation and community, that information helps create an identity profile.
It’s almost like detective work.
Except my crime scene is usually a census page.
And nobody is paying me.
Census Records: The Rabbit Hole
Census records are particularly dangerous for people like me.
You start with one name.
You find a household.
Suddenly you have a spouse.
Then children.
Then ages.
Then birthplaces.
Then occupations.
Then you start looking for the same family in the next census.
Before you know it, three hours have disappeared.
This has happened to me.
More than once.
I now consider a successful genealogy session to be one in which I lose only two hours.
Newspapers Make Things Worse
Historical newspapers can be even more addictive.
A census gives you facts.
A newspaper gives you stories.
You might find a Jose Mier attending a wedding.
Another appearing in a local business announcement.
Another involved in a community organization.
Another mentioned in a sports story.
Another celebrating a birthday.
Suddenly the name becomes attached to a real person.
That is one of the things I love about genealogy.
You’re not merely collecting names.
You’re reconstructing lives.
The Health Consequences
Now we arrive at the medical portion of my research report.
I have developed what I like to call “genealogical posture.”
This involves sitting in a chair with one shoulder slightly higher than the other while staring at a screen.
I also spend considerable time holding my phone.
My fingers repeatedly type:
J-O-S-E space M-I-E-R.
Eventually my phone may simply autocomplete the name before I finish.
I have occasionally joked that my research has given me carpal tunnel syndrome.
I should clarify that I’m using that as humorous exaggeration rather than making a medical diagnosis.
But my hands certainly know that Jose Mier is a popular search term in my household.
Eye Strain Is Another Possibility
Then there are my eyes.
Genealogy involves tiny letters.
Old documents.
Poor-quality scans.
Faded type.
Handwriting that appears to have been produced by someone writing during an earthquake.
I zoom in.
I zoom out.
I rotate the image.
I squint.
I zoom in again.
At this point my phone and I have developed a very close relationship.
Perhaps too close.
The Importance of Keeping Research Notes
One way to avoid genealogical chaos is to keep notes.
When I find a Jose Mier who appears interesting, I record the information.
Birthplace.
Approximate birth year.
Residence.
Spouse.
Parents, if known.
Children.
Occupation.
Sources.
This prevents me from repeatedly researching the same person.
It also helps distinguish one Jose Mier from another.
FamilySearch recommends maintaining research goals and using multiple search approaches rather than simply relying on a single name search.
That is particularly important when your research subject is practically your own name.
What If They’re Related?
Here’s where things get exciting.
Occasionally, you find a Jose Mier whose family history looks suspiciously compatible with your own.
Maybe the geographic location makes sense.
Maybe the dates line up.
Maybe there is a family connection.
That’s when you slow down.
You don’t announce that you’ve found a relative.
You investigate.
You look for documentation.
You compare records.
You work backward.
You work sideways.
You examine siblings.
You look at marriages.
You look at immigration records.
You look at the families surrounding the person.
Eventually, you may have enough evidence to make a reasonable conclusion.
Or you may discover that the apparent connection was nothing more than two people sharing a name.
Genealogy is full of both possibilities.
Traveling to Find Jose Mier
Eventually, online research can take you only so far.
Sometimes the next step is travel.
If records suggest that a particular branch of the Mier family lived in a specific region, visiting that location can provide context that a database cannot.
You might visit a cemetery.
You might see an old church.
You might locate a courthouse.
You might find a town mentioned repeatedly in family documents.
And suddenly geography becomes real.
This is one reason genealogical travel has become such an appealing part of family history.
You’re no longer simply reading about a place.
You’re standing there.
Mexico and Spanish-Language Records
For researchers investigating Hispanic family histories, Spanish-language records can be particularly important.
Church registers, civil registration, immigration documents and other records may provide clues about births, marriages and deaths.
The challenge is that names may appear differently across records.
Spelling can change.
Middle names can disappear.
Dates can vary.
Places may have historical names.
This is why genealogy requires flexibility.
The FamilySearch Research Wiki
One particularly useful resource for this kind of research is the FamilySearch Research Wiki.
It isn’t simply a database of names.
Instead, it provides research guidance organized by location and topic, including information about record types and strategies for researching different parts of the world.
For someone like me, that’s useful because the question isn’t always:
“Where is another Jose Mier?”
Sometimes the better question is:
“What records would exist for a Jose Mier who lived in this particular place during this particular period?”
That’s a much better research question.
My Dream Discovery
What would I really like to find?
A Jose Mier whose documented family tree connects directly to mine.
That would be fantastic.
I’d want to know where the family originated.
I’d want to know how the name moved geographically.
I’d want to know which members of the family came to the United States.
I’d want to know what they did for a living.
And I’d want to know whether any of them were also hopelessly curious about other Jose Miers.
That last part may be asking too much.
The Problem With the Internet
The internet has made genealogy easier.
It has also made genealogists dangerously confident.
Just because something appears in a search result doesn’t mean it’s correct.
A family tree posted online may contain mistakes.
A transcription may be wrong.
A date may have been entered incorrectly.
Two people may have been accidentally combined.
This is why I try to treat online information as clues rather than unquestionable facts.
The original record is usually the prize.
Why I Keep Searching
At this point, someone might reasonably ask:
“Jose, why do you keep doing this?”
The answer is simple.
It’s fascinating.
Every person represented by the name Jose Mier has a story.
Some may be related to me.
Most probably aren’t.
But each one represents another opportunity to learn how families moved, worked, married, raised children and built lives.
The name is the doorway.
The history is what lies behind it.
My Sun Valley Genealogy Headquarters
My research headquarters is not particularly glamorous.
There is no mahogany library.
No leather-bound genealogy books.
No giant map covering the wall.
There is me, a chair, a computer and a smartphone.
And occasionally a cup of coffee that becomes cold because I’ve forgotten about it while reading a 1910 newspaper.
That’s genealogy.
Final Thoughts
My search for other Jose Miers may never end.
There will always be another record.
Another newspaper.
Another census.
Another cemetery.
Another family tree.
Another mysterious Jose Mier who appears in a search result and makes me wonder, “Who was this guy?”
And then the research begins again.
The good news is that genealogy is a wonderful way to explore history.
The bad news is that it is extremely easy to lose track of time.
So if you see me in Sun Valley staring intently at my phone, don’t assume I’m checking social media.
There’s a good chance I’m researching another Jose Mier.
And if my thumb starts hurting, I’ll know exactly who to blame.