Research during COVID

In May 2019, I started down the road of looking into five Marines who served in two of Richard E Byrd's Antarctic expeditions (1928-1930 and 1933-1935).  In the summer of that year, I ceased work on it for reasons unimportant to this discussion. 

But earlier this year, I decided those reasons that stopped me were no longer valid and I picked up where I left off and it has exploded, just in time for COVID-19 to really kick us all in the "jimmies" and bring things to a halt--or so I thought.  Research in COVID-times... 

Since I've had plenty of time on my hands in my off-hours, I've been doing research--99.5% of the research was done online or remotely via email.  Ancestry.com, Fold3.com, Proquest, random blogs and websites, newspapers.com, and online memorials have all been a treasure trove of information on individual Marines.  Online book sellers have made a killing off me these past 6 months, but in the end I will have a nice collection to donate to a repository one day.  Some of the books are signed first editions, others are signed by actual participants.

Ohio State's Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center Archival Program is my "go-to" online resource.  Every time a new name was found, I cross checked it against their online database.  While they don't have everything online, there is plenty there to keep me coming back for more, and to get me excited to visit when life comes back to some semblance of normalcy.  

The major hold up on research is the closure of the National Archives (College Park and St Louis) and the less than stellar search engine of digitized materials--however, I will give them kudos for getting more out there.  They simply have so much that they won't be getting to the goodies I want any time soon. 

Marines at South Pole (Pitman Papers USMC HD)

A note on a couple useful online tools, if you'll indulge me.  First is Google.  Google's drive function, online office products and email has allowed me to put these materials in a safe place and to use an email that isn't tied to my personal stuff.  Oh I know there are plenty of similar tools out there, but I already knew how to use google and all it's gadgets and it has been a Godsend.  I have it already on my phone, and just put the app on my tablet, so now I don't have to drag my laptop everywhere.

Rocketbook is the next--anyone who is like me and loves to keep notes in notebooks, knows that they stack up after a while and you run the risk of losing them and unless you want to carry them everywhere (all of them) you're kind of stuck when you travel.  Rocketbook is basically a dry-erase notebook (with multiple pages) you write in, then using their app, digitize your notes.  I save mine back to the aforementioned Google drive and boom, wipe the book and move on.

Pocket is a feature that I didn't realize was in my Firefox browser--but it is! One click and I've saved a website to Pocket.  Why not just bookmark it? Well, again, if I don't have my laptop with me, I can just pull up the app on what ever device I'm using and there are all my bookmarks.  And frankly, not digging through bookmarks (open your app and search) is really nice.

Yes, there are plenty of other tools out there to keep you organized, but these are a few that I'm using that are making my life a little bit better and helping me keep my research organized.  

I'm game to hear what others have been able to do while in COVID-times--what tools are you using? What resources have you found online (surprisingly or not so surprisingly) and what are some of the difficulties you've overcome? Tell me! I want to hear!

The result of my research so far? No longer is it just five Marines and Byrd in two Antarctic expeditions, today it is over 120 Marines (another found just today) over in 10 expeditions to both poles!  There are some interesting finds in amongst this story of Marines involved in polar exploration, but guess you'll have to wait for me to write the bloody book!