Donald Lines Jacobus,FASG of New Haven, Connecticut, was widely regarded among genealogists as the dean of American genealogy. Jacobus struggled to teach and stress the importance of a scientific method of using primary sources in genealogical research. This replaced the idea of oral traditions and acceptance of time-honored pedigrees as facts due to their age. He provided the first basics of proper documentation and citation for all genealogists. While he endorsed the concept of eugenics he felt it was seriously lacking in the ability to properly trace bloodlines nor were those proponents of the field experienced enough in genealogical research or ability. He established the New Haven Genealogical Magazine in 1922, which became The American Genealogistten years later. He served as the periodical's editor and publisher for 43 years until 1966.
Family
Jacobus was the son of John Ira Jacobus and Ida Wilmot. "He never married and was devoted to his widowed mother throughout her life. His favorite hobby was charting the descendants of Spain’s King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, demonstrating that as serious as genealogy had become for him, it was also bound up in fun and fantasy."
Important works
Jacobus was a prolific writer. Besides his numerous magazine articles, he is perhaps best known for two publications:
Genealogy as Pastime and Profession, published in 1930.
In recognition of his contributions and his status of elevating genealogy to the social sciences, Jacobus was the first person inducted into the National Genealogy Hall of Fame. He was nominated for this honor by the American Society of Genealogists, the Genealogical Society of Utah, and the DuPage County Genealogical Society. The Donald Lines Jacobus Award was established in 1972 by the AmericanSociety of Genealogists to encourage sound scholarship in genealogical writing. Jacobus promoted a scientific method of ancestor research that replaced reliance on oral tradition and time-honored pedigrees with primary source documentation. It was an approach made possible because of enormous efforts to preserve and index early church records and grave stone inscriptions carried out by patriotic and heraldic societies, government agencies and religious groups during the very years that Jacobus was starting his work. Jacobus was one of the earliest Fellows of the American Society of Genealogists, an Honor Society of fifty members chosen on the basis of the significance of their contributions to genealogy. On his death, he was described by his colleague Milton Rubincam, as "the man who more than any other single individual elevated genealogy to the high degree of scholarship it now occupies." A list of eleven of his books can be found at: https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/590839.Donald_Lines_Jacobus
