👥 Managing Families Guide for LineagePress

The Families page (Location: WordPress Admin → LineagePress → Families) displays and manages all the married couples, partnerships, and family units stored in your genealogy database, offering an at-a-glance view of relationships, marriages, and children.

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What You’ll See

The main table lists each family unit with the following details:

• Husband/Wife Columns: The spouse’s full name (clickable), and their birth year (if available) for quick identification. “Unknown” appears if a spouse is missing.
• Marriage Column: The date and place of the marriage/partnership. Shows “—” if details are unavailable.
• Children Column: The number of children linked to that specific family unit, shown in a blue badge.

Finding and Organizing Families

Search and Sort

Function	Method	Description
Search	Type a surname (Husband or Wife) into the search box.	Finds families where either spouse has a matching surname.
Sort (Dropdown)	By Surname (Default)	Sorts alphabetically by husband’s surname, then by wife’s surname, then by marriage date.
Sort (Dropdown)	By Date	Sorts chronologically, showing the most recent marriages first.
Sort (Dropdown)	By Children	Sorts by the number of children, listing families with the most children first.

Viewing Details

Clicking on a person’s Full Name link will open their individual profile page on the WordPress frontend in a new browser tab. This lets you access their complete information and family tree without losing your place in the Families list.

Understanding Family Records

A family record represents a relationship structure: a couple/partnership and their children.

• Complete Families: Show both spouses, marriage details, and a children count.
• Incomplete Families: Common in genealogy, these may show “Unknown” for a missing spouse, or lack marriage details or children. They do not necessarily indicate an error.
• Complex Families: If a person was married multiple times, they will appear in multiple separate family records, one for each relationship.

Tips and Troubleshooting

• Load More: The page loads families in batches to maintain performance. Scroll to the bottom and click “Load More” to display the next set of results.
• Privacy Protection: If a family member is marked private in the system, their details may be hidden or limited, even in the admin table. As an administrator, you will still see the full, unhidden information.
• Children Count: The number shown is only for children linked to that specific family record. Children from previous or subsequent marriages appear in those separate family records.
• Finding Recent Marriages: Use the “By Date” sort option to quickly check modern family data.