The Genealogist

Why Bother With Genealogy?

Ever wonder why the folks on your mom’s side of the family have prominent ears? Stymied by your left-handed tendencies when everyone in your immediate family uses the right?

To find the answers to questions such as these and many more, genealogy may be the answer. It’s more than recording the dates of births, marriages and deaths. Or at least it can be.

While dates are an important part of creating a family history, so too are interesting facts and figures about family members. Dates are just dates, but a true historian wants to dig much deeper than that.

As you research your family’s past to create your own history, pay attention to the “little nuggets” you can find out about different family members either in oral histories provided by living relatives or in documents from the past.

Items to pay close attention to if the desire is to make your ancestors more three dimensional are such things as diaries, letters, journals, notes in family bibles and more. These handwritten documents may or may not be easy to come by, but if you can even glean a page or two, you’re likely to learn a lot about your relatives than you ever expected.

Recording the little things about the people in your past can also give you a little information about yourself as well. This is what makes the pursuit so much fun.

You might just find out that your great-great grandfather was the lefty and that your grandmother’s family is responsible for the giant ears. In the course of your research you might also learn that artistic tendencies run deep on your dad’s side of the family while more scholarly pursuits are the mainstay of your mom’s ancestors. Each piece of information you find is a personal treasure to hold on tightly to for yourself and the family members that are yet to be.

Recording family history can be a pursuit that’s very involved or just a minor pastime. However much effort you put into it, you won’t be sorry you started. As you uncover the past, you’re likely to be able to make more sense of the present as well.

Tracking Down The Past Begins In The Present

You’ve heard for years that your great-great grandfather was a famous bullfighter. Perhaps it was stories about your great uncle and his sailing career that were passed down as family lore.

Now as an adult, you’d like to learn more. Were these stories true, or just legend? Where do you start?

Tracking down ties to the past begins first with you.

Making the decision to clearly delineate a family tree, or pedigree, is a big one. Make no mistake, it can be a lot of work. But it also can be a very rewarding, entertaining labor of love.

The best place to start in tracking down such unusual references is with the present generation. Create as much of your family tree as you can by speaking with living relatives and try to find documents to back up the research as you can.

Once you’ve landed in an area you cannot confirm, it’s time to hit the books, so to say. Start with your last known relative and his or her place of birth. See if you can find birth, census or other vital records. Within these you might find the next clue on your hunt – a name, a place or a date that might lead you to your next ancestor going back in the line.

Once you have names and dates, it’s a little easier to begin to confirm or deny that family lore. With the names, dates and places, check out old newspapers for your ancestor’s name and even check the Internet.

If the stories surround professional prowess or even some form of entertainment talent, there may even be professional groups or organizations you can check with. In their archives you might find documentation to confirm the stories you’ve heard all your life.

Creating a family history and especially tracking down a family legend to prove or deny its truth is a real detective job. Don’t pass up on the clues that lie in front of you and certainly don’t forget to start in the present.

The best way to map out your family’s past is to start in the present and work your way back, picking up clues and bits of information along the way.

Jumping Into Genealogy

It doesn’t take a degree in archival history to get into genealogy. Anyone with a penchant to record their family’s story and learn more about their own roots can take part in the pursuit.

To get started all a person needs is a basic idea of family history and a nose for sleuthing.

One of the best ways to begin is to start constructing a family tree. Start with your parents or your spouses’ and fill in the blanks, working backward. What you’re looking for in a basic tree is names and places and dates of births, marriages and so on. Move up from your parents to theirs and go as far back as you can without major research.

The simplest way to accomplish this is to ask a family member to help you fill in the blanks. If none are available with a recollection of the past, check into old family documents such as Bibles, photo albums and so on. Generally there’s at least one person in a family that enjoys hanging onto these things, so look them up!

Once you have a basic tree with a few branches and you can’t go any further, it’s time to start looking at archival documents. This might seem a little intimidating, but you can find a lot of help at local libraries and on the Internet.

Search for birth and death records, immigration records and so on from where your ancestors are from.
Don’t get discouraged if you only can get your hands on documents that only go back a few generations. That, for many, is more than a great start, it’s a solid family tree.

With the branches spread out as far as you can get them to go, now’s the time to fill in a little more information. Find out what you can about each of your ancestors, relying first on living relatives’ memories. Record their likes, dislikes, professions, hobbies, talents and so on. Any detail can be more than fitting.

Whether you can only go back 100 years or your story stretches back 200, what you start when you create a genealogy is picture of your own past. It’s a fun and rewarding hobby that will give you a glimpse into the history of you.