Anything Goes Friday - Genealogy

I thought I’d blog about Genealogy today since I am the family historian and genealogy has been a big part of my life since I was seventeen.

My family search started out as a high School project and took on a life of its own from there. I can’t resist saying that I wish I knew then what I know now. When you’re seventeen you think the family who has been there your entire life always will be and even if you grasp the concept of death at seventeen you seldom actually get the “forever” thing. 

My father died when I was 26. That’s certainly old enough to understand death but do we ever really understand it until we have actually gone years without the loved one and still feel their absence. I’m 53 and the reality that he is not coming back still rears its ugly head from time to time.

I guess I’m saying that in this type of project you need to strike while the iron is hot…. talk to relatives while they are still around to talk to. Collect pictures and label them so future generations know who they are. Find out who are in the older pictures while there is someone still around who knows who they are.

I started out interviewing my parents and grandparents. I visited countless courthouses and cemeteries but in my family, the genealogical jackpot was my Aunt Katie and Aunt Gracie. Great-Aunts seem to always have a wealth of knowledge about the family. My Aunt Katie, in her eighties, remembered every tiny detail of everyone’s lives and all the stories that she told me, I told in my family tree books and my Aunt Gracie remembered everyone’s birthdates. I take after Aunt Gracie in that respect. I know everyone’s birthdays in my family including nieces, nephews, Aunts, Uncles and cousins.

I found later…..after computers came out that they too were a wonderful informational source.  I have fifteen generations back on my maternal grandmother’s side of the family which is really remarkable. I don’t have as far back on other branches of my family tree but it keeps me working on the search.

I also incorporated pictures into my books. It’s really great to put faces with the stories I’ve written. The toughest thing you might face once you get into genealogy isn’t finding the relatives as much as how to layout the information you have. I’ve had a few systems over the years and am in the process of changing again. Seems the more people you have the harder it is to organize the whole thing. So keep an eye on my blogs regularly and the next time we’ll talk more in depth about formatting the knowledge we have on paper.