Archive for the ‘genealogy’ Category

Useful Genealogy Research Tips

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

Making a family tree can be a fun and fulfilling hobby. But it also comes with many challenges. As you delve deeper into your family history, you might find your tree growing by hundreds of names in a very short period of time. It’s incredibly easy to get lost in all the information.

So here are some simple tips you can utilize to make your genealogy research easier!

1. Break your family tree into manageable sections rather than trying to handle the entire thing all at once. It may be a good idea to concentrate on one grandparent’s lineage at a time. This way the work will be less overwhelming and easier to digest.

2. Pay attention to detail. Work slow and steady. Always remember to check and double-check your facts to ensure accuracy. You should always review more than one document per person so that the facts, such as birth dates and locations, line up.

3. Take advantage of your computer and the internet when compiling your family tree. Having it all laid out digitally will make it easier to manage all of the names and dates. There are dozens of websites on the internet made specifically to help you with your genealogy research, so use them! Some require membership fees but there are still plenty of useful sites that can help you free of charge, like BirthDetails.com.

4. Connect with other genealogists! You can do this through online forums or you can stick to real life by joining clubs or societies in your community. Other genealogists may have a lot of advice and wisdom to impart. You may even find that your family tree crosses into someone else’s. A distant relative of yours may also be making a family tree. The two of you can combine your research and make the project that much fuller and richer.

5. Finally, if you get caught up on all the names and dates and find yourself frustrated and “stuck”, take a break and come back to it later. Genealogy should be a fun and exciting hobby, not a pain in the butt. By taking breaks and allowing yourself some time away from the project, you can return with a fresh start and a fresh mind.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Family Tree, Finding Family Members, Genealogy Research, genealogy | 1 Comment »

Step By Step Genealogy: Make Your Family Tree!

Monday, April 5th, 2010

If you’ve spent any time at all researching your family tree, likely you’ve stumbled upon the two major genealogy research hubs on the internet, Ancestry and MyHeritage.

However, even though the websites carry some value, without a thorough understanding of how to conduct genealogy research, it’s likely you’ll reach a dead end at some point or another. Both of those services are expensive to use and provide shaky results at best! As a result, the beginner genealogist is often left in the dust.

What you need is an easy to understand, step-by-step guide teaching you how to conduct genealogy research from A to Z.

Luckily, I found this absolutely fantastic guide: How To Make A Family Tree.

This e-book contains dozens of pages of valuable information that can be found nowhere else on the internet. To even come close to the amount of knowledge it reveals, you would have to spend hours upon hours of endless research. And who has time for that?

Here are a few of the things How To Make A Family Tree will teach you:

  • How to find ancestors from overseas

  • How to know if you’ve found the right person

  • How to build a family tree with lightening speed – even if it’s your first time

  • How to find rare surname databases

  • Free alternatives to the “big-name”, expensive search databases

As a special bonus, you’ll also receive a huge set of family tree templates.

This is by far the best way for a beginner to get started. If you’re frustrated with your genealogy research, seem to be going nowhere, or if you don’t even know where to start, How To Make A Family Tree will truly solve all of your problems and get you on the fast track to completing your family tree sooner than you ever thought possible.

So are you going to keep twiddling your thumbs, hoping that one day you’ll find the time and resources to finish your research, or are you going to check this book out and get started TODAY?

Check out the book Now!

Tags: , ,
Posted in Family Tree, Genealogy Research, genealogy | 3 Comments »

6 Essential Genealogy Research Tips

Tuesday, March 30th, 2010

For beginners of genealogy research, the task at hand can seem overwhelming! Compiling accurate information about your ancestors can be a long and arduous process. But don’t get discouraged. Here are some great tips that you can utilize immediately. Hopefully it’ll make your genealogy research easier and as a result, more fun! After all, making your family tree is supposed to be an enjoyable hobby — not a headache.

1. Learn to be organized! Over the course of your genealogy research, you will likely find yourself buried in paperwork and documents. If everything is a cluttered mess around you, your mind will become cluttered as well, and it’ll be easier to get frustrated and tempted to throw in the towel. Invest in some filing cabinets and try to store many things online. Scan photographs and documents and put them in the appropriate folder on your computer.

2. Find out if any of your relatives have previously conducted genealogy research. Why start from scratch if someone has already done much of the grunt work for you? You can take their information and add/edit it as needed, or perhaps the two of you can work together on the project.

3.  If you’re having trouble pinpointing exact birth and death dates of your relatives, try going to the cemetery where they were buried and searching there. Most of the time, the dates will be printed on their tombstones. This seems like an obvious solution but many people overlook it.

4. Looking for distant relatives still alive in your family today? You may need to speak with a second or third cousin to get the information you need to fill in the gaps. One of the best places for tracking people down is Facebook. If you have a full name and location, Facebook can act as a personalized, virtual White Pages. Many distant relatives have been connected or reconnected through Facebook and other social networking sites.

5. Despite all the advances made in genealogy research in recent years thanks to the internet, don’t underestimate the power of your local library. Most likely it will contain valuable documents that are not accessible online. One important resource your library may offer is access to local newspapers. You can research these newspapers to find out important information such as birth and marriage announcements and obituaries.

6.  When speaking with relatives over the phone or in person, try to record everything they tell you. The best thing to use is a tape recorder, but if that isn’t possible, you could simply use a pen & paper to transcribe important facts. You’ll want to do this to ensure that you record and remember everything they speak about. Don’t assume that you’ll remember everything — chances are you’ll forget. Another important tip: make sure to disclose to them the fact that they are being recorded.

So there you go! If you follow all of these tips, you’ll find that your genealogy research is going quite well. Chances are you’ll come up against some roadblocks, but stay persistent and don’t give up!

Tags: , ,
Posted in Family Tree, Finding Birth Records, Genealogy Research, genealogy | 3 Comments »

How To: Quick And Easy Genealogy Research

Thursday, March 18th, 2010

When most people think of genealogy research, the phrase “quick and easy” doesn’t normally pop up in their minds. Making a family tree is usually thought of as a long, drawn-out process that involves many different areas of research. One must conduct interviews, sort through many photographs and documents, search through public records archives, and more. Fortunately, genealogy research has become much easier in recent years thanks to the internet!

By doing a simple search online, you can now find dozens, perhaps even hundreds of websites whose sole purpose is to help you build your family tree! You now have many tools and resources at your disposal, all from the comfort of your home.  Some of these tools may include printable family tree charts to help you better visualize your ancestry, archives of public records from long ago, and hard-to-find documents like ship logs and immigration records.

All of these resources will undoubtedly help you in your research. But an often-overlooked treasure chest are simple birth records search engines, such as the one found on BirthDetails.com. With only a few clicks of the mouse, you can find the exact birth records you need to compile a family tree with accurate facts and details. At a certain point in your research, you will find it absolutely necessary to rely on birth records searches to get the information you need. And doing it “the old way” could mean that your research will take ages, and will likely cost a pretty penny.

Genealogy-based websites are fantastic resources, but they often come with membership fees. If you want to find birth records for free, you’re already at the right place! Check out BirthDetails.com’s birth records search engine to get a jump start on your research today!

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in About Birth Records, Finding Birth Records, Genealogy Research, birth records, genealogy | 1 Comment »

Start Your Family Tree

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

Starting a family tree can seem like an overwhelming process at first glance. Indeed, it requires a lot of research and a lot of hard work and patience. But fortunately, in our modern age, genealogy research has become much easier! We now have tons of useful resources at our disposal to make the task relatively pain-free. You’ll find that conducting genealogy research can be a fun and exciting project.

Here are a few steps you can take to get started on the right foot when it comes to your family tree.

  1. Use BirthDetail.com’s printable family tree. This is a pre-made family tree worksheet that you can use. Place the names of your relatives upon the branches of the tree and you will get a visual representation of your entire family. Using one of these worksheets is better than making lists of names, because this way you get to look at a graph that puts things in perspective for you.
  2. Schedule interviews with some of your family members, particularly grandparents and great grandparents if possible. They will be the ones with the information dating the farthest back.
  3. These older relatives will likely have collections of photographs, newspaper clippings, and other documents that you can use to gain even more information and insight into your family heritage.
  4. Use BirthDetails.com’s Genealogy Database to search for public records belonging to your ancestors. You can look up birth records, marriage records, death records, property records, and more! Interviewing your family members will give you a good headstart, but eventually you will need to access public records in order to confirm names, dates, and facts. Birthdetails.com offers a great resource that you will likely use over and over again in your genealogy research. It is much easier and faster than attempting to contact Vital Records.

Follow these steps and you will be well on your way to creating an accurate, extensive family tree. A family tree is a great asset to have. When you finish, you should consider sharing it with the rest of your family so everyone can enjoy reading and learning about their heritage.

Tags: , ,
Posted in genealogy | No Comments »

Making A Family Tree: Genealogy 101

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

Making a family tree and conducting genealogy research in general can be a fun and interesting project, but it can also be terribly painstaking if you do not know how to do it properly. Fortunately, there are many resources on the internet that you can utilize to make your genealogy research go as smoothly as possible. These resources simplify the process tenfold! One such resource is public records databases. Without access to public records, making a family tree becomes a difficult, if not impossible process.

Most people start out their genealogy research by making a list of all known living and deceased relatives. Afterwards, they conduct interviews with some of the older relatives to learn more about their lives and their childhoods, as well as the full names of their parents and grandparents, as well as any other useful information they may be able to disclose. Most older people also keep old documents, photographs, and newspaper clippings, which can prove invaluable. Taking these steps can give you a great head start and you may be able to compile pages upon pages of facts, lists, and details just from talking to your family members for a few hours and looking through some old boxes.

However, you can only go so far with these methods. At a certain point, you’ll reach the end of your word-of-mouth research because people simply won’t be able to remember any further back. This is when accessing public records comes into play. You can do it by contacting Vital Records if you want, but doing so can be long and painstaking. It can take weeks before they send you the public records you need. It can also be a costly procedure.

But don’t sweat it. Making your family tree doesn’t have to be long, frustrating, or expensive. By far the easiest way to look up public records is to do it online. You can access many basic facts and documents about people for free. Other information might cost you a few dollars here and there, but nothing major. With a few clicks of the mouse, you can conduct a large part of your genealogy research. Looking up birth records is one of the most important tasks you’ll face, but it will also be necessary to look up marriage/divorce records and death records. Other public records such as property records, military records, and church records may come in handy and allow you to gain insight about your ancestor’s lives.

Using these public records, you will learn concrete facts about your family’s history. As valuable as the interviews with your grandparents and other relatives may be, you have to acknowledge that not everything they say may be totally accurate. Public records can back up their statements with concrete facts. It’s always a good idea to confirm the information given to you by your relatives if you want your genealogy project to remain as accurate and truthful as possible.

These are only a few basic tips. We’ve barely dipped our toes into the water! But hopefully this will help you get started making a family tree.

Tags: , ,
Posted in genealogy | 2 Comments »

Trace Your Genealogy with Free Online Databases

Saturday, January 2nd, 2010

There is a lot of work put into tracing someone’s genealogy. Many times documents are really difficult to locate especially if families have broken up along the way. History hasn’t always been written down either. Even one hundred years ago, some family lines were lost amongst tragedies and even simply due to undocumented name changes.
(more…)

Tags: ,
Posted in genealogy | 1 Comment »