Only for those who are research gifted?

Question

I need to know the orgins of my families one is BURKE and so far cannot be traced beyond a couple of generations ago. The other is DESHAIES and is traced to pierre in qubec in the 1600 's and came from France I believe but there is no other tracings to back to the 1500's so if you are man or woman enough to rise up to the challenge engage and answer only if you have ancestrial relevant information.

Answer 1

I don't know where you live, if it is near the area where you have traced your ancestry back to so far, but if you are able go to the local universities of the area. Most universities have a "special/rare collections" area in their libraries(the public libraries are worth checking out also). Some of these collections will have a genealogy area, and they will even house old diaries (rare items of the sort that are not published but simply preserved). But it is very time consuming to go through these collections-the needle in the haystack. One problem is that these collections are rare so most libraries will not allow you to check them out or even to photocopy the information.
I am a hty major and have spent many hours in universities searching through rare collections for my needle in the haystack.