how do i locate my fathers family hstory for free?

Question

my name is michael todd irwin,fathers name is blair herbert irwin and his fathers name was herbert blair irwin,my fathers family is from the erie pa. area and i believe that is were he was born,can you help?

Answer 1

Sure found alot of Irwins in Pennsylvania...back to where they were born in Ireland. Never did find Herbert Blair or vice-versa, but anyway.... Blair H was living in Erie with Blair (1911) and Marian L (1912). That Blair seems to have been the son of Jacob and Elsie and had 5 siblings when they lived in Kane, Pa in 1920. Sound familiar? If interested, email me....



These are all excellent sites. As you explore them you will find many more free access sites.

http://www.rootsweb.com/
http://www.ellisisland.org/default.asp...
http://www.familysearch.org/
http://www.castlegarden.org/
http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/...
http://freebmd.rootsweb.com/
http://www.cyndislist.com/

Answer 2

If you're interested in Genealogy it's a fascinating hobby. I spent several years doing research on my own family when I was in high school. There are a lot of resources, but it ends up being a lot of "digging" and patience... getting excited everytime you have a possible "match".

A lot of it can be done for free - it just requires elbow grease.

If you're going for free, you'll have to start with a good word processing program or something you can use to track all your data in, because you'll find a lot. I prefer using an actual family history program, but that's an expense.

After that, you'll need to gather all the data you DO have. You'd be surprised when you rack your brain and talk to immediate family (or extended family), how much information you can gather. They key information you're looking for is first names, last names, maiden names (for the women), birth dates, death dates, marriage dates, spouses and locations. Even years or ranges of years will help narrow down your search.

After you've gathered a solid set of information from the easily accessed resources around you... you start your search.

There are three inexpensive avenues of research... the web, other extended family, and libraries. You need to know what you're looking for in order to be able to find other places to look. Eventually, you should be able to get birth certificate copies etc, but that's if you really want to trace your family. :)

I would do a web search to find "geneaolgy" sites. There were a lot of great websites out there when I was tracing my own family history, but I don't know what the best ones are now so "browse" a little bit. In particular, you're looking for sites where you search for family members in certain databases (often just knowing they're in a certain database will help you locate more information) and post questions asking others for information on certain people. Often the sites will have paid and non-paid options (the free options offering limited access - but definitely a help.)

The best database is the social security death records database. Its the easiest way to locate more recent relatives. From there, it always gets a little trickier... I was able to track mine back to the Netherlands (where my family is from) but eventually got stuck in the 16-1700's where things get a lot tougher. But the 1900's are much easier with the birth of tracking mechanisms etc.

Good luck!

Answer 3

My father use to stay in campbelltown nsw Australia this became while i became 3 im now a 32 twelve months previous guy an might prefer to discover my genuine father his call is Gregory John Richards who lived along with his mom and brother at campbelltown i became 3 as quickly as I final observed him I even have my delivery certificates wich has his call and what date they the place married it became the 14 /2 /1984 the comparable day i became born now how do i come across him

Answer 4

Mike sorry to say you can't, every ancestry site out there charge for one service to another. they pull you end by telling you this is for free then you find out that it is if you pay a certain price. Ancestry.com is one of the worse, along with Genealogy.com. If it hadn't been for a cousin of mine that found me through one of the web sites I wouldn't have had as much information as I do now.

Answer 5

You don't "locate" a family unless a family has already done the work for you. You search and trace your own tree. There are several good sites that will help you with it.

Answer 6

Try starting at a library. Perhaps there are records that you can access there. Best of luck to you in your search.

Answer 7

It always costs too much money to be worth it.

Answer 8

Inquire at your church.