family trees?

Question

Im looking to start a family tree. I've never done it before butreally want to start now. Part of my families origins are in Mexico and maybe some ancestors in Spain. Any ways (books, websites, places, etc.) that i can trace my families roots far far back. Please help and suggesstions are welcome..really want to get this started. Thankyou!

Answer 1

Traditional genealogy sites won't be helpful to you in either Mexico or Spain. Both did not begin civil registration of births, marriages or deaths until the 1870s. Almost none of those records are on the internet. To find them you'll have to contact the town hall or district archives for copies.

From that point back the only records you will find are in the hands of the Roman Catholic Church and they are NOT happy to post them on the internet. To get the records you need to contact the first parish you find a link to and get all of the sacramental register information on person after person. Be particularly careful to ask for the "home parish" of any person who was not baptized in that parish but later received sacraments there. In Catholicism the parish where a person is baptized is responsible for keeping track of the person until death. All sacraments received by a person, regardless of parish, are ultimately kept by the parish where that person was baptized. So many parishes may have touched that person sacramentally, and all will have a copy of what sacrament was received in that parish, but they will also note the baptismal parish and will notify the priest of that parish before giving a sacrament...because they have to verify that the individual is a Catholic in good standing with the Church (ie not ex-communicated).

There was a census carried out in 1921 but I have never seen the results of that census released. You can check with the LDS to see if they have copies of the census, otherwise you'd have to check with the archives for the Mexican state where your ancestors lived.

I hope it helps. Very Catholic countries that were under Spanish and/or French common law as late into the 1800s as Mexico was are really best researched from religious sources or you'll beat your head against a brick wall.

BTW, the common protocol is that when the parish does respond to your query you request a mass in memory of your ancestors at some point in the next year and send an honorarium for the mass (usually $10 in the US) and you should send them a pre-addressed large manila envelope and enclose more than enough postage for whatever records they can copy for you or any sacramental certificates that they type up for you.

Answer 2

Start with a short online course on how to do the research. There's a good one at:

http://www.rootsweb.com

Next, prepare by getting a loose leaf notebook. The course will tell you how to organize it. Basically, you keep your information about each generation there. You can download free forms at rootsweb, too.

Find out all you can from family members who are still alive. Get locations, dates, and maiden names. All are important.

At rootsweb, you can find the dates for deceased family members at the Social Security Death Index (for US citizens)

At rootsweb, you can go to World Connect , a collection of family trees, to see if anyone has information on your family already posted.

At rootsweb, you can go to US Gen Web and World Gen Web to access places where your ancestors have lived. You can find out what records are available and post queries for other researchers to read.

http://www.rootsweb.com is a great place to start your research.

Answer 3

If you wanta cool start, try collecting all the information about your family, then all that your grandparents know.
You need Whole names, birthdates, birth places, maiden names, parents names, siblings and all the birthdates and deathdates. Then go to each grandparent and get all this information from them. Also, get some occupation information and where they lived. Afterwards, try some of the family tree creater sites. Also get all the free documents that are listed on these sites as blank information pages.
My family tree is about 100 pounds so far and I have been working on it about 2 years.

Answer 4

there are about a thousand books on the subject


the first thing you want to do is interview every family member you can. videotaping it is even better.

then start making a chart. you can print off something, or use software

check familysearch.org also.

!buena suerta!

Answer 5

Here are a few links that may help you in your search.

http://genforum.genealogy.com
http://boards.rootsweb.com/

These are the messageboards at both GenForum and Rootsweb. You can look at the message boards either by surname, county, state, country and there is even some little specialty boards like ones for wars and cemeteries, etc. You may or may not find your relatives on these boards and even if you don't it would be wise to post a query and see who answers. I have found these to be very useful boards for finding your genealogy. If someone responds to your query, the board will send you an E-mail to let you know that someone has responded.

I must say, however, that a good genealogy query, doesn't just say. " I need information on John Smith" Try to provide as many dates, places, and details as possible. One little thing can make the difference as to the answer you get.

a good query has

1) the persons name
2) all of the biographical information you know to date and
3) asks a specific question

The reason a query should be so specific is because people won't waste your time and theirs telling you what you already know. I have done lookups for people already and reported my findings only to be told, "Well, I knew that!" It would have been helpful if they would have told me that they knew that from the beginning. I probably would have checked a different set of sources to further the search. Also, by providing ALL of your known information (for example, the childrens names) it gives people alternate people to research to help arrive at your answer.



http://lists.rootsweb.com/

This is the link to the mailing lists at Rootsweb. Basically a mailing list is like a study group. All of its members are interested in a particular surname or locality in one way or another. Everytime someone posts, you receive an E-mail. You can always unsubscribe at anytime. If you aren't interested in joining the list, there is a searchable archive of all the postings. Some of these mailing lists at Rootsweb go back 10 years. Simply click the "search the archives" link and then enter your search terms.

http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/

This is the link to the world connect family trees at Rootsweb. These are user contributed family trees. These may or may not be related to your family, but it is a starting point. If you find one with members of your family, I always recommend double checking it, or getting in touch with the contributer whose name and E-mail address should appear with the tree.

http://www.gencircles.com/

This is a link to the trees on the gencircles website. Again, I recommend double checking any information you may find on your particular family.

http://www.familysearch.org/eng/search/f...

Finally, here is the site for the church of the Latter Day Saints website. Simply put in your search terms and press search. I'm sure you can figure it out from there.

If you are interested in doing your genealogy, the best way to get started is to start with yourself. Write down everything you know about your parents, then keep going back until you run stuck. Most people can get back to their grandparents and maybe a set of great grandparents. At this point there are so many ways to get back further in your tree. Much of it depends on the records available. For instance, it you live in the United States, public records are only going to take you back so far. Many localities weren't required to keep records until the late 1800's or even early 1900's, and many courthouses were burned in the Civil War destroying many of the existing records that were already in place. In Europe and many other countries, records go back a lot further. Other avenues of getting information are studying old land records, wills, cemeteries, city directories, local histories and military records. Another gold mine of information is if your parents kept old letters of the family. It wasn't uncommon in the early twentieth century for women to have post card books. Some old post cards have some interesting information as well. If you are young, you may have the honor of being able to interview your grandparents for information. If you do this, I would recommend taping the conversation because often it is impossible to remember everything they said and you will have a treasure for future generations. Even though tracing your tree yourself takes a lot of time and a lot of effort, you learn so much and it is so much more worthwhile than pulling up a tree on a website and wondering where in the world the author got their information.

Here are a few more websites that may help you in your search. These are more United States oriented so if you live in another part of the world, these will probably not be of help to you. Hwever, the above mentioned links will appeal to a world wide audience.

http://www.usgenweb.org/ -When you get to the main page, you can get to the state and individual locality pages by clicking on the appropriate links. Keep in mind that some towns are going to have more information than some smaller obscure towns. It all depends on what kinds of volunteers contribute information to their sites. Genealogy is very much a hobby that depends on people.

Check your LOCAL LIBRARY. Many libraries have subscriptions to Ancestry.com or hertiage quest that you can access. Heritage Quest is geared mostly toward the US records.

www.interment.net or www.findagrave.com These are cemetery sites that have grown by leaps and bounds.

http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-b...

This is the link to the Social Security Death index. This is a very helpful resource to finding death dates of people who died in recent years (since about the 60's)

If your family immigrated to the US in the last 100-125 years you can try
www.ellisisland.org
This one is cool because you can actually have a look at the ships manifests!!

If you start your search for your ancestry, it will probably turn into an obsession. It is very addicting and it is like a big puzzle with so many benefits. You learn where your family came from, where they've been, often you can learn about family medical history. There just isn't a down side. Remember the old addage, "If you want something done right, you often have to do it your self." You are not going to just find your entire genealogy in one search. It is an ongoing puzzle. I tell people, if you can find one thing every time you are searching, you are doing GREAT. If you find any more than that at any given time you are LUCKY!! Write to me if you have any questions. I would be happy to help if I can. Blessings