How do I trace my ancestors? Where do I start? What do I use to do so?

Question

I need help on what to do.

Answer 1

You have gotten quite a few answers already, but I'm going to paste my standard answer on how to get started. Hopefully, there is a tidbit or two that will be useful to you. Just remember, it is a process and will take some time. Don't get frustrated and remember, if you run stuck you can always post another question. There are so many sweet, friendly people on this forum, who will gladly help. Take care!

The best place to begin researching your family tree is with your very own family. Get a note book and write down everything that you know about yourself and your siblings. Include dates and places of birth, marriage and if applicable death dates and places of interment. As soon as you have all that, move back a generation to your parents. Once you have all of that, move back to your grandparents and keep going until you run stuck. Once you have written down everything you know, talk to your family members. Sometimes even your siblings know more than you do, but usually if you talk to your parents or grandparents they can go a generation or two further than you can simply because they are a generation or two older than you.

One thing I should mention to you since you are a new genealogist is to document EVERYTHING! This will save you so much work later. If you get a date from Grandma's bible, simply document that information. If you can get in the practice of doing this from the beginning, you will avoid making the big mistake that most of us genealogists made while we were starting out. Think about it... if you have 50 people in your family tree, you might be able to keep this information "in your head", but what happens when this number rises to 500 or 50,000? After a while genealogy gets in your blood and 50,000 people is not and unfeasible number.

What happens next is up to you. What are you interested in? Would you like to know who all of your great great grandparents are? Are you interested in a particular surname? Are you trying to prove that you are related to someone famous? Only you know the answer to these questions? Once you've decided which avenue you want to explore you can continue. There are many records out there that genealogists use. Many of them are free, but there are others that are by subscription.

One thing I need to mention is that to trace your genealogy right, it is going to cost you, whether it be for a subscription to a genealogy site, paying for vital records, making copies of documentation, buying gas to visit libraries or cemeteries, but these are such worthwhile expenditures. The nice thing is that it is not money you spend all at one time. Many of my roots came from Michigan so everytime I go up there for a visit, I carve out time to got to the library or to the cemetery etc.

There are many people on this forum who are avid genealogists who have never paid for a membership to ancestry; however, I have found it invaluable. You might want to visit ancestry because they do have some free areas on their site. I live next to a branch of the National Archives and they have every census record in existence. If you start out looking up people in the census using the microfilms, there is a process you must follow that requires you to look at two microfilms before you find the census page of the family that you need. This is very time consuming and if you are looking up a family member with a name that is usually spelled wrong, there is no guarantee that you will find it. The beauty of having a membership to ancestry is that they have the censuses fully indexed meaning you can type in a name and pull it right up without looking on two microfilm rolls. Further, you can manipulate spellings of the name and the places you are searching in a single search. This alone has made Ancestry worth the money I have spent for a subscription. Many times Ancestry runs specials and I pay under $100.00 per year so if you divide that by 12, the expense is less than a subscription to Netflix or just about anything else. Ancestry also offers Military records, obituaries, marriage records, birth and death indexes and much much more.

With that said, there are also a lot of free resources. I have over 500 links to free genealogy records that I myself have found online. Here are some that can help just about everyone.

http://www.familysearch.org/eng/search/f... This is the webpage to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

http://searches.rootsweb.com/
This is a list of popular searchable databases on Rootsweb. There is a link to the Social Security Death index, as well as death records for California, Kentucky, Maine, and Texas. There are some international databases included too.

http://www.ellisisland.org/
If you are from the United States and know that you have ancestors that immigrated from other countries, there is a chance that Ellis Islands website could help you. You can actually look at the ships manifests on this site. It is so cool! You could even get information like how much money was in your great grandfathers pocket when he came over.

Then there are the message boards at both Ancestry and Rootsweb. They have boards for surnames, counties, States, and countries. This would be a great place to post information you already know about family members and attempt to build on it. It is always wise not to post information on living family members.

http://boards.ancestry.com/default.aspx....
http://genforum.genealogy.com/

You can also look at many of the existing trees out there to see if anybody has created one including members or your families. Sometimes you get lucky, but if you find one out there, I would recommend researching the information yourself before including it in your tree.

http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/..........
http://www.gencircles.com/

After you get so far, you may want to try to input your information into a family tree program. There are several commercially available; however, there are a few that you can download for free off of the internet. PAF (Personal Ancestry File) is a very respectable program that you can download at

http://www.ldscatalog.com/webapp/wcs/sto...

There are several different language versions available. Most programs have places for you to document your sources and have a file format called GEDCOM making it easy to share your tree with people using a different genealogy program or easy for you to change programs without reentering all of your information.

So, as you can see from my answer... there is a whole lot to learn about genealogy and finding resources. I learned just by jumping in and doing it. Once you get out in the genealogy community you will see that there are a lot of people eager to help you in any way they can. Have I made mistakes along the way? You bet... who hasn't? You will find though that the rewards are numerous and that it can get quite addicting.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me through my profile. Blessings

Answer 2

You've got a bunch of answers here. My suggestion is that you invest $20 and buy the book "unpuzzling your past" by Emily Croom. It is well worth the money and will walk you thru each step. The 4th edition is out now. I have used my 1st edition since it first came out years ago. When I get stuck I go back thru it and it jogs my memory and I find a new trick to find an elusive ancestor.
Next take one of the charts in the back of that book and start with yourself and then your parents and then both sets of grandparents and fill out all the info. Talk to your relatives and get what info they have. From there just keep working backwards.
Online websites are a great tool but don't take anything as proof positive from the net. There is a lot of bad info online so document your work (birth, death, marriage certificates, obits, cemetery records, etc.) Sometimes this requires you visiting Courthouses, cemetery's etc to get what you need.
This is an expensive hobby if you are going to do it right. But in the long run you will have something to pass down that you can be proud of.

Happy Hunting

Answer 3

First start asking questions of all your living relatives. Take good notes. Even if they say "I think" about something, write it down. Get on a good website like Ancestry.com or Genealogy.com. They cost a little, but they are worth it. You can start and keep a family tree with all kinds of extras. It's fun. I've done a little research myself and it's amazing what you can find out. I have a cousin who did a family history back in the 80's before the Internet and it took her many years, many trips to different cities and trips to libraries. Either way, you should enjoy yourself and remember that it will take a while, you're not going to get info overnight.

Answer 4

Genealogy is the study and tracing of family pedigrees. This involves the collection of the names of relatives, both living and deceased, and establishing the relationships among them based on primary, secondary and/or circumstantial evidence or documentation, thus building up a cohesive family tree. Genealogy (often misspelled "geneology"[1]) is often also referred to as family history, although these terms may be used distinctly: the former being the basic study of who is related to whom; the latter involving more "fleshing out" of the lives and personal histories of the individuals involved.

__________

The excerpt above is from the source below...it has too much information to be included in this forum...happy hunting!

BUMPER STICKER:

I'm a geneologist...I collect ancestors.

Answer 5

hmm...
start with your birth record: Names, locations, and occupations of your parents. Then each of their birth records.

Start a notebook, with your birth record, then 2 dividers, one for your father and one for your mother.

Put their records in the notebook and notice you now have 2 surnames: Your first branch is your mother's surname.

Next do your grandparents on both sides. (Or alternatively just focus on one of the two surnames you have thus far.)

Each marriage onto the trunk of your tree will bring a new surname. Add dividers in your notebook for each of these grandmother last names.

After you have done that or if you find that difficult, pose a specific question on Y/A Genealogy and someone will help you.

So, first off, a notebook with some of those sheet protectors, then some birth records. Then you are off, off, and away.

Answer 6

Start w/ Rootsweb.com. It's free. Ancestry is also great but it cost money. If your family are immigrants you can go to the Ellis Island website. If you have anymore questions, add me as a contact. I have been doing Genealogy for about 2yrs.

Answer 7

You have to be able to answer: Do I have the correct spellings of last names? Do I know where they lived? There are tons of sites to look at for info. Some public libraries have genealogical references to that area. The Mormon database is the familysearch.org addy.

Answer 8

start with your self, and the your parents.
since you most likely don't have the software yet, down load a blank family page from rootsweb.com. as you fill it out remember to document were/who you got the information from. that way when someone asks a question later, you know your sources.

Answer 9

http://www.ancestry.com/home/mbDefault.aspx

Answer 10

one more suggestion