Tips for Researching Family History

During the past few years I have been researching my family history. The days of the internet have made this task much easier. You can find information about genealogies on a variety of websites. While you still may need to make some trips to local government offices, more and more information is being put online every day.

I began my research by talking with various relatives and friends to gather as much information about my family history as I could. I purchased a program to help track my family tree. This is an important step when researching family history since the farther back you get, the more complicated it is to keep things in order. Send out a questioner to all of your current living relatives with a stamped self addressed return envelope to simplify and speed up the process of gathering information. The older generations of your family can offer very important details that you cannot find anywhere else. Have them write down stories, or have them dictate them to you as you make notes.

The more official data you gather about your ancestors the better. If you can find old Social Security numbers, driver's license numbers, or immigration records of deceased relatives they are very helpful because it will help you deepen your search into your family history.

One of the complications I ran up against with finding out my family history is the lack of communication between my still living family members. My grandfather threw out all items related to my grandmother when she died. He died before I started this endeavor so I have no information earlier than my mom's father on that side. On my dad's father's side, the record house burned down destroying many valuable records. I was able to trace his ancestry back to about 1776 where the trail goes dry. Overall, I have 3 of 4 lineages mapped out to the 1700s.

If you have old pictures of relatives, be sure to scan them into a computer to keep them saved for life. Also, keep the original pictures in a safe location on acid free paper.

Don't forget to start gathering information, pictures, video clips, articles and general family stories from current living relatives. Someday, they will be the ancestors of other curious relatives.

You can find a lot of information about your history just by researching the online databases of government agencies, churches, historical societies, cemetery records, land records, Ellis Island immigration records and many other online resources.

A computer, the internet and some basic research skills is about all you need to get you moving in the right direction to learn more about your family history.