Start your genealogy research or family-history research with family members.
Phone, write or better yet, visit your parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles,
your parents' cousins, etc.
Ask older family members specific questions about your ancestors. "What was your grandmother's maiden name?" "Where did she live as a child?" "What were her parents' names?" "When did they come to Canada?" Any clue, no matter how small, may help your search.
An excellent web site to assist you with female ancestor research is: http://www.CyndisList.com/female.htm
While you work, remember the basic rules of genealogy:
1. Start with yourself and work backwards through each previous generation.
Work from the known to the unknown
2. Write down what you find and where you found it. What institution? Which collection of records? What volume and page number? Which microfilm reel?
Ask older family members specific questions about your ancestors. "What was your grandmother's maiden name?" "Where did she live as a child?" "What were her parents' names?" "When did they come to Canada?" Any clue, no matter how small, may help your search.
An excellent web site to assist you with female ancestor research is: http://www.CyndisList.com/female.htm
While you work, remember the basic rules of genealogy:
2. Write down what you find and where you found it. What institution? Which collection of records? What volume and page number? Which microfilm reel?
- Create a research log to keep track of the family history information you find. Include the name of the ancestor you are researching, the information you find, and the sources. Using a research log will help you remember what records you have searched and what information you have found.
- Always record the sources you've searched, even if the results are negative.
4. Be consistent in the way you write names, dates and places on your forms or pedigree chart
- Write the "surname" in all caps. This lets the eye scan records more easily. (HINSHAW, Winfred Orestes)
- List dates in this order: (07 Mar 1895) Instead of 7/3/95 or 3/7/95, this keeps dates from getting jumbled.
- Write the "places" people lived in this order: City/Township, County, State, Province, Country. (Seeleys Bay/Leeds & Grenville, Ontario, Canada)
- Full name of ancestor
- Birth dates & places
- Marriage dates & places
- Death dates & places
- Place of burial (often burial is not in same place as where the death occurred)
- Military service
- Interesting stories
Remember that family stories are very important. Often genealogists and researchers
can get caught up in "just the facts." Family stories add invaluable life
and character to these facts. They may also give you clues towards further
research, or missing pieces to your genealogy puzzle.
Tutorial
Lesson Two
Lesson Two
