You’d be amazed how many folks begin to trace their family tree because they heard they were related to Jesse James, or Marilyn Monroe, or George Washington, or any number of other people they’d truly love to be able to claim in their family tree. In most cases, to be honest, they found they weren’t but the searching was half the...

While in the beginning of your genealogy work, you’re probably not going to go to much expense for things like genealogy reference books, particularly if its just a sometimes hobby for you, but as you get more deeply involved you’re going to find that a few books to point you in the right direction will help immensely. When you come to...

I used to work as a phone solicitor. I don’t like phoning people I don’t know, it made me uncomfortable to pretend to be friendly and I detest asking them to purchase something I probably wouldn’t buy myself on a bet. For that reason alone, I am no longer a phone solicitor. In point of fact, I don’t like using the phone at ...

As in any other walk of life, there are certain things that aren’t exactly what they seem to be, yet we, in our knowledge seem to want to assume that it’s a certain way. In the beginning of my genealogy I made an assumption that cost me a great deal of time and work, and since then I’ve made it a point to not make assumptions. My...

Just What does it mean.. Twice removed? If someone came up to you in the store and said, Hey how’s it going, I’m your second cousin twice removed, would you be as clueless as most of the rest of us when it comes to understanding exactly what she was talking about. Essentially we have a fairly good grasp on what the essential relations...

• Find a Specific Site, or Go Live On Location: There are web sites at USGenWeb, or WorldGenWeb where you can find specific counties which are what you’re going to be needing next. Depending on which country you’re interested in you’re going to need county specific information now that you’ve dug a bit deeper into things.- depending upo...

There is not a genealogist, amateur or professional who has not struggled at times to understand a document that is written in more archaic, or older terminology. As you can see by the document above, a document which is partially hand written and in part printed, their are rampant misspellings and areas in which deciphering the old script is diff...

Anyone who does genealogy even as a weekend hobby knows that you’re going to be literally buried under files and folders in no time at all. The hobbyist to the expert, wants to keep a copy of everything that you come across that pertains to what you are currently researching, and we are tempted by the vast array of copiers to do just that. Once y...

The best kind of oral interview is the one where the subject of your interview knows exactly what to expect. Your interviewee has been preplanning for the interview and knows what to expect from you and may have some documents with them that will help them to refresh their memory. Suggestions and discussion prior to the meeting will help to bring ...

In the Midwest, particularly Wisconsin, Nebraska, Minnesota and areas such as those, many of the immigrants were of Norwegian descent, which presents it’s own special problems when trying to trace your roots. Most people know well about the explorations of the Vikings along the coasts of North America, which began long before the English expediti...