Advice from Genealogists / Historians

[ForresterModern]

I traced my paternal line backwards as far as I could go with family remembrances, family bibles and other birth and death records. Through all the trees and a lot of dead ends I finally came upon one particular relative (my 5great grandfather I believe) who had a very unique name-Bedford Addison Foster-, but could get no further. So I googled, and Binged, and Yahooed his name with and without quotations marks around it (without separates each individual name while with quotations marks makes the search look for those three names in that specific order together) and lo and behold found not just one, but three, BAF the first, second and third, and very flush trees for each of them going both ways. Turns out my tree connected to BAF the first and I could follow that several more generations backward from there through someone else's work. If you have a family name clan website try to see if they have a geneology search function there. Once you find out information, try county records for birth, death, marriage, taxes, land ownership, etc., documentation that may help you. The further back you go the sketchier and more colloquial some of the "official" documentation actually becomes, but just using these tools I have traced my line back to my 11th great grandfather who supposedly is the one who came across the pond and settled with a land grant in Virginia back in the late 1600s. I am still tracing grave and birth and marriage records, as well as a listing of ships manifests, to find what ship he arrived on and exactly when, and from where, to try to make the definitive link up to "the old country", but feel confident that with these resources I will eventually succeed. If I run into road blocks then ancestry.com and geneology.com will become additional references, along with Y-chromosome DNA analysis and comparison to an ongoing project of my surname that is already in place on both sides of the ocean. There is no end to the amount of potential information available out there, if you just start looking. Dive in.

Good luck

jeff

[davidlpope]

...along with Y-chromosome DNA analysis and comparison to an ongoing project of my surname that is already in place on both sides of the ocean.

Has anyone else had experience with this Y-chromosome mapping stuff? I'm intrigued by it, but just don't know enough yet to justify the expense. I'm all ears.

David

[gilmore]

Has anyone else had experience with this Y-chromosome mapping stuff? I'm intrigued by it, but just don't know enough yet to justify the expense. I'm all ears.

David

I tested my Y DNA and found the results surprising and extraordinary helpful. www.familytreedna.com has the largest database and is therefore more likely to have matches than the other companies.

Genetic genealogy is in its infancy, and I suspect that it will become more useful in the years and decades to come, as the databases grow larger. Now, it would be wisest to rely on it as an adjunct to primary sources, that is, well-documented research following the paper trail backward in time from yourself and your parents.

It can be especially helpful if you are at a brick wall in narrowing down areas where further research is likely to be helpful, and eliminating areas where it wouldn't. Unfortunately quite a few people test in hopes of riding on some one else's coattails and profiting from research others have done without having done much or any themselves, but that's the way it is.

If you find DNA testing confusing, there are two or three Yahoo groups on it, with members who are very well-informed, if often opinionated, and who are good about answering queries.

The expense of Y DNA testing isn't all that great, I think it's US $100 for a 7 marker test, which won't tell you very much in itself, but if you have matches, you can upgraded to a finer test. Most people get the 25 or 37 marker tests for US $200 or $300 or so.

LDS, as well as Ancestry.com and other online sites are often great sources for authoritative primary sources, such as census records, ships lists, etc, but I would not rely on family trees posted online, as well as those kept by the LDS. They don't do quality control at all, and accept whatever is submitted to them, bad research and all. And mistakes can be repeated there over and over again until they have the appearance of fact.

[SteveB]

Sorry to be late in the advise department.

As said previously:

1.) Start with yourself and work back one step at a time and get documentation for every event.

2.) The most popular software is Family Tree Maker. It works on Winows. Mac, and Linux.

3.) Use the "trees" on Ancestry.com, familysearch.org, etc. for GUIDANCE ONLY. They will help you find direction, but be sure to document by original sources each "fact". The LDS accepts whatever has been submitted, and many are full of serious errors. Examples are children born to a female four years after her death, children born within seven months of each other, and children born before the mother was eight years old. In early times a person may have gone through two or three spouses. Sometimes a child is credited to a father that was dead over twenty years. (Long before sperm banks).

4.) Ancestry's Census records and other source documents are quite helpful, and best when you are pursuing an uncommon name.

5.) Your friendly local library is the next stop. Many will have a section for genealogy that will contain published Vital Records, and local community histories with a genealogy section in the book, as well as published family genealogies. If you are on track for a Mayflower ancestor, many libraries have the Mayflower "Silver" books covering five or more generations of descendants from the original passengers. If you are on track for someone who served in the colonial, revolutionary wars, or the conflict amongst the states, there are numerous military records that have been published that may include some family data. While you are at the library, you should see if they have subscriptions to Ancestry.com, Heritage Quest, or NEHGS. The pay side of Ancestry has a lot more data than the stuff that is available for free. Heritage Quest is a site loaded with many genealogy and history books that have been digitized, and master indexed. NEHGS is The New England Historic Genealogy Society. Its website is loaded with digital images of many documents for New England research as well as family works and manuscripts from around the United States and Canada. All of the Massachusetts Vital Records before 1915 are digitized and online.

Should the local library not have these resources available the librarian will generally be able to direct you to a library in your region that can help. For specific books, most libraries can obtain them for you on inter-library loan.

Should you hop across the pond to Scotland, Scotlandspeople.gov.uk is the official site for Vital Records. One warning is that you should have a very good idea of where and when before searching, as you can use up a tenner rather quickly.

Good luck and happy hunting,

Steve Brown,
Research Genealogist
The Scottish Genealogy Society
Edinburgh.

[Bugbear]

I tested my Y DNA and found the results surprising and extraordinary helpful.... And mistakes can be repeated there over and over again until they have the appearance of fact.

Darth Gilmore! I was worried a giant baobab tree had eaten you!

Hope all is going well on your visit; nice to see you posting again.

Unfortunatly, the interesting parts of the family history are not so directly recorded, or talked about in my case. Doesnt keep me from wondering, though; guess one can only guess.

[gilmore]

Darth Gilmore! I was worried a giant baobab tree had eaten you!

Hope all is going well on your visit; nice to see you posting again...

Thanks for the kind regards.

All is well here. Though I haven't worn pants in months, I haven't worn even the one kilt I brought with me since I left the US.