Steps to Starting A Family Tree
The first step in starting a family tree is to start with what you already know and then build upon that information. Write down any facts that you have about your family. Begin with yourself, your children, your spouse, your siblings and their children. Then move on to your parents, their siblings and children, their parents, etc. Continue to build your tree backward through time.
Include any vital information such as birth, marriage, death dates, and places. Be sure to look around your home for possible sources of this information. For example, birth dates may be written in a family bible or relatives names may be found on old family photos. Obituaries are treasure troves and can provide information that can catapult your family research.
Look through old family papers, trunks, and don’t neglect the bookshelves. I once found a first-hand description of when my grandmother fell down a well and how she was rescued. This information was written inside the front cover of a book that had belonged to her. It was a story that I had never heard, but when I asked my mother about it, she confirmed that her mother had indeed fallen into their well. She also began to provide more details as to that day’s events. It doesn’t take much. Sometimes you just need a tidbit of information to trigger the conversation.
More recently a lot of this information can be found on social media, such as Facebook. I’m always excited to see those “Happy Birthday”, “Happy Anniversary”, and “Congratulations” messages on social media. I know that it sounds slightly twisted, but for family historians, it’s always helpful when people post obituaries. (Side Note: The info found on social media may or may not be accurate. However, it at least gives you a baseline of where to start. Always validate your findings.)
The next step is to talk to and gather additional information from as many living relatives as you can. This will help you to obtain first-hand accounts and stories about your family. Take good notes and record the conversation, if possible. You’d be surprised at how reviewing the notes from those earlier conversations can help you when you get further into your research.
Ask family members if any family histories or copies of the family tree already exist or if they know of anyone in the family who is already working on the family’s history. You never know who might have the nuggets of information that you need. Keep in mind that just because someone may have already developed a family tree, it does not necessarily mean that the information is accurate. Always do your due diligence and verify the information which is provided to you with as much direct evidence as possible. Examples of direct evidence are legal documents (wills, birth records, marriage records, death records, etc.), dna, etc.
Be sure to talk to the older generations of your family. They can provide you with other relatives’ names, interesting stories, and clarify any questions that you might have. Believe me you will have many. When I first started working on my family’s tree, I accompanied my dad to visit the cemetery where his parents were buried. While we were there, we looked at other headstones and he would tell me about the people who were buried there. I found out how some of them died, how they were related to us, their parents and children’s name, etc. Keep in mind that it wasn’t the typical family history interview with prepared questions. It was, however, a free-flowing, very natural, and at times humorous (my relatives did some hilarious stuff in their lifetime) conversation. I recorded the conversation as we walked and talked. In exchange, my dad got to go down memory lane.
After you’ve gathered information from family members, you will soon be ready to move on to research which is more in-depth and more concrete. Begin to look at birth, marriage, and death certificates. Look at census records, wills and church records. Check out the local libraries and archives in the areas where your family members lived to find whatever resources can be gleaned.
For example, when I first started working on my family tree, I paid a visit to my local county library’s genealogy department. It just so happened that they maintained a huge collection of obituaries for African American people in the area. I had hit the mother lode! Most of the people in those obituaries turned out to be related to me in some shape, form, or fashion. I was able to quickly piece together how various people were connected to one another and to me. At a library in an adjacent county, I found a book containing the family tree of one of the lines of my family tree. While I did find that the book contained some errors, it was mostly accurate and provided a wealth of information with which to work.
You can build your tree using good ole pen and paper or you can build an online family tree using sites such as Ancestry, FamilySearch, and MyHeritage. You can also purchase and use a program which is stored on your desktop, such as RootsMagic. FamilySearch is free to use and can be used from home. Just be mindful that a tree built on FamilySearch can be edited by anyone. Sites such as Ancestry and MyHeritage are usually free to use at your local library. Subscriptions can be purchased if you’d prefer to use these sites from the comfort of your home. If it makes you feel better, you can use all or a combination of these methods.
