Getting Started in Genealogy
Researching your family history, your genealogy, can be rewarding and enlightening. Knowing your ancestry gives you a sense of self that cannot be gained anywhere else. It is also the greatest gift you can give your children, grandchildren, and extended family members. It is often said that genealogy is the collection of names, birthdates, and death dates, but family history contains the stories of the individuals in our tree. Where they lived, who they loved, what their gifts, talents, or dreams were, and how that contributed to who we are today. We are family historians.
We urge you to climb your family tree. However, before you join Ancestry.com or travel to faraway places, there are a few things you want to do in preparation for your research. You first want to evaluate what you know about your ancestry. Start with a basic pedigree chart. Fill in your name, parents, grandparents, etc. This chart will quickly reveal what you don’t know about your lineage.
Next, ask for help. Reach out to your parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and ask if they can help you fill in the names of anyone you don’t have on your chart. If you are interested in your family history but don’t want to research, you can help by sharing your knowledge, documents, and photos with your family historians.
Before you visit any libraries, museums, or courthouses, go through all the documents in your home. Look for funeral programs, Bibles, family reunion booklets, yearbooks, military records, insurance papers, marriage licenses, birth certificates, death certificates, church histories, old letters, address books, holiday cards, old photos, or anything else that may contain names or information. The documents in your home are often referred to as the home repository or personal archives. Allow us this moment to say, when someone in your family passes away or moves out of their home, please don’t throw away their paperwork. Especially the funeral programs. More valuable family history has ended up in recycling bins than we can ever imagine. Once you’ve reviewed everything in your home and asked others for any information they can share, it’s time to begin filling in the holes in your pedigree chart.
Now you are ready to look for additional documentation to support what you have and go further with your research. There are several options for you to follow at this point. If you have previous experience or believe you are a self-starter, you can set up a free account from home with FamilySearch.org and look through the records. You can subscribe to Ancestry. com as well. Or, you can use the free Ancestry. com database at the local library. We urge caution when viewing trees built by other subscribers. They often contain errors.
However, we suggest you visit a FamilySearch center. The FamilySearch centers are provided by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, often referred to as the Mormons. Neither of us are members of this church, but we have found them to be very helpful. The centers are staffed by volunteers who assist in finding records, evaluating documents, and providing a general overview of the process. Their services are free. Having a good foundation will save you a lot of time in the long run.
There are two FamilySearch centers in this area. One in Waco at 7201 Viking Dr., 254-715-576,3 and one in Killeen at 1410 S 2nd St, 254-526-2918. Call ahead to verify their hours before making the drive.
Recommended reading for African American researchers is “Black Roots, A Beginner’s Guide to Tracing the African American Family Tree” by Tony Burroughs. It can be found online or possibly at your library. This book was released in 2001, long before the DNA boom. Yet, it provides a clear, easy-to-understand blueprint for genealogy, which will help you on your journey. And, yes, it will be a journey.
In the upcoming months, we will share genealogical tips on DNA, military records, census, cemetery research, oral history, and more. We will also share parts of our research journey with you. We believe you can find your family history, and we want to help you accomplish this goal.
Our goal is to find living descendants of the 435 Freedmen who migrated from Kingstree, South Carolina, to Marlin, Texas, in 1867. If you believe you are a descendant, please contact us. Sharon, Sharon.kay@sbcglobal.net , or Angela, honey_be_2001@yahoo. com.