Genealogy and Research Are In My BloodPosted on 3/3/2008
I began my adventure in genealogy when I was 13 years old. My babysitter used to take me to court houses, libraries, and cemeteries where we would look for deceased members of her family. We would put on old clothes and wrap our faces in a bandana so we could go down to the basements. There we would sift through every box in the basement to see what records we could find.
There were birth certificates, marriages, death certificates, and any public record you could imagine. The big problem was that the papers were old, smudged, and very hard to read. It took all day just to find three or four government records.
Fast forward to 1998 and you find me in front of a new computer trying to find out what kind of research was available on the Internet for genealogy. Needless to say, it was a nightmare back then. Individual groups and organizations were beginning to transcribe their local records and put them online. The LDS church was already leading a major campaign to organize and record all historic government records. Although these intentions were noble, and they were made with the best tools of their time, finding what you were looking for was tough. Only in the last few years has all the local, state, and national organizations began to work together to put all of the government records in one place.
By 2005, there were more genealogy websites popping up in a day than what was available the entire year of 1998. Genealogy had become a marketing tool. What did this mean to the innocent people who were just out looking for more family history? Every where you clicked, you found another government records site, claiming to have what you were looking for. Buy this site or subscribe to this training course was all over the web.
Today is even worse than 2 years ago. There are scammers in every market you could probably think of and it is growing. I have fallen into several of these traps looking for my family records.
That is why I am here. I want to give you a list of the tips and tools that have helped me succeed in doing my genealogy online. Instead of giving it all to you at one time here, since I know you hate big web pages, I created a Squidoo Lens. You will be able to visit when you want and leave any comments or questions there. I will be adding genealogy to Robin's Nest soon, but for now this works.
The next article is already waiting for you at Squidoo to help you with your government records research. See you there!