The Family History Book

A comprehensive guide to researching and documenting one's family history, including tips on genealogy research, organizing information, and preserving family artifacts. This book is a must-have for anyone interested in learning more about their ancestors. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

Genealogy research should go beyond finding documents and filling in charts. This book outlines a simple process that will aid your research and create pages of information that can be read and understood by all family members. Your research will become faster and more accurate and your family can enjoy the family history. We all have family stories that give insights into the lives our ancestors. Some are entertaining and others are more historical in nature. Many others are celebrations of our ethnic and cultural heritage. They all should be saved and repeated for our future generations. However, pieces of these stories are lost as families pass them down from generation to generation. Writing a family history will save them for many generations. Writing a family history can seem to be a very challenging project for many people. Hopefully, the methods discussed in this book will show the reader a simple format that will make this task much easier. You may be reluctant to write down these stories because you do not consider yourself a writer or you cannot see how your family history is important to save. However, it is important for you to understand that someone in your family should capture and save the oral histories, do the research to try to confirm what the accurate story is and do the research to increase the knowledge of your ancestor's lives. All of our immigrant ancestors contributed to America's history and their stories should be saved for our grandchildren. Our family histories should give clues of their roles and this will help us understand our roots. Your collection of family history, photos and documents are incomplete unless someone writes an explanation of how they are related. This creates your unique family history and is the core of why someone needs to write them down for the enjoyment of your children and grandchildren. If you feel you do not have the skills to do this, who in your family can? If you like to do the research, is there someone that can work with you to write it? If you are interested in telling your family stories, I hope that the materials in this book help you overcome your fears of writing and you will commit the oral traditions of your family to the written word. I show how getting started with brief biographical summaries can make writing easier and overcome your fears of writing, I cover simple methods for organizing your summaries that can stand alone and then later be combined into a larger document that becomes your family history. The book reviews a simple process that compiles oral history, family pictures, and genealogical documents and puts it together into a readable and interesting document that suddenly becomes your family history.

An exciting new addition to any family historian's library, Family History: Digging Deeper will take your research to the next level. Joined by a team of expert genealogists, Simon Fowler covers a range of topics and provides clear advice for the intermediate genealogist. Helping you push back the barriers, this book details how to utilise the internet in your research and suggests some unusual archives and records which might just transform your research. It will teach you about genealogical traditions, variants of family history around the world and even the abuse of genealogy by the Nazis. It will help you understand current developments in DNA testing, new resources and digitised online material. Problem-solving sections are also included to help tackle common difficulties and provide answers to the brick walls often reached when researching one's ancestors. If you want to dig deeper into your family tree and the huge array of records available, then this book is for you.

For anyone looking to create a useful, lasting history of your family: This is a book that should adorn the library or bookshelves of all genealogists! Whether you're an amateur or professional, chances are the ultimate goal of your research is to produce a quality family history. Producing A Quality Family History, by Patricia Law Hatcher, guides you through the steps required to create an attractive-and functional--family history report. Learn how to organize your work, how to write the narrative, choose type faces, grammar styles, and punctuation. You'll also see how to create useful bibliographies and discover ways to incorporate photos and illustrations effectively plus much, much more!

This important book examines the motives that drive family historians and explores whether those who research their ancestral pedigrees have distinct personalities, demographics or family characteristics. It describes genealogists’ experiences as they chart their family trees including their insights, dilemmas and the fascinating, sometimes disturbing and often surprising, outcomes of their searches. Drawing on theory and research from psychology and other humanities disciplines, as well as from the authors’ extensive survey data collected from over 800 amateur genealogists, the authors present the experiences of family historians, including personal insights, relationship changes, mental health benefits and ethical dilemmas. The book emphasises the motivation behind this exploration, including the need to acknowledge and tell ancestral stories, the spiritual and health-related aspects of genealogical research, the addictiveness of the detective work, the lifelong learning opportunities and the passionate desire to find lost relatives. With its focus on the role of family history in shaping personal identity and contemporary culture, this is fascinating reading for anyone studying genealogy and family history, professional genealogists and those researching their own history.

With sections dedicated to family origins; reunions and special events; photographs and stories, this book is designed so you can record forever the history of your family and ancestors.

Completely updated for today's search tactics and blockades, The Everything Family Tree Book has even more insight for the stumped! Whether you're searching in a grandparent's attic or through the most cryptic archiving systems, this book has brand-new chapters on what readers have been asking for: Genetics, DNA, and medical information Surname origins and naming Appendix on major genealogical repositories, libraries, and archives Systems for filing and organizing The latest computer software Land, probate, and estate records Chock-full of tips the competitors don't have, this is the one-stop resource for successful sleuthing!