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**MaxandRuby**

nndidiamakanndidiamaka
in Stay at Home Moms

I noticed on the Hobbies thread that you do Genealogy.  Can you tell me more about how you do it?

I used to be really into it before I was married, but at that time I lived in Utah and could go to their big Family History Center in Salt Lake whenever I wanted and do research.  Obviously, since I live in Georgia and have a 19 month old, I can't do that now.  I would love to get back into it though.  Do you do it online?  What services do you use?  How much do they cost?

Thanks!

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Re: **MaxandRuby**

  • MaxandRubyMaxandRuby member

    The main websites I use are ancestry.com and usgenweb.com (I go into the individual states from there).  Depending on what I'm looking for, I may also google something like "vital records Illinois" or something similar.  I also google names (maiden and married for females) just to see what comes up sometimes.  I have used the family tree maker software in the past but had to get a new computer so lost my data (I have serious craploads of paper copies of records though) and will be getting the newest version of it soon.  Once received I will take my paper records and enter the data on the software.  Other things I do is occasionally travel to cities where I know records should exist (typically I go to County Clerk and Recorders offices) and get certified copies of records.  You can also go to your public library to look for info there.  I was able to get the newspaper articles for my granduncle who was KIA in WWII and with that information actually got detailed info online (declassified docs) as to what actually happened.  That was a pretty cool find!  As morbid as it sounds, I also go to cemeteries and photograph the headstones.  Sometimes they have great info like detailed birth/death dates (versus just a year).  Genealogy, as you know, is all about document document document.

    And speaking of documenting, do NOT go by the word of anyone else's information especially on the web.  People get branches and information wrong all.the.time. because they don't take the time to do the actual research and find the actual documents that support what they put in their tree.  One of my branches is misdocumented all the time and one other branch has the wrong parents listed - the person writing the info didn't take the time to see that the birth date of my ancestor and the woman they have him attached to doesn't make sense at all, as in the woman would have been in her 80s when my ancestor was born....pretty much super unlikely even in this day and age. Take what you find online with a grain of salt until you document it yourself.  Who wants to pass down the WRONG info?  I sure don't!

    Ancestry.com is expensive IMO but worth it if you plan on doing a lot of researching.  I haven't checked out other websites to see their costs.  Ancestry has different subscription options so the costs vary.  

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  • nndidiamakanndidiamaka
    Thank you!!  :-)
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  • MaxandRubyMaxandRuby member

    I'm guessing you have used ancestry.com before but just wanted to state that some things you can do for free on that website and the usgenweb site is free.  You can also google "genealogy websites" or something similar and find a bunch more.  Rootsweb is at least a message board (Ancestry.com has one too).

    Let me know if you have any other questions. I love working on the family tree!

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