You've made the decision to finally invest in a new online Ancestry service subscription and are incredibly excited to dive into researching your family history. But wait! Slow down! Before you start this project, it is a good idea to prepare a game plan of how you are going to approach this and what information are you specifically looking to find. Like a puzzle, do you sort pieces by colour first? Do you start with the frame?
Seedling.
The analogy of comparing a family to a physical tree is a genius concept, as the branches of a tree exponentially divide similarly to how family is related, with you being the seed. A paternal branch sprouts out on the left, and a maternal branch on the right, then each of their parents get their own new branch, etc. This arrangement will create an inverted triangle, similar to the shape of a tree.
Given how each generation of ancestors will have at least twice as many branches (or family members) as the previous, the potential for the number of people listed in your tree could be in the hundreds, if not thousands.
How far do you plan to go?
Considering there is a chance that you had three great-grandparents with 13 children each, don't underestimate the time it may take to add all of your aunts, uncles and cousins to your tree if you are wishing to do so. You also should consider how much specific information you would like to add about each person. Beyond names and dates, you may have some photos you would like to upload, or perhaps copies of letters, etc. written by that person. Would you rather simply list a name, or do you want to try to discover the character of who that person really was?
Do you want to research vertically or linearly?
To approach your family tree vertically means to pick one person and only go as far back as you can on one of their direct branches. For example, first you would find out as much information as possible about your mother. Next, you would research your mother's mother (your maternal grandmother). When researching vertically, you would initially be ignoring siblings until all of the parental information has been completed.
Contrarily, if you want to approach your family tree in a linear manner, this might be first entering as much information as possible about your father, then doing so with each of his nine siblings, and then their families. Once that branch is completed, focus on all of your mother's siblings and first cousins, etc.
Verify
The intention of the Ancestry family tree services is to help you find information about your ancestor, by not only giving you access to specific documentation, but also allowing you to utilize the information provided by other users. However, they are not responsible to verify the truth of any information posted, nor should they be.
It is up to you, the user, to verify that the information you find is the truth. Simply copying from another user who shares the same relative as you is no different than copying your friend's homework in High School. You are trusting that they have written down the correct test answer.
Should you follow an incorrect or irrelevant lead, this could cause you a lot of wasted time and risk triggering further errors on you family tree.
Likewise, other users are trusting you to only enter correct information. Should you not be completely sure of something, it is always a good idea to add a note somewhere stating this. For example, your heard a family rumour that Great Uncle Sven was born in Finland, but you can't find any paperwork about him from that country.
Locate and cite the actual documentation.
It is better to be as thorough as possible and enter as much information as you can gather about one person at a time when building your family tree.
When you are doing research about your ancestor, try to locate specific legal documentation about them. Some options include: birth certificate, marriage certificate, immigration passenger lists, military service lists, etc.
It is a good idea to cast a wide net and set your initial parameters with several variables. For example, the papers that your Grandma gave you have a note that says that Great Uncle Sven immigrated to Canada in 1873. But when you search through passenger lists, there doesn't look to be any ships that travelled between Finland and Canada 1873. When you widen your search, you then discover that Great Uncle Sven's name is listed on a passenger list of 1875.
Work on one ancestor at a time.
Enter as much information as you can about that person into your family tree, including all names, important dates, and the names of their direct family. If you have any photos, scan and upload these, then at your discretion, share them with other users. Not only is it nice to upload pictures of the actual person, you also might want to post pictures of that person's gravestone, house, car, or other things associated with them. Remember the reason you wanted to build your family tree.
Research historical context
In order to learn the character of an ancestor, take some time to research their environment during the dates when they lived. If you have a picture of Great Uncle Sven and he is wearing a uniform, search for military service records. Was he religious? If so, what denomination? Were there any civil clashes in the area where he lived and was he involved in them? You should always think about the geographical location and the timeframe when this person was alive.
Use outside resources.
Although our modern society now allows us to simply use the Internet to find a large amount of our family history records, there remain some resources that you may wish to physically locate. For example, the only written record of a marriage may only be listed in a book on a shelf in a small-town church. In this case, if you research churches in the area where your ancestor resided, and narrow them down by denomination and dates of construction and operation, you should be able to narrow down which church a record might be located. Then you can Google search for the caretaker/minister/etc. of that church and ask if there are any written records located there.
Think Outside the Box.
Does a male in your family have hemophilia? This disease is caused from an inherited gene, most often coming from the mother's family branch. It is also rumoured to have evolved from the inbreeding of the British Royal Family. Therefore, if someone in your family has hemophilia, they could also be in the line of succession of a monarchy.
Slow down and enjoy getting to know your Family.
Examine, analyze and appreciate all the information you find. It might be a fun activity to build your family tree with other family members beside you, looking for similar family traits. Point out that Great Great Grandma Heidi has a cat sitting in her lap in the photo that looks a lot like your daughter's. Utilize Google by typing in a location and date to find pictures of the world that that person lived in.
No Expectations.
Warning: you may also come across upsetting information when researching your family tree. In 2018 the Golden State Killer was finally identified using a new research method called 'Forensic Genealogy'. The DNA of the killer was followed through his family tree, eventually getting to his specific family tree branch. Then investigators can use that lead to narrow down their suspects. All serial killers had parents, and all humans are flawed. Considering, as mentioned above, you could end up with hundreds or thousands of names listed in your tree, there is a high percentage that you may find some scandals.
Appreciate your work.
When I complete a jigsaw puzzle, I will usually leave it completed on the table for a few days before I take it down. Schedule in time to use your purchased Ancestry account properly, and go back and review the people whose profile you've completed. I find looking through my Family Tree online gives me the same warm feeling as walking through the cemetery.
What do I do when I reach a dead end?
When you've exhausted all of your leads looking for information about an ancestor, Agent K Private Investigations Inc. offers a person location service. Whether a person is currently alive or dead, the same investigative method is applied to try to locate them. You will be provided with a full report of findings providing a biography on your person. www.agentkpi.ca
