Hi
Just wanted to add a word of encouragement to other 'beginners'...
I started tracing my family tree in November 2004, after my late dad's cousin's step-son (
) came across a battered old bible from the late 19thC that related to my dad's family. It included about a dozen notes for family births which offered me a flying start into starting to trace my tree.
At first, I didn't know where to begin, but fortunately someone pointed me in the direction of this site. Over the last four months I've somehow transmogrified from a Rootschat 'newbie' to a 'veteran', had more fun than I could ever have imagined, and managed to add 576 people to my family tree.
Looking at my tree last night, I found that I have the details for 28 of a possible 32 gg grandparents, and for 30 of a possible 64 ggg grandparents - one, alas, is an illegitimate birth and I think I can take this no further. For one line, I have details going back as far as 1668 - my 9x grandfather.
I'm not writing this to in any way brag (although I was quietly chuffed when I looked at this last night
, but to let other beginners (of whom I count myself one, after just 4 months!) know what is possible.
All of my work has been done primarly from home and using my PC, with the help of:
Rootschat.com
Familysearch.org
Ancestry.co.uk
GenesReunited.com
Google.com
plus a few other sites.
Of most help has undoubtedly been Rootschat - whether this has been individual lookups that people have done for me, encouragement and advice on how to take things further, simply having a laugh (the Lighterside on Rootschat is a wonderful place!) or 'meeting' other family historians.
I 'keep' my tree on Genersreunited, and through this have made contact with dozens of people who are tracing different parts of my own tree,and in this way have been able to advance some lines by many generations.
I'm now at the stage where I'm going to have to start off as a beginner all over again - where the only way will be to look at some of the parish records that aren't on familysearch.org. This is where it will start to get time-consuming, I'm sure!
Anyway - newbie's take heart!
best wishes
Paul
