Tracing your Heritage Part 1 An Overview Tracing your Heritage Part 1 John Samuels March 2011

Definitions… An-ces-tor: one from whom a person descends, either through the father or the mother, at any distance of time. Gen-e-al-o-gy: an account or history of the descent of a person or family from an ancestor; pedigree; lineage. Her-i-tage: something handed down from one’s ancestors or the past, as a characteristic, culture or tradition.

But, why? To fill in all the details you should have asked about when growing up, but didn’t To find relatives you didn’t even know you had To provide a feeling of continuity To preserve family data for your descendents To provide insight into medical problems To do detective work

How I got started… Aunt Sis and Aunt Sister’s Book Early Attempts Family Tree Maker

Sources… Your own recollections Sisters, brothers, mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, cousins, and their friends… Family bibles, diaries, birth, marriage and death certificates, correspondence Photos, films, handed-down stories, items Registry offices, churches, synagogues, schools

Other Sources… Internet: Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormon church) FamilySearch.org Boards.ancestry.com, boards.rootsweb.com Google, Intellius ($), etc. Ancestry.com ($)

Getting it all organized… A notebook and pencil A program Family Historian (shareware) Gramps Family Legacy Tree Family Tree Builder GEDTree Family Tree Maker

The Willy Samuels Mystery The Greeting Card 1966

Initial Info… What my father told me… What my mother told me… 2 brothers, 2 sisters What my mother told me… “Willy? We brought him and his family over from Germany before the war.”

Plan… Search for William, Willy, Wilhelm, Willi, etc. An idea… Only found 1944 name change document – William Nathan Samuel to William Samuels Dead End An idea… Jackpot!

Gerhard Kurt

Then… Put out a message on the SAMUEL boards looking for Kurt and Gerhard. Added info to my tree and published it. Contacted by Arnold Samuels of WA. In the army he changed his name from Kurt to Arnold and added the “S”. His father, Wilhelm Samuel came over two years later. I finally found his record. Arnold shared his whole ancestry tree with me, filling in all the info from Max (my grandfather’s brother) on down, and much else.

Justin Weinshenk The Search The Message Response! The Story

Family Tree Maker Purchased software to capture, schedule, research, print, and share your ancestry Build descendent and ancestry charts Save, import or export your data Link to online services ($) to search over 6 billion records – birth, death, census, passport, immigration, etc. Well integrated.

Tracing your Heritage Part 2 An Overview Tracing your Heritage Part 2 John Samuels November 2011

Getting Started Obtain forms Fill out the Ancestor chart for: Yourself, your parents, your grandparents Your spouse, his or her parents and grandparents Use Family Group Sheet for recording more facts Do the research (Bible, letters and papers, recollections, Libraries, government records, Google, etc.) Expand your history and include your children and grandchildren

Bottom line… Professional researchers use many forms and tools Unless you have unlimited time and funds, you are better off using a PC program integrated with online search tools

FamilyTreeMaker Ancestry.com A PC-based program which includes all the tools of the professional researcher . Ancestry.com Ftm 2012 $40 basic, $80 with books, CDs. Ancestry.com US $13 x 12 = $156, Int’l $25 x 12 = $300 An online database of over 6,000,000 records of use to genealogical researchers.

Ancestry.com Learning Center Starting your tree: http://learn.ancestry.com/BuildTree/BuildTreeLND.aspx?aid=3 Searching: http://learn.ancestry.com/GetStarted/GetStartedLND.aspx?aid=1

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