Tips and Resources for Researching Your Family History

These days people are looking for more and more information on their family heritage. It is pretty interesting knowledge to have, not to mention useful if you can track their medical history as well. I have found it very useful to search the web, and not just in the obvious places. I also like all the different ideas people are willing to share about their type of family trees.

Finding your family tree can be easy or hard depending on how you start, your best bet is to make some sort of an outline as to what you want it to look like. And using Microsoft Office OneNote is very helpful in keeping your notes organized until you are ready to input it into the tree.

Then you have to figure out if you want an electronic tree or paper tree. Electronic trees are nice for the bulky family trees, some also offer the option of inputting pictures and letters. I personally like to use electronic trees so that I can keep it all on disc and make multiple copies in less time.

A paper tree tends to be a bit more simple, you basically only want to put down names and dates, unless creating a binder which can be nice. If you choose to do the binder you best bet is to index as much as possible, so it is organized and easy to read. You may also choose a binder because it can hold original documents rather than scans, which is very cool.

I have compiled a list of resources and ideas that may help in your quest to figuring out your family history.

Websites And Forums:

Ancestry.com- Though this site is a bit pricey, they do offer a free trial to see if you have a use for their database. I lucked out because somebody had already inputted most of one side of my family, which it is not uncommon for that to happen, given the growing population interested in their family history.

Familysearch.org- This site is free to use, and is very resourceful. Founded by the Church of LSD, they also have centers with local information that you can visit. Though their isn't many original documents online, you may find them at the centers. They also have free downloadable Software to store your family tree.