RootsChat.Com
General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: ATGoldsmith on Saturday 17 May 14 19:56 BST (UK)
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I started researching my family history two years ago when I was 14. I'm wondering how many other young people share my interest!
ATGoldsmith
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well done you :) in my experience including myself most people decide to do their family research when their relatives they could have asked info from have passed on
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You can see Rootschatters "ages" in Upcoming Calendar near the end of the page "Forum" although some are definitely fictitious. ;) Not too many in their 20s or 30s
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php
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Hi AT,
I started researching my family history when I was 21 and I got my first computer but sadly that was quite a few years ago.....!
My interest started after hearing family stories as a child told by my Great Uncles and Aunties that we were related to the Rolls Family of Manchester (Roll Royce) sadly this turned out not to be true. I was not disappointed as I have found each line interesting because they are part of my family ;)
What started off your interest?
Regards
Sarah :)
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I started a couple of years ago in my mid thirties. I have generally always been told how good it is that I started 'young', as so many people don't start until later in life, when previous generations are not around to be asked the important questions. I think it's great that you've started at your age!
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Wow! A lot of replies! ;)
I started my family history research, sadly when a previously unknown cousin of mine was murdered by her boyfriend and I was curious to know more about her. This lead me to draw up a family tree and I was amazed at the stories of my ancestors that I was told by my relatives.
I've recently made her a Find A Grave Memorial: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Peat&GSfn=Megan&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=129897033&df=all&
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Wow! A lot of replies! ;)
I started my family history research, sadly when a previously unknown cousin of mine was murdered by her boyfriend and I was curious to know more about her. This lead me to draw up a family tree and I was amazed at the stories of my ancestors that I was told by my relatives.
I've recently made her a Find A Grave Memorial: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Peat&GSfn=Megan&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=129897033&df=all&
I have had a look at the link , so sad a lovely young girl :)
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How sad :'( But how lovely that you were can so inspired by her untimely death...Do it in her memory 8)
I started researching 15 years ago when both my parents passed away and I started a folder of all their documents.
Carol
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I started at 15 (2008), still going at 21!
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Hi AT, I didn't start until my early 40's, by then my grandparents had passed away and there are so many questions I would love to have asked them. It is unusual for someone of your age to take an interest in their family history, so well done to you. You have the fantastic opportunity to talk to your older relatives, I am sure us older lot are all a little envious of that :D. Sometimes you get little gems from older relatives if you just let them tell you their memories rather than grilling them for info.
So sad about your cousin, it's good that you are keeping her memory alive on findagrave.
Jool
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Hi AT,
I started my research when I was about 21 after I was given the family bible. Being of a curious nosey nature I set about trying to find out more. Back in the day it was a case of much letter writing to vicars & then a visit to the church to trawl through the registers, usually not knowing what I was looking for ::) All of those letters & replies still remain with me to this day! You're lucky to be beginning your research in the days of the computer & online information.
I've uncovered some interesting stories over the years & hope to find more! I would love to have my parents & grandparents around to share my findings with.....or maybe they do know about them ;).....
Here's hoping you enjoy your hobby for many years to come,
Jane
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It can sometimes be daunting to start family history young but there may also be advantages.
I never really started but was born into family history. I was given the family surname as a forename to "keep the name alive", my uncle the last of the male line was killed in WW2.
I was then taught to write tracing original parish registers in the early 1950s and washed tombstones during holidays.
As others have said it may be possible to talk with older members of the family before they die, but don't take everything you are told as gospel and facts get confused and possibly exaggerated in time.
One suggestion I would make is to keep a daily diary, I never did but reading my mother's diaries has brought many memories flooding back.
Cheers
Guy
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I started in my 20s. It was made easier for me as my Mum was doing our tree so I first got involved helping her. It also helped that she worked at the local Record Office so going in there for the first time was not as daunting as it could have been. It's good to start early as if you have long gaps when other things are happening in your life you still have plenty of time to pick it up again, at least that's what I've found.
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"I wish I'd started earlier," probably something that a lot of genealogists say. By the time I became interested in, and had the time to devote to tracing my Family Tree, most of my older relatives had died. A chance remark by an elderly uncle, reminded me of the story my grandmother told me when I was much younger, about how her mother had drowned when the HMS Albion was launched on the Thames. I started up by following that and it opened up a whole new world.
My greatest regret, as Jane said, is not being able to share my findings with my parents and Grandparents. I often wonder if they knew they originated from Liverpool, Suffolk and Germany and not London as I'd been led to believe.
Enjoy your journey through your family history AT, and, as others have said, get as much information from your family as possible. Don't be left saying, as most of us are, "If only I'd asked."
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Hiya, I started when I was 20 (through boredom actually as I was on maternity leave waiting for my daughter to make an arrival - she was late, as she always is now too!).
That was 10 years ago now x
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I had a brief dabble when I was in my teens, because we found a Family Tree my grandfather (dead by then) had done quite a bit of research on. Then, sadly, like almost everyone else I did nothing until all the ones I ought to have asked were no longer there to ask.
I think what you're doing is great, and I do hope that all your relatives - even the distant ones that are only heard of via a card at Christmas - pile in and help you. Actually, I'm still trying to find out who was the person behind some of those cards my last parent posted off without fail each December - I know at least 2 she'd had no word from for ten years. I wrote to all the addresses in her address book when she died, explaining that she'd died, and mentioning that I really didn't know who/what the connection might be - I got no reply from many, and a "really not interested - we are related but I can't be bothered to tell you" from another. Don't get discouraged, but keep digging.
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I started when I was 16, but didn't get very far, then in my final year of University decided to research and put together a family tree for my grandad. I had one name and two dates to go from. In 3 months got a very long way back and was able to give my grandad a 40 page booklet on everything from surname origins to letters from his gran to the Army records office as she was not given her sons belongings for some 2 years after her was KIA on the Somme. The highlight was 2 photos showing 3 generations of his family, including his father as a young boy. It eventually led to two phonecalls with a cousin he had not seen since the war and a visit to the house where his grandmother was born . The house was still owned by a distant cousin and turned out to have been in the family for over 300 years. He had known none of this as his father had been very close lipped about his family.
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I started when I was 17 years old
I am now 22 and still doing research after five years. I have accumulated 350 pages of research and have gathered information on about five hundred relatives
I have traced the majority of the lineages to the late 1700s, the earliest lineage I have traced dates back to 800 AD
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Sirsimon How on earth do you get back to 800AD? That's amazing! Was it a gateway ancestor? If so that's very lucky indeed!
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I did the usual working backwards in time. It so happened that the line was well documented and could be traced to 800 ad
The person in question is related to me through my great grandmother
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I did the usual working backwards in time. It so happened that the line was well documented and could be traced to 800 ad
The person in question is related to me through my great grandmother
I would be very interested to know what documents you are talking about, as you say "well documented"
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iluleah I'm guessing that he is probably related to an aristocratic line as past about 200 years ago they were the only people who really had a very accurately documented family pedigree. If you then trace that line back to a so called gateway ancestor i.e. one with close connections to some of the oldest families you could conceivably date your ancestry back to someone like Charlemagne, who I guess is the ancestor in question at 800 AD.
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Or I am completely wrong, which does happen. Think I'm right about the ancestor in question here, though.
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I have traced the majority of the lineages to the late 1700s, the earliest lineage I have traced dates back to 800 AD
I am also impressed - have you seen these records and tracked back this far yourself or are you relying on the research of others
Rosie
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My maternal great grandmother was Evelyn Brain, using parish, birth, marriage and death records, as well as censuses, I got the Brain family back to Thomas Brayne, born 1665 in Stafford.
His wife was Catherine Cartledge, her mother being Lydia Adams
The Adams family can be traced back to 1272, to the Lords of Gavestone, Gloucestershire
The earliest traceable Adam married Elizabeth De Gournay, this family was well documented and much information about them can be found online on family societies.
If you follow the Gournay family, you will reach around 800 AD.
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My maternal great grandmother was Evelyn Brain, using parish, birth, marriage and death records, as well as censuses, I got the Brain family back to Thomas Brayne, born 1665 in Stafford.
His wife was Catherine Cartledge, her mother being Lydia Adams
The Adams family can be traced back to 1272, to the Lords of Gavestone, Gloucestershire
The earliest traceable Adam married Elizabeth De Gournay, this family was well documented and much information about them can be found online on family societies.
If you follow the Gournay family, you will reach around 800 AD.
So by "well documented" you mean you believe someone else has researched, proved, cited and you have accepted that.
I know how hard it is to prove connection and to find any connecting records before 1800 as you will be very aware the parish records very often do not show this like modern records do and having been given the privileged of access to the real manorial records of one family which they still hold, the same records that the Heralds on their visitation transcribed from, which many people use as primary records ( Heralds visitations) and being able to compare the two side by side along with the PRs, day book etc , the Heralds certainly in that county were as bad as the online copy and paste merchants of today marrying people off to other local 'noble' families where there is not record of it in the manorial records or the parish records, a name 'fitted' so they wrote it in, but there is no primary record to prove it at all.
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I am 22 years old. I started researching my ancestry seriously when I was about 18 (4 years ago roughly). I had always grown up with stories from my great grandmother about the 'old days'. We would have tea and discuss all the amazing tales she had seen and heard in her life. I started taking notes when I was 14 or 15 and did a few searches on the internet and for records, specifically regarding my German great-great-great grandfather. Not until I was 19 however and my great grandmother had just passed away did I decide to actually go beyond tales and memories to properly and seriously find things out for myself. :) I felt as if with her death the 'old days' where passing away and that I had a duty to keep the stories going.
But yes, you are not alone in starting genealogy young although we are probably in the minority. Come to think of it, you are so young that you make me feel old(ish) ;D
One of my cousins is in his late 20s and has actually just qualified as a professional genealogist after taking a Master's Degree in it. Another of my younger cousins is also really interested in everything too do with the family and he is only 13. I think that kids and young adults nowadays are more inquisitive by nature than older generations. My own parents knew very little about their family histories. We seem to have a more knowledge-based society today (ie with internet access etc.)
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I think its wonderful that more and more people are getting involved in genealogy, especially the younger generations.
Every single visit to the record offices, I have seen many elderly people, but no young adults like myself, except those on staff.
Its an odd sensation
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I think its wonderful that more and more people are getting involved in genealogy, especially the younger generations.
Every single visit to the record offices, I have seen many elderly people, but no young adults like myself, except those on staff.
Its an odd sensation
It has always been the same, when I visited the old records offices such as Somerset House as a boy in the 1950s, I always got funny looks from the staff and visitors.
Now having aged a couple of years or so I happily give youngsters the same funny looks as you may do in 40 or 50 years.
One thing I do laugh at is when family historians say "I wish I had got interested earlier, I could have asked grandma etc. this or that. I started early and wished I could ask my great grandma etc. just the same questions, starting young doesn't solve the quest to ask an earlier generation the same questions.
Cheers
Guy
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One thing I do laugh at is when family historians say "I wish I had got interested earlier, I could have asked grandma etc. this or that. I started early and wished I could ask my great grandma etc. just the same questions, starting young doesn't solve the quest to ask an earlier generation the same questions.
Cheers
Guy
Thanks Guy - that's made me feel a little better! Wise words :)
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I started my research in my early twenties, my interest started when Who Do You Think You Are started on telly. At the time my only surviving grand-parent had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's so realising that our family history was no longer just a conversation away I decided to start researching it. And I've been doing it on and off since then, there are times where I don't do any as life takes over but I always come back to it as it's so addictive!