Writing your own Genealogy

I am often asked: “Where does one start from to write their own genealogy.” Researching your family history can be a hugely rewarding journey of discovery. A person not afraid to depart from the myths, folklores and mistruths to discover facts however irrelevant seeming and rebuild an orderly and honest account of the remembrance of other people’s lives will excel. For the dreamy persons whom sail closer to the stories they find interesting, may perhaps achieve greater profit by re-writing these accounts in fiction. This is not a criticism, but an observation of where motivations lie. Far too many begin genealogy without asking necessary questions of what they aim to discover. This is not a question that needs asking, for the suitability motivated will already know whether the need to know exceeds their need for sleep and overarches their own questions of what their family’s interaction with the world may mean for their own life today.

The tools to write your own family history are straightforward. Begin with what you already know. Begin with you. I recommend an ordinary spreadsheet for recording the lineage chart. Just record the basic details as I have done, and do not despair at all with the abundance of blank fields. This will focus your research to find the answer to the missing gaps. It is basically your map of where to focus next.

Then begin with an ordinary word document. Create a chapter for each main person, who represents the next generation in your lineage. I would discourage writing a chapter for every person on your chart. It becomes too broad, irrelevant and distracts the readers focus from who are the main players. Certainly mentioning these people as parts of the biography of the heads of each family is necessary, and entirely appropriate. Too many people you will interview will want their families history to be included in full. Retain your focus, using the lineage chart as your map, while encouraging these peoples to write their own histories. 

I do not recommend software that helps you write family histories or design lineage charts. There are two main problems with this. Firstly control, you will become very particular about how you wish to present your findings. A specialised program may help you start the project but will be frustrating and demoralising when you reach the point of it being inefficient and insufficient for meeting your needs. The second issue is survivability of your work. Should you pass on, it is important that someone can carry on your work. If it is held in a specialised software program you have much less chance that it will survive, that even should they persist to gain access to the information, that they will handle it in same way or even bother to extract information to another format. You can be guaranteed that by using common software tools, someone will have knowledge and respect for your work to carry it forward.

As you write the history it is crucial to reference throughout it the source of your information. I would therefore record in a second spreadsheet every book, map, video, website, database researched in your task. Whether successful or unsuccessful in revealing data. Otherwise you will waste enormous effort revisiting the same records five or ten years down the road. If you allocate a serial number to your database of records searched, then you can scribble this number on any printed copies you may have retained. This way a piece of information that you did not know the relevance of, you can reference much later, when you find a place to add the information to your book. Once you have begun by properly recording and assembling all the information that you presently know, you can be adequately prepared to be ready to receive and include further information. 

The last tip is to print a finished copy early. It is the surest way to elicit criticisms. Everyone who was slow to assist during the early draft stage, will pick up the finished copy and tell you in no uncertain terms of any inaccuracies. It is the quickest way to get your book completed by finishing an early print version prematurely. Your second edition will then be fairly accurate.