Connections
One of the best things about researching the family tree is remaking family connections.
For me I've made several contacts with people to discuss my family history with.
While I may say I'm the keeper of the tree, seriously, there are many tree keepers. I feel I'm responsible for my keeping my Dad's history going ... but there are other cousins out there nurturing and tending to their own branch on the family tree. So in reality, I guess I'm just the "keeper of a branch" ...
As I search into the tree I am amazed by the number of cousins I have out there who are adding their bit. Some share and share and share and it gives you a buzz to be able to share back with them! I've got two family members who have basically provided me with the stories and details of two branches of my tree. Here is where I need to acknowledge the fine work of one Daffyd Cotter, what a marvelous man. I've had a lot of contact with this particular cousin, and he has given me pages and pages and pages of information, yet I probably know more about our shared Great Great grandfather then I actually know about him!! How strange.
Then there is cousin Pam ... I still don't really know her last name or even how I might contact her. I just assume in my hunt I'll cross her path. She met up with my dad once on her research into the family tree. He, being one of the "Last of the Laings" and living on the family property. Before my father died she sent him a parcel of birth/death/marriage details. Without these clues I think I may not have had much luck starting off.
Then there is Cousin Ian. Somehow his mother and my grandmother are the same person ... yet they were definitely two different people. It was his family tree I literally found within minutes of starting my first internet search.
Have you found those "dead spots" in your trees .. where the records just can't be easilly accessed? For me it's anyone born 1911-1930 in Australia ... we can't access those records, and they're too young to have married ... god forbid they've died too young, or for the women before they've married (though it helps with the search!).
Cousin Ian has given me a whole family tree ... it just makes me sad that in my search for family, he may have lost the one he called his own. Take care Ian, you'll always be my cousin .. and one day, by jove, we'll prove it!!
For me I've made several contacts with people to discuss my family history with.
While I may say I'm the keeper of the tree, seriously, there are many tree keepers. I feel I'm responsible for my keeping my Dad's history going ... but there are other cousins out there nurturing and tending to their own branch on the family tree. So in reality, I guess I'm just the "keeper of a branch" ...
As I search into the tree I am amazed by the number of cousins I have out there who are adding their bit. Some share and share and share and it gives you a buzz to be able to share back with them! I've got two family members who have basically provided me with the stories and details of two branches of my tree. Here is where I need to acknowledge the fine work of one Daffyd Cotter, what a marvelous man. I've had a lot of contact with this particular cousin, and he has given me pages and pages and pages of information, yet I probably know more about our shared Great Great grandfather then I actually know about him!! How strange.
Then there is cousin Pam ... I still don't really know her last name or even how I might contact her. I just assume in my hunt I'll cross her path. She met up with my dad once on her research into the family tree. He, being one of the "Last of the Laings" and living on the family property. Before my father died she sent him a parcel of birth/death/marriage details. Without these clues I think I may not have had much luck starting off.
Then there is Cousin Ian. Somehow his mother and my grandmother are the same person ... yet they were definitely two different people. It was his family tree I literally found within minutes of starting my first internet search.
Have you found those "dead spots" in your trees .. where the records just can't be easilly accessed? For me it's anyone born 1911-1930 in Australia ... we can't access those records, and they're too young to have married ... god forbid they've died too young, or for the women before they've married (though it helps with the search!).
Cousin Ian has given me a whole family tree ... it just makes me sad that in my search for family, he may have lost the one he called his own. Take care Ian, you'll always be my cousin .. and one day, by jove, we'll prove it!!
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