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What Is Family History Research?

What Is Family History Research? Family history research is an exploration of the past to uncover stories that have been hidden for generations. It's more than just tracing your lineage back to a distant relative; it's about understanding where you come from and how your family has shaped who you are today. In this article, we'll delve into what family history research entails, why it matters, and how anyone can embark on their own journey of discovery. To begin with, our families hold a wealth of information about our ancestors - their origins, struggles, triumphs and even secrets. By exploring these stories through documents like census records, birth certificates or military service files, we can piece together a puzzle that reveals important insights not only about our individual lives but also about the larger society in which they lived. Moreover, by learning about our forebears' experiences and resilience in overcoming challenges such as discrimination or poverty

Where to find useful websites for researching your family history

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Introduction to useful sites for family history research So, you are researching your family history! You may be a newcomer to the hobby or you may have already made great progress. One thing is for sure, all of us doing family history research need good sources of information. These days we have the wonderful world wide web and numerous online sources that can prove very useful in our research. Of course, you can cough up a monthly or annual subscription to one of the paid Family History sites such as Ancestry, MyHeritage and FindMyPast (there are several others too). I have used several of these over the years and currently MyHeritage is the one I subscribe too though I have free accounts on others (limited features of course but still useful). However, this post is not about which paid site you should go for (that's a whole topic in and of itself) - maybe the next one). Instead this is to share some of the free sites that I have found useful. First up is Historic UK Historic UK

Introduction

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Landguard Point Fort, Felixstowe Welcome to my blog about researching your ancestry ( family history ). I hope to post information that will be of use to anyone researching their family history. As I live in Essex ( UK ) I will be mainly posting about Essex-related matters but I am originally from Lancashire , with family roots going back to Yorkshire as well. So, I intend to include information related to those areas too. As a big fan of computers and the internet I will post about software and sites too that will be useful to anyone searching for more information about the ancestors. Another interest of mine is photography and we all like to have photos of our ancestors. I sometimes buy old postcards and have a small collection of photographs of people unrelated to myself (as far as I know anyway) and will be posting some of these on the site too. Related articles by Zemanta Aussies are branching out into history (news.theage.com.au) Need a source? Canadian Ce

FamilySearch.Org - free family history search

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Image by paparutzi via Flickr FamilySearch .Org is a website provided by  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . You can search your family history for free and as  FamilySearch is the largest genealogy  organisation in the world there are plenty of records for you to explore. Every day millions of people use FamilySearch records, resources, and services to learn more about their family history. They have been collating data now for over 100 years, You can also use any of over 4,500 family history centers in 70 countries to do your research, though many find the web a convenient way to do their research. Check out their site at FamilySearch Related articles New FamilySearch Forum (seattlefhc.com) FamilySearch.org is fostering third party innovation (bloggingdave.wordpress.com) "Super Indexing Sunday" Breaks World Record With 2 Million Records Indexed in a Day (staynalive.com) FamilySearch.org To Discuss Living/Dead Relationship Technology With New Ro

BBC Online Resources

The BBC often has programs on Family History (such as Who Do You Think You Are?). What a lot of folk don't realise is that they have plenty of online resources for anyone researching heir family history. Why not pop along and check out the site now and find topics such as: Get Started Family History Trail What's in a Name? Next Steps Genetic Genealogy Research Timeline Military ... Your Photos Family Trees Messageboard

DNA Research and Family History

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Image via Wikipedia Most of us are happy to discover something about our grand-parents and great- grandparents when researching our family history . When we start to dig deeper in our family history we would probably be over the moon if we discovered details of our family history as far back as the 16th century or even the 15th century . One reason for this is the difficulty of research this far back, with the types of records being available not one you can easily gain access to and also due to the relative paucity of records prior to the early 1800's. Parish records can go back quite a way before this of course but unless you are related to the aristocracy or royalty, chances are the will be few records available for your ancestors . So, how would you feel about tracing your ancestors back 40,000 years? Impossible, you may think. Well, think again. With advances in DNA research it's becoming more common everyday for genetic lines to be followed back further in history.

Genealogy Research Tools Online

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Image via CrunchBase Isn't the web amazing! There is so much stuff out there and new web sites and pages are being added every day by the thousands. According to Netcraft.com , there are over 227 million websites in the world and in September so far another 14 million were added to world wide web. So, chances are that some of those are about genealogy and indeed, a Google search for 'genealogy' produces  almost 43 million hits. Its no surprise then that you will find excellent resources online to help you with your genealogical research . One such site is http://www.geneasearch.com/ Although the look of the site is fairly basic, its very functional and so its relatively easy to navigate. Her's what they say about themselves: "Looking for free genealogy look ups, tips, databases, free searches, photos, links, family newsletters, genealogy freebies, biographies, beginners, and much more to help find your ancestors and surnames? Genealogy research can be gre