Taking Time for Genealogy

Where, or rather, WHO do you come from? Seems like these days a lot of people don’t care. But, as the poet John Donne wrote, “no man is an island.”

I’m half German and half Irish. I know very little of my Irish side because my dad’s side of the family did not keep many of their memories passed down and my paternal grandparents passed away before I was born. Asking questions; therefore, was not an option. In the 1990’s, my father went to Ireland to learn more about his heritage and I do have a bit of genealogy information from those trips, but I do not possess nearly the amount of history on that side of the family as I do for my mom’s side.

Maybe it is because of my mother’s own fondness for the stories of old that have kept those stories alive. I remember her sitting me down from time to time with papers and books and telling me about people I’d never met. She would tell me how my great-greats came to this country and how the register of the boat they traveled on is on display in a museum. She told me about children who died and took me to graves. She told stories of her own childhood…of sliding down laundry shoots and her months of confinement due to polio.

As I grow older myself, I am much more interested in these stories. My mother was recently sharing her stories with me and I thought, “Why don’t we compile these into a book of sorts?” I have a terrible memory so a book like this would help me tremendously. You see, there will come a time when my mom won’t be around for me to ask her to tell me “one more time” who these people are. If I don’t get it written down now, I may be the one who loses the memories in our family.

So, this past week I set about compiling the genealogy on my mom’s maternal side. I’m not doing much extra research besides gathering a few maps and a more complete picture of historical facts surrounding my family’s departure from their German Mennonite village in Russia. Everything else is straight from my mom’s previously gathered documents and the memories she has of what she was told.

I have page after page of copied pictures and stories, all with sticky notes adorning them because I can’t remember diddly and have to use sticky notes to supplement my brain power. I had mom come earlier in the week to sit with me as I typed and arranged so I could be certain I had things right. Once finished, mom is going to take the pages to a place like Office Max and have them copied (for my siblings) and comb-bound.

While this isn’t necessarily the easiest project, I believe it is an important one. It is also relatively inexpensive. You could have a nice compilation of your family’s history for just a few dollars.

So, what if you don’t have any documents to compile? Well, here’s an idea that doesn’t require extensive research. My husband is going to take a tape recorder and sit down with his granny and his great-aunt and have each of them tell all the stories they can remember. From there, I’ll type up the stories, print them off and comb-bind them with a title like Granny’s Stories or Family Memories. So, even though his family does not have the documentation my family does, he can still preserve the memories.

This also makes for a great Homeschooling History project (with some Grammar thrown in!) Have one of the children head up the project. Have them conduct the interview with their grandparent. Have your budding typist type the information. Have your graphic-designer child design a cover for the booklet. You could even take it one step further and set up a page at Tribal Pages.com. Hopefully, in the end, you’ve instilled an awareness, if not a love for their family history.

Here are a few resources to get you started:

Free Family Tree Pages HERE and HERE

Tribal Pages (online family tree website)

Family History Interview

Genealogy Clip Art

Beyond this, all you really need is an older family member, a word processing program, printer paper, and a little bit of effort! I guarantee you won’t be sorry you took the time to learn more about your genealogy.