Discover the enormous array of genealogy resources available for researching your family history. Several tutorials are available online to help you get started. To learn the important techniques of record gathering, consider taking a free online genealogy course: RootsWeb's Guide to Tracing Family Trees & Researching Your Family Tree .
Before you begin, develop a clear method of organizing documents and notes. To organize ancestor names and important dates, consider downloading family tree charts and research logs at Ancestry.com and Family Tree Magazine . |
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| 1. Once you've gathered names ... from interviews, you're ready to search the Social Security Death Index . This database, managed by the Social Security Administration, can provide you with the birth date, death date and last residence for some ancestors. The index only contains the names of people whose deaths were reported to the Social Security Administration, not everyone who had a Social Security card. Most people in the database died after 1962. If you find a relative in the database, you can get a copy of their original Social Security application, which contains place of birth and parents' names. | 1A. The census is an invaluable resource to genealogists. They help locate the family at a given time in a certain place, which is particularly helpful for families that moved around often. Some census data has been transcribed on the Internet at sites such as Census Online and the USGenWeb Census Project . However, the bulk of census records must be perused at a state or county library. The National Archives and Family History Centers also have microfiche of census documents up to 1930. |
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2. Now you can begin researching the places your ancestors lived ... The USGenWeb Project maintains genealogy sites for every state and county in the United States. If your ancestors emigrated from another country, consult the WorldGenWeb , which maintains informative sites for almost every nation. Other helpful resources can be found in GenealogySpot's Country and State sections and at these sites: |
2A. Military records, passenger ship lists, cemeteries, wills, land records and obituaries may provide additional pieces to the puzzle. RootsWeb and Family Search maintain good online databases of such materials. Additional Sources: |
3. While you conduct your research, it can be helpful to communicate with other amateur genealogists. Posting a message on a forum dedicated to your surname can lead to new clues. Gen Forum and the RootsWeb Message Boards are two forums where researchers share information.
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Social Security Death Index |
Family History Ctr. Locator |
There is additional documentation that you may want to research that is not available on the Internet, but can be located at libraries and archives. State and local libraries have genealogy guides, local history books and newspaper archives that are unavailable anywhere else.
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