(From GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION – National Archives and Records Service – GSA CD 01906543)
GENEALOGICAL RESEARCH - - HOW TO BEGIN
As
the depository of the Federal Government’s records deemed of permanent value
for historical purposes, the National Archives houses many records that can be
helpful to persons who wish to trace their ancestry.
The search, however, cannot be completed at the National Archives.
Other depositories must be visited. The
following are suggestions about what you can do to find your ancestors:
START WITH YOURSELF
You are the beginning “twig” on your
family tree. Start with yourself,
the known, and work toward your unknown “roots”.
Find out the vital information about your parents, write it down, then
look for data about your grandparents, great-grandparents, etc.
NAMES, DATES, PLACES, RELATIONSHIPS
You will be concerned with pulling from
the many and varied documents of recorded history, four key items:
names, dates, places, and relationships.
These are the tools of the family searcher.
People can be identified in records by their names, the dates of events
in their lives (birth, marriage, death), the places they lived, and by
relationships to others either stated or implied in the records.
HOME SOURCES
The place to begin is at home.
Here you will find much information in family Bibles, newspaper
clippings, military certificates, birth and death certificates, marriage
licenses, diaries, letters, scrapbooks, backs of pictures, baby books, etc.
RELATIVES AS SOURCE
Visit or write those in your family who
may have information, particularly older relatives.
More often than not others before you have already gathered family data.
You should write a letter, make a personal visit and/or a telephone
survey to find out about such persons and what information is already collected.
FINDING DISTANT RELATIVES
Before launching your research program
in libraries and archives, search for distant
relatives who may have already performed research.
Advertise your family interests in the national, regional and local
genealogical magazines. Such
periodicals are usually available in public libraries.
CHURCH RECORDS
A few churches have records of important
events in the lives of members but many do not.
Investigate the possibility of finding genealogical data in the records
of the church to which your ancestor belonged.
BIRTH, MARRIAGE and DEATH RECORDS
Some states began to keep records of
birth and death earlier, but for most of the United States, birth and death
registration became a requirement around the turn of the century, about
1890-1915. Before that time these
events will be found recorded generally only in church records and family
Bibles. Marriages will be
found recorded in most counties,
dating often as early as the establishment of the county.
DEEDS AND WILLS
Records of property acquisition and
disposition can be good sources of genealogical data.
Such records are normally in the county courthouses.
Often the earliest county records or copies of them are also available in
the State Archives.
FEDERAL RECORDS
The National Archives in
LIBRARIES, SOCIETIES, ARCHIVES
Visit the State, regional and local
institutions in your area. Libraries,
historical and genealogical societies and archival depositories are all good
sources for genealogical and family history data.
Be sure to find out what books are available on how to do genealogical
research.