Simple Steps Toward Preserving Your Family History

January 13, 2000 (FREMONT, CALIFORNIA) — As the new millennium dawns, many of us feel a sense of nostalgia about the past, and a desire to keep it alive for future generations. The pursuit of family history — called "genealogy" — has never been easier than now, thanks to home computers, affordable software, and Internet access.

"Family tree research that used to take months or years can now be accomplished in minutes or hours via the Internet," says Rob Armstrong, CEO of Genealogy.com, a decade-long leader in the genealogy technology space.

To preserve your family history, follow the steps below to learn how easy it is to get started. Before you know it, you'll be calling yourself a "genealogist."

• Record What You Already Know
  The information that you already have probably includes the names, birth dates and birthplaces of your close relatives, along with other facts. To start growing your family tree, all you need to do is record what you know.
  
  Start by collecting information about relatives closest to you, which may include you, your children, and your grandchildren. Collect facts such as full names, birth dates, birthplaces, marriage dates, marriage places, death dates and death places, if applicable. Then, start working backwards with your parents, grandparents, and so on, as far back as you can remember. Take these facts and enter them into a family tree software program such as the best-selling "Family Tree Maker" software from Broderbund.

• Collect Information from Relatives
  Next, ask family members for any information they can remember. Many family tree software programs allow you to print blank worksheets that help capture the information you need. When you talk to relatives, ask for information about other relatives as well as themselves. Another source of information can be close family friends. You may be surprised by who knows what about whom in your family.

• Find Previous History on Your Family
  The next step is to check for information that has already been compiled about your family, including family and local histories, genealogies, pedigrees, articles in periodicals, and collections of family papers. You can find this research with the help of libraries, or you can visit a number of different Web sites, such as www.genealogy.com, where you can search for information by surname or region, and join discussion groups where you can share information about specific family names. These Web sites will also help you learn about other resources available to you.

Nothing is more precious than family, so recording and preserving family history is one of the most special legacies you can leave behind.

###

The National Endowment for the Humanities, in partnership with the White House Millennium Council, has created a guidebook of resources for preserving family history, called My History Is America's History -- Things You Can Do to Save America's Stories, which can be obtained at www.myhistory.org.

Contact Genealogy.com