Heritage Album

What is the best website to get started making a family tree?

I am just getting started with this project, and am getting in touch with other people with the same last name. I would like to start by allowing people to sign up for a user name and adding information to the tree, eventually connecting the family lines.

Public Comments

1. Edit: I have corrected my link. My answer is lengthy and I apologize for that but I want to warn you of the advantages and the pitfalls of genealogy on the internet. We get your question many time a day. So I have cut and am pasting an answer. Here is a link to various websites, some free, some not http://www.progenealogists.com/top50genealogy2008.htm Websites that only have family trees are not worth a tinker's curse unless you are willing to verify the information with documents/records. They are subscriber submitted, very seldom documented and if they are they are poorly documented. You frequently will see the different info on the same people from different subscribers. Then you will see the absolute same info on the same people from different subscribers but you would be very foolish if you thought for one moment that that means it is correct. A lot of people copy without verifying. The information can be useful as clues only as to where to get the documentation. Right before Christmas of 2008, I found out I was dead. So was my sister and my brother-in-law. We died in New Jersey. Since the only time my sister and I were ever in New Jersey is when our family drove through it coming from New York in 1957. It was the same year Hurricane Audrey hit in our part of the world. Hey! we had been dead for 51 years. It says so on the internet. It has to be right if it is on the internet! I found out that family on both sides married and died in New Jersey. Since my ancestry is mostly southern American colonial with some exceptions and those exceptions came in through southern ports, I was surprised. This tree would have been accepted by any genealogy website. You can make up an entirely fictitious family tree and it will be accepted. You disagree with something someone has on one of your family members, the websites will tell you that it is between you and the other subscriber. Now the best for the total amount of records online isn't free but your public library might have a subscription to it. That is Ancestry.Com. Still be careful about the information in their family trees. CyndisList.com is a website with links to many other websites, some free and some not. Many people involved in genealogy find it helpful. Not all records are online but the ones you will find will save you time and money traveling to courthouses, libraries etc. However your first free source is your own family. Get information from them. Tape your senior members if they will let you. People who do this state they go back and listen to the tape again after doing research and hear things they didn't hear the first time around. I am not saying they won't be confused or wrong on some things. Find out if anybody in your family has any old family bibles. Ask to see and make copies of birth, marriage and death certificates. Depending on the religious faith, baptismal, first communion, confirmation and marriage certificates from their church can be helpful. A good free source is a Family History Center at a Latter Day Saints(Mormon) Church. They have records on people all over the world, not just Mormons. In Salt Lake City, they have the world's largest genealogical collection. Their FHCs can order microfilm for you to view at a nominal fee. They won't try to convert you, at least they haven't done so to me or anyone else that I know. Just call the nearest Mormon Church or visit their free website, FamilySearch.org, to get their hours for the general public. Rootsweb and FamilySearch.org are 2 free sites but remember verify information in family trees with documents/records. If you don't you don't know whether it is accurate or not.
2. see the following websites
3. Yeah, well, that's a nice idea, but the idea of genealogy is to find ancestors, and hopefully there is some kind of credence that they are, indeed, one's ancestors! While official records are not really accurate (there goal is to control people, not aid in genealogical research), official records, church records, family Bibles, etc., plus historical records are the best we have to go on. So, here is my short list: You should start by asking all your living relatives about family history. Then, armed with that information, you can go to your public library and check to see if it has a genealogy department. Most do nowadays; also, don't forget to check at community colleges, universities, etc. Our public library has both www.ancestry.com and www.heritagequest.com free for anyone to use (no library card required). Another place to check out is any of the Mormon's Family History Centers. They allow people to search for their family history (and, NO, they don't try to convert you). A third option is one of the following websites: http://www.searchforancestors.com/... http://www.censusrecords.net/?o_xid=2739... www dot usgenweb dot com/ www dot census dot gov/ http://www.rootsweb.com/ www dot ukgenweb dot com/ www dot archives dot gov/ http://www.familysearch.org/ http://www.accessgenealogy.com/... http://www.cyndislist.com/ www dot geni dot com/ Cyndi's has the most links to genealogy websites, whether ship's passenger lists, ancestors from Africa, ancestors from the Philippines, where ever and whatever. Of course, you may be successful by googling: "john doe, born 1620, plimouth, massachusetts" as an example. Good luck and have fun! Check out this article on five great free genealogy websites: www dot associatedcontent dot com/article... Then there is the DNA test; if you decide you want to REALLY know where your ancestors came from opt for the DNA test. Besides all the mistakes that officials commonly make, from 10% to 20% of birth certificates list the father wrong; that is, mama was doing the hanky-panky and someone else was the REAL father. That won't show up on the internet or in books; it WILL show up in DNA. I used www.familytreedna.com which works with the National Geographics Genotype Program. Good luck!
4. Friendly tip... Assuming that all persons with the same name to be related, is incorrect. You are assuming that all of the lines will connect, and that just does not always happen. Genealogy is about your ancestors, and the vast majority of them will not have the last name as you do. Identify your grandparents, using the birth name for the women.. and this immediately becomes clear. This is YOUR family tree. You do this by using (first) your personal documents ie birth/death cert, then branch out to other documents that directly relate to those persons. From experience.. your idea of allowing any person to "add" to the tree is open to chaos. The one thing that makes your research reliable is the effort that YOU put into finding quality records, and knowing the original source of the info. When you have numerous persons adding info.. I predict it will take about a month before you have several persons giving conflicting "facts", and no way to verify which fact is accurate. (no, there cannot be 3 dates of birth for a person). I have shared work and sources with other persons in the past, and had good results (and bad). My database/ files remain under my control, and nothing is added, that I don't personally have a source for. There ARE surname projects out there, and in SOME cases (a rare name or very small family), the relationships are there. However, it is critical that you have already worked your own ancestry first, and have some background as to how to find the records that are involved. edit govt records are just one type of item that is used in research, and they have errors, just as any other ones. They just need evaluating (all records do).
5. try ancestry.com. i use it everyday. of course you will need an account but you can make your family tree and also view census records as well as birth, death, marriage and immigration records too. its outstanding!!