Heritage Album

What should I include in my family tree?

I made a project for a competition abut old photos with family members and some events related to them. I came out with ten short stories about my relatives from my mother's side, and now I have to build a family tree and I am really confused on what should I include. It doesn't have to be complete or anything, I want it to show rather what connections there are between the persons in the stories. Should I include siblings of my grandmother, for example, if they carry no real importance for the people in the stories?

Public Comments

1. I would include all known siblings and relatives , but since this appears to be a presentation, I would paint the boxes gray or tint them back, and make them smaller. The people who have photos and stories are the featured people, so they should jump out. Still, you want people to see the whole picture, even if most of it is muted, so that you show how the featured people relate to each other through the family line. This is really a graphic arts problem. In genealogy, we generally work on direct lines and add sibling and cousin lines as their documents become available. We are information recorders. Your project looks like you need to display information that you already know, and you really need to present the important information in a context without having your audience fall asleep. Good luck with the project. I'm sure you'll do fine.
2. What is technically included in family trees are relatives.. and the standard TREE is direct ancestors only. Your concept is not technical.. but it is WAY COOL and I really like that. Standard is that you start a tree with you, work back to include parents, then your grandparents, then great grandparents, and on back. Siblings, (aunts, uncles, cousins, etc) don't generally show on standard tree format. They are included in research files, listed on family group sheets, or show up on descendant charts. The last chart is to pick a person and come "down" to show all the desc. As said above, yours is more graphical oriented.. but ALSO yours is much more personalized with stories that connect to grandma. Thus, your focus needs to be on who is in the stories. MAYBE you can adjust the "tree" to have little smaller pics of siblings, with enlarging the pics of those involved in the stories. Those not technically related are on the outside of the tree (maybe include them as "encircling"??) with linking line of some sort that is labeled "friend" or?? I am not great in any way with visuals.. so this is hard because it is trying to find a bridge between the norm (name/date/place/relationship), and the not norm. The norm is very cut and dry. And sometimes other stuff takes priority over the norm. One suggestion only from online.. google the phrase "family tree" with quotes.. then look to the top and click on IMAGES. You will get bunches of images for maybe some inspiration. I vote for your project to win.