Heritage Album - Why do i even do genealogy anymore?

Why do i even do genealogy anymore?

If you really think about it, once you have completed your family tree it is a bit boring. Is there anything I can do with my information. I have traced all sides of my family to at least my great great great grandparents with reliable information from the city records not just other peoples family trees. So exactly what do i do now?

Public Comments

If you are satisfied with the information you have so far, then by all means, give it up. I have found it interesting to trace some of the families that married into ours. I have also tried to get stories of how they lived, why they left the old country to come here, how they fit into the history of this country (USA) and Canada. What did they do for a living? What did they do for fun? There is a lot more to your family history than just obtaining names and dates.
First, no one ever completes their family tree. If you figure out how many ancestors you have, going back in time, it's an unbelievable number. Second, I see two types of researchers. Family Researchers and Genealogists, although I admit this is a gross oversimplification. Genealogists are interested in following the DNA... who begot who. Some of them are bean counters, satisfied that they have thousands of people on their family tree, but probably unable to tell you much about any of them. Family Researchers are interested in the lives of their ancestors.... their highs and lows, and how it relates to their own lives. Surely, within the above there is always more to do.
what did they do, what work or jobs did they have, what was the name of the boat they can over on, what was the name of the person that married them, what color of hair and eyes did they have, the list goes on. Pictures or paintings of the areas they lived, pictures or paintings of the houses they lived in, etc. You can do the 6 degrees of separation by finding out their friends and neighbors names and where they moved to. Who were the ones that traveled with them on the boat. You are only limited by how much time you want to spend doing this.
Congratulations!! You have managed to do something I haven't been able to accomplish in 30 years of researching my ancestors. Now, that you've had your fun with us, get back to work! Your 3rd great-grandparents didn't just materialize as adults. They had parents. Who were they, where did they live, what were their occupations, how many children did they have, could they read and write, who were their parents? And, the process continues, again and again and again...........! There are two types of Genealogists. Amateurs and Professionals. Amateurs research their family(s) histories and help other people research their family(s) histories for free. Professionals research their family(s) histories and charge other people a fee for researching their family(s) history.
So you've gone back 4-5 generations? Congratulations!! Seriously. What to do next: compile all your data into an e-book (But beware - there are hordes of scams out there), and offer it online. You've done all this legwork yourself, so there's no harm whatsoever in benefiting from your labors - Turn your data into an e-book & offer it up (with the 2 most prominent surnames) on e-Bay, for instance, and you might be pleasantly surprised by the interest.
I've been researching close to 30 yrs.. have yet to reach the "immigrant" ancestor on several lines that go back to the 1600s, so still don't consider any of it "done". When I started research, there was no internet, and no dna testing. It is simply something you LOVE DOING or not. No one can choose for you. I also wind up here, working with other folks to get them going. If you have it all "organized", I suspect there is a cousin somewhere in the woodwork, who would love a copy, so that it never gets dumped.
go further.
most people stop at this point what i would suggest and what i have done is put it all on computer if you haven't already that way when the current generations of your family are added to ie through marriages and children being added to both your immediate and extended family you can have a fully up to date tree and something to hand down to future generations when they start to ask questions there is very reliable software out there the two programs i mainly use are personal roots deluxe made by expert software and family tree maker which is one of the most widely used programs around i believe . go back even further if you can it depends on the country they immigrated from as to how far the records go back with my family we had to stop because being irish and catholic there is nothing pre 1820 to find unless they are in church records and this isn't always the case with the catholic church in the british isles
I have to pipe-up here as well - I concur with Dr.J and Wendy. I have been working on the Family's "History" - not just the names on a Pedigree Chart. I am back 10 generations on the Paternal side to my original Immigrant ancestor - who arrived from England and assisted in the development of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629. My GGG-GF was a 5th generation American, when at 16, he entered the First New Hampshire Regiment in 1776. On my Mothers Side, I have both her Mother and Father tracked back to the original Immigrant Ancestor. The education that I have gotten from building these Family Histories have allowed me to travel giving Lectures and Speeches on subjects of Westward Migration Patterns, County Records and Land Deeds, and I am currently working on three books. "Building a Complete Family History" "The Revolutionary War - from a Soldier's Eye" and 23 Generations of my Families Surname - From Normandy 1030 to Laramie, WY 1956... It's all about learning new things...and, you're never done! DCG
OK, so you went out to the gold fields and collected the nuggets, and you want to head back to camp. I work this way too. Take your findings, distill them down, and share the product with your cousins. There simply must be a point where you must stop and assay your findings. I wrote a book on my known and documented lines, and sent copies to the cousins. It was amazingly cheap. ( http://www.lulu.com ) The photos came out great, and the binding looks sharp. And I did all the citations MLA style, which was probably the most tedious thing I've ever done with Genealogy-- but it was necessary. Then I relaxed. I figured all was fine. I could die now, my kids and family will know what happened to our ancestors. Two days later, a brick wall that I had given up on suddenly crumbled. So here comes the second edition... Just take a rest and you'll get back into the detective work. Then go back to the station periodically to write the reports.
What I like to do is find out how the ancestors lived. So I look up the local regional history which makes every body come alive for me. I also try to find the "collaterals" -- the children of the aunts and uncles and cousins... We've located 2nd, 3rd, 4th and even 5th cousins that way! We're from Ireland and we've located other relatives as far away as New Zealand and Australia!