I have always been interested in our family history, putting the family tree together seemed like a fun thing to do, not knowing how big the task I wanted to do was going to be and what sort of costs I soon would encounter.
I started my initial research in the early 90s, dabbled here and there accumulating certificates I paid for, verifying births, deaths, or marriages of my kinfolk, so I could start placing them in some sort of organised fashion. That in itself is another grand endeavor, my tip is to stay on top of your organisation by having a great system to start with. The accumulation of your research can soon get overwhelming if you have not put into place a process to know what you have or even who you have and where they fit in your ever-increasing maze of kin. If you put your research away for a while it can get hard to figure out where you left off without wasting time going over research already done if there is no organisation.
I am a bit of a dreamer and romantic, so the desire to put our stories together to learn about the lives of my kinfolk. All the family who have come before me, that had paved the road for me to become who I am today. This was just a desire I could not ignore, so I started my never-ending project to discover who my kinfolk are.
As this project is a never-ending task, I have had years on and off researching, occasionally I’d jump in trying to find my people, and other times I wouldn’t touch my ever-growing wish list for years at a time. (as life gets in the way).
When I first started researching, it was all library-based searching as the internet was not as big a tool then to use for family research, now the internet has opened up so much, making the starting journey through the labyrinth a lot easier to navigate and organize.
Unfortunately, I have left some of my more near-kin stories too late to record and ask questions, thinking I had plenty of time to hear their stories, what their lives had been like, and what they could remember of the past and family before them, those that had touched their lives. Photos are also something that has not survived or has not been passed down.
I would suggest starting your research now if possible, even if it’s just to ask your relatives about their lives and what they remember about their kinfolk before them. Before you have also lost a lot of your family’s historical stories and photos to time.
I spent many of my young adult years traveling and living overseas; I wish I had armed myself with kinfolk information, to look into finding gravesites and places, my ancestors may have lived, whilst I was traveling.
I enjoy learning about my family history, scrolling through old newspapers, deciphering old documents, and trolling through the census to find out where they may have lived and with whom, to glean as much information about their lives as I can, each little thing I learn takes me down another path of research into land records, churches they were a part of being baptised or married, to gravesites where they could be buried, so many twists and turns down the labyrinth path with no end in sight.
Remember, as you search Name’s in themselves can spin your head in such a way you do not know which way is up, be skeptical of all you find. Your name is not your name, many surnames variations have been created over time for all different reasons, reaching into the past to decipher where and how these changes came about is difficult but if you uncover the stories, it’s fascinating. I know my Surname has changed over the years, from what my Ancestors were named in Wales to what it is now in Australia.
A Labyrinth of Kinfolk©