Hi, it's me - Tricia. Great advice. I agree about the birthdate. Birthdays were not celebrated like we do today and many immigrants lived in countries where vital records were either not kept at all or were sketchy, at best. Church records are baptism dates - not usually birthdays. Result - many immigrants simply did not know when they were born. So, because it was required info they made a date up and, sometimes, didn't remember what they had put on each different form. Then, to further confuse the situation many immigrants were not literate or spoke dialects using just phonics and each person from the same village spelled the same word differently. Now, add in the problems on the other end in the US (lack of ability to understand foreign languages, poor literacy rates, equally poor spelling) and mistakes were more the rule than exception unless your immigrant came from an English speaking country. I agree to check other points of entry besides Ellis Island. Remember, to a non-English speaking person Ellis Island meant nothing. But, over the years it became the place most people associated with "immigrants" so they said that is where they were processed. T'aint always so. Even if they write Ellis Island on their official paperwork. My own grandfather is a good example. All of his official paperwork read Ellis Island. He told everybody Ellis Island, including me. I spent 10 years looking for him. Nadda. Hired the National Archives to search. Nadda. I'm a contact person for the German-Russian Historical Society for the village of Norka. Got an email one day - from a women searching for one of my aunts who immigrated with my grandfather. She said, "Ellis Island? Gee, that's funny. My aunt always said they arrived through Portland, Maine." With the correct point of entry - Grandpa was easy to find. Fifteen years old and towing behind 3 younger sisters. Sometimes, there no better genealogical research than dumb luck. :) I also think a membership with ancestry.com is a good investment if you're just getting started. But, I warn you - BE CAREFUL! People are idiots. They just copy what somebody else has written with no further research on their own. So, mistakes get passed on and on and on and on. LOTS of them. I use whatever I find on ancestry.com as a clue, nothing more, until I've confirmed the info by independent resources. Also, the Mormon church site is notorious for mistakes. So much so I could not with good conscience even recommend using their data bank. But, if you do - proceed with caution. My goal is always 3 separate confirming documents saying the same thing. And, I get copies if possible. I've got tens of thousands of hard copy records. I set an annual budget for vital records and such because it does get expensive. I had my second book, "Thunder on the Steppes, a genealogy of ______________", edited this past spring (while we were rebuilding from Sandy). I was especially nervous because I've written a novella inside the book to bring my German-Russian ancestors to life for my grandchildren. My first attempt at fiction. My editor loved it and said I should seek a publisher believing it has a broader audience than immediate family. I'm thrilled. First though I need to publish the entire genealogy and not get sidetracked. I'm so close to being finished - just got to sprint those last 200 meters and cross the line. It's taken over fifteen years. At that point, I'm going to call my genealogy project finished. Genealogy is never truly finished but after nearly 3 decades of research and two books each exceeding 800 pages and going back to the mid-1200s it's as complete as I'm going to take it. I'll leave it up to future generations to carry on. Have Fun! /tricia

Casi, I used Family Tree Maker from Broderbund. It suited my purpose at the time. Not sure that you can simply copy over all your data with a few mouse clicks sadly. However the upside of using the Familysearch program is that they are not going to disappear any time soon so there is little fear of becoming outdated. I never used it but did download a few times - in case I plucked up the courage to start the transfer of all the data. Moving the names and stuff did not seem daunting but adding all the notes as well made it a serious proposition. Much of my data was stored on XL where I could add any variables I needed. My family is from the UK so I sorted the names as I found them in the 1850,1860,1870, 1880 and 1890 census. Plus there were columns for church records and birth, marriage and death columns. I enjoyed it for over 3 years but got side tracked easily trying to understand the way of life back then, plus through family contacts my photo album of the departed grew steadily and I spent a lot of time repairing damaged photos.

Moonshadow, I'm sorry my email is unlisted; it was that way before the change-over from Spike when all the data went loopy and now I can't change it back, although I've tried several times. (Full disclosure, years ago I was once "Sent to Disney" for, um, criticizing the management on a thread. Then I sneaked back on with a different user name and addy once I got over my sulks and found I couldn't do without THS. During the big change over my two accounts got confabulated and the result is I can't change anything on my profile.) On the happy side however, I do have a fresh copy of Califirnia Paints historical colors brochure along with the formula for Jackson Antique and its nearby colors. Perhaps we can think of some way to get a relay so you can send your snail addy to me somehow. Does anyone have a working THS email account? Perhaps both Moonshadow and I could each use you as a contact if you'd be willing to pass along our mutual email addys so we can get squared away. Thanks! Molly~

yvonnekate - Welcome! And no, I don't think you were born in the wrong century. Genealogy is just now coming into its own for people who are not members of the nobility! As you have found, there is now so much information online that it is much more possible to successfully research your ancestors and do it quickly. Like you, Ancestry.com is my first go-to. Once I find someone in a census record it is often easy to get some basic facts about them and their family over a period of decades, and then go from there - I love that! I use it along with many other sites I have found by Googling. Narrowing in on local Historical organizations/genealogy organizations has been lucrative for me too. Many of these have local archives and a network of like minded people - some of whom may turn out to be cousins! I make a point of sharing with my grown children my latest findings about our ancestors. They didn't show much interest in my "reports" at first, but that is changing as they hear more and more. I know it makes me feel completely different about myself to know something about my roots and to find out what my ancestors were doing during the Revolution, the Civil war, the depression, etc. and I know it is valuable information for my children to know about themselves too. It is amazing and terrible how the family stories can be lost in a generation or two. Many people have no idea who they inherited their genes from - what a loss. Because really, everyone living on the earth today had to have had some truly amazing ancestors to have survived storms and plague and famine and who-knows-what! Everyone in our family knows DH and I are the keepers of the family record, but I was surprised last year when our niece (DH's sister's daughter) contacted us to get family history for a class project. Another niece (my sister's daughter) has also started doing genealogy. So, their may be someone in the younger generation to carry on. :) I've gone on and on , so I'll comment on the rest of your interesting post later! Elizabeth