FREE Web sites for genealogy research: rootsweb.ancestry.com--forums organized by surname, locality, and other topics such as royal ancestry, etc., originally not affiliated with ancestry, but it is STILL free, and has archived posts going back to the 1990s. usgenweb.org subdivides by states and counties, also message boards where inquiries can be posted. genealogy.com has free surname and locality forums. familysearch.org contains the LDS church's International Genealogy Index, formerly only available on microfiche at branch Family History Libraries. cyndislist.com has a wealth of websites/links on many, many genealogy subjects. Treasure Maps website: google the name to get the right address, because it's one of those sub-sub-sub-divided ones that I'll probably screw up. Also, google the surname, and/or an entire name, alone or combined with terms like "family" and genealogy. If it's a name other than Smith or Jones, misspell it in creative ways. My great-grandfather's surname (Braman) was misspelled on the census as late as the 1930s! As far as Ancestry goes, I subscribe to the United States option, almost solely because of access to scanned images of the US Census. Looking at microfilm using a viewer left me dizzy and nauseated:b. You can search or browse the records, and enlarge the image to decipher handwriting. To me, it is worth the price, but that's a personal decision. Other than that, I have found some useful info in the paid databases, but not a whole lot. All Censuses are available at the regional branches of the National Archives, on microfilm. Sorry this is so lengthy, but this IS the heavily edited version, LOL.

Old Fixer, although I use the FamilySearch.org web site, and have also used the LDS Family History Library as well as a local Family History Center, I do not have a tree uploaded to their web site. So, I cannot say whether or not "just anyone" can edit information on a tree that is on their site. I will look into that, though. I do know with certainty, however, that if you have a tree on Ancestry.com, you can mark it as Private. No one can see info that is on the tree unless you send them an invitation to see it. If you add photos or images of documents, etc., to a Private tree, small thumbnails will show up when other people do a search on a name, but if anyone clicks on the thumbnail to see a larger version, they will get an error message that the tree is private. You can also have a tree on Ancestry.com that is marked as Public. When a tree is Public, anyone can see information/photos, etc., for anyone who is deceased, or presumed to be deceased (e.g., they were born in 1884 and you don't have a death date, but it's easy to see that the person would not still be alive - they'd be 130 years old this year). If the person is still living, or presumed to still be living, all anyone can see is a shadow profile of either a male's head or a female's head. For the name it would say Living Fixer, so no one can even tell what the person's first name is (this example uses "Fixer" as the surname). And, even if a tree is marked Public, no one can change anything on it, unless you invite the person to be an editor. You can invite people to just view the tree (they would be invited with a "Guest" designation); or you can give them the ability to add to the tree (they would be invited with a "Contributor" designation); or you can invite them as an "Editor" with full ability to add/change/remove information/people. People who are invited as Guests and/or Contributors can be given the ability to view living persons, but that's not the default setting. You have to deliberately give them that ability. Anyone invited as an Editor automatically can see everything.

England & Wales, FreeBMD Birth Index, 1837-1915 Name: Raymond Higginbottom Year of Registration: 1890 Quarter of Registration: Jan-Feb-Mar District: Ashton Under Lyne County: Cheshire, Lancashire Volume: 8d Page: 537 ~*~*~*~*~*~*~ England & Wales Christening Records, 1530-1906 Name: Raymond Higginbottom Gender: Male Birth Date: 21 Feb 1890 Christening Date: 3 Apr 1890 Christening Place: Denton, Lancashire, England Age at Christening: 0 Father's Name: Samuel Higginbottom Mother's Name: Hannah ~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 1891 England Census 1891 England Census Name: Raymond Higginbottom Age: 1 Estimated birth year: abt 1890 Relation: Son Father's Name: Samuel Higginbottom Mother's Name: Hannah Higginbottom Gender: Male Where born: Denton, Lancashire, England Civil parish: Ashton Under Lyne Ecclesiastical parish: St Stephen Town: Audenshaw County/Island: Lancashire Country: England Street Address: 103 Dinton Road Occupation: Condition as to marriage: Education: Employment status: Registration district: Ashton Under Lyne Sub-registration district: Audenshaw ED, institution, or vessel: 2 Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age ...Samuel Higginbottom 23 ...Hannah Higginbottom 25 ...Raymond Higginbottom 1 (Do you want a copy of the Census page? The family living two houses away has the surname of Booth!) ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ New York Passenger Lists, 1820-1957 Name: Raymond Higginbottom Arrival Date: 23 Sep 1911 Birth Year: abt 1890 Birth Location: England Birth Location Other: Denton Age: 21 Gender: Male Ethnicity/Race�/Nationality: English Port of Departure: Liverpool, England Port of Arrival: New York, New York Ship Name: Celtic (Do you want a copy of the ship manifest? It would be way too big to post here...) ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Linelle - yes, I would suggest 23andme. Ancestry.com gives you: * ethnicity estimate (percentages) * DNA family matches (it will show their nickname, an estimated range you may be related, their family tree if uploaded, their general ethnic background and if you select a match, you can then see which people match both of you) * DNA circles (this matches a group of related people to a common ancestor using your inputted family trees) They are slowing improving functionality and adding features. 23andme.com gives you: * ethnicity estimate (percentages -- you can also view where and on what chromosomes the ethnic background comes from -- for exmaple, one could see that Chromosome 4 is half chinese, half japanese --- finally, if you have a parent test, you can view which percentages you got from that parent and then which from the other parent) * DNA family matches (it will show their nickname, an estimated range you may be related,....there is the ability to electively share genomes to see where you match exactly on the chromosomes.... , you can view a family tree if uploaded and/or view surnames and places family lived, if uploaded.... The matches also tell you the specific amount of segments you match on and the overall percentage of your DNA that matches.) * Haplogroup information -- essentially the origins of your maternal line, if you're female, or maternal and paternal, if male * Neandethal percentage * Countries of ancestry .. as reported by your DNA matches * tools to compare data between or among genomes you have shared with you..... * access to your raw DNA file to possibly use on other sites (ancestry might give you this but I haven't noticed.) If you don't want to play around with the info much and strictly want percentages of DNA composition, I would still choose 23andme as the presentation is nicer. :)