Genealogy Research Tips and Tricks

How to Look Up Military Records About Your Ancestors

Wondering how to look up military records for an ancestor that served in a U.S. conflict? These important records can contain unique insights into your family’s life, and even fill in the gaps when you are missing information in your tree. This quick guide will help you make sense of locating these one-of-a-kind collections online.

Adopted Ancestor? Here’s How to Find Their Biological Family

Some time ago a friend who had been adopted as an infant asked for my help in finding their birth parents. After a good bit of sleuthing, I identified and politely messaged a person who, according to DNA results, was most likely a very close relative.

Feeling a Bit Overwhelmed by Your Research? Here’s Why

Family history research is one of the most popular hobbies on earth, and one of the most enjoyable. But it’s also easy to get overwhelmed by everything you’ve collected. Here’s why this might be happening to you, and how to fix it.

10 Things Family Historians Find the Most Annoying

OK, OK, we promise this article is all in good fun. After all, we genealogists are usually fairly easy-going folks, and goodness knows we’re patient — after all, we’ve waited ten whole years for the 1950 census! But, alas, sometimes even the best of us let things get under our skin (even if we know we shouldn’t).

Why Local Libraries and Archives Are Still Vital to Your Research

Ever-growing access to online records means that many family history researchers aren’t taking advantage of physical repositories like they used to. But, as we discuss in this article about the important of offline records, a great deal of what we need to really understand our ancestors still cannot be found digitally.