Family. It’s usually a word to describe those who share the same bloodline as you. However, family is not only that. Someone could be adopted or married into one as well. Families consist of brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, moms, dads, grandmothers, grandfathers and so forth. Sometimes you can even consider your closest friends part of your family as well along with any step-siblings or step-parents.
You ever have those times as a child where your parents, grandparents or even great grandparents regaled you with stories of the “old days”? I know I sure did. Always hearing different stories about how I was when I was a child, whether happy or embarrassing, were fun. But I was always more interested in hearing about the older generation of my family. How my parents first met, the time my grandfather was in World War II or random stories from other family members. Of course knowing about these days of my family is all well and full of fun, but sometimes curiosity can run a bit deeper.
Have you ever wondered to yourself where you come from? I mean, really come from? I don’t mean from your parents, but the people who came way before you, your parents or even grandparents. Who I’m talking about would be called ancestors. These are relatives who were born and got married to have their own little ones to continue the family line until the point up to now. If you’ve never really thought about it, maybe you should start now.
When I was younger, I had to do a Family Tree project which made me dive into the past of my family on both my mother’s side and father’s side. Unfortunately, I could not do it by myself because I was young and had very little knowledge of who was part of my family. So, I did what I had to do: talk to my family. After speaking to my parents, grandparents and aunts/uncles, I was able to find out so many interesting things I never thought possible such as myself having a distant connection with the famous composer Johann Sebastian Bach.
In each family, everybody is tied to some part in this world. For example, though I was born and raised in the United States and called an American, I have roots stemming from the countries England and Germany. Not only that, I am also connected to the Native Indians of my country known as Cherokee. Trust me when I say I was shocked to learn of these magnificent ties I had to other parts of the world. You also may have ties where you have ancestors from Scotland, Egypt, Norway, Switzerland, Mexico, China or other countries as well. Not only does that make it interesting, it also shares that you have a unique line of family within you.
So, have I made you seriously interested in finding out about your family? Here’s a few ways you can learn about your family:
Ask
Talk to parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles or even siblings if you can. They can give you lots of stories about the old days or about a specific family member. Trust me, you’ll have a ton of fun hearing all those crazy stories about how grandpa had to “walk ten miles to and from school, up and down a hill, in the freezing cold”. (Sometimes I think a story like that is exaggerated, but I still love it.)
Research
You can browse through books, newspapers, internet or even historical documents to help you find out who’s in your family. You’d be surprised at what you can find out. (Just like I stated earlier, I found out I was related to a famous music composer!)
Photographs
Definitely a fun way to find out about your family. Searching through old photos, scrapbooks and drawings give you a feel about what you family looks like. You can put names with faces which makes it a whole lot easier as well. I know I showed a photograph to my grandmother once and she went off on memories of that person. It was great!
Genealogy Websites
With parent’s permission of course, you can find FREE genealogy websites to help you research family. You’ll be able to find names, dates of births, locations, occupations, ages and a whole lot more.
It’s great that you are able to find out about your families, right? I’ve heard a time or two where someone said “It’s not about where you come from, it’s about who you are now”. Yeah, it’s a truthful statement, but I believe it’s thanks to those of the past that I am here and able to be who I want to be.
In other words, I am happy to learn of my heritage. How about you?
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