Building a Family Tree and Checking for Errors

My “Process” and “Tools”...

Building your Family Tree: perform “Google” searches [entering the name and birth date of the person ancestor of the line] to find online Family Trees and create a Source List with the links. Another Google search option: Descendants of Airard Fitz Stephens…

    Note: some Family Trees include “everyone” (all the children) and some only include the “progenitor” lineage (one son to another); which is fine until you come to the “split” (different lineage) and that Family Tree is no longer useful to you.

My “process”: I usually begin by following and establishing the “progenitor” line (branch that connects with my Gray-Piper Family Tree “TRUNK”; adding other “BRANCHES” and “TWIGS” [LATER] as needed (or desired because they are interesting or provide historical information, e.g. wars fought… and, sometimes I add extended family because I find information within their Profile that provides helpful information; things like Obituaries [children, deceased and surviving] and Biographical Sketches in historical books e.g. “The Early Settlers of Ogle County” [Find A Grave, Memorial Pages usually created by family; often provide, children and biographical sketches; often, a photograph of the headstone, the inscription can include: name, birth date, death date, age at death]... Church Records provide baptism, marriage, death… Government Records [tax records, deeds, offices held, probate/will] provide “alive” during a period of time and “location” (city/county/state) -helpful information when you don’t have a birth date and/of location…

Checking for errors:

• check the age of the father; for a missing person; I’ve found up to a hundred years between a father and son, which means at least a couple of generations are missing. 
• check the age of the mother when she gave birth; does she appear to be too young or too old? Usually if she’s “too old” e.g. 60, that child doesn’t belong to her.

Why build Family Trees and research your ancestors?

Reasons I work on Genealogy: not only to establish my blood-lineage and Origins - Immigrant ancestors… but to learn history, both America and European - it’s more fun when it involves “my ancestors”...

Genealogist and family historian, Clarence Perry Stevens has this to say: We have noticed that many of the younger people have little interest in their family history; but as they grow older there comes a time when they want to know about it.. Who begot my ancestors? What are my racial and national origins, etc? ...We are what we are largely because of our ancestry.

 It is not that we should be snobbishly proud, although a reasonable pride is proper in our family as in our nation; but rather that those living should be inspired to greater achievements by these makers of history and that we should cherish, defend and try to better apply the democratic ideals our ancestors labored and suffered to secure for us.

http://www.genealogy.com/ftm/s/t/e/William-Lackey--Stephens/GENE20-0002.html- Stevens - Stephens Genealogy and Family History - author: Clarence Perry Stevens. Privately Published. 1968.

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