- Gather and amass information about immediate relatives; your parents and grandparents. Talk to your relatives. If your parents are still alive, sit down with them and ask questions--lots of questions. Ask when they were born, married and where. This is the first step toward finding birth, marriage and death certificates. Talk to Grandma or Grandpa if they're still alive and ask them about their parents, sisters, brothers and extended family members. Oral histories should be recorded in any family, and that goes for Grandpa Joe's military history as well as what cousin married who, their children's names and so forth.
- Create extensive notes while speaking to relatives. Ask them for permission to record such conversations so you can create complete notes and lists at a later point in time. The Internet offers a wealth of genealogical websites that offer family history document templates that can be downloaded for free to help organize information as you gather it. Templates or records should be organized into family groups and family relationship charts. Pedigree charts list parents, grandparents and up to five additional generations of family members and includes the basics: birth, marriage and death dates. The Family Group Sheet lists spouses, their parents and children.
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Research the date you have by checking dates and names with online census records. Membership to popular genealogical research websites such as RootsWeb and Ancestry offer access to a wide variety of government archives, including but not limited to military, census, Social Security and Vital Records information.
Research can be performed in person if you can travel to the National Archives in Washington D.C., where you can access a variety of government records as well as Immigration documents for ancestors, which may include but is not limited to ship manifests, immigrant arrivals through Ellis Island, New York, or other major ports such as Philadelphia, Los Angeles or San Francisco.
Inevitably, many family historians must expand their search for family records overseas. At this point, individuals should access international genealogical societies and become familiar with archive depositories in foreign countries and how to access them. Each country is different. Pick up a foreign language dictionary at your local library and learn to identify foreign documents by name. Be prepared to write letters and emails requesting information, but most importantly, never give up.
