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I did a lot of genealogy a few years ago -- my dad's family traces to Gov. William Bradford (2nd governor of the plymouth colony) and Alice Carpenter Southworth. DH has a book that traces his family in Germany back to the 1500's. The book is in German. I got so depressed translating and putting the information in the computer -- there would be 10-12 children, most died young and there was a designation of "Death by Plague". It was horrible. DH said to skip the dead ones, but I felt we should remember them too..

yep , me too. I had family on the Mayflower and waiting on the shore. I've been here a llllooooonnnnggg time. hehehe

I have been working on my family for years. I did get my mother family back to 1443. She came to America when she was 4 years old, so it has been fun as most of the records were in Germany.
On all the rest of my family, I am back to the early 1500 with the exception of my mother in law. Her name was Phillips and I think everyone had the same name and it's so hard to prove that it's her family.
It's so much easier today with all the computer records, but it's also much easier to get on the wrong line real fast.

I did a lot but just a warning if you are using you computer PLEASE HAVE A BACK UP My computer crashed and it took so long for someone to get my genealogy back up I lost interest.

Oh yes! I went gun-ho on my husband genealogy. But gave it up to do quilting. This takes up 99% of my time. I love both! My husband family is from Irwin PA Buzzard's, Posharts,Bassards, etc. etc. so many different names. Lost interest as none of his immediate family is interested in it. My family is from Mexico and I can't get too much info.

Researching
 

I have been researching my families for 30 plus years. My maiden name family goes back to the 1500's to Cuckfield England. They arrived in the US in 1640. My husband's line goes back to 1200's in Aberdeen Scotland. In 2000 we went to Scotland and found the "Castle". I was expecting at the best a Manse, but to our surprise the first building we saw and were admiring was the stables. The Castle was further down the road and came complete with Turrets. It is currently under restoration under the Scottish Trust and is owned by a surgeon from Aberdeen. We were told that it was a 20 to 30 year restoration. At the time we saw it the family was living in the servants quarters. It had taken them over a year to just stop the leaks in the main part of the house.

The hardest time I have had in finding records has been in Mississippi. I have sent many requests for birth or death certificates and have yet to get one from Mississippi. I am not talking about deaths prior to the 1900's I mean the 1930's and '40's. Genealogy becomes addicting as quilting...and I do both.

I love it!! As my father was the youngest of 12 (8 lived) and he lost his father when he was 6, I didn't know too much about family. I did the ancestry dot com and have not only done my family as far as I could go but did the ex and the children's spouses and if they had any ex's, did them too. Someone asked why I did "everyone" because I had such a hard time finding mine. Besides, the grandchildren might want to know in the future. Most are not interested now, but neither was I until I was almost 60!! Most of my first cousins have passed, Mom and Dad have passed, my only sibling has passed, so I need to grab all the info I can find and dot com is a convenient place to park it until someone else wants to know. LOL have 1,352 ancesters counting all the ex's and their families. That's my Dad sitting on the ground!! That's my grandma, Miss Annie, in the back row, the shortest with the dark hair
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I have been contacted by family from Ireland and France and England. Many years ago when my grandmother was still alive I went with her to stay at her brother's farm to help him with a few things after his wife died. She had a heart attack after being attacked by a mother sow. She ha fallen into the hog pen. Anyway they still had an uncle who was French. We visited him (this was in southern Indiana south of Connersville) and he spoke French and English. Imagine my surprise when I also heard my grandmother converse with him in French. Then there are some relatives I reallllly don't want them to know where I live.

I am originally from Europe and relatives on both sides of my mother and father's side did the research already. History goes back to before 1500. What I also think is interesting is names going back that far. One of the names I gave my DD can be followed all the way to that time frame. My oldest son is interested and he and DH are getting into it but they are only interested in DH's side. I have gathered a lot of info for them but am not that interested in it since it is not my family's side. Also many of my children are adoptive so my focus is more on the ethnic back ground and general history of people groups and countries. I know this is not always that way because all my sister's children came home by adoption and her kids are totally into it.