“My grandma does genealogy.” “Oh, that’s my great aunt, in our family.” Many a family has someone who does family history. Ever notice how so often those self-appointed guardians of family history are retired, or otherwise have spare time? How many of you have avoided starting your genealogy because you think you don’t have time?…

Ancestry.com, as of this writing, costs between $25 and $55 per month. MyHeritage.com, likewise, costs today between $100 and $400 per year. And so on. In my home state of South Dakota, libraries used to provide access to Ancestry Library Edition. When funding was reduced in 2025, libraries no longer included Ancestry in their databases.…

I wrote last week about why you need to know your ancestors’ religion before seeking German records, especially before the 20th century. At the time, I mentioned how the Catholic church began recording marriages and baptisms and deaths. Lutheran churches began recording baptisms in German speaking countries, some as early as 1540s. These records predate…

A client recently asked me to look up an ancestor born in Belgrade, Serbia. First, I looked up a little about the history. Like many countries in Europe, and most countries in Eastern Europe, Serbia was part of other countries, kingdoms or empires for most of its existence. In addition, the language we know as…

To make specific connections between people, you need to fix them in a specific place. Each individual needs a name, a date, a relationship and a place. When professional genealogists start a research project, we start out by asking a question structured like the following: If you ask me for help, the first thing I…

Too many people with the same name, from the same town. Too many public trees with guesswork instead of research work. As a professional, I begin work on a client’s tree by verifying existing relationships and dates and places. If you tell me another professional has verified a certain branch, I can accept that and…