Genealogy Question

I think you should do as much as you feel like doing. There are no rules. My main goal was to take all lines back to the original immigrant, however I've taken one line further back to 1604 in Germany. I also add anyone that I can dig up no matter how they are related. I find genealogy interesting enough that I'll sometimes get really into a family that isn't even related to me. No matter what I am working on I learn new and interesting things.

I agree....no rules.

There are definite pros and cons to both approaches.

Going further down the lines can turn up unexpected hints that could help you in your search for more direct ancestors. It can also lead to you actually contacting living relatives who you may not have known existed before (For people interested in that.).

The cons are simple.....it starts to become an enormous project. It becomes trickier to organize or to even keep straight in your mind. It takes up more time for every generation you move back. You start to feel like you could just say that everyone living in Centerville in 1850 was related to you and it would likely be close to the truth.


My personal way of doing things is to find the direct ancestors and their siblings to start. Then in the closer generations, I went further. But when I start to get into further back generations, I stop at the siblings until I can go no further with that name. If I've reached a brick wall with one name, and I am not interested in working with any other name at the time, then I'll fill a block of time working forward again with that line.

So it's not a goal for me, but basically a way to keep myself always working on things, even when some lines are giving me trouble or if I need to wait to travel to work on them any more going backward.

It can be an organisational nightmare - I'm probably 97% digital with my genealogy - I have one file box with documents (originals mostly) but I don't print out hard copies at all.

I use The Master Genealogist which easily handles a large database and I use Second Site to make my website and to get a clearer view of selected family groups.

I have 5.25 GB of genealogy documents on my computer (scanned or downloaded) but they are all organised into folders and linked within my TMG database

I've been researching since 1982 back when I used handwritten/hand-drawn paper charts

Well because I am on Ancestry.com, I have just under 12,000 people in my tree.  90% of them I would guess are only related because someone married someone and they were related to that person somewhere along the way.

I would be bored already just doing direct lines because I've had most of that for a very long time.

However if you are doing it yourself by going to court houses and stuff, it's up to you what you do with stuff you find that isn't direct to you.  It just depends how much time you have and what you want to do with what you find.

I really like for anyone who is researching to be able to find stuff through my tree, which is public.  So even if someone is on my tree only because their sister's husband was married to someone who was related to someone else, I don't care.  But if I was doing it myself with no online help, I'd have much less ability to do even a small portion of my direct lines.

I am still primarily a paper researcher.   (Although I do not draw my own charts.)  I drag charts and notebooks with me all over the place.     I do have a tiny portion moved online, but it is such a daunting project for me, that I keep putting it off.       The earliest dated research paper I can find in my stash says 1987, I think.  And I truly can no longer recall if that really was my earliest start or if it was just when I realized that I should be dating things.